it. That is how it happened? Centaine recognized the escape that Anna was offering her, and she yearned to take it.
He forced you, my baby, didn't he? Tell Anna. No, Anna. He did not force me. You allowed him, you let him? Anna's expression was formidable.
I was so lonely. Centaine sank down on to the stool and covered her face with her hands. I had not seen another white person for almost two years, and he was so kind and beautiful, and I owed him my life. Don't you understand, Anna? Please say you understand! Anna enfolded her in those thick powerful arms, and Centaine pressed her face into her soft warm bosom. Both of them were silent, shaken and afraid.
You cannot have it, Anna said at last. We will have to get rid of it. The shock of her words racked Centaine, so she trembled afresh and tried to hide from the dreadful thought.
We cannot bring another bastard to Theuniskraal, they would not stand for it. The shame would be too much.
They have taken one, but Mijnheer and the general could not take another. For the sake of all of us, Michael's family and Shasa, for yourself, for all those whom I love, there is no choice in the matter. You must get rid of it.'Anna, I can't do that. Do you love this man who put it in your belly? Not now. Not any more. I hate him, she whispered. Oh God, how I hate him!
Then get rid of his brat before it destroys you and Shasa and all of us.
The dinner was a nightmare. Centaine sat at the bottom of the long table and smiled briefly, though her eyes burned with shame and the bastard in her belly felt like an adder, coiled and ready to strike.
The tall elderly man beside her droned on in a particularly rasping and irritating tone, directing his monologue almost exclusively at Centaine. His bald head had been turned by the sun to the colour of a plover's egg, but his eyes were strangely lifeless, like those of a marble statue.
Centaine could not concentrate on what he was saying, and it became unintelligible as though he were speaking an unknown language. Her mind wandered off to pluck and worry at this new threat that had loomed up suddenly, a threat to her entire existence and that of her son.
She knew that Anna was right. Neither the general nor Garry Courtney could allow another bastard into Theuniskraal. Even if they were able to condone what she had done, and it was beyond reason or hope that they could, even then they could not allow her to bring disgrace and scandal not only upon Michael's memory, but upon the entire family. It was not possible, Anna's way was the only escape open to her.
She jumped in her seat and almost screamed aloud.
Below the level of the dinner-table, the man beside her had placed his hand upon her thigh.
Excuse me, Papa. She pushed back her chair hurriedly, and Garry looked down the length of the table with concern. I must go through for a moment, and she fled into the kitchen.
Anna saw her distress and ran to meet her, then led her into the pantry. She locked the door behind them.
Hold me, please Anna, I am so confused and afraid and that awful man - she shuddered.
Anna's arms quieted her, and after a while she whispered, You are right, Anna. We must get rid of it We will talk about it tomorrow, Anna told her gently. Now bathe your eyes with cold water and go back to the dining-room before you make a scene. Centaine's rebuff had served its purpose, and the tall, bald-headed mining magnate did not even glance at her when she came back to her seat beside him. He was addressing the woman on his other hand, but the rest of the company was listening to him with the attention due to one of the richest men in the world.
Those were the days, he was saying. The country was wide open, a fortune under every stone, by gad. Barnato started with a box of cigars to trade, bloody awful cigars too, and when Rhodes bought him out he gave him a cheque for $3,000,000, the largest cheque ever issued up to that time, though I can tell you I myself have written a few bigger since thenAnd how did you start, Sir Joseph? Five pounds in my pocket and a nose to sniff out a real diamond from a schlenter, that's how I got my start.'And how do you do that, Sir Joseph? How do you tell a real diamond? The quickest way is to dip it into a glass of water, my dear. If it comes out wet, it's a schlenter. If it comes out dry, it's a diamond. The words passed Centaine without seeming to leave any impression, for she was so preoccupied, and Garry was signalling her from the head of the table that it was time to take the ladies through.
However, Robinson's words must have made a mark deep in her subconscious, for the next afternoon as she sat in the gazebo staring unseeingly out across the sundrenched lawns, fiddling miserably with H'ani's necklace, rubbing the stones between her fingers, almost without conscious t ught she suddenly leaned over the table and from the crystal carafe poured a tumbler full of spring water.
Then she lifted the necklace over the tumbler and slowly lowered it into the water. After a few seconds she lifted it out and studied it distractedly. The coloured stones glistened with water, and then suddenly her heart began to race. The white stone, the huge crystal in the centre of the necklace, was dry.
She dropped the necklace back into the water and pulled it out again. Her hand began to shake. Like the breast of a swan, shining white, the stone had shed even the tiniest droplets, although it glistened more luminously than the wet stones that surrounded it.
Guiltily she looked around her, but Shasa slept on his back with a thumb deep in his mouth and the lawns were deserted in the noonday heat. For the third time she lowered the necklace into the glass and when the white stone came out dry once again, she whispered softly, H'ani, my beloved old grandmother, will you save us again? It is possible that you are still watching over me?
Centaine could not consult the Courtney family doctor in Ladyburg, so she and Anna planned a journey to the capital town of the province of Natal, the sea port of Durban. The pretext for the journey was the perennial feminine favourite, shopping to be done.
They had hoped to get away from Theuniskraal on their own, but Garry would not hear of it.
Leave me behind, forsooth! You've been on at me, both of you, about a new suit. Well, it's a fine excuse for me to visit my tailor, and while I'm about it I might even pick up a pair of bonnets or some other litt e gewgaws for two ladies of my acquaintance. So it was a full-scale family expedition, with Shasa and his two Zulu nannies, with both the Fiat and the Ford needed to convey them all down the winding dusty hundred and fifty miles of road to the coast. They descended on the Majestic Hotel on the beach front of the Indian Ocean, and Garry took the two front suites.
