These, in order of importance, were, first, the decision whether o not to exercise the option on the new Silver River mining'prospect ir the Orange Free State. Then there was the trouble with the company's chemical factory on the Natal coast. A local pressure group was kicking up a rumpus about poisoning the sea bed and reefs in the area where the factory was discharging effluent into the sea. And finally, there was David's crazy fixation, from which Shasa was finding it difficult to dislodge him, that they should spend some.
thing over a quarter of a million pounds on one of those new elephant ine electric calculators.
'The Yanks did all the calculations for the atomic bomb with one of them,' David argued. 'And they call them computers, not calculators,' he corrected Shasa.
'Come on, Davie, what are we going to blow up?' Shasa protested.
'I'm not designing an A-bomb.' 'Anglo-American have one. It's the wave of the future, Shasa.
We'd better be on it.' 'It's a quarter-million-pound wave, old son,' Shasa pointed out.
'Just when we need every penny for Silver River.' 'If we'd had one of these computers to analyse the geological drilling reports from Silver River, we'd have already saved ourselves almost the entire cost of the thing, and we'd be a lot more certain of our final decision than we are how.' 'How can a machine be better than a human brain?' 'Just come and have a_look at it,' David pleaded. 'The university has just installed an IBM 701. I have arranged a demonstration r you this afternoon.' 'Okay, Davie,' Shasa capitulated. 'I'll look, but that doesn't mean I'm buying.' The IBM supervisor in the basement of the engineering faculty building was no more than twenty-six years of age.
'They're all kids,' David explained. 'It's a young people's science.' The supervisor shook hands with Shasa, and then removed her horn-rimmed spectacles. Suddenly Shasa's interest in electronic computers burgeoned. Her eyes were clear bright green and her hair was the colour of wild honey made from mimosa blossom. She wore a green sweater of tight-fitting angora wool, and a tartan skirt which left her smooth tanned calves bare. It was immediately obvious that she was an expert, and she answered all Shasa's questions without hesitation in a tantalizing southern drawl.
'Marylee has a master's in electrical engineering from MIT,' David murmured, and Shasa's initial attraction was spiced with respect.
'It's so damned big,' he protested. 'It fills the entire basement. The ruddy thing is the size of a four-bedroomed house.' 'Cooling,' Marylee explained. 'The heat build-up is enormous.
'Most of the bulk is oil cooling baffles.' 'What are you processing at the moment?' 'Professor Dart's archaeological material from the Sterkfontein caves. We are correlating about two hundred thousand observations of his against over a million from the sites in East Africa.' 'How long will that take you?' 'We started the run twenty minutes ago, we'll finish it before we shut down at five o'clock.' 'That's in fifteen minutes,' Shasa chuckled. 'You're having me on!' 'I wouldn't mind,' she murmured speculatively, and when she smiled her mouth was wide and moist and kissable.
'You say you shut down at five?' he asked. 'When do you start up again?' 'Eight tomorrow morning.' 'And the machine stands idle overnight?' Marylee glanced down the length of the basement. David was at the other end watching the print-out and the hum of the computer covered their voices.
'That's right. It will stand idle all tonight. Just like me.' Clearly she was a lady who knew exactly what she wanted, and how to get it. She looked at him directly, challengingly.
'We can't have that,' Shasa shook his head seriously. 'One thing my mummy taught me was 'Waste not, want not'. I know a place called the Stardust. The band is far beyond belief. I will wager a pound to a weekend in Paris that I can dance you until you plead for mercy.' 'It's a bet,' she agreed as seriously. 'But do you cheat?' 'Of course,' he answered. David was coming back and Shasa went on smoothly and professionally. 'What about running costs?' 'All in, including insurance and depreciation, a little under four thousand pounds a month,' she told him with a matching businesslike expression.
As they said goodbye and shook hands, she slipped a card into Shasa's palm. 'My address,' she murmured.
'Eight o'clock?' he asked.
'I'll be there,' she agreed.
In the Cadillac, Shasa lit a cigarette and blew a perfect smoke ring that exploded silently against the windscreen.
'Okay, Davie, contact the dean of engineering first thing tomorrow. Offer to hire that monster all its down time from five o'clock in the evening until eight the next morning, and weekends also.
Offer him four thousand a month and point out that he'll get the use of it for free. We'll be paying all his costs.' David turned to him with a startled expression and almost drove up on to the pavement, then corrected with a wild swing of the wheel.
'Why didn't I think of that?' he wondered when he had the Cadillac under control.
'You have to get up earlier,' Shasa grinned and then went on, 'Once we know how much time we will need on the thing, we'll sublet the surplus time to a couple of other non-competitor companies who must be thinking about buying a computer themselves. That way we'll get our own usage free, and when IBM have improved the design and made the damned thing smaller, then we will buy our own.' 'Son of a gun.' David shook his head in awe. 'Son of a gun.' Then with sudden inspiration, Tll get young Marylee on our payroll --' 'No,' said Shasa sharply. 'Get someone else.' David glanced at him again and his excitement faded. He knew his brother-in-law too well.
'You won't be taking up Matty's invitation to dinner this evening, will you?' he asked morosely.
'Not this evening,' Shasa agreed. 'Give her my love and apologies.' 'Just be careful. It's a small own and you are a marked man,' David warned as he dropped Shasa off at the Carlton Hotel where the company kept a permanent suite. 'Do you think you will be fit for work tomorrow?' 'Eight o'clock,' Shasa told him. 'Sharp!' By mutual agreement the dance competition at the Stardust was declared a draw, and Shasa and Marylee got back to his Carlton suite a little after midnight.
Her body was young and smooth and hard and just before she drifted off to sleep with her thick honey-coloured hair spread on his bare chest, she whispered drowsily, 'Well, I guess that's about the only thing my IBM 701 can't do for me.' Shasa was in the Courtney mining offices fifteen minutes before David the next morning. He liked to keep everybody on their toes.
Their offices occupied the entire third floor of the Standard Bank building in Commissioner Street. Although
