Sunset at Sheba (5 page)

The sun seemed to boil in the diamond-bright sky, making the shadows harsh and mirror-clear, so that every single pebble on the dusty track had its own oasis of sharp shade, its own shimmering lines of heat. Beyond the eucalyptuses the flat roofs of Plummerton Sidings glinted like fragments of bright glass among the trees that fringed the railway yards and the shining ribbon of metal that ran to the north and south until it disappeared from sight. Along its track, the wide rolling land stretched unbroken almost from sea to sea, from the south where its tip broke the streams of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, separating the waters like the blunt prow of a ship, away to the north beyond the Vaal and the Limpopo, onwards and upwards to Rhodesia and even farther.

They had been moving quietly, indifferent to any need to hurry, and the man had been content to let the old horse in the shafts set its own pace. He turned his head slowly to look at the woman who was sleeping against his shoulder, her mouth open, her hat pushed sideways over her face. She was a good-looking woman with clear plump features, which the over-generous make-up that was rubbing off on his sleeve couldn’t disguise. Her feet were braced against the footboard, and her skirt was above her knees in a froth of dusty muslin and pink ribbon, pulled up for coolness, showing long well-shaped legs in black silk stockings and pink shoes.

He nudged her sharply and she woke quickly, reaching for her hat. She sat up, blinking rapidly and grabbing for a hold as he flicked the reins and set the horse in motion again with a jerk.

‘We home yet, Sammy?’ she asked.

He answered without turning his head, in a soft voice that had the same smooth gentleness as his movements. ‘We aren’t going home, Polly,’ he pointed out. ‘Remember? We’re going to Plummerton Sidings.’

He pointed with a jerk of his thumb and the woman nodded and disconsolately straightened her hat, a small straw affair decorated with cherries and flowers and what appeared to be a spreadeagled bird, then she rubbed her hand across her face and stretched, the cotton blouse she wore taut across her breasts and showing the strength and roundness of her body.

She looked round her, still blinking, drowsy and beautiful with sleep and dizzy with the sunshine, then she nodded. ‘I remember now,’ she said slowly, ‘I fell asleep.’ She studied the little town rising out of the dip with disapproval. ‘It looks worse than Plummerton West,’ she commented heavily. She stared ahead again for a moment then she yawned in a tear-starting jaw-cracking way and licked her lips distastefully. ‘Lor’,’ she said, ‘I feel as old as the hills. It’s the brandy, I suppose.’

Sammy indicated her uncovered knees.

‘Better fix your clothes, Polly,’ he said. ‘They aren’t going to like seeing you like that.’

Polly looked at him placidly. ‘Aren’t they?’ she said. ‘Well, it’s cooler this way, and if people don’t like me with my skirts above my knees, there’s not much point in my being here, is there? They’re nice legs anyway,’ she added with a warm luxurious pride.

Sammy said nothing, and went on whittling at a piece of stick. He had been whittling all afternoon without speaking while she slept, letting the little mare find her own way, picking up a fresh chip of wood out of the back of the cart whenever he needed one. Polly had turned her eyes towards the Sidings again and now, as she woke completely, her countenance brightened hopefully. ‘I bet a girl could get a job here,’ she said with growing enthusiasm. ‘Lots of railwaymen. They’re well paid and they like to spend. Bound to be plenty of work for a girl in the bars round the station. Probably plenty of fun too. Maybe I’ll stop off for a bit.’

Sammy sliced off a sliver of wood from the stick he was cutting, and watched it spin to the ground. ‘You promised Plummer’s man you’d clear off,’ he pointed out. ‘You said you’d go. I heard you.’

‘I’ve changed me mind,’ she said comfortably. ‘I needn’t stay long. Just till I earn the fare south.’

‘You should have taken the money they offered you. Then you wouldn’t have to earn it. Why didn’t you?’

She looked wistful, puzzled at her own impulsive patriotism. ‘I dunno,’ she said. ‘They could have afforded it. Anyway, I didn’t. But I can earn some here - enough to get to Kimberley anyway. That’s a real place. Easy to get a job
there.
Plenty of bars - bigger bars than Plummerton West. I can save up the fare to the Cape even. I’ll earn it quick in Kimberley.’

He was looking up at her and she faced him calmly, her large clear eyes devoid of secrets. ‘Go on, look,’ she said without anger. ‘You know damn’ well how I’ll earn it. Same as always. The only way I’ve ever known. That’s how.’

Sammy flicked a shaving of wood from his trousers, his face inscrutable, and Polly turned her head away, studying the landscape, calm again.

‘You’re a fine one to have fancy ideas,’ she said, once more without rancour, her soft fine eyes on the horizon. ‘Your record’s not exactly unblemished. It’s easy to criticise a fancy girl and plenty of people do, but it’s not so hard to become one if you’ve no Ma and no birth certificate and your Pa does nothing but booze. You get stinking with some bloke in a bar because you’ve no one to tell you better, and before you know where you are you find yourself in bed with him and it becomes a habit. The way
you
talk, anybody’d think I was like them Bree Street coloured gals who used to auction themselves off to the highest bidder. Now
that’s
what I call brassy.’ She paused and glanced round at him. ‘Men never understand,’ she announced maternally. ‘Especially young ‘uns like you, still wet behind the ears.’

He lowered the knife and the piece of wood. ‘I’m as old as you,’ he said.

‘You’re three years younger. I ought to know. I had to look after you.’

‘What’s three years?’

‘Enough.’ She faced him again. ‘I don’t know what
you’ve
got to grumble about,’ she said.
‘You
never encouraged me to stay home before. Dashing off shooting. You think a girl wants to sit around a place like that rotten old farm we had with only Pa drinking hisself silly all the time to keep her company? It’s no wonder I got lonely and went looking for a bit of fun.’

She stopped dead, her voice wistful. ‘And now I’ve had enough fun,’ she said slowly. ‘I want to go to Kimberley.’ Her voice rose on a plaintive note, her eyes gentle and pleading with him. ‘I’m sick of dust. I’m sick of men. I’m sick of the only shops being the ones that sell saddles and mining machinery. I want some pretty clothes. I’ve never had any pretty clothes. Not real ones - from a smart shop like the ones they have in Commissioner Street and Adderley Street in Cape Town. Clothes that make me look nice. I’ve got a good start and it’s a pity to waste it.’ She smoothed her blouse across her breast. ‘That’s real, y’know,’ she pointed out. ‘Not whalebone, like some folks’.’

She stared at him for a moment, as if she expected him to dispute it, then her eyes became wistful again. ‘All I’ve ever had,’ she said, ‘is just a lot of rough blokes, who think they’re gents, all staring at me when I danced and pawing me when I didn’t. And dust. All the time, just dust and sunshine. That’s all you get round here. No wonder I’ve got a skin like old boots.’

‘Your skin’s all right,’ Sammy said quietly.

She looked at him with an oddly tender expression on her face for a moment. ‘Thanks, Sammy boy. Nice of you to say so. Only I know it isn’t true. I read a book once,’ she went on. ‘Women in Cape Town and Durban, they’ve got parasols. They use ‘em all the time. Yet they laugh themselves sick up here when I use one to keep from getting all burned up. They’ve got pretty clothes, too - and nice gardens, with flowers in -- and trees. I wouldn’t mind having a garden with flowers and trees.’

‘Who’s going to look after you down there?’

She looked up accusingly. ‘Who’s going to look after me
up here?’
she asked calmly.

‘I would.’

‘You never shaped much as if you wanted to,’ she pointed out calmly. ‘Riding round enjoying yourself, bangin’ off your gun like billy-o all over the veld, killing things, when you should have been home.’

Sammy started whittling again. It was an old dispute which had been going on between them for years and it would never be settled.

‘I’ll drop you at the Sidings as we go through,’ he said flatly.

He was watching her out of the corner of his eye, with a trace of caution, as though he expected her to develop her theme but she was regarding him anxiously now, seeming younger and less certain of herself and of him.

‘Where are you going, Sammy?’ she asked.

‘South-west,’ he said. ‘Out Namaqualand way.’

‘That’s close by them Germans. They’ve been having fighting that way. They nobbled Grant out that way.’ She paused, her kind heart awed by the thought of war and wounds and pain. ‘Besides’ - she studied him, concern in her eyes - ‘there’s
nothing
out there, Sammy. There’s nothing west of the railway track at Plummerton Sidings - only the Wilderness. Nothing till you get to Upington. And then not much. It’s bare out there. I’ve heard Pa say so, when he had the cart and used to sell things. No people. He’d never go there.’

‘Your Pa was after trade.’ He grinned. ‘It’s not for trade they’re sending me there.’

She was silent and he gestured with his knife towards the railway track.

‘It’s Plummer country over there,’ he went on shrewdly. ‘It has been ever since he annexed Dhanziland. He’s always had the say-so round here and west of the track. Besides, there’s nobody to talk to. Nobody to know I ever knew Willie Plummer. No Fabricius to find me and get me to spin the sort of yarn they don’t want me to spin. Nice safe country.’

Her eyes were worried now. ‘You must have been barmy,’ she said glumly.

‘I didn’t know a lot of silly fatheads would take it into their heads to start a rebellion,’ he defended himself. ‘I only did a carrying job for Willie Plummer. That’s what I did. I took his money and carried what he gave me without asking questions. I didn’t know who was getting them.’

‘That old fool,’ Polly said heavily. ‘Doing this to a girl. He must have been crackers, using my place. And so must we, not to keep an eye on him, letting ourselves get mixed up with money. You get out of your depth.’ She turned to him again, her face softened into anxiety once more, clearly unable to concentrate on her own worries for her thoughts of him. ‘What’ll you live on, Sammy?’

He grinned. ‘That’s the least of my troubles,’ he said. ‘There’s plenty of game. That’s one thing. No need to worry about food so long as you’ve got a gun.’

‘A gun’s not enough. You’ll need a horse.’

‘I’ve got this one. I’ll pick up another in the Sidings for riding. Or mebbe a mule. A mule can work a hoss into the ground. I’ve got plenty of money. Winter gave me plenty.’

She shrugged. ‘Suits me,’ she said, unconvinced. ‘Sooner it was you than me, though.’

By the time they had reached the outskirts of the town, she had forgotten her worries and had picked up a concertina from the back of the cart and was singing softly to herself in a detached way, as though she knew no one was listening to her.

Then she paused, staring at the little town ahead again with an expression of alarm on her face.

‘It’s not my idea of a big city,’ she observed. She studied it for a moment, then shrugged and went on singing, unable to be unhappy for long.

After a while, however, she turned her attention to Plummerton Sidings again, sitting uncomfortably on the seat beside Sammy, the concertina limp in her hands, staring ahead with an expression of marked distaste.

It was only a small place, set solidly athwart the old missionary road opened by Moffat and Livingstone and finally Rhodes, its chief reason for existence being the shimmering steel lines that had been run there from Kimberley in 1894, and onwards in the following years to Bulawayo. Its spreading mass of sidings and engine sheds had made it invaluable to the British in the Boer War.

It had a few hangdog streets, most of them still unpaved, and in the broad dusty area of its square a brand-new garage backed up by the still-necessary livery stables where the rigs stood outside in the sunshine.

The whole place looked as though it had been scattered carelessly across the veld, for in that vast expanse of land no one had been concerned with saving space when the town grew up, and only near the railway track was there any suggestion of neighbourliness. Beyond the railway line, the dun veld stretched desolately towards the river, a muddy trickle under the iron bridge, the rocks smooth and black in the river bed.

Sammy let the horse move at its own pace through the streets into the outskirts of the town. Behind the solitary hotel, among the pomegranates and the brick-edged flowerbeds, and the fallen twisted leaves, a dove was moaning heartbrokenly.

The area round the station seemed emptied of white men in the hot silence of the afternoon. A group of Kaffirs and yellow-faced Hottentots with their peppercorn hair dozed in the shade like bundles of old rags, their heads down on their knees, their dogs as though dead in the dust. A few Indians trying to sell chickens as skinny as themselves stood thin-legged as storks in the sunshine.

There were soldiers billeted near the station water towers in a shabby warehouse just off the splintery platform, volunteers in raspy grey-back shirts, Bedford cords and spurred brown boots - Dutch and native-born South Africans mostly, with a sprinkling of British and other nationalities -- farmers, clerks, diggers and railwaymen, the men Botha was trying to use against De Wet’s rebels instead of Imperial troops in the hope of keeping the uprising a private quarrel; deeply-burned men, hard-bitten and fined down by hard living to a curious uniformity of countenance. Their horses were huddled together round a hitching post, flapping at the afternoon flies with their tails, while in the shade a couple of seconded Army Service Corps mechanics tinkered with the engine of a big Rolls-Royce, a lean-looking vehicle, painted brown and stripped of unnecessary fittings to make room for racks for petrol cans.

For the rest, the street was empty, silent and still in the afternoon sun, only the long-drawn-out hiss of a standing engine beyond the sheds disturbing the silence.