A Sparrow Falls c-9

by Wilbur Smith

  He was twenty feet up when Dirk Courtney stopped on the ledge directly below him. Mark froze into stillness, the last defence of the helpless animal, but he knew that the instant Dirk lifted the beam, he was discovered. He waited for it, with the numbed resignation of the beast waiting in the abattoir chute.

  Dirk made another careful search, swinging the lantern in a full slow traverse of both sides of the river, and he was on the point of lifting the beam to play it on to the cliff where Mark hung, when something caught his attention.

  He took two hurried paces to the edge of the rocky ledge and shone the lantern downwards.

  Mark's jacket was caught on one of the boulders, and Dirk went down on one knee to try and reach it with one outstretched arm.

  It was the respite that Mark needed. Dirk's full attention was on the stranded jacket and the rush and roar of water covered the noise of Mark's scrabbling feet and hands on the cliff.

  He did not look down again until he had dragged himself fifty feet higher, and then he saw that the jacket had succeeded as a decoy. Dirk Courtney was a hundred feet downstream, standing on the lip of the first steep waterfall, on the very edge of the escarpment. He had the sodden jacket in his hands and he was peering over the fearsome drop. In the lantern light, the water was black and smooth as oil, as it streamed into the abyss, turning slowly to thick white spume as it fell.

  Dirk Courtney threw the jacket out into black space and stood back from the drop. He settled down comfortably on his haunches, sheltered by the cliff from rain and wind, and quite calmly he selected a cigar, like a workman taking a break after performing satisfactorily a difficult task.

  That casual little act, the flare of a sulphur match, and the contented puff of blue tobacco smoke in the lantern light, probably saved Mark's life. It stoked his anger to the point when it could overcome his agony and bodily exhaustion. It provided him with the will to go on, and he began to climb again.

  Sometimes during the climb, reality faded away from Mark. Once a sense of warmth and well-being began to suffuse his whole body, a wonderful feeling, floating as though on the very frontiers of sleep, but he caught himself before he fell, and deliberately punched his right hand against the rock face. He screamed with the pain of it, but with the pain came new resolve.

  But resolve faded slowly in the cold and the pain, and fantasy grew again. He believed that he was one of King Chaka's chosen, following the old king up that terrible cliff to the summit of Chaka's Gate, and he found himself talking gibberish in broken Zulu, and in his head he heard the deep resonant voice of the old king calling him on, giving him encouragement, and he knew if he climbed faster he might catch a glimpse of the king's face. He lost his grip in his impatience, and slid away, gathering momentum down the incline, until he crashed into one of the stunted dwarf trees that grew from the cliff face. It broke his fall, but he screamed again at the pain of broken ribs.

  He climbed on, and then he heard Storm's voice. It was so clear and close that he stopped, and turned his face up into the rain and darkness. She was there, floating above his head, so beautiful and pale and graceful, Come, Mark, she said, and her voice echoed and rang like a silver bell in his head. Come, my darling.

  He knew then that she was alive, that she was not dying in a cold hospital bed, that she was here, come to him in his pain and exhaustion. Storm, he cried, and threw himself upwards, falling forward, and lying face down in the short wet grass at the top of the cliff.

  He just wanted to lie there, for ever. He was not even sure that he had reached the top, was not sure if this was not yet another fantasy, perhaps he was dead already and this was all there was to it.

  Then slowly he was aware of the rain drops on his cheek, and the sound of the little tree frogs clinking in the rain, and the cold breath of the wind, and he realized with regret that he was still alive.

  The pain began returning then. It started in his wrist first, and began to spread, and he did not think he had the strength left to ride it.

  Then suddenly he had the image, clearly formed in his mind, of Dirk Courtney stooped over his father's body, with the club raised in his hand to strike, and Mark's anger came to save him again.

  Mark pushed himself to his knees and looked about him. A hundred yards away, the truck was parked on the threshold of the iron bridge, and in its headlights, he could make out the shape of a man.

  With one more huge, draining effort, Mark came to his feet, and stood swaying, gathering himself for his next lumbering step.

  Pete Botes stood in the rain, holding the heavy pistol hanging in his right hand. The rain had soaked his fine sandy hair, and it ran down his cheeks and forehead, so he kept wiping it away with his left hand.

  The rain had soaked through the shoulders of his overcoat also, and he shivered spasmodically, as much from fear as from cold.

  He was caught up in the great swirl of events over which he had no control, an encircling web from which he could see no escape, even though his lawyer's mind twisted and turned. Accessory to murder, before and after the fact. He did not want to know what was going on down there at the foot of the cliff, and yet he felt the sick fascination and dread of it.

  This was not what he had imagined when he had made the decision to go to Dirk Courtney. He had thought it would be a few words, and he could walk away, pretending it had not happened, crawling back into his wife's warm bed and pulling the blankets over his head.

  He had not been prepared for this horror and violence, for a gun in his hand, and this ugly bloody business in the gorge.

  The penalty is death, he thought, and shivered again.

  He wanted to run, but there was no place to run now. Oh God, why did I do it? he whispered aloud. I wish, oh God, I wish, the age-old cry of the weakling, but he did not finish the wish. There was a sound behind him and he began to turn, lifting the pistol and beginning to point it with both arms at full stretch in front of him.

  A figure came towards him out of the darkness, and Peter opened his mouth to cry out.

  The figure was an apparition of blood and mud, with a distorted pale face, and it came so swiftly that the cry never reached his lips.

  Peter Botes was a man of words and ideas, a soft little man of desks and rich foods, and the man who came out of the darkness was a soldier.

  Mark knelt over him in the mud, panting and holding his ribs, waiting for the pain of movement to recede, and for his starred vision to clear.

  He looked down at the man under him. His face was pressed into the mud, and Mark took a handful of his hair and rolled the head on its narrow shoulders to prevent the man drowning; it was only then that Mark recognized him. Peter! he whispered hoarsely, and felt his senses reel again, uncertain if this was another fantasy.

  He touched the unconscious man's lips, and they were warm and soft as a girl's. Peter! he repeated stupidly, and suddenly he knew it all. It did not have to be thought out a step at a time. He understood how Dirk Courtney had known where to set his ambush. He knew that Peter was the traitor, and he knew that the decoy had been Storm and baby John, he knew it was all a lie then. He knew that Storm and her child were safe and sleeping in the tiny bedroom above the beach, and the knowledge buoyed him.

  He picked the Smith Wesson revolver out of the mud with his left hand and wiped it carefully on his shirt.

  Dirk Courtney paused at the head of the pathway. He was only slightly breathless from the climb, but his boots were thick with mud and raindrops dewed his shoulders, glittering in the burning headlights of the truck.

  The headlights dazzled him, and there was an area of unfathomable darkness behind them.

  Peter? he called, and lifted one arm to shield his eyes.

  He saw the shadowy figure of the waiting man leaning against the cab of the truck, and he walked forward. It's done, he said. You have nothing to worry about now. I have the key to the safe, it's just the cleaning up left to do. He stopped abruptly, and peered again at the waiting figure. The man had not moved. Pe
ter, his voice cracked. Come on, man! Pull yourself together. There is still work to do. And he started forward again, stepping out of the beam of the headlights. What time is it? he asked. It must be getting late. Yes. Mark's voice was thick and slurred. For you, it's very late. And Dirk stopped again, staring at him. The silence seemed to last for all of eternity, but it was only the instant that it took Dirk to see the revolver and the pale mud-smeared face. He knew that the bullet would come now, and he sought to delay it, just long enough. Listen to me, said Dirk urgently. Wait just one second. He changed his grip on the lantern in his right hand, and his voice was compelling, the tone quick and persuasive, just enough to hold Mark's finger on the trigger. There is something you must know. Dirk made a disarming gesture, swinging the lantern back, and then hurling it forward in a wide arc of his long powerful arm, and, at the same instant, hurling himself forward.

  The lantern struck Mark on the shoulder, a glancing blow, just enough to deflect his gun hand as he fired.

  But he heard the bullet strike, that muffled thumping sound of soft lead expanding into living flesh, and he heard the grunt of air driven forcibly from Dirk Courtney's lungs by the strike.

  Then the man's big hard body crashed into Mark, and as they reeled sideways, supported by the chassis of the truck, he felt one arm lock around his chest and hard fingers close over his gun hand.

  In that first moment of direct encounter, Mark knew instantly that Dirk Courtney's strength and weight were far greater than his own. Even if he had been uninjured, it would have been no contest, he was so out-matched that he felt as though he had been caught up in the cogs of a powerful piece of machinery. Dirk Courtney's body seemed not to be made of flesh and bone, but of brutal iron.

  Mark's broken ribs moved in the vast encircling grip, and he cried out as the sharp edges of splintered bone lanced into his flesh. He felt his gun hand being forced back, the muzzle of the pistol training up into his own face, and Dirk Courtney swung him off his feet, both of them spinning into a turn like a pair of waltzing dancers, so that only the wildest effort and a lucky trick of balance allowed Mark to come down on his feet again. But now he no longer had the support of the truck -chassis and the next effort would throw him headlong into the mud.

  He felt Dirk Courtney gather himself for the next effort, the hard athlete's muscles moving him into perfect balance. Mark tried desperately to meet it, but it came with a smooth surge of power as irresistible as a huge comber rushing towards the beach. Then miraculously, at the moment when he was going, Mark felt the big body hit with a tremor, heard the sobbing outrush of Dirk Courtney's breath, and almost instantly Mark's stomach was drenched with a copious rush of warm liquid as it poured from his adversary.

  The strength melted out of Dirk Courtney's body, Mark could feel his balance go, the grip on his pistol hand relaxed slightly, and Mark realized that his bullet had done damage, and that that last effort had torn something open in Dirk's chest. His life blood was expelled from the wound in thick hissing jets by the powerful pump of his heart, and Mark found he was able, by a supreme effort, to reverse the direction of the pistol barrel, swinging it in a slow arc back, back until pointed into Dirk Courtney's face.

  Mark did not believe that he had the strength left to pull the trigger. The weapon seemed to fire of its own accord, and the muzzle flash almost blinded him.

  Dirk Courtney's head snapped back as though he had been hit in the mouth with the full swing of a baseball bat.

  He was hurled backwards, out of the beam of the headlights into the darkness, and Mark heard his body sliding and tumbling down the steep side of the gorge.

  The pistol dropped from Mark's hand, and he fell, first on to his knees, and then slowly toppled forward on to his face in the mud.

  This is the last will and Testament of SEAN COURTNEY, married out of community of property to RUTH COURTNEY, (formerly FRIEDMAN, born COHEN), and presently residing at LionKop Ranch in the district of Ladyburg.

  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I give and bequeath my entire estate and effects, movable or immovable, whether in possession, reversion, expectancy or contingency, wherever situate and of whatever description nothing excepted, to my wife the said RUTH COURTNEY.

  At first light the next morning, Mark led the search party down the steep river banks. His right arm was in a sling, his ribs were strapped tightly under his shirt, and he hobbled painfully with his injuries.

  They found Sean Courtney half a mile below the last cataract, where the Baboon Stroorn debauched into the valley.

  He lay on his back, and there was no blood, the waters had cleansed every drop of it, and even his wounds were clean and washed pale blue. Except for the dent in his temple, his features were almost unmarked, and the white bush of his beard had dried in the early morning sun. it curled proudly on his chest. He looked like a carved stone effigy of a medieval knight laid out with his armour and sword on a sarcophagus in the dim depths of an ancient cathedral.

  In the event of my wife predeceasing me, or dying simultaneously, or within six months of each other The river had been kind and carried her down to the same sand-bank. She was lying face down, half buried in the soft white sand. One slim naked arm was outflung, and on the third finger was the simple band of bright gold.

  The fingers almost, but not quite, touched her husband's arm.

  They buried them together, side by side, in the same deep excavation on the slope of the escarpment, a little way beyond the big house of Lion Kop.

  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I direct that the following shaLl apply in regard to the rest and residue of my estate.

  There followed almost five hundred separate bequests which covered fifty pages, and totalled almost five millions of sterling. Scan Courtney had forgotten nobody. Beginning with the humblest grooms and domestic servants enough for a piece of ground, a small herd, the equivalent of a life pension.

  TO those with a lifetime of service and loyalty, the gift was greater, in proportion.

  To those who had laboured to build up the various prosperous companies and enterprises, there was a share of those companies, a large share.

  He had not forgotten a single friend nor relative, not one of them.

  I acknowledge that I have one legitimate man-child, though I hesitate to employ the word son, one DIRK COURTNEY, presently residing at Great Longwood in the district of Ladyburg. However, God or the devil has already provided for him so abundantly, that anything I could add would be superfluous. Therefore I leave him nothing -not even my blessing.

  They buried Dirk Courtney in the pine forest, below the dog ring. No priest could be found to recite the office of burial, and the undertaker closed the grave under the curious eyes of a few members of the Press and a throng of sensation-seekers. Though there were many to stare, there was nobody to weep.

  To my daughter STORM HUNT (born COURTNEY), who took lightly her filial duties, I, in turn, discharge my paternal duties with the bequest of a single guinea. He did not mean it, Mark whispered to her. He was talking about you that night, as it happened, he was remembering you. I had his love, she said softly. Even though, at the end - he tried to deny it, I will have it always. That is riches enough. I don't need his money as well. To MARK ANDERS, for whom I have conceived the affection a man usually accords only to his natural son, I leave no money, as I am well aware of the contempt he holds for that commodity. I bequeath to him, in lieu of cash, all my books, paintings, guns, pistols and rifles, personal jewellery, and all my domestic animals, including dogs, horses and cattle.

  The paintings in themselves made up a considerable fortune, and many of the books were unique in rarity and condition.

  Mark sold only the cattle and horses, for they were many and there was no place for them all in the tsetse-infested valley of the Bubezi.

  The rest and residue of my Estate I bequeath to the said MARK ANDERS in his capacity as the Trustee of the Wild Life Protection Society. The bequest to be used to fu
rther the aims of the Society, particularly to the development and extension of the proclaimed lands presently known as Chaka's Gate, into a Wild Life Reservation. No one in Government will want to touch a Bill that was drawn up and piloted by the former Deputy Minister of Lands, General jannie Smuts prophesied to Mark, as they stood talking quietly together after the funeral. The man's name will leave a pungent stink on anything he ever touched. Political reputations are too fragile to risk like that, I foresee a stampede by the new Government to dissociate themselves from his memory. We can confidently expect a new Bill being introduced, confirming and upgrading the status of the proclaimed lands of Chaka's Gate, and I can assure you, my boy, that the Bill will have the full support of my party. As General Smuts had foreseen, the Bill passed through the House at the following Session, becoming law on 31 st May 1926, as Act No. 56 of 1926 of the Parliament of the Union of South Africa. Five days later, the telegram from the Minister of Lands arrived at Ladyburg confirming Mark's appointment as first Warden of Chaka's Gate National Park.

  There was no trial at which Hobday could turn king's evidence and claim immunity from the crime of murder; so at Hobday's own trial, the Public Prosecutor asked for the death sentence. In his summing up, the Chief justice mentioned the evidence given by Sithole Zama, alias Pungushe. He made an excellent impression on this Court.

  His answers were clear and precise. At no time did the defence shake his transparent honesty and powers of total recall. On Christmas Eve in the whitewashed room at Pretoria Cential-Gaol, with his arms and legs pinioned by leather straps, and his head covered by a black cotton bag, Hobday dropped to eternity through the crashing wooden trap.

  Peter Botes, cleared of any implication in the crimes of murder and attempted murder by the testimony of Mark Anders, was not placed on trial. His crimes were weakness and greed, Mark tried to explain to Storm. If there were punishment for those, then there would be a gallows waiting for each of us. Besides, there has been enough vengeance and death already Peter Botes left Ladyburg immediately after the hearings, and Mark never learned where he went or what became of him.