Power of the Sword

by Wilbur Smith

  He parked the truck in the yard of a secondhand car dealer down near the railway tracks and left the key under the floor mat. Then the two of them walked the last mile, through the deserted streets to Roelf’s home, a cottage in a row of small thatched cottages. Roelf let them in through the back door into the kitchen, and a familiar figure rose up from his seat at the kitchen table to greet them.

  ‘Uncle Tromp!’ Manfred cried. The old man held open his arms, and Manfred ran into his embrace.

  ‘What a terrible ruffian you are with that beard,’ Uncle Tromp laughed. ‘And I see the American did a permanent job on your nose.’

  Manfred looked over Uncle Tromp’s shoulder and there was a woman standing in the doorway of the kitchen. That was what misled him – a woman, not a girl. Her face was marked by a kind of sad wisdom, and her expression was pinched and without joy.

  ‘Sarah?’ Manfred left Uncle Tromp and went towards here. ‘How are you, my little sister?’

  ‘I was never your little sister, Manfred,’ she said. ‘But I am very well, thank you.’ She made no effort to embrace him and Manfred was clearly disturbed by the coolness of her welcome.

  ‘Are you happy, Sarah?’

  ‘I have a fine man and three beautiful babies,’ she said, and looked at Roelf.

  ‘You will be hungry now,’ she told him. ‘Sit down. You can talk while I make your breakfast.’

  The three men seated themselves at the kitchen table and every once in a while Manfred glanced surreptitiously at Sarah as she worked over the stove, and his expression was troubled, ridden by old memories and guilt. Then he gathered himself and concentrated once more on what the others were saying.

  ‘The news is all good – the British smashed and broken at Dunkirk, France has fallen and the Netherlands. The German U-boats are winning the battle of the Atlantic and even the Italians are victorious in North Africa—’

  ‘I did not know you were one of us, Uncle Tromp,’ Manfred cut in on the discussion.

  ‘Yes, my son. I am a patriot as you are. The Ossewa Brandwag is forty thousand strong now. Forty thousand picked men in positions of power and authority, while Jannie Smuts has sent one hundred and sixty thousand of the English-lovers with their little orange tabs on their shoulders out of the country. He has put himself at our mercy.’

  ‘Our leaders know of your arrival, Manie,’ Roelf told him. ‘They know that you bring a message from the Führer himself, and they are eager to meet you.’

  ‘Will you arrange a meeting,’ Manfred asked, ‘as soon as possible? There is much work to do. Glorious work to do.’

  Sarah Stander stood quietly at the kitchen stove, breaking eggs into the frying pan, turning the chops under the grill. She did not look round or draw attention to herself, but she thought:

  ‘You have come to bring sadness and suffering into my life again, Manfred De La Rey. With your every word and look and gesture you open the wounds I thought had healed. You have come to destroy what little life has left me. Roelf will follow you blindly into folly. You come to threaten my husband and my babies—’ And her hatred of him was made stronger and more venomous as it fed on the corpse of the love that he had murdered.

  Manfred travelled alone. There was no control of personal movement, there were no roadblocks, police searches or demands for identification papers. South Africa was so far from the main war centres that there were not even significant shortages of consumer goods, apart from petrol rationing and a ban on the milling of white flour, therefore no need for ration books or other documentation existed.

  Carrying a small valise, Manfred merely purchased a second-class railway ticket for Bloemfontein, the capital town of the Orange Free State province, and he shared a compartment with five other travellers on the five hundred mile journey.

  Ironically, the meeting to subvert the elected government of the nation took place in the provincial government building at the foot of Artillery Hill. When Manfred entered the imposing administrator’s office, he was reminded how wide was the influence of their secret organization.

  The commander of the OB came to meet him at the door. He had changed little since he had administered the blood-oath to Manfred in that midnight torchlit ceremony. Still paunchy and craggy-featured, he was now dressed in a sombre double-breasted civilian suit. He greeted Manfred warmly, clasping his hand and patting his shoulder, smiling broadly.

  ‘I have been expecting you, brother, but first let me congratulate you on your achievements since last we met, and the magnificent work you have accomplished so far.’

  He led Manfred into the room and introduced him to the five other men seated at the long table.

  ‘All of us have taken the blood oath. You may speak freely,’ he told Manfred who knew now that he was addressing the highest council of the brotherhood.

  He sat at the bottom of the table facing the commander and gathered his thoughts for a moment before beginning. ‘Gentlemen, I bring you personal greetings from the Führer of the German people, Adolf Hitler. He has asked me to assure you of the close friendship that has always existed between the Afrikaner and the German nation, and to tell you that he is ready to support us in every possible way in our struggle to win back what is rightfully ours, to regain for the Afrikaner the land that belongs to him by right of birth and conquest.’ Manfred spoke forcefully and logically. He had prepared this address with the help of the experts of the German propaganda department and had rehearsed it until his delivery was perfect; he could judge his success by the rapt expressions of the men listening to him.

  ‘The Führer is fully aware that this country has been stripped of almost all men of military age who have sympathy with the Smuts government and the British. Almost one hundred and sixty thousand men have been sent north to serve beyond our borders. This makes the task easier.’

  ‘Smuts has called in all weapons in private hands,’ one of the men interrupted him. ‘He has taken the sporting rifles and shotguns, even the memorial cannons from the town squares. There will be no rising without weapons.’

  ‘You have seen to the centre of the problem,’ Manfred agreed. ‘To succeed we need money and weapons. We will get those.’

  ‘The Germans will send them to us?’

  ‘No.’ Manfred shook his head. ‘This has been considered and rejected. The distance is too great, the difficulty of landing great quantities of arms on an inhospitable coast is not acceptable and the ports are well guarded. However, immediately we have control of the ports, supplies of heavy arms will be rushed to us by U-boats of the German navy, and in return we will throw open our harbours to the German U-boats. We will deny the Cape route to the British.’

  ‘Then where will we get the arms we need for the rising?’

  ‘From Jannie Smuts,’ Manfred told them, and they stirred uncomfortably and glanced at one another doubtfully.

  ‘With your approval, naturally, I will recruit and train a small élite striking force of our stormjagters. We will raid the government arms and ammunition dumps and seize what we need – the same with money. We will take it from the banks.’

  The enormity of the concept, the boldness and sweep of it, amazed them. They stared in silence and Manfred went on.

  ‘We will act swiftly and ruthlessly, seize the arms and distribute them. Then at a given signal we will rise, forty thousand patriots, to seize all the reins of power, the police and the army, the communications system, the railways, the harbours. In all of these we have our people already in place. All of it will be done at the pre-arranged signal.’

  ‘What will that signal be?’ asked the commander of the OB.

  ‘It will be something that will turn the entire country on its head – something staggering, but it is too early to speak of it. It is necessary only to say that the signal has been chosen and the man who will give the signal.’ Manfred looked at him steadily, seriously. ‘I will have that honour. I have trained for the task, and I will do it alone and unaided. After that it will only remain for yo
u to take up the reins, to swing our support to the side of the victorious German army, and to lead our people to the greatness that has been denied them by our enemies.’

  He was silent then as he studied their expressions, and he saw the patriotic fervour on their faces and the new light in their eyes.

  ‘Gentlemen, do I have your approval to proceed?’ he asked, and the commander looked at each of them in turn, and received a curt nod of the head.

  He turned back to Manfred. ‘You have our approval and our blessing. I will see that you have the support and assistance of every single member of the brotherhood.’

  ‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ Manfred said quietly. ‘And now if I may give you the words of Adolf Hitler himself from the great book Mein Kampf, “Almighty God, bless our arms when the time is ripe. Be just as Thou has always been. Judge now whether we be deserving of freedom. Lord, bless our battle.”’

  ‘Amen!’ they cried, leaping to their feet and giving the O B salute of clenched fist across the chest. ‘Amen!’

  The green Jaguar was parked in the open, beside the road where it skirted the top of the cliff. The vehicle looked abandoned, as though it had stood here for days and weeks.

  Blaine Malcomess parked his Bentley behind it and walked to the cliff’s edge. He had never been here before, but Centaine had described the cove to him and how to find the pathway. He leaned out now and looked down the cliff. It was very steep but not sheer; he could make out the path zigzagging down three hundred feet to Smitswinkel Bay, and at the bottom he saw the roofs of three or four rude huts strung out along the curve of the bay, just as Centaine had described.

  He shrugged out of his jacket and threw it onto the front seat of the Bentley. The climb down the pathway would be warm work. He locked the door of the car and set off down the cliff path. He had come, not only because Centaine had pleaded with him to do so, but because of his own affection and pride and sense of responsibility towards Shasa Courtney.

  At various times in the past he had anticipated that Shasa would be either his stepson or his son-in-law. As he climbed down the pathway he felt again the deep regret – no, more than regret, the deep sorrow – that neither expectation had been fulfilled thus far.

  He and Centaine had not married, and Isabella had been dead for almost three years now. He remembered how Centaine had fled from him on the night Isabella died, and how for many months afterwards she had avoided him, frustrating all his efforts to find her. Something terrible had happened that night at Isabella’s deathbed. Even after they had been reconciled, Centaine would never talk about it, never even hint at what had taken place between her and the dying woman. He hated himself for having put Centaine in Isabella’s power. He should never have trusted her, for the damage she had done had never healed. It had taken almost a year of patience and gentleness from Blaine before Centaine had recovered from it sufficiently to take up again the role of lover and protectress which she had so revelled in before.

  However, she would not even discuss with him the subject of marriage, and became agitated and overwrought when he tried to insist. It was almost as if Isabella were still alive, as if she could from her long-cold grave assert some malevolent power over them. There was nothing in life he wanted more than to have Centaine Courtney as his lawful wife, his wife in the eyes of God and all the world, but he was coming to doubt it would ever be so.

  ‘Please Blaine, don’t ask me now. I cannot – I just cannot talk about it. No, I can’t tell you why. We have been so happy just the way we are for so many years. I can’t take the chance of ruining that happiness.’

  ‘I am asking you to be my wife. I’m asking you to confirm and cement our love, not to ruin it.’

  ‘Please, Blaine. Leave it now. Not now.’

  ‘When, Centaine, tell me when?’

  ‘I don’t know. I honestly don’t know, my darling. I only know I love you so.’

  Then there were Shasa and Tara. They were like two lost souls groping for each other in darkness. He knew how desperately they needed each other, he had recognized it from the very beginning, and how close they had come to linking hands. But always they failed to make that last vital contact, and drifted, pining, apart. There seemed to be no reason for it, other than pride and pigheadedness, and without each other they were diminishing, neither of them able to fulfil their great promise, to take full advantage of all the rare blessings that had been bestowed upon them at birth.

  Two beautiful, talented young people, full of strength and energy, frittering it all away in a search for something that never existed, wasting it on impossible dreams or burning it up in despair and despondency.

  ‘I cannot let it happen,’ he told himself with determination. ‘Even if they hate me for it, I have to prevent it.’

  He reached the foot of the path and paused to look around. He did not need to rest, for although the descent had been arduous and although he was almost fifty years old, he was harder and fitter than most men fifteen years younger.

  Smitswinkel Bay was enclosed by a crescent of tall cliffs; only its far end was open to the wider expanse of False Bay. Protected on all sides, the water was lake-calm and so clear he could follow the stems of the kelp plants down thirty feet to where they were anchored on the bottom. It was a delightful hidden place and he took a few moments longer to appreciate its tranquil beauty.

  There were four shacks built mostly of driftwood, each of them widely separated from the others, perched upon the rocks above the narrow beach. Three were deserted, their windows boarded up. The last one in the line was the one he wanted, and he set off along the beach towards it.

  As he drew closer he saw the windows were open, but the curtains, faded and rotted by salt air, were drawn. There were crayfish nets hanging over the railing of the stoep and a pair of oars and a cane fishing-rod propped against one wall. A dinghy was drawn up on the beach above the highwater mark.

  Blaine climbed the short flight of stone steps and crossed the stoep to the front door. It was open and he stepped into the single room.

  The small Devon stove on the far wall was cold, and a frying pan stood on it, greasy with congealed leftovers. Dirty plates and mugs cluttered the central table, and a column of black ants was climbing one leg to reach them. The wooden floor of the shack was unswept, gritty with beach sand. There were two bunks set against the side wall, opposite the window. The bare boards of the upper bunk were without a mattress, but in the lower bunk was a jumble of grey blankets and a hard coir mattress with a stained and torn cover. On top of it all lay Shasa Courtney.

  It was a few minutes before noon and he was still asleep. An almost empty bottle of whisky and a tumbler stood on the sandy floor within reach of Shasa’s dangling arm. He wore only a pair of old rugby shorts and his body was burned to the colour of oiled mahogany, a dark beachcomber’s tan; the hair on his arms was sunbleached to gold, but on his chest it remained dark and curly. It was obvious that he had not shaved in many days and his hair was long and unkempt on the dirty pillow. Yet the deep tan covered all the more obvious signs of debauchery.

  He slept quietly, no sign on his face of the turmoil which must have driven him from Weltevreden to this squalid shack. He was still in all respects but one a magnificent-looking young man – that was why the left eye was even more shocking. The top ridge of the eye-socket was depressed on the outside corner where the bone had shattered; the scar through his dark eyebrow was shiny white and ridged. The empty eye-socket was sunken, and the eye-lids drooped apart, exposing wet red tissue in the gap between his thick dark lashes.

  It was impossible to look on the hideous injury without feeling pity, and it took Blaine a few seconds to steel himself to what he had to do.

  ‘Shasa!’ He made his voice harsh. Shasa groaned softly and the lid of his empty eye twitched.

  ‘Wake up, man.’ Blaine went to the bunk and shook his shoulder. ‘Wake up. We’ve got some talking to do.’

  ‘Go away,’ Shasa mumbled, not yet awake. ‘Go awa
y and leave me alone.’

  ‘Wake up, damn you!’

  Shasa’s good eye flickered open and he peered up at Blaine blearily. His eye focused and his expression altered.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ He rolled his head away, hiding the bad eye as he groped amongst the tangled bedclothes until he found a scrap of black cloth on a black elastic band. With his face still averted, he fitted the patch over the damaged eye and looped the band over his head before he turned back to look at Blaine again. The eye-patch gave him a piratical panache, and in some perverse way highlighted his good looks.

  ‘Got to pump ship,’ he blurted and tottered out onto the stoep.

  While he was away Blaine dusted one of the stools and set it against the wall. He sat down on it, leaned back, and lit one of his long black cheroots.

  Shasa came back into the shack, pulling up the front of his rugby shorts, and sat down on the edge of the bunk, holding his head with both hands. ‘My mouth tastes like a polecat pissed in it,’ he muttered, and he reached down for the bottle between his feet and poured what remained of the whisky into the glass, licked the last drop from the neck and trundled the empty bottle across the floor in the general direction of the overflowing garbage bucket beside the stove.

  He picked up the glass. ‘Offer you one?’ he asked, and Blaine shook his head. Shasa looked at him over the rim.

  ‘That look on your face can mean only one of two things,’ Shasa told him. ‘Either you have just smelled a fart or you don’t approve of me.’

  ‘I take it the coarse language is a recent accomplishment, like your new drinking habits. I congratulate you on both. They suit your new image.’

  ‘Bugger you, Blaine Malcomess!’ Shasa retorted defiantly, and raised the glass to his lips. He swished the whisky through his teeth, rinsing his mouth with it. Then he swallowed and shuddered as the raw spirit went down his throat and he exhaled the fumes noisily.

  ‘Mater sent you,’ he said flatly.