The Diamond Frontier (Simon Fonthill Series)

by John Wilcox

  Yet was this good, dear friend turning into something more? Had the tribulations they had suffered together - the fighting, the killing, the deaths of those close to them - had all these horrific intrusions into her life drawn her closer, in fact, to this boyish - and yes, almost heroic - figure? Could she deny that her platonic feelings for him had metamorphosed into something warmer and deeper?

  Alice stood and moved to sit before the small dressing table. The mirror reflected an attractive face, one that certainly would have been regarded as beautiful if it were not for the strong and even masculine jaw-line. She flicked the ends of her hair upwards with an impatient finger but her mind retained little of the reflected image. Instead the mirror showed a dark, hawk-like face with a hooked nose whose savagery was more than offset by sad brown eyes. She smiled. He really was quite handsome, this person of contradictions, this young man whose acute sensitivity made him doubt his own courage and yet who could fight like a lion when cornered; this genuine gallant who couldn’t dance or exchange small talk; this patriotic soldier who hated the army. His body was slim and scarred and once more she felt something stir as she thought of him. She shook her head to remove the memory.

  Did he love her? Alice pursed her lips and put her head to one side as she considered the question. She had sensed that he was going to propose to her in Kandahar when she had interrupted him to tell him of her betrothal to Ralph Covington, the tall, commanding man she had met on her first posting to Africa and to whom she had felt attracted - and, indeed, to whom she had willingly lost her virginity. She had accepted his offer of marriage, and that, of course, was that. She frowned again. She had no right to let her thoughts dwell on Simon Fonthill. Once her work was done in the Transvaal she would resign once again from the Morning Post and take passage home to prepare for her wedding to Covington, the man she kept telling herself she loved. Covington, with his faint aroma of cigar smoke and shaving soap, his bristling moustache, his acres of land in Gloucestershire, his desire for children . . . Damn! She put her hands to her face and kicked back the stool.

  As she did so, there was a tap on the door.

  She composed herself. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Visitor downstairs to see you, missee.’

  ‘Do you have his name?’

  ‘He give me the card, missee.’

  Sighing, Alice opened the door and took the visiting card from the cupped hands of the black boy. In italic script it bore the name Piet F. Joubert. She turned it over and read the message carefully inked on the reverse: I feel it would be mutually beneficial if you could spare me a moment.

  Joubert! It must be the Boer who, for a short time, had been president of the Transvaal and who now was the leader of the strong faction within the Afrikaner community arguing - and threatening to fight - for independence. Alice had met some of his subordinates but not this intransigent militant who had a reputation as a shrewd commando leader and fighter. He tended to shun the limelight, but it was rumoured that he had threatened Wolseley with insurrection if the annexation was not reversed. Alice tapped the card on her thumbnail. ‘Please show him up,’ she said, and quickly dashed back to the dressing table to make sure that the pins holding up her hair were firmly in place.

  Two minutes later a stronger tap on the door ushered in a thickset man of middle height, dressed in conventional formal day-wear and carrying a top hat. Only a lined face, a long, black beard and penetrating eyes that seemed to see far beyond the walls of the little room betrayed that he was a Boer, a man of the high veldt.

  ‘It is good of you to see me, Miss Griffith,’ he said. ‘I apologise for what must seem like an intrusion.’

  The graceful note pleased Alice, who had met little of this sort of courtesy so far from the gruff, straight-talking Boers of the Transvaal. ‘It is an honour, Mr President,’ she said.

  He smiled and held up his hand. ‘President no more, madam. Just a humble citizen.’

  Alice returned the smile. ‘That is not what I have heard, Mr Joubert. Won’t you have a seat? Here, let me take your hat.’

  The two looked at each other for a moment. Then Joubert put both hands upon his knees and leaned forward. ‘Miss Griffith, my colleagues and I have been reading your dispatches from Pretoria with great interest.’

  Alice inclined her head but remained silent.

  ‘Yes.’ Joubert allowed himself a flicker of a smile. His features seemed to imply that this was a rare indulgence. ‘It has been most unusual for us to see in the columns of the Morning Post even the merest trace of understanding of the Boer position here in the Transvaal, and you have perhaps gone rather further than that.’

  Alice raised her eyebrows. ‘Oh, but sir, I have only tried to be balanced in what I have reported. And that word “reported” is important. I am not a leader writer. I pass on the views and actions of others. The leaders, of course, represent the opinions of my newspaper.’

  ‘Ah yes. And certainly those have not altered. The editorials of your newspaper certainly seem to reflect what I am afraid I must call the jingoistic views of the Tory party.’ He held up his hand as Alice made to interrupt. ‘And until your arrival, the reporting of events here - particularly of my earlier meetings with Sir Bartle Frere - has been less than accurate, I must confess. We have always been painted as insurrectionists, as stubborn, unworldly farmers who are unreasonable in wishing to go back on our so-called agreement with the British. You, on the other hand, have been able to suggest that yes, just conceivably, we might be patriots too.’ This time he allowed his smile to spread.

  Alice resisted the temptation to smile back at this seemingly gentle man. She could be on dangerous ground here, with one battle pending and, possibly, a new war waiting behind it. She must preserve her status of impartiality.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Joubert,’ she said. ‘But, you know, I am not sure that I can accept that as a compliment. To repeat: I do not wish to be less than detached and impartial in my coverage of the political situation here, and if what might appear to be certain personal sympathies are perceived to be creeping into my reports, then I regret that.’

  ‘Please do not, my dear miss.’ The rather awkward form of address reminded Alice that this man was, after all, only a farmer and not a statesman, although by all accounts he was a good soldier, too. ‘And this is the point of my visit to you.’ He leaned forward again. ‘In fact, there are two reasons why I came. Firstly, I wished to thank you for the balanced way you have been reporting the scene here. As I say, we are not exactly used to being portrayed so . . . ah . . . accurately in the British press.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. And the second reason?’

  ‘To ask you to preserve whatever flickering sparks of sympathy you may have for our cause - and I know from reading the Post editorials that sometimes you may well have come under pressure from your employers, and, perhaps, elsewhere, to snuff out those tiny flames. If you can manage to preserve your sympathy, then I can offer you co-operation at a level which, perhaps, we may well have to deny to your colleagues here.’

  ‘What sort of co-operation have you in mind, Mr Joubert?’

  He sat back and the wintry smile returned. He spread his arms and opened his palms towards her in an almost Semitic fashion. ‘Ah, who can tell what will happen over the next few months? I fear I cannot be precise and, obviously, I could not inform you of something that might harm our cause. But whatever the conditions, you would have access to me personally at all times. I promise you that.’

  Alice looked hard at the man opposite. She could be playing with fire here, she realised, particularly after the warning she had received from Wolseley. There was no way that she could allow herself to be perceived as a mouthpiece for the Boer cause. She well knew that it was only the patronage she received from her editor that prevented the more reactionary elements of the Post’s Board - and, indeed, other senior editorial staff on the newspaper - from having her dismissed as a dangerous liberal. Knowing just how far to go was a talent she worked hard at nurtur
ing. And yet the journalist within her was fascinated by the opportunity that now presented itself.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Joubert,’ she said. ‘I cannot enter into any kind of relationship with you and your colleagues that could prejudice my independence, you must understand that.’

  Joubert nodded, albeit a little sadly.

  ‘However, I can promise you that I will continue to report on Boer affairs as fairly as I possibly can, given that I am subject to the editing of my bulletins back in Fleet Street.’ Alice decided to chance her arm. ‘But while you are here, may I put one or two points to you so that I can better understand your position?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Alison retrieved her notebook and pencil. ‘As I understand it, the annexation of the Transvaal three years or so ago was entered into with the full agreement of the then government of the Transvaal. And was it not surely an act which virtually saved your country from bankruptcy? ’

  Joubert shook his head slowly, an air of resignation on his hard features, but his eyes were glowing. ‘There is some truth in that, my dear miss, but it is a distorted view, of course. It is true that the fiscal affairs of the Transvaal were in some difficulty. We are, after all, a small nation of farmers. We do not possess the resources of financial acumen that you British can call on from the City of London, for instance. In addition, please remember that we were not able to take any benefit from the discovery of the diamond mines in Kimberley, a territory which your government virtually took from us once it was clear that the mines were viable.’ Joubert’s eyes were now quite cold.

  Alice held up her hand. ‘But Mr Joubert, surely Kimberley is sited on land which was native owned, by the Griquas, and the British Government actually bought it from the tribe?’

  ‘Not quite. We had administered the land for years on behalf of the Griquas, with their agreement. Naturally, they would sell their birthright for bags of gold - and the British had far more gold than we had. As for your point about the annexation being approved by our government at the time, I can only say that it was certainly not with the support of the full population of the state. You must realise, Miss Griffith, that we were a young, rather divided, and struggling nation.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘And now, Miss Griffith, we have gained somewhat in confidence and completely in determination and unity. Our fathers and grandfathers trekked across thousands of miles to get away from British domination. It seems as though your people have doggedly followed us here to take our country away from us once more. Well, we will not run away again. This is our state, our country, and we want it back.’

  Alice looked up from her note-taking. ‘Mr Joubert, will you fight?’

  Joubert smiled, although his eyes remained cold. ‘I hope it will not come to that, Miss Griffith, and perhaps in your reports you can even help to dissuade the British Government from doing something so foolish as allowing its troops to attack us. We do have resources. As you know, the Kaiser is very sympathetic to us, and,’ here an enigmatic smile spread across his face, ‘Kimberley and its diamonds are not so very far from Pretoria.’

  Alice glanced up from her notebook with raised eyebrows, but the Boer raised his hand and stood, as though he had already said too much. ‘I have taken up a great deal of your valuable time, Miss Griffith,’ he said. He picked up his top hat and, almost absent-mindedly, ran the cuff of his coat around its base before walking to the door. ‘Once again, our thanks for your sympathy. Please remember: we are patriots, not revolutionaries. Good day to you.’

  Alice closed the door behind him and raised a pensive finger to her brow. What a strange encounter! But what good copy. At last she could quote directly the leader of the anti-annexation party in the Transvaal, who hitherto had not spoken directly to the British press. An exclusive, indeed, even though he had not said anything particularly new. Or had he? She bit the end of her pencil. Why on earth would Joubert point out that Kimberley and its diamonds was not so far from the Transvaal capital? As far as she knew, the poor state of Transvaal owned none of the diggings there. Was he planning to invade and take the town and its precious resources? Unlikely, for the Boers were defensive fighters and not aggressors. Anyway, she had no proof and it would be impossible to draw that inference without it. Nevertheless, she had the basis of a good feature article here.

  Deep in thought, she wandered to the window and looked down into the dusty street below. Joubert was replacing his hat and beginning to cross the road. As she watched, a tall figure strode towards him and stopped him halfway across so that they could engage in conversation. The other man was hatless - unusual in itself in Pretoria - and seemed to be middle-aged. He had rather unkempt grey-flecked hair that clearly had felt no scissors’ edge for months, and his beard was similarly untended. His legs were long and slightly bowed, as from years in the saddle, and his stride towards Joubert had been purposeful and rangy. Obviously a man of the outdoors, but somehow he did not look like a farmer, and his dress - riding boots, once-elegant jodhpurs, red shirt with unbuttoned waistcoat over it - showed none of the clerical conformity of the Boer. He was broad-shouldered and carried himself well, but he was clearly concerned about something, for his manner of address to Joubert was forceful and agitated.

  As she watched, Joubert looked around with seeming perturbation and then beckoned the man back to the sidewalk. Together they disappeared from Alice’s view.

  The encounter had no obvious significance for Alice, except perhaps that Joubert seemed concerned to be seen to be in discussion in mid-street with such a man. But then he was a politician and a schemer. He must have many such assignations.

  Alice settled down at her small desk, pulled copy paper towards her and slowly began to write. Yet the words did not flow. There was something about Joubert’s meeting with the man in the street that disturbed her concentration, something about the stranger and his stride, his lowering of the head and the earnest manner with which he engaged the Boer. She had seen that same intensity somewhere before. In fact, she had seen the man himself somewhere before. But where and when? Who was he?

  Absently, she walked back to the window and pulled aside the curtain to look down into the street again. There was no inspiration there. A British cavalry officer trotted down the middle of the road, his upright, pennanted spear, fixed into a leather base by his gleaming boot, showing that he was a Lancer . . . Her mind immediately flew back to the Battle of Ulundi, where, from within the safety of the British square, she had watched the Lancers form up within the hollow before setting out to spear the Zulus as they fled, defeated, from the fire of the British Martini-Henrys and Maxims. Her lip curled as she recalled the glee on the faces of the horsemen as they revelled in the prospect of sport - man-sticking this time instead of pig-sticking or tent-peg-splitting. What fun! Her mind’s eye recalled the gleaming ranks of the cavalry, their uniforms so far unsullied by any direct contact with the enemy. She saw once again a tall figure striding towards the Lancers’ commander. A man dressed in civilian clothing and clearly a scout, for he pointed to where the horsemen should attack once the square had been opened for them to exit. A tall, rangy man . . .

  Of course. That was him. John Dunn, the father of Nandi!

  Chapter 6

  Simon, Jenkins and de Witt limped away from the wrecked bar as quickly as their bruised legs could take them, for Simon was anxious not to be involved in further trouble. De Witt left for his own lodgings, having arranged to meet with the others the following day, and Simon and Jenkins slipped as discreetly as they could into their hotel. There they bathed their bruises - nothing had been broken - and Simon, anxious that time was passing, left Jenkins clutching a cold compress to his jaw and made for the mine which contained the Dunn/Mendoza holding, stopping on the way only to find more modest and inexpensive lodgings for the next day at a boarding house near Currey Street.

  The site was a huge crater, perhaps some six acres in area and about 350 feet deep at its lowest point. It had once been a kopje,
but thousands of shovels had turned it into a hole, though one with little symmetry to it. It was as if a huge meteorite had hit the earth at this point, shattering on impact and creating thin molars of rock standing vertically like stalagmites at various depths down the crater where the diggings had been sunk between them, and looking vertiginously dangerous to the men working like termites far below at their bases. Set back from the rim of the hole on the surface were huge drums and gantries from which a bewildering network of ropes stretched down to the bottom of the diggings, enabling the diamondiferous ground to be hauled to the top for washing and sorting. At the bottom, where the buckets were being filled, scores of what seemed like white mushrooms could be seen scattered about - mushrooms which, on closer inspection, turned out to be the tops of umbrellas carefully arranged over the heads of the seated white overseers who supervised the labour of the Kaffirs working in each section. It was the largest man-made excavation in the world, and to Simon, watching the activity under the hot sun, the place looked almost Satanic.

  He was directed to claim number 427. It was near the surface and on the periphery of the hole: a ‘yellow digging’. No one was working there, and indeed, it looked as though the surface soil had not been disturbed for days. A neighbouring overseer, seemingly in charge of a group of ropes which disappeared into the depths, confirmed that the owners of the mine had not been seen on the site for some days now and that he had no idea if the holding was still being worked.

  Simon walked away, his brow furrowed. Why had Dunn and Mendoza stopped working the mine? To Simon’s untutored eye, it seemed that there was still surface digging to be done on their patch. Other ‘yellow diggings’ nearby on the edge of the crater were still being worked. But why had Dunn seemingly walked out on his partner? And why had Mendoza gone to earth in number 5 Currey Street - if, that is, he was still there?