is worth twenty thousand quid. ' 'You want me to buy sight unseen-no
questions asked? All right. I'll give you four thousand-gold.
'Seven.' 'Four and a half,' countered Izzy.
'You bastard. ' 'Four and a half.
'No, damn you. Five!' growled Sean.
'Five?
'Five!
'All right, five.
'Thanks, IZZy. ' 'Pleasure, Mr. Courtney.'
Sean described the location of his laager hurriedly.
'You can send someone out to pick it up. I am going to run for the
Natal border as soon as it's dark.
'Keep off the roads and well clear of the railway. Joubert has thirty
thousand men in Northern Natal, massed around Ladysmith and along the
Tugela heights. ' Goldberg went to the safe and fetched five small
canvas bags from it. 'Do you want to check?'
'I'll trust you as you trusted me. Good-bye, Izzy.' Sean dropped the
heavy bags down the front of his shirt and settled them under his
belt.
'Good luck, Mr. Courtney.'
There were two hours of daylight left when Sean finished paying his
servants. He pushed the tiny pile of sovereigns across the tailboard
of the wagon towards the last man and went with him through the
complicated ritual of farewell, the hand-clapping and clasping, the
repetition of the formal phrases-then he stood up from his chair and
looked around the circle. They squatted patiently, watching him with
wooden black faces-but reflected back from them he could sense Ins own
sorrow at this parting.
Men with whom he had lived and worked and shared a hundred hardships.
It was not easy to leave them now.
'It is finished,' he said.
' Yebho, it is finished.' They agreed in chorus and no one moved.
'Go, damn YOU! Slowly one of them stood and gathered the bundle of his
possessions, a kaross (or skin blanket), two spears, a cast-off shirt
that Sean had given him. He balanced the bundle on his head and looked
at Sean.
-Nkosi! ' he said and lifted a clenched fist in salute.
'Nonga,' Sean replied. The man turned away and trudged out of the
laager.
'nosi!'
'Hlubi.
'Nkosi!'
'Lim.
A roll call of loyalty-Sean spoke their names for the last time, and
singly they left the laager. Sean stood and watched them walk away in
the dusk. Not one of them looked back and no two men walked together.
It was finished.
Wearily Sean turned back to the laager. The horses were ready.
Three with saddles, two carrying packs.
