arm.
“Shackle!” Johnny snapped at him, and while the Old Man untied the length of rope which secured the steel shackle around his waist, Johnny looked up at the cliff of sand that hung over them.
“Christ!” he said softly, the sea was attacking it - and now it was soft and trembling above them, ready to collapse and smother them.
The Old Man passed him the huge shackle, and Johnny began with numbed hands to secure the end of the chain.
He must pass the thick case-hardened pin through two links and then screw it closed. It was a Herculean task under these conditions, with the surf bursting over his head, the drag of the sea on the chain, and the cliff of sand threatening to fall on them at any moment. From twenty feet above them Johnny’s foreman was watching anxiously, ready to pass the word to the two waiting bulldozers to throw their combined weights on the chain.
The thread of the pin caught, half a dozen turns would secure it, he would have finished the job by the time the word was passed to the “dozer operators.
“Okay,” he nodded and gasped at the Old Man. “Pull!” The Old Man lifted his head and bellowed up the bank, “Pull!” The foreman acknowledged with a wave.
“Okay.” And his head disappeared behind the bank as he ran back to the bulldozers, and at that moment the surf swung the chain. A movement of a few inches, but enough to catch Johnny’s left index finger between two of the links.
The Old Man saw his face, saw him struggling to free himself.
“What is it?” Then the water sucked back for a moment, and he saw what had happened. He waded forward to help - but from above them came the throaty roar of the diesels and the chain began running away, snaking and twisting up the bank like a python.
The Old Man reached Johnny and caught him about the shoulders to steady him. They braced themselves in horror, staring at the captive hand.
The chain jerked taut, severing the finger cleanly in a bright burst of scarlet, and Johnny reeled back into the Old Man’s arms. The great yellow bulk of the bulldozer was dragged relentlessly down on top of them, threatening to crush them both, but using the next break and push of the sea the Old Man dragged Johnny clear - and they were carried sideways along the bank, tumbled helplessly by the strength of the water out of the bulldozer’s path.
Johnny clutched his injured hand to his chest, but it hosed a bright stream of blood that discoloured the water about them. His head went under and salt water shot down his throat into his lungs. He felt himself drowning, the strength oozing out of him.
He surfaced again, and through bleary eyes saw the glistening wet bulldozer half-way up the sand bank. He felt the Old Man’s arms about his chest and he went under again relaxing as the darkness closed over his eyes and brain.
When the darkness cleared from his eyes, he was lying on the dry sand of the beach and the first thing he saw was the Old Man’s face above him, furrowed and pouched, his silver white hair plastered across his forehead.
“Did we get her out?“Johnny asked thickly.
“Ja,” the Old Man answered. “We got her out.” And he stood up, walked to the jeep, and drove away, leaving the foreman to tend to Johnny.
Johnny grinned at the memory, and lifting his left hand off the driving-wheel of the Jaguar he licked the shiny stump of his index finger.
“It was worth a finger,” he murmured aloud, and still searching for road signs he drove on slowly.
He smiled again comfortably, shaking his head with amusement as he remembered his hurt and disappointment when the Old Man had walked away and left him lying on the beach. He had not expected the Old Man to fall on his shoulders sobbing his gratitude and begging forgiveness for all the years of misery and loneliness - but he had expected something more than that.
After a two-hundred-mile round Jeep-journey through the desert night to the nearest hospital where they had trimmed and bound the stump, Johnny was back at the workings the next day in time to watch the first run of gravel from the beach.
In his absence, the gravel had been screened to sieve off all the over-size rock and stone, then it had been puddled through a tank of silicon mud to float off all the material with a specific gravity less than 2.5, then finally what was left had been run through a ball mill - a long steel cylinder containing steel balls the size of baseballs.
The cylinder revolved continually and the steel balls crushed to powder all substance softer than 4 on Mohs hardness scale.
Now there was a residue, a thousandth part of the gravel they had won from the sea. In this remainder would be the diamonds - if diamonds there were.
When Johnny arrived back at the shed of galvanized iron and wood on the cliff above the beach that housed his separation plant, he was still half groggy from the anaesthetic and lack of sleep.
His hand throbbed with the persistence of a lighthouse, his eyes were reddened and a thick black stubble covered his jaws.
He went to stand beside the grease table that filled half the shed. He was swaying a little on his feet, as he looked around at the preparations. The massive bin at the head of the table was filled with the concentrated diamond gravels, the plates greased down, and his crew was standing ready.
“Let’s go!” Johnny nodded at his foreman, who immediately threw in the lever that set the table shaking like an old man with palsy.
The table was a series of steel plates, each slightly inclined and thickly coated with dirty yellow grease. From the bin at the head of the shuddering table a mixture of gravel and water began to dribble, its consistency and rate of flow carefully regulated by the foreman.
It spread over the greased table like spilled treacle, dropping from one plate to the next, and finally into the waste bin at the end of the table.
A diamond is unwettable, immerse it in water, scrub it, but it comes out dry. A coat of grease on a steel plate is also unwettable, so wet gravel and sea shell will slide over it and keep moving across the agitating, sloping table.
But a diamond when it hits grease sticks like a halfsucked toffee to a woollen blanket.
In the excitement and anxiety of the moment Johnny felt his weariness recede, even the pain in his stump was muted by it. His eyes and whole attention were fastened on that glistening yellow sheet of grease.
The little stuff under a carat in weight, or the industrial black diamond and boart would not be visible on the table; the agitation was too rapid - blurring with speed, and the flow of loose material would disguise them.
So complete was his absorption that it was some seconds before he was aware of a presence beside him. He glanced up quickly.
The Old Man was there, standing with the wide stance and tension-charged attitude that was his own special way.
Johnny was acutely conscious of the Old Man’s bulk beside him - and he felt the first flicker of alarm. What if this was a barren run?
He needed diamonds now - as he had never needed anything in his life.
He scanned the blurring plates of yellow grease, seeking the purchase price that could buy back the Old Man’s esteem. The speckled gravel flowed imperturbably across the plates, and Johnny felt a flutter of panic.
Then from across the table the foreman let out a whoop, and pointed.
“Thor she blows!” Johnny’s eyes darted to the head of the table.
There beneath the outlet from the bin, half buried in the thick grease by its own weight, anchored solidly while. the worthless gravel washed past it, was a diamond.
A big fat five-carat thing, that glowed sulky and yellow, like a wild animal resenting its captivity.
Johnny sighed softly and darted a sideways glance at the Old Man.
The Old Man was watching the table without expression, and though he must have been conscious of Johnny’s scrutiny, he did not look up. Johnny’s eyes were dragged irresistibly back to the table.
By some freakish chance, the next diamond fell from the bin directly on to the one already anchored in the grease.
