Gold Mine

by Wilbur Smith

  the dealer's voice prodded. "the bet is ten thousand francs, from four, five, seven of clubs. possible straight flush." "bet or drop," said one of the uncommitted players.

  "you're wasting time." the algerian flashed him a venomous glance.

  "bet," he said, and counted out ten thousand-franc notes into the pool.

  "carte." the dealer slid a card face down in front of each of them.

  quickly the algerian lifted one corner of his card with his thumb, glanced at it and then closed the face.

  manfred sat very still, the card lying inches from his right hand.

  his face was pale, calm, but he was seething internally. far from a possible straight flush, manfred was holding four, five, seven of clubs and the eight of hearts. a six was the only card that could improve his hand and one six was already showing among the algerian's cards.

  his chances were remote.

  his lower belly and loins were tight and hot with excitement, his chest constricted. he drew out the sensation, wanting it to last for ever.

  "pair of queens still to+et," murmured the dealer.

  "ten thousand." the algerian pushed the notes forward.

  he has found another queen, thought manfred, but he is uncertain of my flush or straight.

  manfred placed his smooth white hand over his fifth card, cupping it.

  he lifted it.

  "table, said manfred calmly, and there was a gasp and rustle from the watchers. the girl's hand tightened on the algerian's sleeve, she stared with hatred into manfred's face.

  "the gentleman has made a table bet," intoned the croupier. "house rules. any player may bet the entire stake he has upon the table." he reached across and began to count the notes in front of manfred.

  minutes later he announced the total. "two hundred and twelve thousand francs." he looked across at the algerian. "it is now up to you to bet against the possible straight flush." the girl whispered urgently into the arab's ear, but he snapped a single word at her and she recoiled. he looked about the room, as if seeking guidance, then he lifted and examined his hole cards again.

  suddenly his face hardened, and he looked steadily across at manfred.

  "call!" he blurted, and manfred's clenched right hand fell open upon the table.

  the arab faced his hand. three queens. the whole room looked expectantly at manfred.

  he flicked over his last card. two of diamonds. his hand was worthless.

  with a birdlike cry of triumph the algerian leaped from his seat and reaching across the table began raking manfred's stake with both arms towards him.

  manfred stood up from the table, and the arab girl grinned maliciously at him, taunting him in arabic. he turned quickly away and almost ran down the steps that led to the cloakrooms. twenty minutes later, feeling weak and slightly dizzy, manfred slipped into the back seat of a citroen taxi cab.

  george cinq," he told the driver. as he entered the lobby of the hotel he saw a tall figure rise from one of the leather armchairs and follow him across to the lifts.

  shoulder to shoulder they stepped into the lift and as the doors slid closed the tall man spoke.

  "welcome to paris, doctor steyner."

  "thank you, andrew. i presume you have come to give me my instructions?

  "that is correct. he wishes to see you tomorrow at ten o'clock. i will call for you." it was saturday night in kitchenerville and in the men's bar of the lord kitchener hotel the daily-paid men from the five gold mines were bellying up to the counter three deep.

  the public dance had been in progress for three hours.

  at tables along the veranda the women-folk sat primly sipping their port and lemonade. although they all were admirably ignoring the absence of the men, yet a constant and merciless vigil was kept on the door to the men's bar.

  most of the wives already had the automobile keys safely in their handbags.

  in the dining-hall, cleared of its furniture and sprinkled liberally with french chalk, the local four-piece band who played under the unlikely name of the "wind dogs" launched without preliminaries into a lively rendition of "die ou kraal liedjie', and from the men's bar, in various stages of inebriation, answering the call to arms came the troops.

  many of them have shed their jackets, the knots of their ties had slipped, their voices were boisterous and legs were a little unsteady as they led their women onto the dance floor and immediately showed to which school of the dance they belonged.

  there was the cavalry squadron which tucked partner under one arm, very much like a lance, and charged. at the other end of the scale were those who plodded grimly around the perimeter, looking neither left nor right, speaking to no one, not even their partners. then there were the sociables who reeled about the floor, red in the face, their movements completely unrelated to the music, shouting to their friends and attempting to pinch any feminine posterior that came within range.

  their unpredictable progress interfered with the revolutions of the dedicated.

  the dedicated took up their positions in the centre of the floor and twisted. a half dozen years previously the twist had swept like an asian "flu epidemic through the world and then faded out. gone, forgotten, except in places like kitchenerville. here it had been taken and firmly entrenched into the social culture of the community.

  even in this stronghold of the twist, there was one master. "Johnny delange? god man, but he can twist, hey!" they murmured with awe.

  with the sinuous erotic movements of an erect cobra, Johnny was twisting with hettie. his shiny rayon suit caught the light and the lace ruffles of his shirt fluttered at his throat. there was a fierce grin of pleasure on his hawk features, and the jewelled buckles of his pointed italian shoes twinkled as he danced.

  a big girl with copper hair and creamy skin, hettie was light on her feet. she had a tiny waist and a swelling regal bottom under the emerald-green skirt. she laughed as she danced, a full healthy laugh to match her body.

  the two of them moved with the expertise of a couple who have danced together often. hettie anticipated each of Johnny's movements, and he grinned his approval at her.

  from the veranda davy delange watched them. he stood in the shadows, clutching a tankard of beer, a squat, lonely figure. when another dancing couple cut off his view of hettie's luscious revolving buttocks he would exclaim with irritation and move restlessly.

  the music ended and the dancers spilled out onto the veranda, laughing and breathless, mopping streaming faces;

  girls squealing and giggling as the men led them to their seats, deposited them and then headed for the bar.

  "see you." Johnny left hettie reluctantly, he would have liked to stay with her, but he was sensitive about what the boys would say if he spent the whole evening with his wife.

  he was absorbed into the masculine crowd, to join their banter and loud laughter. he was deeply involved in a discussion of the merits of the new ford mustang, which he was considering buying, when davy nudged him.

  "it's constantine! he whispered, and Johnny looked up quickly.

  constantine was a greek immigrant, a stoper on the blaauberg mine. he was a big strong black-haired individual with a broken nose. Johnny had broken his nose for him about ten months previously. as a bachelor Johnny would fight him on the average of once a month, nothing serious, just a semi- friendly punch-up.

  however, constantine could not understand that nowadays Johnny was forbidden by his brand new wife from indulging in casual exchanges of fisticuffs. he had developed the erroneous theory that Johnny delange was afraid of him.

  he was coming down the bar room now, holding his glass in his massive hairy right hand with the little finger extended gent eely on his hip rested his other hand and he minced along with a simpering smile on his blue-jowled granite-textured feature'S, stopping in front of the mirror to pat his hair into place, he winked at his cronies and then came on down to where Johnny stood. He paused and ogled Johnny heavily, fluttering his eyelids and wriggling his hips
.

  His colleagues from the Blaauberg Mine were weak with laughter, gurgling merrily, hanging onto each other's shoulders.

  Then with a bump and grind that raised another howl of laughter Constantine disappeared into the lavatories, to emerge minutes later and blow Johnny a kiss as he went back to join his friends. They plied liquor on the Greek in appreciation of his act. Johnny's smile was a little strained as he resumed the discussion on the Mustang's virtues.

  Twenty minutes and half a dozen brandies later, Constantine repeated his little act again on the way to the latrine. His repertoire was limited.

  "Hold it, Johnny," whispered Davy. "Let's go and sit on the veranda."

  "He's asking for it. I'm telling you!" Johnny's smile had disappeared.

  "Come on, Johnny, man."

  "No, hell, they'll think I'm running. I can't go now."

  "You know what Hettie will say," Davy warned him. For a moment longer Johnny hesitated.

  "The hell with what Hettie says." Johnny bunched his right fist with its array of gold rings as he moved down to Constantine and leaned beside him on the counter.

  "Herby," he called the barman, and when he had his attention he indicated the Greek. "Please give the lady a port and lemonade." And the bystanders scattered for cover. Davy shot out of the door onto the veranda to report to Hettie.

  "Johnny!" he gasped. "He's fighting again."

  "Is he!" Hettie came to her feet like a red-headed Valkyrie. But her progress to the men's bar was delayed by the crowd of spectators that jammed the doorway and all the windows. The crowd was tiptoeing and climbing onto the chairs and tables for a better view, every thud or crash of breaking furniture was greeted with a roar of delight.

  Hettie had her handbag clutched in her right hand, and like a jungle explorer hacking his way through the undergrowth with a machete, she opened a path for herself to the bar room door.

  At the door she paused. The conflict had reached a critical stage.

  Among a litter of broken glass and shattered stools, Johnny and the Greek were circling each other warily, waving and feinting, all their wits concentrated upon each other. Both of them were marked. The Greek was bleeding from his lip, a thin red ribbon of blood down his chin that dripped onto his shirt. Johnny had a shiny red swelling closing one eye. The crowd was silent waiting.

  "Johnny Delange!" Hettie's voice cracked like a Mauser rifle fired from ambush. Johnny started guiltily, dropping his hands, half turning towards her as the Greek's fist crashed into the side of his head.

  Johnny spun from the blow, hit the wall and slid down quietly.

  With a roar of triumph Constantine rushed forward to put the boot into Johnny's prostrate form, but he pitched forward to sprawl unconscious beside Johnny. Hettie had hit him with the water bottle snatched up from one of the table tops.

  "Please help me get my husband to the car," she appealed to the men around her, suddenly helpless and little-girlish.

  She sat beside Davy in the front of the Monaco, fuming with anger.

  Johnny lay at ease upon the back seat. He was snoring softly.

  "Don't be angry, Hettie." Davy was driving sedately.

  "I've told him, not once, a hundred times. "Hettie's voice crackled like static. "I told him I wouldn't put up with it."

  "It wasn't his fault. The Greek started it," Davy explained softly and placed his hand on her leg.

  "You stick up for him, just because he is your brother."

  "That's not true,"-Davy soothed her, stroking her leg.

  "You know how I fele about you, Hettie."

  "I don't believe you." His hand was moving higher. "You men are all the same. You all stick together." Her anger was fast solidifying into a burning resentment of Johnny Delange, one in which she was willing to take a calculated revenge. She knew that Davy's hand was no longer trying to comfort her and quench her anger. Before she married Johnny Delange, Hettie had had every opportunity to learn about men, and she had been an enthusiastic and receptive pupil. She placed no special importance on an act of the flesh, dispensing her favours as casually as someone might offer a cigarette-case around.

  "Why not?" she thought. "That will fix Mr. Johnny Delange! Not all the way, of course, but just enough to get my own back on him." "No, Hettie. It's true I tell you." Davy's voice was husky, as he felt her knees fall apart under his hand. He touched the silky-smooth skin above her stocking top.

  The Monaco slowed to almost walking pace, and it was ten minutes more before they reached the company-owned house on the outskirts of Kitchenerville.

  In the back seat Johnny groaned. Immediately Davy's hand jerked back to the steering-wheel, and Hettie sat up in the seat, straightening her skirt.

  "Help me get him inside," she said, and her voice was shaky and her cheeks flushed. She was no longer angry.

  They were both a little tipsy. They had stopped to celebrate Rod's promotion at the Surmyside Hotel.

  They had sat side by side in one of the booths, drinking quickly, excitedly, laughing together, sitting close but not touching.

  Terry Steyner could not remember when she had last behaved this way. It must have been all of ten years ago, her last term at Cape Town varsity, swigging draught beer in the Pig and Whistle at Randall's Hotel and talking the most inane rubbish. All the matronly dignity that Manfred insisted she maintain was gone, she felt like a freshette on a first date with the captain of the rugby team.

  "Let's get out of here," Rod said suddenly, and she stood up unquestioningly. He took her arm down the stairs, and the light touch of his fingers tingled on her bare skin.

  In the Maserati again she experienced the feeling of isolation from reality.

  "How often do you see your daughter, Rod?" she asked as he settled into the seat beside her, and he glanced at her, surprised.

  "Every Sunday."

  "Tomorrow?"

  "Yes."

  "How old is she?"

  "Nine next birthday."

  "What do you do with her? Rod pressed the starter.

  "How do you mean?"

  "Where do you take her, what do you do together?"

  "We go rowing on Zoo Lake, or eat ice cream sundaes. if it's cold or raining we sit in the apartment and we play mali-jong." He let in the clutch, and as they pulled away he added, "She cheats."

  "The apartment?"

  "I keep a hideaway in town."

  "Where?" "I'll show you," said Rod quietly.

  She sat on the studio couch and looked about her with interest. She had not expected the obvious care that he had taken in furnishing the apartment. It was in wheat field gold, chocolate brown and copper.

  There was a glorious glowing autumn landscape on the far wall that she recognized as a Dina Paravano.

  She noticed a little ruefully how Rod stage-managed the lighting for full romantic effect, and then moved automatically to the liquor cabinet.

  "Where is the bathroom?" Terry asked.

  "Second left, down the passage." She lingered in the bathroom, opening the medicine cabinet like a thief. There were three toothbrushes hanging in the slots, and below them an aerosol can of Bider.

  Quickly she shut the cabinet. Feeling disturbed, not sure if it was jealousy or guilt at her own prying.