The Burning Shore - Smith Wilbur (читаем бесплатно книги полностью .txt) 📗

Then one afternoon, when she had almost despaired, Twenty-man-jones came down the mountain. Swart Hendrick saw him on the cliff path and came hurrying to her tent to warn her, so that she had time to rise from her cot, bathe her face and change her sweat-damp clothes.

When he strode into the stockade, she was seated at her camp table, concealing her great belly behind it, and she did not rise to greet him.

Well, madam, there is your report. He laid a thick folder on the table before her.

She untied the tapes and opened it. There, in his neat pedantic handwriting, was page after page of figures and numbers, and words she had never seen before. She turned the pages slowly while Twenty-man-Jones watched her sadly. Once he shook his head and looked as though he were about to speak, instead he pulled the handkerchief from his top pocket and noisily blew his nose.

Finally, she looked up at him.

I'm sorry, she whispered, I don't understand any of this. Explain it to me.

I'll be brief, madam. I sank forty-six prospect holes, each to a depth of fifty feet and sampled at six-foot intervals.

Yes, she nodded. But what did you find? I found that there is a layer of yellow ground overlaying the entire property to an average depth of thirty-five feet. Centaine felt dizzy and sick. Yellow ground sounded so ominous. Twenty-man-Jones broke off and blew his nose again. It was quite obvious to Centaine that he did not want to say the final words that would kill for ever her hopes and dreams.

Please, go on, she whispered.

Below this stratum we ran into- his voice fell and he looked as though his heart was aching for her -we ran into blue ground.

Centaine lifted her hand to her mouth, and she thought she would faint.

Blue ground. It sounded even worse than yellow ground, and the child heaved and struggled in her, and despair came down upon her like a flow of poisonous lava.

All for nothing, she thought, and she was no longer listening as he went on.

It's the classic pipe formation, of course, the decomposing breccia composite above with the harder impermeable slaty-blue formation below. So there were no diamonds after all, she said softly, and he stared at her.

Diamonds! Well, madam, I've worked out an average value of twenty-six carats to a hundred loads. I still don't understand, she shook her head stupidly. What does that mean, sir? What is a hundred loads? A hundred loads is approximately eighty tons of earth. And what does twenty-six carats mean? Madam, the Jagersfontein assays at eleven carats to a hundred loads, even the Wesselton goes only sixteen carats to a hundred loads, and they are the two richest diamond mines in the world. This property is almost twice as rich. So there are diamonds after all? She stared at him, and from the side pocket of his alpaca jacket he took a bundle of small buff-coloured envelopes, tied together with string, and placed these on top of the report folder.

Please do not mix them up, Mrs Courtney, the stones from each prospect hole are in separate envelopes, all carefully notated. With fingers that felt numb and swollen, she untied the string and fumbled open the top envelope. She poured the contents into her hand. Some of the stones were chips not much bigger than sugar grains, one was the size of a large ripe pea.

Diamonds? she asked again, wanting his assurance.

Yes, madam, and of peculiarly good quality on the average. She stared dumbly at the little pile of stones in her hand, they looked murky and small and mundane.

You will excuse the liberty, madam, but may I ask you a question? You might of course, choose not to answer. She nodded.

Are you a member of a syndicate, do you have partners in this venture? She shook her head.

You mean, you are the sole holder and owner of this property? That you discovered this pipe and pegged the claims entirely on your own account? She nodded again.

Then, he shook his head mournfully, at this moment, Mrs Courtney, you are probably one of the wealthiest women in the world.

Twenty-man-Jones remained at Lion Tree Camp for three days longer.

He went over every line of his report with her, explaining any item of which her understanding was unclear. He opened each of the packages of sample stones, and picked out unusual or typical diamonds with a pair of jeweller's forceps, laid them on the palm of her hand and pointed out their special features to her.

Some of these are so small, do they have any worth at all? She rolled the sugar-grain chips under the forefinger.

Those industrials, madam, will be your bread and butter. They will pay your costs. And the big jewellery grade stones, like this one, will be the jam on top of it all. Strawberry jam, madam, of the very best quality Crosse and Blackwell, if you like! It was as close as she ever heard him come to a witticism, and even then his expression was morose.

The last section of his report was twenty-one pages of recommendations for the exploitation of the property.

You are extremely fortunate, madam, to be able to open this pipe systematically. All the other great diamond pipes, from Kimberly to Wesselton, were pegged by hundreds of individual miners, and each started working independently of his neighbour's efforts. The results was utter chaos. He shook his head and tugged at his fluffy white sideburns mournfully. Hundreds of plots each thirty feet square all going down at different speeds, with roadway in between the a tangle of wires and pulleys and buckets connecting each to the lip. Chaos, madam, pandemonium! Costs inflated, men killed in cave-ins, thousands of extra labourers required, madness! He looked up at her. While you, madam, have here the opportunity of constructing a model working, and this report, he laid his hand upon it, explains exactly how you should do it. I have even surveyed the ground and put in numbered pegs to guide you. I have calculated your volumes of earth at each stage. I have laid out your first incline shaft for you, and explained how you should plan each level of excavation. Centaine broke in on his dissertation. Dr TwentymanJones, you keep saying "you". You don't expect me personally to perform all these complicated tasks, do you? Good Lord, no! You will have to have an engineer, a good man, with experience of earth-moving. Ultimately I envisage that you will be employing several engineers and many hundreds, possibly thousands, of men at thehe hesitated -do you have a name for the property? The Courtney Minc, perhaps? She shook her head. The H'ani Mine, she told him.

Unusual. What does it mean? It is the name of the San woman who guided me here."Very appropriate, then. Now, as I was saying, you will require a good engineer to put in hand the initial developments that I have outlined. Do you have a man in mind, sir? Difficult, he mused.

Most of the best men are employed permanently by De Beers, and of the others the one that comes to mind first was recently crippled in a blasting accident. He thought for a moment. Now then, I have heard good reports of a young Afrikaner chappie.

Never worked with him myself, damn me, what was his name again. Oh, yes, that's it. De La Rey! No! Centaine exclaimed violently. I'm sorry, madam. Do you know him? Yes. I don't want him."As you wish, I'll try and think of someone else. In her cot that night Centaine tossed from side to side, trying to get comfortable, trying to adjust the suffocating weight of the child so that she could sleep, and she thought of Twenty-man-Jones's suggestion and sat up slowly.

Why not? she said aloud in the darkness. He must return here, anyway. A stranger coming here at this time might see more than I would wish him to. And she cupped both hands under her belly. It need only be for the initial development stages. I'll write Abraham Abrahams right now and tell him to send Lothaff And she lit the lantern and waddled across the tent to her camp table.