Oh dear, Mrs Courtney! I hope you didn't think, I must sincerely apologize for having led you to think that I might question your ability to pay. There is absolutely no hurry.
We will post you the contract note in the usual way. Your credit with Rabkin and Swales is always good. I hope to confirm the purchase for you by tomorrow morning at the very latest. As you are no doubt aware, tomorrow is the final trading day before the Christmas recess. Her hands were shaking so violently that she had trouble setting the handset of the telephone on its hook.
What have I done? she whispered, and she knew the answer. She had committed a criminal act of fraud, the maximum penalty for which was ten years imprisonment.
She had just contracted a debt which she had no reasonable expectation of honouring. She was bankrupt, she knew she was bankrupt, and she had just taken on another half million pounds obligation. She was taken with a fit of remorse and she reached for the telephone to cancel the order, but it rang before she touched it.
Mrs Courtney, I have Mr Anderson of Hawkes and Giles on the line. Put him on, please Nigel, she ordered, and she was amazed that there was no tremor in her voice as she said, casually, Mr Anderson, I have a purchase order for you, please. By noon she had telephoned seven separate firms of stockbrokers in Johannesburg and placed orders for the purchase of gold-mining shares to the value of five and a half million pounds. Then at last her nerve failed her.
Nigel, cancel the other two calls, please, she said calmly, and ran to her private bathroom at the end of the passage with her hands over her mouth.
just in time she fell to her knees in front of the white porcelain toilet bowl and vomited into it a hard projectile stream, bringing up her terror and shame and guilt, heaving and retching until her stomach was empty and the muscles of her chest ached and her throat burned as though it had been scalded raw with acid.
Christmas Day had always been one of their very special days since Shasa was a child, but she awoke this morning in a sombre mood.
Still in their night clothes and dressing-gowns, she and
Shasa exchanged their presents in her suite. He had hand painted a special card for her, and decorated it with pressed wild flowers. His present to her was Francois Mauriac's new no!el Noeud de Vip&res and he had inscribed on the flyleaf: No matter what, we still have each other Shasa.
Her present to him was a leather flying helmet with goggles and he looked at her with amazement. She had made her opposition to flying very plain.
Yes, cheri, if you want to learn to fly, I'll not stop you. Can we afford it, Mater? I mean, you know- You let me worry about that. 'No, Mater. He shook his head firmly. I'm not a child any more. From now on I am going to help you. I don't want anything that will make it more difficult for you, for us. She ran to him and embraced him quickly, pressing her cheek to his so that he could not see the shine of tears in her eyes.
We are desert creatures. We will survive, my darling. But her moods swung wildly all the rest of that day as Centaine played the grande dame, the chatelaine of Weltevreden, welcoming the many callers at the estate, serving sherry and biscuits and exchanging gifts with them, laughing and charming, and then on the pretext of seeing to the servants hurrying away to lock herself in the mirrored study with the drawn curtains while she fought off the black moods, the doubts and the terrible crippling forebodings.
Shasa seemed to understand, standing in her place when she fell out, suddenly mature and responsible, rallying to her aid as he had never been called upon to do before.
just before noon one of their callers brought tidings which genuinely allowed Centaine to forget for a short time her own forebodings. The Rev. Canon Birt was the headmaster of Bishops and he took Centaine and Shasa aside for a few moments.
Mrs Courtney, you know what a name young Shasa has made for himself at Bishops. Unfortunately next year will be his last with us. We shall miss him. However, I am sure it will come as no surprise to you to hear that I have selected him to be head of school in the new term, or that the board of governors have endorsed my choice. Not in front of the Head, Mater, Shasa whispered, in an agony of embarrassment when Centaine embraced him joyously, but she deliberately kissed both his cheeks in the manner he designated French and pretended to disparage.
That is not all, Mrs Courtney. Canon Birt beamed on this display of maternal pride. I have been asked by the board of governors to invite you to join them. You will be the first woman, ah, the first lady, ever to sit on the board. Centaine was on the point of accepting immediately, but then like the shadow of the executioner's axe the premonition of impending financial catastrophe dulled her vision and she hesitated.
I know you are a very busy person, he was about to urge her.
am honoured, Headmaster, she told him. But there are personal considerations. May I give you my reply in the new year?
Just as long as that is not an outright refusal No, I give you my assurance. If I can, I will. When the last caller had been packed off, Centaine could lead the family, including Sir Garry and Anna and the very closest family friends, down to the polo field for the next act in their traditional Weltevreden Christmas festival.
The entire coloured staff was assembled there, with their children and aged parents and the estate pensioners too old to work, and all the others who Centaine supported. Every one of them was dressed in their Sunday best, a marvelous assortment of styles and cuts and colours, the little girls with ribbons in their hair and the small boys for once with shoes on their feet.
The estate band, fiddles and concertinas and banjoes, welcomed Centaine, and the singing, the very voice of Africa, was melodious and beautiful. She had a gift for each of them, which she handed over with an envelope containing their Christmas bonus. Some of the older women, emboldened by their long service and sense of occasion, embraced her, and so precarious was Centaine's mood that these spontaneous gestures of affection made her weep again, which set the other women off.
It was swiftly becoming an orgy of sentiment and Shasa hastily signalled the band to strike up something lively.
They chose Alabama', the old Cape Malay song that commemorated the cruise of the confederate raider to Cape waters when she captured the Sea Bride in Table Bay on 5
August, 1863.
There comes the Alabama Daar kom die Alabama Then Shasa supervised the drawing of the bung from the first keg of sweet estate wine, and almost immediately the tears dried and the mood became festive and gay.
