Gold Mine

by Wilbur Smith

  "It gets late early around here," Dimitri agreed. "I'm off.) "Wait!"

  Rod stopped him. "I'll shoot her."

  "No trouble." Dimitri demurred. Company standard procedure laid down that each day's blast must be supervised by either the Underground Manager or his assistant.

  "I'll do it," Rod repeated. Dimitri opened his mouth to protest further, then he saw that expression on Rod's face and changed his mind quickly.

  "Okay then. See you tomorrow." And he was gone.

  Rod grinned at his own sentimentality. The Sander Ditch was his now and, by God, he was going to shoot his own first blast on her.

  They were waiting for him at the steel door of the blast control room at the shaft head. It was a small concrete room like a wartime pillbox, and there were only two keys to the door. Dimitri had one, Rod the other.

  The duty mine captain and the foreman electrician added their congratulations to the hundreds he had received during the day, and Rod opened the door and they went into the tiny room.

  "Check her out," Rod instructed, and the mine captain began his calls to the shaft overseers at both No. 1 and No. 2 for their confirmation that the workings of the Sander Ditch were deserted, that every human being who had gone down that morning had come out again this evening.

  Meanwhile, the foreman electrician was busy at the electrical control board. He looked up at Rod.

  "Ready to close the circuits, Mr. Ironsides." "Go ahead, Rod nodded and the man touched a switch.

  A green light showed up on the board.

  "No. 1 north longwall closed and green."

  "Lock her in," Rod instructed and the electrician touched another switch.

  "No. 1 east longwall closed and green."

  "Lock her in." The green light showed that the firing circuit was intact.

  A red light would indicate a fault and the faulty circuit would not be locked into the blast pattern.

  Circuit after circuit was readied until finally the foreman stood back from the control board.

  "All green and locked in." Rod glanced at the mine captain.

  "All levels clear, Mr. Ironsides. She's ready to burn." "Cheesa!" said Rod, the traditional command that had come down from the days when each fuse had been individually lit by a hand-held igniter stick.

  "Cheesa" was the Bantu word for " burn The mine captain crossed to the control board and opened the cage that guarded a large red button.

  "Cheesa!" echoed the mine captain and hit the button with the heel of his hand.

  Immediately the row of green lights on the control board was extinguished, and in its place showed a row of red lights. Every circuit had been broken by the explosions.

  The ground under their feet began to tremble. Throughout the workings the shots were firing. In the stopes the head charges fired at the top of the inclines, then in succession the other shots went off behind them. Each charge taking a ten-ton bite of rock and reef out of the face.

  At the end of the development drives, a more complicated pattern was shooting. First a row of cutters went off down the middle of the oval face. Then the shoulder charges at the top corners, followed by the knee charges at the bottom corners. A moment's respite with the dust and nitrous fumes swirling back down the drive, then a roar as the easers on each side shaped the hole. Another respite and then the lifters along the bottom picked up the heap of broken rock and threw it back from the face.

  Rod could imagine it clearly. Though no human eye had ever witnessed the blast, he knew exactly what was taking place down there.

  The last tremor died away.

  "That's it. A full blast," said the mine captain.

  "Thank you." Rod -felt tired suddenly. He wanted that drink, even though their brief exchange that morning had warned him that Dan would probably be insufferable. He could guess the conversation would revolve around Dan's new-found love.

  Then he smiled as he. thought about what waited for him in Johannesburg later that night, and suddenly he wasn't all that tired.

  They sat facing each other.

  "Only three things worry me," Terry told Rod.

  "What are they?" Rod rubbed soap into the face flannel.

  "Firstly, your legs are too long for this bath." Rod rearranged his limbs, and Terry shot half out of the water with a squeak.

  "Rodney Ironsides, would you be good enough to take a bit more care where you put your toes?" "Forgive me." He leaned forward to kiss her. "Tell me what else worries you."

  "Well, the second thing that worries me is that I'm not worried."

  "What part of Ireland did you say you were from?" Rod asked. "County Cork?"

  "I mean, it's terrible but I'm not even a little conscience-stricken.

  Once I believed that if it ever happened to me I would never be able to look another human being in the eyes, I'd be so ashamed." She took the flannel from his hands and began soaping his chest and shoulders. "But, far from being ashamed, I'd like to stand in the middle of Eloff Street at rush hour and shout "Rodney Ironsides is my lover"."

  "Let's drink to that." Rodney rinsed the soap from his hands and reached over the side of the bath to pick up the two wine glasses from the floor. He gave one to Terry and they clinked them together, the sparkling Cape burgundy glowed ruby red.

  Rodney Ironsides is my lover!" she toasted him.

  "Rodney Ironsides is your lover," he agreed and they drank.

  "Now, I give you a toast," he said.

  what is it?" She held her glass ready, and Rod leaned forward and poured the red wine from the crystal glass between her breasts. It ran like blood down her white skin and he intoned solemnly: "Bless this ship and all who sail in her!" Terry gurgled with delight.

  "To her captain. May he keep a firm hand on the rudder!"

  "May her bottom never hit the reef!"

  "May she be torpedoed regularly!"

  "Terry Steyner, you are terrible."

  "Yes, aren't I?" And they drained their glasses.

  "Now," Rod asked, "what is your third worry?"

  "Manfred will be home on Saturday." They stopped laughing, Rod reached down for the burgundy bottle and refilled the glasses.

  "We still have five days," he said.

  It had been a week of personal triumph for Manfred Steyner. His address to the conference had been the foundation of the entire talks, all discussion had revolved upon it. He had been called upon to speak at the closing banquet which General de Gaulle had attended in person, and afterwards the General had asked Manfred to take coffee and brandy With him in one of the ante-rooms.

  The General had been gracious, had asked questions and listened attentively-to the answers. Twice he had called his finance minister's attention to Manfred's replies.

  Their farewells had been cordial, with a hint of state recognition for Manfred, a decoration. In common with most Germans, Manfred had a weakness for uniforms and decorations. He imagined how a star and ribbon might look on the snowy front of his dress shirt.

  There had been a wonderful press both in France and at home. Even a bad-tempered quarter column in Time magazine, with a picture, de Gaulle stooping over the diminutive Manfred solicitously, one hand on his shoulder. The caption , read: "The huntsman and the hawk. To catch a dollar?" Now standing in the tiny cloakroom in the tail of the South African Airways Boeing, Manfred was whistling softly as he stripped his shirt and vest, crumpled them into a ball and dropped them into the waste bin.

  Naked to the waist, he wiped his upper body with a wet cloth and then rubbed 4711 Eau de Cologne into his skin.

  From the briefcase he took an electric razor. The whistling stopped as he contorted his face for the razor.

  Through his mind ran page after page of the report that Andrew had delivered that morning to his hotel room.

  Manfred had total recall when it came to written material.

  Although the report was in the briefcase beside him, in his mind's eye he could review it word for word, figure for figure.

  It was a
stupendous piece of work. How the authors had gained access to the drilling and exploration reports of the five Kitchenerville field companies he could not even guess, for the gold mining companies" security was as tight as that of any national intelligence agency. But the figures were genuine. He had checked those purporting to be from CRC carefully. They were correct. So therefore the other four must also be genuine.

  The names of the authors of the report were legend.

  They were the top men in the field. Their opinions were the best in Harley Street. The conclusion that they reached was completely convincing. In effect it was this: If a haulage was driven from 66 level of the Sander Ditch No. 1 shaft through the Big Dipper dyke, it would pass under the limestone water-bearing foundations, and just beyond the fault it would intersect a reef of almost unbelievable value.

  It had not needed the lecture that Manfred had received from his corpulent creditor to show him the Possibilities.

  The man, who gave the order to drive through the Big Dipper would receive the credit. He would certainly be elected to the chairmanship of the Group when that office fell vacant.

  There was another possibility. A person who purchased a big packet of Sander Ditch shares immediately before the reef was intersected would be a very rich man when he came to sell those shares later. He would be so rich that he would no longer be dependent on his wife for the means to live the kind of life he wanted, and indulge his own special tastes.

  Manfred blew the hairs from his razor and returned it to his brief case. Then as he took out a fresh shirt and vest, he began to sing the words to the tune: "Heute 1st der schenste Tag In mein em Leben." He would telephone Ironsides from Jan Smuts Airport as soon as he had passed through customs. Ironsides would come up to the house on Sunday morning and receive his orders.

  As he knotted the silk of his tie Manfred knew that he stood at the threshold of a whole new world, the events of the next few months would lift him high above the level of ordinary men. It was the channce for which he had worked and waited all these years. Circumstances had changed completely since his last visit, Rod reflected, as he took the Maserati up the drive towards the Dutch gabled house.

  He parked the car and switched off the ignition, sitting a while, reluctant to face the man who had sponsored his career and whom Rod in return had presented with a fine pair of horns.

  "Courage, Ironsides!" he muttered and climbed out of the Maserati and went up the path across the lawns.

  Terry was on the veranda in a gay print dress, with her hair loose, sprawled in a canvas chair with the Sunday papers scattered about her.

  "Good morning, Mr. Ironsides," she greeted him as he "came up the steps. "My husband is in his study. You know the way, don't you?"

  "Thank you, Mrs. Steyner." Rod kept his voice friendly but disinterested, then as he passed her chair he growled softly, "I could eat you without salt."

  "Don't waste it, you gorgeous beast," Terry murmured and ran the tip of her tongue over her lips.

  Fifteen minutes later, Rod sat stony-faced and internally chilled before Manfred Steyner's desk. When at last he forced himself to speak, it felt as though the skin on his lips would tear with the effort.

  "You want me to drive through the Big Dipper," he croaked.

  "More than that, Mr. Ironsides. I want you to complete the drive within three months, and I want a complete security blanket on the development," Manfred told him primly. Despite the fact that it was Sunday he was formally dressed, white shirt and dark suit. "You will commence the drive from No. 1 shaft 66 level and make an intersect on reef at 6,600 feet with the SD No. 3 borehole 250 feet beyond the calculated extremity of the serpentine intrusion of the Big Dipper."

  "No," Rod shook his head. "You can't go through that.

  No one can take the chance. God alone knows what is on the other side, we only know that is bad ground. Stinking rotten ground."

  "How do you know that?" Manfred asked softly.

  "Everybody on the Kitchenerville field knows it."

  "How?"

  "Little things." Rod found it hard to put into words. "You get a feeling, the signs are there and when you've been in the game long enough you have a sixth sense that warns you when-"

  "Nonsense," Manfred interrupted brusquely. "We no longer live in the days of witchcraft."

  "Not witchcraft, experience," Rod snapped angrily.

  "You've seen the drilling results from the other side of the fault?"

  "Of course," Manfred nodded. "SD No. 3 found values of thousands of penny-weights."

  "And the other holes went dry and twisted off, or had water squirting out of them like a pissing horse!" Manfred flushed fiercely. "You will be good enough not to employ bar-room terminology in this house."

  Rod was taken off balance, and before he could answer Manfred went on.

  "Would you put the considered opinions of," Manfred named three men, "before your own vague intuitions?"

  "They are the best in the business," Rod conceded reluctantly.

  "Read that," snapped Manfred. He tossed a manila folder onto the desk top, then stood up and went to wash his hands at the concealed basin.

  Rod picked up the folder, opened it and was immediately engrossed.

  Ten minutes later, without looking up from the report, he fumbled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

  "Please do not smoke!" Manfred stopped him sharply.

  Three quarters of an hour later, Rod closed the folder.

  During that time Manfred Steyner had sat with reptilian stillness behind his desk, with the glitter of his eyes the only signs of life.

  "How the hell did you get hold of those figures and reports?" Rod asked with wonder.

  "It does not concern you." Manfred retrieved the folder from him, his first movement in forty-five minutes.

  "So that's it!" muttered Rod. "The water is in the limestone near the surface. We go in under it!" He stood up from the chair abruptly and began to pace up and down in front of Manfred's desk.

  "Are you convinced?" Manfred asked, and Rod did not answer.

  "I have promoted you above older and more experienced men," said Manfred softly. "If I tear you down again, and tell the world you were not man enough for the job, then, Rodney Ironsides, you are finished.

  No one else would take a chance on you again, ever!" It was true. Rod knew it.

  "However, if you were to follow my instructions and we intersected this highly enriched reef, then part of the glory would rub off on you."

  That was also true. Rod stopped pacing, he stood with shoulders hunched, in an agony of indecision. Could he trust that report beyond his own deep intuition? When he thought about that ground beyond the dyke, his skin tickled with gooseflesh. He almost had the stink of it in his nostrils.

  Yet he could be wrong, and the weight of the opposition was heavy.

  The eminent names on the report, the threats which he knew Manfred would not hesitate to put into effect.

  "Will you give me a written instruction" Rod demanded harshly.