The Sound of Thunder (49 page)

Thus encouraged, Michael approached Sean one night when he was alone in his study. Sean was in a state of deep contentment induced by a meal from an enormous roast sirloin which he was digesting, by the fact that Ruth had finally agreed to his adoption of Storm and the change of her name from Friedman to Courtney, and by the prospect of joining Ruth in their gargantuan double bed just as soon as he finished his brandy and his hand-rolled Havana cigar.

“Come in, Michael. Sit down. Have a brandy. ” Sean greeted him genially, and almost defiantly Michael crossed the Persian carpet and laid a thick sheaf of papers on the desk in front of him.

“What’s this all about?” Sean smiled at him.

“Read it and you’ll see. ” Michael retreated to a chair across the room. Still smiling Sean glanced at the heading on the top sheet.

“Preliminary estimates and ground plan for proposed Tannin Extraction Plant. Lion Kop Estates.

The smile faded. Sean turned the page and as he read he began to frown and then to scowl. When at last he finished he relit his dead cigar and sat in silence for five minutes while he recovered from the shock.

“Who put you up to this?

“Nobody.

“Where would you sell your extract?”

“Page 5. The outlets are listed there-and the ruling prices over the last ten years.

“This plant needs 20,000 tons of bark a year-if we planted every foot of Lion Kop and Mahobo’s Kloof to wattle we could only supply half of that. ” “We’d buy the rest from the new estates along the valley-we could offer a better price than Jackson, because we’d save rail age to Pietermaritzburg. ” “Who would run the plant?”

an engineer.

“On paper you are,” Sean grunted. “What about water?”

“We’d dam the Baboon Stroom above the falls. ” For an hour Sean poked and prodded at the scheme, seeking for a soft spot. His agitation mounted as Michael calmly met each of his queries.

“All right,” Sean growled. “You’ve done your homework.

Now answer me this one. How the hell do you propose finding seventy thousand pounds to finance this little lot?”

Michael closed his eyes as though he were praying, his jaw was a hard, thrusting line. And suddenly Sean wondered why he had never noticed the strength in that face, the stubborn almost fanatical determination. Michael opened his eyes again and spoke softly.

“A loan on Lion Kop and Mahobo’s Kloof for twenty-five thousand, a notarial bond on the plant for as much again-and a public share issue on the balance.

Sean jumped up from his desk and roared.

“No!”

“Why not?” still calmly and reasonably.

y

“Because I’ve spent half my life in debt up to here!” Sean rubbed his own throat. “Because now at last I’m in the clear and I want to stay that way. Because I know what it feels like to have more money than I need, and I don’t like the feeling.

Because I’m happy just the way things are now-and I don’t want to catch another lion by the tail and have him cum round and claw the hell out of mee.” He stopped panting and then shouted: “Because a certain amount of money belongs to you, but more than that you belong to it.

Because I don’t want to be that wealthy again! ” Lean and fast as an angry leopard, Michael came out of his chair and smashed a balled fist on to the top of the desk. He glared across at Sean, flushed angry red under his tan, quivering like an arrow.

“Well, I do! Your only objection to my plan is that it’s sound, he blazed. Sean blinked in surprise and then rallied.

“If you get it, you won’t like it!” he bellowed, and Michael matched his volume.

“Let me be the judge of that!”

At that moment the door of the study opened and Ruth stood on the threshold and stared at them. They looked like a pair of game cocks with their hackles up.

What on earth is going on?” she demanded. Both Michael and’ Sean looked up guiltily, then slowly they relaxed. Michael sat down and Sean coughed awkwardly.

“We are just having a discussion, my dear.

“Well, you’ve woken Storm and just about torn the roof off.

Then she smiled and crossed to take Sean’s arm. “Why don’t you leave it until tomorrow. Then you can continue your discussion at twenty paces with pistols.”

The pygmies of the Ituri Forests hunt elephant with tiny arrows.

Once the barb is lodged they follow quietly and doggedly, camping night after night on the spoor until at last the poison works its way to the animal’s heart and brings it down. Michael had placed his arrow-head deep in Sean’s flesh.

At Lion Kop Ruth found a happiness she had never expected, had not believed existed.

Up to this time her existence had been ordered and determined by an adoring but strict father, and then in the same manner by Ben Goldberg. The few short years with Saul Friedman had been happy, but now they were as unreal as memories of childhood. Always she had been wrapped in a cocoon of wealth, hemmed in by social taboos and the dignity of the family. Fven Saul had treated her as a delicate child for whom all decisions must be made. Life had been placid and orderly, but deadly dull. Only twice she had rebelled, once to run away from Pretoria and again when she had gone to Sean in the hospital.

Boredom had been her constant companion.

But now suddenly she was mistress of a complex community.

The sensation had been a little overpowering at first and from habit she had appealed to Sean for him to make the fifty decisions that each day brought forward.

“I’ll make a bargain with you,” he answered. “You don’t tell me how to grow wattle and I’ll not tell you how to run the house-put the damn sideboard where it looks best. ” Hesitantly at first, then with growing confidence and at last with sureness and pride she made Lion Kop into a home of beauty and comfort. The coarse grass and scrub around the homestead fell back to make room for lawns and flower-beds, the outer walls of Lion Kop gleamed in a crisp new coat of whitewash.

Inside, the yellow-wood floors shone like polished amber setting off the vivid Bokhara carpets and draped velvet curtains.

After a few disastrous experiments the kitchens began to yield a succession of meals that moved Michael to raptures, and even Sean pronounced them edible.

Yet, with a dozen servants, she had time for other things. To read, to play with Storm and to ride. Sean’s wedding gift to her was a string of four golden palarninos. There was time also for long visits from and with Ada Courtney. The two of them established an accord stronger than that of mother and daughter.

There was time for dancing and barbecues, there was time for laughter and for long quiet evenings when she and Sean sat alone on the wide front stoep or in his study and talked of many things.

There was time for love.

Her body, hard from riding and walking, was also healthy and hot.

It was a sculpture sheathed in velvet and fashioned for love.

There was only one dark place in her happiness-Dirk Courte they.

When her overtures were met with sullenness and her small specially cooked gifts were rejected, she realized the cause of his antagonism. She sensed the bitter jealousy which was eating like a canker behind those lovely eyes and the passionately beautiful face.

For days she prepared what she would say to him.

Then she found the opportunity when he came into the kitchens while she was alone. He saw her and turned quickly to leave, but she stopped him.

“Oh, Dirk, please don’t go. I want to discuss something with you He came back slowly and leaned against the table. She saw how tall he had grown in the last year, his shoulders were thickening into the shape of manhood and his legs were strong and tapered from the narrow hips that he thrust forward in a calculated insolence.

“Dirk… ” she began and paused. Suddenly she was unsure of herself. This was not a child as she had imagined; there was a sensuality in that beautiful face she found disturbing-he carried his body with awareness, moving like a cat. Suddenly she was afraid, and she swallowed jerkily before she went on: “I know how difficult it has been for you-since Storm and I came to live here. I know how much you love your father, how much he means to you. But … ” She spoke slowly, her carefully prepared speech forgotten so that she had to grope for the words to explain. She tried to show him that they were not in competition for Sean’s love; that all of them-Ruth, Michael, Storm and Dirk-formed a whole; that their interests did not overlap, but that each of them gave to Sean and received from him a different kind of love. When at last she faltered into silence she knew he had not listened nor tried to understand.

“Dirk, I like you and I want you to like me.

With a thrust of his buttocks against the table, Dirk straightened up. He smiled then and let his eyes move down over her body, slowly “Can I go now?” he asked, and Ruth stiffened. Then she knew there was no compromise, that she would have to fight him.

“Yes, Dirk. You may go,” she answered. She knew with sudden clarity that he was evil, and if she lost this contest he would destroy her and her child. In that moment she was no longer afraid.

Catlike, Dirk seemed to sense a change in her. For a moment she thought she saw a flicker of doubt, of uncertainty in his eyes-then he turned away and sauntered out of the kitchen.

She guessed that it Would Come soon, but not as soon as it did.

Every afternoon Ruth would ride out into the plantations with Storm’s pony on a lead rein beside her. They made a game of finding Sean and Michael, following the labyrinth of roads that crisscrossed through the blocks of” trees, guided by the vague directions of the gangs of Zulus until finally they ran them down and delivered the canteens of coffee and the hamper of sandwiches. Then, all four of them would picnic on the soft carpet of dead leaves beneath the trees.

This afternoon, dressed in riding habit and carrying the hamper, Ruth came out into the kitchen yard. The young Zulu nursemaid was sitting in the shade of the kitchen wall flirting with one of the grooms. Storm was nowhere in sight, and Ruth asked sharply: “Where is Miss Storm?”

“She went with Nkosikana Dirk.” And Ruth felt the tingling premonition of danger.

“Where are they?” and the nursemaid pointed vaguely in the direction of the stables and outbuildings that sprawled away down the back slope of the hill.

“Come with me.” Ruth dropped the hamper and ran with her skirts gathered in one hand. She reached the first row of stables and hurried down them, glancing into each stall as she passed. Then into the feed rooms with the big concrete bins and the smell of oats and molasses and chopped lucerne mixing with the sharp tang of dung and dubbined leather, out again into the sunlight, running for the barns.

Storm screamed in terror, just once, but high and achingly clear, so the silence afterwards quivered with the memory of it.

The harness room. Ruth swirled in her run. God, please No!

Don’t let it happen. Please! Please!

She reached the open door of the harness room. It was gloomy and cool within the thick stone walls, and for a moment the scene made no sense to Ruth.

Her back wedged into the far corner, Storm stood with hands lifted to shield her face-small fingers rigid, splayed open, spread like the tip feathers of a bird’s wing. Her body shook silently with her sobs.

In front of Storm, squatting on his heels, Dirk leaned forward with one hand outstretched as though he offered a gift. He was laughing.

Then Ruth saw the thing in Dirk’s hand move and she froze with horror. It uncoiled from around his wrist, and slowly reached out towards Storm, its head cocked back in a half-loop of its body, tiny black tongue vibrating between the grinning pink lips.

Ruth screamed, and Dirk jumped to his feet and spun to face her with his right hand hidden behind his back.

–– . ….. .

From the corner Storm darted across the room and bailed her face in Ruth’s skirts, weeping piteously. Ruth picked her up and held her tight against her shoulder, but she never took her eyes off Dirk’s face.

“It’s only a rooi-slang. ” Dirk laughed again, but nervously.

“They’re harmless-I was only having a joke.” He brought the snake out from. behind his back, dropped it on to the stone flagged floor and crushed its head under the heel of his riding boot He kicked it away against the wall, then with an impatient gesture he brushed the black curls from his forehead and made to leave the room. Ruth stepped across to block his path.

“Nannie, take Miss Storm back to the house.” Gently Ruth handed the child to the Zulu nursemaid and closed the door after them and slid the bolt across.

Now it was darker in the room, two square shafts of sunlight filled with moving dust motes fell from the high windows, and the quiet was spoiled only by the sound of Ruth’s laboured breathing.

“I was only having a joke,” Dirk repeated, and grinned defiance at her. “I suppose you’ll run and tell my father?”

The walls of the room were studded with wooden pegs from which were suspended the harness and saddlery. Beside the door hung Sean’s raw-hide stock whips eight foot of braided leather tapering from the butt handle into nothingness. Ruth lifted one down from the rack and flicked the lash out to lie upon the floor between them.

“No, Dirk, I’m not going to tell your father. This thing is between you and me alone.

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to settle it.”

“How?” Still grinning, he placed his hands on his hips. Beneath rolled sleeves his upper arms bulged smooth and brown as though they had been freshly oiled.

“Like this,” Ruth flicked her skirt aside and stepped forward, using the whip underhand she sent the lash snaking out to coil around Dirk’s ankle and immediately she jerked back on it.

Taken completely off balance, Dirk went over backwards. His head hit the wall as he fel and he lay stunned.

To give herself space in which to wield the whip, Ruth moved into the centre of the room. Her anger was cold as dry ice, it gave strength to arms already finely muscled from riding, and it seared away all mercy. Now she was a female animal fighting for the survival of herself and her child.