expended Jim could make more with hippopotamus fat and wood ash.
For the maintenance of the wagons there were two drums of tar to be mixed with animal fat to grease the wheel hubs, heavy coils of rawhide
trek ropes, ri ems and straps, yokes and yoke-pins, lynch-pins for the wheel hubs, rolls of canvas and coir matting to repair the tents. One of the after chests contained a selection of tools such as augers, brace and bits, wood planes and spoke shaves, chisels, a heavy vice, blacksmith's tongs and hammers, and a huge selection of other carpenter's and blacksmith's equipment stores, including two hundred horseshoes, bags of nails and drawing knives to trim hoofs.
'Now, these are important, Jim.' Tom showed him the iron pestle and mortar for crushing rock samples, and a nest of gold pans, each a broad flat dish with a groove around the circumference. The groove would capture the heavy flakes of gold when the ore or river-sands were washed.
'Old Humbert showed you how to use them.' Humbert had been Tom's gold-finder until his liver had succumbed to a steady diet of Hollands gin and cheap Cape brandy. 'There is also a tub of slow-match -two hundred yards of fuse for blasting open the reef when you find gold.'
As trade goods and gifts to African chieftains and potentates, Tom had selected stores that he knew were highly valued by all the wild tribes they might meet in the far interior: two hundred cheap knives, axe heads, bags of Venetian trade beads in fifty different patterns and colours, hand mirrors, under boxes, coils of thin copper and brass wire to be converted into bracelets, anklets and other ornaments by the indi genes who received them.
There were two fine English hunting-saddles and tack, common saddles for the servants, two pack-saddles for bringing in venison from the veld, a large bell tent for a kitchen and dining room, folding chairs and tables to furnish it.
For hunting and defence against attack by the more warlike tribes Tom had provided twenty naval cutlasses and thirty smooth-bore Brown Bess muskets, which most of the servants could load and fire with some proficiency, two heavy German elephant guns that threw four to the pound and could drive to the heart of an elephant or a rhinoceros, and a pair of iniquitously expensive London-made two-grooved double barrelled rifles so accurate that Jim knew from experience that with the conical bullet he could bring down an oryx or kudu at four hundred paces. There was one other rifle, a lovely little lady's gun made in France. Its provenance was noble for the lock was gold inlaid with the coat of arms of the dukes of d'Ademas. Tom had given it to Sarah when Jim was born. It was light and accurate and there was a pink velvet cheek pad on the walnut stock. Although nowadays she seldom hunted, Jim had once seen his mother drop a running spring buck at two hundred
paces with this weapon. Now she was giving it to Louisa. 'It may be
useful.'
Sarah dismissed Louisa's thanks, but impulsively Louisa threw both arms round her and whispered, 'I shall treasure your gifts, and always remember your kindness to me.'
To serve this battery of guns there was an assortment of lead ladles, bullet moulds, loading ramrods, shot-belts and powder flasks. To manufacture ammunition there were five hundredweight of lead in bars, fifty pounds of pewter to harden the balls to be used against heavy game, twenty thousand prepared lead musket balls, twenty kegs of first-class sporting gunpowder for the rifles and a hundred kegs of coarse black powder for the Brown Bess muskets, two thousand gunflints, greased patches to ensure a tight fit of the conical bullets in the rifle bore, fine cotton cloth to be cut into more patches, and a large keg of rendered hippopotamus fat to grease them.
So great was this store of goods that by nightfall on the second day they had not finished reloading the wagons. 'That can wait until tomorrow,' Tom said expansively, 'but now the ladies are free to make supper for us.'
The last meal together was marred by melancholy silences when they were reminded of their imminent parting. These were followed by bursts of forced jollity. In the end Tom brought it to its conclusion with typical directness. 'Early start tomorrow.' He stood up and took Sarah's hand. As he led her to their quarters in the first wagon he whispered, 'Can we leave them alone? Should we not chaperone them?'
Sarah laughed gaily at him. Tom Courtney, what a time for you to turn prissy on me! They have already spent weeks alone in the wilderness together, and it seems they are about to spend several years more. What good could you do now?'
Tom grinned ruefully, picked her up in his arms and boosted her into the wagon. Later as they settled in the car dell bed Sarah murmured, 'Don't worry about Louisa. I have told you already that she is a good girl, and we have brought up Jim to behave like a gentleman. Nothing has happened between them yet, and nothing will until the time is ripe. Then herds of wild buffalo could not prevent it. If things have changed when next we all meet we can think of a wedding. As I recall, Tom Courtney, you showed less restraint when we first met, and there was some delay before we celebrated our own nuptials.'
'In these matters, at least, you are wiser than me,' Tom admitted and pulled her closer. 'Mind you, Mistress Courtney, there are no herds of wild buffalo present to prevent anything happening here tonight, between you and me.'
'Indeed, Mr. Courtney, how perceptive of you,' she said, and giggled like a girl.
p a nrirl
They had taken breakfast and completed the rest of the loading before the sun had fully dispersed the last of the night's chill. With a single stroke of his trek whip Smallboy, the huge head driver, gave the signal to begin in spanning the oxen. This formidable instrument was a bamboo pole twenty-two feet in length, with a whip thong even longer. Without leaving his seat on the wagon or removing his clay pipe from his mouth, Smallboy could kill a fly on the rump of the lead ox in his team with the tapered fore lash of kudu hide and not disturb a hair on the beast's back.
Now as he cracked the long whip with a report like a double- shot ted pistol that could be heard a mile away across the plain, the lead boys ran to yoke the oxen in pairs and bring them in from the veld where they had been grazing. They drove them in with shouted insults and well-aimed pebbles.
'Come, Scotland, you snake with twenty-two fathers and only one mother.'
'Hey! Squint Eye, look this way or you will fetch another stone.'
'Wake up, Lizard, you lazy skelluml'
'Move along, Blackheart, don't try any of your tricks today.'
Pair after pair the beasts were linked into the span. Then the leaders, the strongest and most tractable animals, were led to their places. Smallboy fired his great whip again and, without apparent strain, the oxen walked away and the heavily loaded wagon rolled smoothly after them. At intervals of a few hundred paces the other three wagons fell into caravan behind the leader. They maintained the wide spacing to avoid the dust raised by the hoofs of the leading oxen and the iron rimmed wheels of the vehicles they pulled. Behind the wagons followed a loose herd of horses, spare oxen, milk cows and sheep and goats for slaughter. Although they spread out to graze, they were kept in a loose formation and brought along at a leisurely pace by four herd-boys. None of these lads was older than thirteen or younger than ten. They were some of the orphans Sarah had gathered over the years, and who had pleaded to be allowed to join in the great adventure with Somoya, whom they revered. At their heels ran a motley pack of mongrel hounds, who would earn their keep by hunting and finding wounded game or stray animals.
Soon only one small dog-cart remained in the encampment below
the Baboon's Head kopje, but it was packed and the horses were grazing nearby, ready to take Tom and Sarah back to High Weald. The family the Baboon's Head kopje, but it was packed and the horses were grazing nearby, ready to take Tom and Sarah back to High Weald. The family were reluctant to part. They drew out the last hour together, drinking a final mug of coffee around the smouldering fire, remembering all the things they had forgotten to say over the last few days, and repeating all those that had been said many times already.
Tom had kept one of the most serious matters to the last. Now he fetched a mariner's tarpaulin chart case from the dog-cart and came back to sit beside Jim again. He opened the flat case, and drew out a chart. This is a copy of a chart I've been drawing up over the past fifteen years. I have kept the original, and this is the only copy. It's a valuable document,' he told Jim.
'I will keep it safe,' his son promised.
Tom spread the sheet of heavy parchment on the ground in front of them, and placed small stones on each corner to hold it down in the light morning breeze. Jim studied the finely drawn and coloured topography of the south continent. 'I had no idea, Father, that you were a talented artist.'
His father looked mildly uncomfortable and glanced at Sarah. 'Well,' he drawled, 'I had a little help.'
'You are too modest, Tom.' Sarah smiled. 'You did all the supervision.'
'Of course,' Tom chuckled, 'that was the difficult part.' Then he was serious again. 'The outline of the coast is accurate, more accurate than any other map I have seen. Your uncle Dorian and I made the observations as we sailed and traded along both the western and eastern coastlines over the last twenty years. You have been on one of these voyages with me, Jim, so you will remember these places.' He named them as he pointed them out. 'On the west coast the Bay of Whales and New Devon Harbour I named it for the old country. On the east coast this is
