Jack of Diamonds (96 page)

I remembered Noel White’s warning about the poker professionals who periodically came into the single quarters to skin the unwary. It wasn’t quite how he’d put it but, nevertheless, I was pretty sure such a game would be rigged in some way. ‘Why do you ask?’ I replied.

‘In two weeks, Saturday night, is coming some friends. They wish to make poker school. Maybe you want to play also?’

‘For fun?’ I asked.

‘
Ja
, maybe a little money, only a few pounds, but maybe you win some.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ I said, then asked him about my medic team visiting. I’d bandaged a few heads after drunken Saturday-night fights and figured I was in the Krauts’ good books.

‘Maybe it is okay, but maybe also you want to play with our friends some poker,
ja
? You will enjoy,’ he assured me. He was obviously indicating that one favour deserved another.

‘When?’

‘Saturday two weeks; six o’clock at the recreation hut, drinks are on the house, compliments za committee.’

‘What are the stakes?’ I asked.

‘Okay. We start five-pound limit; zen after zat, the school, zey decide.’

I whistled, feigning shock., ‘Five pounds. Jesus, I dunno if I want to risk that much, it’s been a long time since I played. Sounds way out of my league, Hans.’

‘
Ach
, no, don’t vorry, ve are all friends togezzer, Jack.’

Yeah right,
I thought.

From what Noel White had told me, together with the odd bit of gossip I’d picked up around the place, the visiting players seemed to clean up regularly. Funny that. Two weeks gave me time to make a few enquiries. In fact, maybe, just maybe, I could get a little of our own back, I mean, something for the guys in the single quarters, who, like me, were kept firmly under the thumb of the Germans. ‘Can I think about it, Hans?’ I asked.

‘For sure, Jack. But ve
must
see you, Saturday, two veeks, okay?’ There it was . . .
you must obey!

Even better, I thought. I’ve been nominated as the sucker. ‘Any other locals playing?’ I asked, my expression a mixture of wariness and uncertainty.

‘
Ja
, always some,’ Hans replied. ‘You vill like zem, Jack.’ As always, liking them sounded compulsory.

I sighed. ‘Okay, count me in, Hans.’

‘
Gut
.
Ja
, okay, you can bring your
kaffir
gang zis Saturday, but only one hour.’ Hans Meyerhof was smiling like a fucking Cheshire cat or whatever the German equivalent might be.

If I’d been offered a million pounds to guess what would happen next, I wouldn’t have even gotten close. As arranged, Daniel, Samson, Milo and Jackson arrived outside my hut that Saturday, accompanied, to my astonishment, by Jacob.

‘Bonjour, Bwana Ingelosi
Doctor Canada!’ he said, laughing at my obvious surprise.

‘Jacob!
Je n’en reviens pas . . .
[I can’t believe . . .]’

And then I saw it. Perched on what remained of his severed arm was a parrot, a grey parrot that stood about twelve inches high, with red tail feathers.

I changed to Cikabanga for the benefit of the others. ‘What have you got on your arm?’ I exclaimed.

‘It is a gift of thanks from my people,
Bwana Ingelosi
Doctor Canada.’

‘Jacob, his father, he is chief,’ Daniel explained. ‘Many, many peoples, this tribe,
bwana
.’

I was incredulous. ‘A parrot, a gift? But how will I look after such a nice gift?’ I asked, trying hard to look pleased, so as not to hurt Jacob’s feelings. He’d obviously slipped over the border with the parrot and walked god knows how far to get to Luswishi River.

This produced laughter all round. ‘No,
Bwana Ingelosi
Doctor Canada, you must kill the parrot.’

‘What!’ I cried, taken completely by surprise. It wasn’t the most attractive bird I’d ever seen, but even so . . .

Jacob stroked the parrot’s breast with his forefinger and ruffled its neck feathers, then indicated the crop. ‘Inside is the gift,
bwana
.’ Then, in French, he said quietly, ‘
Diamants . . . bijoux
[Diamonds . . . jewels].’

‘Diamonds! You mean there is a diamond in its crop?’ I couldn’t believe what he was telling me.

‘Many
bwana
, many
diamants,
’ Jacob said, grinning.

They all nodded happily, the French word for diamond too similar to the English one for them not to understand. ‘You will be rich,
bwana
,’ Jackson laughed, then added, ‘I will kill for you this bird.’

In the meantime the parrot had hopped onto Jacob’s shoulder. I knew that in the Congo Africans who were caught mining alluvial diamonds were instantly shot. Jacob had risked his life, or those of some of his father’s tribe, to repay me for saving his own.

‘No, no, I cannot kill it!’ I protested.

‘It is only a bird,
Bwana
Jack. Inside is the gift,’ Jacob said.

‘Ah, is that like “
It’s only a
kaffir
, let him die?
”’ I mimicked.

There was a roar of approval from the team and Jackson broke into a handclapping dance. ‘Maybe, one day when you need help, like you helped me,
bwana
, then the diamonds will be there,’ Jacob said, laughing, accepting my point.

‘But how old is he? When will he die naturally? Perhaps then?’

Jacob laughed again. ‘We have him in the village, in my father house, since he was a little baby, but he is two-and-a-half years only. He will live many, many years, more than you even,
bwana
.’

The little parrot had cocked its head and I swear was looking at me. Then suddenly, almost as if making up its mind, it took off and landed on my right shoulder. ‘See,
Bwana
Jack, he knows you already,’ Jacob cried happily.

‘I shall call him Diamond Jim,’ I said, reaching up and stroking the parrot with my damaged hand. The little fellow immediately nibbled my hand and then nuzzled his head into my hand. It was mutual love at first sight.

After my team had gone and I’d thanked Jacob profusely, I procured a cardboard box from the mess kitchen, knocked holes in it, so Diamond Jim could breathe, then phoned Noel White and asked him if I could borrow his family car to go to Ndola. ‘Of course, Jack,’ he replied.

‘I need to buy a big birdcage. Where would I find one?’ I asked, aware he knew the town inside out.

‘The town’s closed, mate . . . I mean, the shops. Saturday arvo, everything’s shut tight as a duck’s arse. Don’t worry about the car. My neighbour’s kids used to keep half a dozen budgies but they’re down south, the kids, not the budgies, at university, so he gave them away to another family. I’m sure he’s still got the cage. Wait on, he’s working in his shed, I spoke to him half an hour ago, I’ll ask. Can you hang on a mo?’

Noel returned a couple of minutes later. ‘Sure thing, mate, you’re welcome to it. I’ll bring it around in the van. Gimme an hour or so.’ As usual, Noel didn’t question me. Why I wanted a birdcage was my business and he stuck, as always, to the three monkeys code.

I was somewhat apprehensive that the cage might be too big for my rondavel but, as it turned out, it fitted nicely. It was a large wooden and mesh box on four legs, just the right size for a parrot. ‘Perfect!’ I exclaimed. ‘How much do I owe your neighbour?’

Noel looked surprised. ‘He’s happy to get rid of it out of his shed, mate. Carpentry’s his hobby, he made it himself.’

‘No, I must,’ I insisted. ‘It’s a nice cage and he must have paid for the timber and wire mesh, never mind his time.’

Noel didn’t argue. ‘Gimme a quid and I’ll buy him a case of Lion Lager, he likes South African beer,’ he said. Then, seeing Diamond Jim perched on the windowsill, said, ‘Shit, that’s one ugly bloody bird!’

I laughed. ‘He’s a male.’

‘Thank god for that. Wouldn’t want a sheila lookin’ as bad as that! You gunna teach him to talk, Jack?’

‘Yeah, I hope to, but I know nothing about parrots.’

‘Me neither, except that he’s a Congo African Grey.’

‘Oh, thanks; that’s a start, anyhow.’

But, I must say, I wasn’t at all sure what I was going to do with a greyish-green and, I admit, far from attractive African Grey parrot with a purported stash of diamonds in his crop. Or, for that matter, what the Krauts might have to say about the possibility of parrot shit in my rondavel.
Ziz bird kak on za floor everyvere, you must kill him!
Ja
, ve must have clean!

With the poker game in two weeks, maybe I could negotiate, insist I do my own cleaning. But what about afterwards, if I managed to achieve what I had planned? Diamond Jim’s life might well prove to be a short and far from happy one.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

FROM THE GOSSIP I’D
picked up in the months I’d been at Luswishi River Copper Mine, I’d decided the poker games organised by the Krauts had to be rigged. The ‘visitors’ from across the Congo border cleaned up the locals way too frequently. They were either the best players I’d ever heard of or they were running some sort of scam. Even the best players don’t always pocket the cash. Moreover, as with most con men and cardsharps, they always left a little butter on the bread, allowing a few bucks . . . sorry, pounds . . . to fall into the laps of the locals; twenty-five or fifty pounds, certainly no more, just sufficient for the winners to boast about their win and make the game look straight.

While living in Las Vegas, and like most gamblers who take their game fairly seriously, I’d developed an almost obsessive interest in how the odds worked in just about every game of chance ever invented. Knowing guys like Johnny Diamond, I’d been exposed to what went on behind the scenes, and learned the immutable rule for gambling professionals: that if someone is defying the odds over time, then it isn’t luck. They are not beating the odds, they are simply altering them. This applies to any game of chance. Sure, casino games and the slots were designed so the punter would eventually lose, or rather the house had to win. But even in poker, a card game that involves a fair degree of skill, players are still subject to the same rule. Nobody, not even the best player in the world, wins constantly; everyone has bad days. Sometimes the cards just don’t fall the right way. You don’t get the card you need to fill an open-ended straight, the diamond doesn’t fall for a flush, or the third king doesn’t come to make three of a kind. Worse still, your opponent gets the cards he needs all damned night. That’s poker, always has been, always will be.

However, I know one more immutable human rule: if a school of poker players feels they’ve been cheated, then they’ll make sure the cheats get what’s coming to them, usually a very painful experience. The saying, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, pales into insignificance compared with when a bunch of ‘bunnies’ find out they’ve been cheated at cards.

I approached Noel White and asked him if he’d let me have the names of any guys who’d played in poker games organised by the Krauts against the visitors from across the border.

‘Jack, you know the rules. No names no pack drill. Besides, you told me you don’t play cards.’

I came clean then and told him the truth. He nodded. ‘And they’ve invited you to play and you’ve agreed?’ I nodded too and then told him I planned to find out if they were cheating. ‘Shit, Jack, are you sure you know what you’re doing? We’ve all thought like you but none of us has ever been able to find anything wrong. Sure, the French . . . er, Belgian guys clean up, but that’s because they’re good.’

I then explained. ‘If they do it every time and allow one or two of the local players to pocket a bit of a win, always one or two guys in a game who get ahead of their stake by twenty-five or fifty quid, then they’re cheating. Nothing more certain, buddy.’

‘Well, there’s Jannie Coetzee, of course. That’s why he’s pretty lenient with the Kraut fuckers in the single quarters. They keep quiet about him playing a game that’s illegal to play for money in the colony, so it doesn’t get to mine management.’ He shrugged. ‘And in return . . . well, you know the rest.’

‘What are you saying? Jannie Coetzee is in on the scam?’

Noel looked askance. ‘Jesus, no way! Jannie Coetzee is straight as a die. Most of the Afrikaner diamond drillers are; it’s just that they’re Afrikaners, a stubborn breed. They hate
kaffirs
and get angry when they’re conned or even contradicted. They’re what you’d call a
definite
bunch of blokes. You don’t want to get one who’s religious, he’ll tell you they’re one of the lost tribes of Israel or some such bullshit, but don’t try changing their opinions if you know what’s good for you. Know what I mean?’