On his twenty-third birthday, control of the sheep ranches in the
Karroo, the cattle ranch in South West Africa and Jabulani, the
sprawling game ranch in the Sabi-Sand block, passed to him, their
management handled smoothly by his trustees.
On his twenty-fifth birthday the number two fund interest would divert
to him, in addition to a large block of negotiable paper and title in
two massive urban holdings, office and supermarket complexes, and a
highrise housing project.
At age thirty the next fund opened for him, as large as the previous two
combined, and transfer to him for the first of five blocks of Morgan
stock would begin.
From then onwards, every five years until age fifty further funds
opened, further blocks of Morgan stock would be transferred. It was a
numbing procession of wealth that stretched ahead of him, daunting in
its sheer magnitude; like a display of too much rich food, it seemed to
depress appetite.
David drove fast southwards, with the Michelin metallics hissing
savagely on the tarmac, and he thought about all that wealth, the great
golden cage, the insatiable maw of Morgan Group yawning open to swallow
him so that, like the cell of a jelly fish, he would become a part of
the whole, a prisoner of his own abundance.
The prospect appalled him, adding a hollow sensation in his belly to the
pulse of pain that beat steadily behind his eyes, testimony to the
foolhardiness of trying, to drink level with Colonel Rastus Naude.
He pushed the Maserati harder, seeking the twin opiates of power and
speed, finding comfort and escape in the rhythms and precision of
driving very fast, and the hours flew past as swiftly as the miles so it
was still daylight when he let himself into Mitzi's apartment on the
cliffs that overlooked Clifton beach and the clear green Atlantic.
Mitzi's apartment was chaos, that much had not changed. She kept open
house for a string of transitory guests who drank her liquor, ate her
food and vied with each other as to who could create the most
spectacular shambles.
In the first bedroom that David tried there was a strange girl with dark
hair curled on the bed in boys pyjamas, sucking her thumb in sleep.
With the second room he was luckier, and he found it deserted, although
the bed was unmade and someone had left breakfast dishes smeared with
congealed egg upon the side table.
David slung his bag on the bed and fished out his bathing costume. He
changed quickly and went out by the side stairs that spiralled down to
the beach and began to run, a trot at first, and then suddenly he
sprinted away, racing blindly as though from some terrible monster that
pursued him. At the end of Fourth beach where the rocks began, he
plunged into the icy surf and swam out to the edge of the kelp at
Bakoven point, driving overarm through the water and the cold lanced him
to the bone, so that when he came out he was blue and shuddering. But
the hunted feeling was gone and he warmed a little as he jogged back to
Mitzi's apartment.
He had to remove the forest of pantihose and feminine underwear that
