A Sparrow Falls c-9

by Wilbur Smith

  Suddenly and clearly, she had an image of Mark Andersslim and graceful body, with the clean shape of young muscle, as he sat in the dappled sunlight of the glade.

  She remembered with a terrible pang of loss the lovely head with the fine strong lines of mouth and brow, and the serene poet's eyes.

  As the bed dipped beneath the solid weight of her husband, she wanted to scream with despair and the knowledge of coming pain.

  For breakfast Derek Hunt liked a little Black Velvet, mixing the Guinness stout and champagne in a special crystal punch bowl. He always used a Bollinger Vintage

  1911 and drank it out of a pewter tankard.

  He believed in a substantial breakfast, and this morning it was scrambled eggs, Scotch kippers, devilled kidneys, mushrooms and a large well-done fillet steak, all of it on the same plate.

  Although his eyes were watery and pink-rimmed with the previous night's revelry, and his face blazed crimson as the rising sun, he was cheerful and loudly friendly, guffawing at his own jokes, and leaning across the table to prod her with a thick red thumb like a boiled langouste to emphasize a point.

  She waited until he had picked up the bowl and tilted the last of the Black Velvet into his tankard, and then she said quietly, Derek, I want a divorce. The grin did not leave his face, and he watched the last drops fall into the tankard. Damn stuff evaporates, or the dish has got a hole in it, he wheezed, and then chuckled merrily. Get it? A hole in it! Good, what? Did you hear what I said? Aren't you going to answer? Needs no answer, old girl. Bargain is a bargain, you've got a name for your bastard, I've still got my share coming. You've had that, as many times as you could wish, Storm answered quietly, with a whole world of resignation in her voice. Won't you let me go now? Good God! Derek stared at her over the rim of his tankard, his mustache bristling and the pink eyes wide with genuine amazement. You don't think I was really interested in the crumpet, do you? Can get that anywhere, all of it looks the same in the dark. He snorted with real laughter now. Good God, old girl, you didn't really think I fancied your lily-white titties that much? Why? she asked. Ten million good reasons, old girl. He gulped a mouthful of scrambled eggs and kidney, and every single one of them in General Sean Courtney's bank account. She stared at him. Daddy's money? Right first time, he grinned. Up you go to the head of the class. I But-but -she made fluttery little gestures of in comprehension with both hands. I don't understand. You are so rich yourself. Was, old girl, used to be, past tense. And he let out another delighted guffaw. Two loving wives, two unsympathetic divorce judges, seven brats, forty polo ponies, friends with big right hands, rocks that shouldn't have been where the road was going& a mine with no diamonds, a building that fell down, a dam that burst, a reef that pinched out, cattle that got sick and myopic lawyers who don't read the small print, that's the way the money goes, pop goes the weasel! I don't believe it. She was aghast. Would never joke about that, he grinned. Never joke about money, one of my principles. Probably my only principle. And he prodded her. My only principle, get it?

  Skunked, absolutely flatters, I assure you. Daddy is the last resort, old girl, you'll have to speak to him, I'm afraid.

  Last resort, what? One for the poor, don't you know? There was no answer to the front door and Mark almost turned away and went back into the village, feeling a touch of relief and a lightening of heart that he recognized as cowardice. So instead, he jumped down off the veranda and went around the side of the house.

  The stiff collar and tie chafed his throat and the jacket felt unnatural and constricting, so that he shrugged his shoulders and ran a finger around inside his collar as he came into the kitchen yard of the cottage. It was five months since last he had worn clothes or trodden on a paved sidewalk, even the sound of women's voices was unfamiliar. He paused and listened to them.

  Marion Littlejohn was in the kitchen with her sister, and their merry prattle had a lilt and cadence to which he listened with new ears and fresh pleasure.

  The chatter ceased abruptly at his knock, and Marion came to the door.

  She wore a gaily striped apron, and her bare arms were floury to the elbows. She had her hair up in a ribbon but tendrils of it had come down in little wisps on to her neck and forehead.

  The kitchen was filled with the smell of baking bread, and her cheeks were rosy from the heat of the oven. Mark, she said calmly. How nice, and tried to push the curl of hair off her forehead, leaving a smudge of white flour on the bridge of her nose. It was a strangely appealing gesture, and Mark felt his heart swell. Come in. She stood aside, and held the door open for him.

  Her sister greeted Mark frostily, much more aware of the jilting than Marion herself. Doesn't he look well? Marion asked, and they both looked Mark over carefully, as he stood in the centre of the kitchen floor. He's too thin, her sister judged him waspishly, and began untying her apron-strings. Perhaps, Marion agreed comfortably, he just needs the proper food. And she smiled and nodded as she saw how brown and lean he was, but she recognized also, with eyes as fond as a mother's, the growing weight of maturity in his features. She saw also the sorrow and the loneliness, and she wanted to take him in her arms and hold his head against her bosom. There is some lovely butter-milk, she said instead. Sit down, here where I can see you. While she poured from the jug, her sister hung the apron behind the door and without looking at Mark said primly, We need more eggs. I'll go into the village When they were alone, Marion picked up the roller, and stood over the table, leaning and dipping as the pastry spread and rolled out paper thin. Tell me what you have been doing, she invited, and he began, hesitantly at first, but with blossoming sureness and enthusiasm, to tell her about Chaka's Gate, about the work and the life he had found there.

  'That's nice. She punctuated his glowing account every few minutes, her mind running busily ahead, already making lists and planning supplies, adapting pragmatically to the contingencies of a life lived far from the comforts of civilization, where even the small comforts become luxuries, a glass of fresh milk, a light in the night, all of it has to be planned for and carefully arranged.

  Characteristically she felt neither excitement nor dismay at the prospect. She was of pioneer stock. Where a man goes, the woman follows. It was merely work that must be done. The site for the homestead is up in the first fold of the hills, but you can see right down the valley, and the cliffs of Chaka's Gate are right above it. It's beautiful, especially in the evenings. I'm sure it is. I have designed the house so it can be added on to, a room at a time. To begin with there will only be two rooms -'Two rooms will be enough to begin with, she agreed, frowning thoughtfully. But we'll need a separate room for the children. He broke off and stared at her, not quite certain that he had heard correctly. She paused with the rolling-pin held in both hands and smiled at him. Well, that's why you came here today, isn't it? she asked sweetly.

  He dropped his eyes from hers and nodded. Yes. He sounded bemused. I suppose it is. She lost her aplomb only briefly during the ceremony, and that was when she saw General Sean Courtney sitting in the front pew with his wife beside him, Sean in morning suit and with a diamond pin in his cravat, Ruth cool and elegant in a huge wagon-wheel sized hat, the brim thick with white roses. He came! Marion whispered ecstatically, and could not restrain the triumphant glance she threw to her own friends and relatives, like a lady tossing a coin to a beggar.

  Her social standing had rocketed to dizzying heights.

  Afterwards the General had kissed her tenderly on each cheek, before turning to Mark. You've picked the prettiest girl in the village, my boy. And she had glowed with pleasure, pink and happy and truly as lovely as she had ever been in her life.

  With the help of the four Zulu labourers Sean had given him, Mark had opened a rough track in as far as the Bubezi River. He brought his bride to Chaka's Gate on the pillion of the motorcycle, with the side-car piled high with part of her dowry.

  Far behind them, the Zulus led Trojan and Spartan under heavy packs, the rest of Marion's baggage.

>   In the early morning the mist lay dense along the river, still and flat as the surface of a lake, touched to shades of delicate pink and mauve by the fresh new light of coming day.

  The great headlands of Chaka's Gate rose sheer out of the mist, dark and mysterious, each wreathed in laurels of golden cloud.

  Mark had chosen the hour of return so that she might have the best of it for her first glimpse of her new home.

  He pulled the cycle and side-car off the narrow, stony track and switched off the motor.

  In the silence they sat and watched the sun strike upon the crests of the cliffs, burning like the beacons that the mariner looks for in the watery deserts of the ocean, the lights that beckon him on to his landfall and the quiet anchorage. It's very nice, dear, she murmured. Now show me where the house will be. She worked with the Zulus, muddy to the elbows as they puddled the clay for the unburned Kimberley bricks, joshing them in their own language and bullying them cheerfully to effort beyond the usual pace of Africa.

  She worked behind the mules, handling the traces, dragging up the logs from the valley, her sleeves rolled high on brown smooth arms and a scarf knotted around her head.

  She worked over the clay oven, bringing out the fat golden brown loaves on the blade of a long handled spade, and watched with deep contentment as Mark wiped up the last of the stew with the crust. Was that good, then, dear? In the evenings she sat close to the lantern, with her head bowed over the sewing in her lap, and nodded brightly as he told her of the day's adventures, each little triumph and disappointment. What a shame, dear. Or, How nice for you, dear. He took her, one bright, cloudless day, up the ancient pathway to the crest of Chaka's Gate. Holding her hand as he led her over the narrow places, where the river flowed six hundred sheer feet below their feet. She tucked her skirts into her bloomers, took a firm hold on the basket she carried and never faltered once on the long climb.

  On the summit, he showed her the tumbled stone walls and overgrown caves of the old tribesmen who had defied Chaka, and he told her the story of the old king's climb, pointing out the fearsome path up which he had led his warriors, and finally he described the massacre and pictured for her the rain of human bodies hurled down into the river below. How interesting, dear, she murmured, as she spread a cloth from the basket she had carried. I brought scones and some of that apricot jam you like so much. Something caught Mark's eye, unusual movement far down in the valley below, and he reached for his binoculars. In the golden grass at the edge of the tall reed beds they looked like a line of fat black bugs on a clean sheet.

  He knew what they were immediately, and with a surging uplift of excitement he counted them. Eighteen! he shouted aloud. It's a new herd, What is it, dear? She looked up from the scone she was spreading with jam. It's a new herd of buffalo, he exulted. They must have come in from the north. It's beginning to work already. In the field of the binoculars he saw one of the great bovine animals emerge into a clearing in the long grass.

  He could see not only its wide black back, but the heavy head and spreading ears beneath the mournfully drooping horns. The sunlight caught the bosses of the polished black horns so that they glittered like gunmetal.

  He felt an enormous proprietary pride. They were his own. The first to come into the sanctuary he was building for them. Look. He offered her the binoculars, and she wiped her hands carefully and pointed the glasses over the cliff. There on the edge of the swamp. He pointed, with the pride and joy shining on his face.

  I can see them, she agreed smiling happily for him. How nice, dear. Then she swung the binoculars in a wide sweep across the river to where the roof of the homestead showed above the trees. Doesn't it look so nice with its new thatch? she said proudly. I just can't wait to move in. The following day they moved up from the shack of crude thatch and canvas at the old camp under the sycamore fig trees, and a pair of swallows moved in with them.

  The swiftly darting birds began to build their neat nest with little shiny globs of mud under the eaves of the new yellow thatch against the crisply whitewashed wall of Kimberley brick.

  That's the best of all possible luck, Mark laughed. They make such a mess, said Marion doubtfully, but that night, for the first time ever, she initiated their lovemaking; rolling comfortably on to her back in the doublebed, drawing up her nightdress to her waist, and spreading her warm womanly thighs. It's all right, if you want to, dear. And because she was kind and loved him so, he was as quick and as considerate as he could be. Was that good, then, dear? It was wonderful, he told her, and he had a sudden vivid image of a lovely vital woman, with a body that was lithe and swift and, and his guilt was brutal like a fist below the heart. He tried to thrust the image away, but it ran ahead of him through his dreams, laughing and dancing and teasing, so that in the morning there were dark blue smears beneath his eyes and he felt fretful and restless. I'm going up the valley on patrol. He did not look up from his coffee.

  You only came back last Friday. She was surprised.

  I want to look for those buffalo again, he said. Very well, dear. I'll pack your bag, how long will you be gone, I'll put in your sweater and the jacket, it's cool in the evenings, it's a good thing I baked yesterday -'she prattled on cheerfully, and he had a sudden terrible urge to shout at her to be silent. It will give me a chance to plant out the garden. It will be nice to have fresh vegetables again, and I haven't written a letter for ages. They'll be wondering about us at home. He rose from the table and went out to saddle Trojan.

  The flogging explosion of heavy wings roused Mark from his reverie and he straightened in the saddle just as a dozen of the big birds rose from the edge of the reed-beds.

  They were those dirty buff-coloured vultures, powering upwards as they were disturbed by Mark's approach, and undergoing that almost magical transformation from gross ugliness into beautiful planing flight.

  Mark tethered Trojan and slipped the Marinlicher from its scabbard as a precaution. He felt a tickle of excitement, hopes high that he had come upon a kill by one of the big predatory cats. Perhaps even a lion, one of the animals for which he still searched the valley in vain.

  The buffalo lay at the edge of the damp soft ground, half hidden by the reeds and it was so freshly dead that the vultures had not yet managed to penetrate the thick black hide, nor to spoil the sign which was deeply trodden and torn into the damp earth. They had only gouged out the uppermost eye and, with their beaks, scratched the softer skin around the bull's anus, for that was always their access point to a big thick-skinned carcass.

  The buffalo was a big mature bull, the great boss of his horns grown solidly together across the crown of his skull, a huge head of horn, forty-eight inches from tip to tip. He was big in the body also, bigger than a prize Hereford stud bull, and he was bald across the shoulders, the scarred grey hide scabbed with dried mud and bunches of bush ticks.

  Mark thrust his hand into the crease of skin between the back legs and felt the residual body warmth. He's been dead less than three hours, he decided, and squatted down beside the huge body to determine the cause of death. The bull seemed unmarked until Mark managed to roll him over, exerting all his strength and using the stiffly out-thrust limbs to move the ton and a half of dead weight.

  He saw immediately the death wounds, one was behind the shoulder, through the ribs, and Mark's hunter's eye saw instantly that it was a heart-stroke, a wide-lipped wound, driven home deeply; the clotted heart blood that poured from it had jellied on the damp earth.

  If there was any doubt at all as to the cause of that injury, it was dispelled instantly when he looked to the second wound. This was a frontal stroke, at the base of the neck, angled in skilfully between bone, to reach the heart again, and the weapon had not been withdrawn, it was still plunged in to the hilt and the shaft was snapped short where the bull had fallen upon it.

  Mark grasped the broken shaft, placed one booted foot against the bull's shoulder and grunted with the effort it required to withdraw the blade against the reluctant suc
k of clinging flesh.

  He examined it with interest. It was one of those broadbladed stabbing spears, the assegai which had been designed by the old king Chaka himself. Mark remembered Sean Courtney reminiscing about the Zulu wars, Isandhlwana, and Morma Gorge. They can put one of those assegais into a man's chest and send the point two feet out between his shoulder blades, and when they clear the blade, the withdrawal seems to suck a man as white as though he had his life blood pumped out of him by a machine. Sean had paused for a moment to stare into the camp fire. As they clear, they shout "Ngidhla! " -I have eaten! Once you have heard it, you'll not forget it. Forty years later, the memory still makes the hair come up on the back of my neck. Now still holding the short heavy assegai, Mark remembered that Chaka himself had hunted the buffalo with a similar weapon. A casual diversion between campaigns and as Mark glanced from the blade to the great black beast, he felt his anger tempered with reluctant admiration. His anger was for the wanton destruction of one of his precious animals, and his admiration was for the special type of courage that had done the deed.

  Thinking of the man, Mark realized that there must have been special circumstances for that man to abandon such a valuable, skilfully and lovingly wrought weapon together with the prize he had risked his life to hunt.

  Mark began to back-track the sign in the soft black earth, and he found where the bull had come up one of the tunnellike pathways through the reeds after drinking. He found where the huntsman had waited in thick cover beside the path, and his bare footprints were unmistakable.

  Pungushe! exclaimed Mark.

  Pungushe had lain upwind and, as the bull passed, he had put the steel behind his shoulder, deeply into the heart.

  The bull had leapt forward, crashing into a ponderous gallop as Pungushe cleared his point, and the blood had sprayed from the wide wound as though the standing reeds had been hosed by a careless gardener.