Solitaire

by Graham Masterton

  It was hot and sunny on the steps outside the house, but in the distance, over the Indian Ocean, blue-black thunderheads had gathered, and lightning was licking at the sea.

  Sara said, in a high, breathless voice, ‘Shall I see you again! Ever?’

  Barney nodded. ‘If you want me to, I’ll come back. But first I have to go see to my business.’

  ‘Well,’ she said, with a difficult smile, ‘I suppose I can be brave.’

  She walked a little way down the garden path, her hands clasped in front of her, and then she turned and looked at him with complete misery. ‘Do you have to?’ she asked. ‘Do you really have to?’

  Barney said, ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, and her eyes flooded with tears. ‘Oh, Barney.’

  He held her hand. ‘It couldn’t have been any other way. I would have had to go back to Kimberley, no matter what.’

  ‘But I could have come with you.’

  ‘You? In Kimberley? Do you have any idea what it’s like there?’

  ‘The only think I know about it is that you’re going to be there, and I’m not.’

  ‘It’s a madhouse. Rough, dirty, hardly any fresh water. Shortages of food. Nothing but diamond dealers and prostitutes and drunken diggers.’

  ‘But I love you,’ she squeaked.

  Barney put his arm around her neck and held her face against his shoulder. ‘I have to go back, Sara. And that’s all. If I don’t go back, then I might as well buy myself a ticket to New York, to the Lower East Side, and take up tailoring again. And you wouldn’t want to follow me then.’

  ‘Wouldn’t I?’ she challenged him. Her eyes were blurred with tears.

  In the distance, the thunder grumbled aggressively. It sounded like Zulu impi rattling their assegais against their shields, and rumbling their warcry, ‘uSuthu! uSuthu!’

  ‘Give me time,’ Barney pleaded.

  She looked up at him. ‘You’ll give me time, too, won’t you? You won’t go off with anyone else? I don’t mind prostitutes. I could stand that. But not another fiancée.’

  ‘Fiancée?’

  Sara’s cheeks flushed pink. ‘I naturally assumed –’

  Barney took her hands, and held them between his own hands, tightly and safely and warmly. ‘Sara,’ he said, ‘you’re a Sutter. Look at this house, look at your background. You couldn’t possibly marry anybody like me. I know you don’t care that I’m Jewish, but I’m not even rich Jewish. As a matter of fact, I don’t even own my own diamond-digging claim, just at the moment.’

  ‘Barney, I don’t care. What does money matter?’

  He lowered his eyes, looked at her hands, and then released them. ‘I wish it didn’t matter at all. But I’m afraid that it does. Sara, I’m sorry. Maybe I’ve deceived you a little, just because I’ve enjoyed your company. No – I’m telling lies now. I’ve more than enjoyed it. I think I love you. But if we tried to marry … it wouldn’t work. You wouldn’t have any horses or any servants or any gowns. I couldn’t give you the life that you’ve been used to. The whole thing would be a mistake.’

  Sara said quietly, and with an impeccable accent, ‘I see.’

  ‘I’ll come back,’ said Barney. ‘I promise you that. When I’ve made some money, which by God I’m going to, then I’ll come back.’

  ‘And how long will that be?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m starting from scratch.’

  She was trying very hard to be offish; but she could not. She looked at Barney with tears sliding down her cheeks and all she could say was, ‘Don’t make it too long. I might be married to somebody else. And if that happened, and you came back too late, then I couldn’t bear it.’

  It began to rain, dark spots on the neat pathways of Khotso the size of pennies. English pennies, with the Queen’s head on one side, and Britannia on the other. Barney kissed Sara quickly, and her mouth tasted of salt tears and rain.

  *

  They travelled more slowly back to Kimberley, arriving at the diamond mines in mid-May. The cosmos flowers had bloomed again on the veld, and the weather was cooler. They had ridden for days on the ox-waggon without speaking. Barney had been too preoccupied with thoughts of Sara, whom he had left behind, and Mooi Klip, who by now must have given birth to his child. I have a baby, he thought to himself, and I don’t even know if it’s a boy or a girl. I don’t even know if it was born alive.

  I don’t even know if Mooi Klip’s alive.

  They were amazed, both of them, at the depth to which the Big Hole had now been dug. When they drove up to the east reef of the mine, they could see below them a scurrying ants’-nest of hundreds of diggers, all of them swarming over the hollows and hills and burrows with tireless energy, shovelling and hacking and walling up their claims with sandbags. The steel cables which connected each claim to the surface were now on three tiers of pulleys, the top tier bringing out the yellow ground from the claims in the centre of the mine, and the bottom two tiers serving the claims that were nearer to the rim. There were hundreds and hundreds of cables, shining in the afternoon sun like a giant spiderweb.

  ‘We could have been a part of that,’ said Barney, more to himself than to Joel. ‘We could have been rich by now.’

  ‘But we’re not,’ said Joel. ‘So let’s make the best of it.’

  Barney cracked his whip, and the oxen trudged the last few yards towards their bungalow. Edward Nork was there, sitting on the verandah in his socks, trying to sew a patch on a pair of work trousers. He had grown a long gingery beard which made him look like a hermit, and he was wearing tiny wire-rimmed eyeglasses.

  ‘The Lord in heaven,’ he said, setting down his needlework. ‘You came back. And you’re better, Joel! I do believe you’re better!’

  Joel climbed down from the waggon and limped on his stick to the verandah steps. ‘I’m not better, Edward. I’m worse. These days, I have to walk with a stick. But I’m still alive, if that’s what you mean.’

  Barney led the oxen through to the kraal, and Edward followed him. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t kept the house all that tidy,’ he apologised. ‘I’m not very methodical when it comes to cleaning.’

  Barney said, ‘At least you’ve kept it warm for us.’

  With Edward’s help, Barney freed the oxen from their harnesses, and then led them over to the trough to drink.

  ‘Is there any feed?’ he asked.

  ‘I can get hold of some.’

  ‘Thanks, I reckon these beasts deserve some kind of reward.’

  Edward took off his eyeglasses and folded them. He appeared to be embarrassed. ‘I heard from Mooi Klip,’ he said.

  ‘I was going to ask you if you had. Is she all right?’

  ‘Oh, yes. She’s doing very well. It was terrible, what happened between you and Joel.’

  Barney said, ‘The baby?’

  ‘Oh, she had the baby all right. No trouble at all. It was a boy. She said she was going to call him Pieter.’

  ‘Pieter,’ said Barney. ‘You mean like Pieter Retief?’

  ‘I don’t think so. More like Pieter Steyn. He was the Griqua who was praying for Joel, wasn’t he, when you found him staked out?’

  Barney nodded. ‘She’s still at Klipdrift?’

  ‘As far as I know.’

  ‘Well,’ said Barney, ‘I guess I’d better get over there and see her. And Pieter, too.’

  ‘Congratulations,’ smiled Edward Nork. ‘You’re a father.’

  Joel came hobbling around to the kraal on his stick. ‘Have you seen the inside of this house?’ he demanded. ‘It’s a pigsty. In fact, it’s worse than pigsty. Where the hell are we supposed to sleep?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Edward Nork, uncomfortably. ‘I’m afraid I had to dispose of some of the furniture.’

  ‘You mean you had to sell our beds to buy yourself drink?’ snapped Joel.

  ‘If you like,’ said Edward, with a touch of defiance in his voice. ‘I didn’t think you were ever coming back, to tell you the truth. Nobody did.
’

  ‘Do you know what’s happened to Claim 172?’ asked Barney.

  ‘I heard that it was bought by an Australian. A fellow called McIntyre. He keeps himself to himself, though, and never buys a round of drinks, so I’m not at all sure how he’s doing. He’s not a millionaire yet, if that’s any consolation.’

  ‘I’m not sure that it is,’ said Barney.

  At that moment, there was a sharp rattling sound from the small stable at the side of the kraal. ‘Oh,’ said Edward, ‘that’s Alsjeblieft. I expect he’s feeling hungry.’

  ‘You’ve still got that mangy horse?’ asked Barney.

  Edward shrugged. ‘I’ve grown rather fond of him, as a matter of fact. He’s the only horse who’s ever let me ride him. He’s so docile, he even takes me home when I’m drunk. I think he’d put me to bed if I let him into the house.’

  ‘Or if we had any beds,’ put in Joel, sharply.

  ‘I’ll make it up to you,’ said Edward. ‘Don’t you worry, my dear chap. I’ll make it up to you.’

  They spent the rest of the day sweeping out the bungalow and building up the fire. Then Barney cooked up a mess of beef and beans, and they sat on the floor in the living-room and ate it with their billy-can spoons. They talked for a while about diamonds, and Edward told them that the world market was slumping so badly that many of the Kimberley diggers were already selling up and moving on. Diggers were always searching for quick and easy fortunes, and there were rumours of gold having been discovered in the Transvaal.

  The next morning, there was heavy grey cloud cover, and that fine persistent rain the Boers called motreën – rain as fine as mist. Barney woke up early, rolling out of the blankets that he had spread on the floor of the bedroom he had once shared with Mooi Klip. He lit the range to cook himself a breakfast of beef hash and eggs, and boiled up the coffee that he and Joel had made themselves the previous night. Then, while Joel was still sleeping, and Edward Nork was snoring away in the living-room in an alcoholic stupor, he opened the front door and went around to the kraal to saddle up Alsjeblieft.

  The old horse shivered and snuffled in the rain, but stood there patiently while Barney tightened his girth, and clumsily swung himself aboard. This was not like riding at Khotso, where a black servant was always waiting with a portable step, and one’s feet were inserted into the stirrups by the groom. But Barney had learned enough about riding with Sara Sutter to be able to direct Alsjeblieft out of the kraal and out through the early-morning outskirts of Kimberley, and point his nose north-westwards to Klipdrift. Barney had to blink from time to time, to shake the rain out of his eyes but there was a dreary familiarity about the landscape which made him feel at home.

  The odd thing was, when Barney tried to ride around the De Beers Mine, where Cecil Rhodes was digging, the horse trotted to the north side of the mine without being bidden. Barney tried to tug his reins in the opposite direction, but he seemed to know exactly where he was going, and when he reached a rain-sodden tent, with pools of water collecting in its canvas sides, he stopped, and stood still, the rain dripping off his patchy hide, as if he expected Barney to dismount. Barney, wonderingly, climbed down.

  The tent flap was flung back, and water gurgled on to the mud. A short, bearded digger in a checked shirt and a broad-brimmed hat and no trousers came struggling out into the daylight, snuffling and sniffing.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Barney. ‘I didn’t mean to wake you up.’

  The digger stared at Barney and then at the horse. ‘Screw me if that isn’t Alsjeblieft,’ he said, in a strong Irish accent.

  ‘That’s right,’ nodded Barney. ‘Alsjeblieft.’

  ‘Well, that’s a pity,’ said the digger. ‘I sell my diamonds to Dan Isaacs these days, ever since old Vandenberg passed over. But how are you, Alsjeblieft?’ he asked, paddling his way through the churned-up mud, and rubbing the horse on the nose. ‘I’ve got some sugar-lumps stashed away someplace. I’ll find him one.’

  ‘Dan Isaacs give you a good price?’ asked Barney.

  The digger looked up at him, and then shrugged. ‘Good enough. Maybe not as good as old Vandenberg. But they say the market’s going down the hill, you know? As long as I make myself enough to keep my body and my soul in the same tent.’

  ‘Whatever Dan Isaacs gives you, I’ll top,’ said Barney.

  The digger frowned uncertainly. ‘Have you taken over from old Vandenberg?’

  ‘I may have. I came here on Alsjeblieft, didn’t I?’

  ‘Well, sure. But can you pay me ready money?’

  ‘Show me what you’ve got.’

  The digger thought about that, and then nodded. ‘All right. But let me put my trousers on first. I don’t like to do business when I’m half-dressed.’

  Barney waited in the drizzling rain while the digger dressed himself. Then the digger reappeared with a wash-leather bag, which he opened up and spread across the palm of his stubby hand. There were ten or eleven rough diamonds there, none of them less than two and a half carats. ‘What would you pay me for these?’ he asked.

  Barney fished inside his waistcoat pocket for his loupe. He squinted at the stones one by one, and then he said, ‘A hundred and fifty. Bearing in mind that we’re going through a world slump.’

  ‘All right,’ said the digger, ‘You’re on. That’s twenty more than Isaacs would have paid me. Can you pay me ready money?’

  ‘Tomorrow. And that’s a promise. I didn’t come out here expecting to buy.’

  ‘You came out on Alsjeblieft and you didn’t expect to buy? Why, that horse would come out on his own and buy.’

  Barney patted Alsjeblieft’s wet flanks. ‘I’m beginning to realise that.’

  Barney rode on towards Klipdrift. The rain began to clear, and the sky was rich with white and stately clouds. He arrived on the banks of the Vaal River just as the sun was setting over the Kaap Plato, and the evening was alive with chorusing insects. He stopped at the first digger’s hut he came across – a long, English-style cottage with a thatched roof and mud-plastered walls – and asked the woman sitting outside if she knew where he could find the Griquas.

  She pointed, dumbly, to the northern part of the settlement. Barney raised his hat and followed her directions. The pale blue sky lay in the ruts of the dark muddy road like fragments of a broken mirror. Somewhere, someone was playing ‘Rose of Ireland’ on a harmonica.

  The Griqua houses were just like the rest – narrow and thatched and surrounded by mud. But somehow they seemed more permanent. Almost all of them were fenced, and most of them had vegetable gardens, neatly laid out in rows, the way the Boers always did it. One of the gardens even boasted a scarecrow – a sad-looking half-caste effigy with his body stuffed with straw.

  He saw Mooi Klip before she saw him. She was walking ahead of him, her bare feet squeezing into the mud, her baby held around her in a sling of Indian cotton. She must have been walking down to the Vaal River to wash, or fetch water. In one hand she carried a large pitcher of terracotta clay. Barney dismounted from his horse, and followed her only two or three paces behind, leading Alsjeblieft by the reins.

  Sudden sunshine lit up the houses all around them. Barney said, ‘Mooi Klip,’ in his softest voice. Mooi Klip hesitated, and then turned, and when she saw Barney all she could do was stand in that muddy street with her hand against her cheek, and stare at him as if he were a dream. A stray cat sprang on to a low mud wall beside her, and watched them both with curiosity.

  ‘Barney,’ she said. ‘I didn’t think I would ever see you again.’

  ‘You called him Pieter,’ Barney said, trying to sound steady. ‘May I see him?’

  Mooi Klip untied the Indian cotton sling, and carefully lifted Pieter out. He was only three weeks old, red and crunched-up and tiny, and his fingers groped at the air as if he were feeling for something that he could never reach. Barney held his hands out, and Mooi Klip let him hold his son for the first time.

  ‘He’s so small,’ said Barney, breathlessly.<
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  Mooi Klip nodded, and shrugged. Barney held Pieter up against his shoulder, and stroked his soft dark hair, and it was all he could do to stop himself from crying. This was his son, his small baby son, by the woman he loved more than anyone else.

  ‘Joel’s fine now,’ Barney told Mooi Klip, swallowing the constriction in his throat. ‘It hurt him a lot, that trip to Durban. But he survived, and they operated on him. He can walk now, provided he uses a stick.’

  Mooi Klip said nothing, but turned away. Barney said, ‘It wasn’t my fault, Natalia.’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t your fault. But you didn’t really want to marry me, did you?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Barney,’ she chided him, ‘you loved me, but I was never right for you, was I? A Griqua girl. When you first met me, I could scarcely speak English. How can you introduce a black savage like me to all of your society friends, or to Agnes Knight?’

  ‘Agnes Knight? She was nothing at all. Look at what you’ve produced. Pieter Blitz. My first child.’

  ‘Pieter Marneweck.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘His name’s Pieter Marneweck. Not Blitz. We were never married, were we?’

  ‘But, Natalia, he’s my son. And, anyway, can’t we marry now? What’s to stop us?’

  She gently took Pieter out of Barney’s arms. The last light of the evening touched her curly hair, and sparkled in her eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry, Barney, it just wouldn’t work. There was a time when I thought it could. But you taught me more than English. You taught me that everybody in this world has their place, and that my place isn’t beside you.’

  ‘What am I going to do?’ asked Barney. His throat felt as if it were coated in dust.

  ‘You can live without me.’

  ‘But how?’

  ‘You’ve been living without me ever since you took Joel to Durban. And I’ve been living without you. It’s easy. All you have to do is to pretend that pain is something that everybody has to live with, all of the time.’