The Angels Weep b-3 Page 18

  It seemed as though an army was encamped in the valley.

  Jordan jumped down from the coach, shrugging off the cotton dust-coat that had protected his beautiful dove-grey suit, and smoothing his dense golden curls as he crossed to his brother.

  "What on earth is going on, Ralph?" he demanded. "I never expected anything like this." "Robyn has invited half the Matabele nation to the wedding and the other half invited themselves." Ralph smiled down at his brother. "Some of them have trekked a hundred miles to be here, every patient she has ever treated, every convert she ever turned, every man, woman and child who ever came to beg a favour or advice, everyone who ever called her "Nomusa" they are all here, and they have all brought their families and friends. It's going to be the greatest jollification since Lobengula held the last Chawala ceremony back in "93." "But who is going to feed them all? "Jordan went immediately to the logistics.

  "Oh, Robyn can afford to blow a few of her royalties, and I sent her a gift of fifty head of slaughter-bullocks. Then they do say that Gandang's wife, old fat Juba, has brewed a thousand gallons of her famous twa la They will be bloated as pythons and overflowing with good cheer." Ralph punched his brother's arm affectionately. "Which reminds me that I have worked up a fair old thirst myself, let's get on with it." The road was lined on both sides with hundreds of singing maidens, all of them decked with beads and flowers, their skin was anointed with fat and clay so that it shone like cast bronze in the sunlight. Their short aprons swirled about their thighs as they stamped and swayed, and their naked bosoms bounced and joggled. "By God, Jordan, have you ever seen such a fine display?" Ralph teased his brother, well aware of his prudish and reserved attitude to all women.

  "That pair over there would keep your ears warm in a blizzard, I war rand Jordan blushed and quickly made his way back to join his master, as the girls crowded about the carriage and the mules were reduced to a walk.

  One of the girls recognized Mr. Rhodes.

  "Lodzi!" she called, and her cry was taken up by the others.

  "Lodzi! Lodzi!" Then they saw Louise. "Balela, we see you. Welcome, Balela," they sang, clapping and swaying. "Welcome, the One who brings Clear and Sunny Skies." Then they recognized Zouga, and they cried, "Come in peace, the Fist." And then to Ralph, "We see you, little Hawk, and our eyes are white with joy." Zouga lifted his hat and waved it over his head. "By God," he murmured to Louise, "I wish Labouche and the damned Aborigine Protection Society could be here to see this."

  "They are happy and secure as they never were under Lobengula's bloody rule," Louise agreed, "this land will be kind to us, I feel it deep in my heart." From the back of his horse, Ralph could look over the heads of the girls. There were very few men in the crowd, and they hung back at the fringe of the press of black bodies. However, a face caught Ralph's attention, a single solemn face amongst all the smiles.

  "Bazo!" Ralph called and waved, and the young and una looked at him steadily, still without smiling.

  "We will talk later," Ralph shouted, and then he was past, swept along by the throng down the avenue of tall dark green spathodea trees with their flaming orange blossoms.

  When they reached the lawns, the dancing black girls fell back, for, by unspoken accord, these were reserved for the white guests.

  There were a hundred or so gathered below the wide thatched veranda.

  Cathy was there, for she had ridden out three days before to help with the preparations. She was slender and cool in a dress of yellow muslin and the straw hat upon her dark head was wide as a wagon-wheel and loaded with artificial flowers of bright-coloured silk that Ralph had ordered from London.

  Jonathan let out a'shriek when he saw Ralph, but Cathy held his hand firmly to prevent him being trampled in the crowd that surged forward to engulf the bridegroom in a storm of greetings and good cheer. Ralph left his horse, and came through the crowd, and Cathy almost lost her hat in the violence of his embrace. She had to snatch desperately at it, and then she froze and the colour drained from her face.

  The door of the mule coach had opened, Jordan jumped down and set the step.

  "Ralph," Cathy blurted, clinging to his arm. "It's him! What's he doing here?" Mr. Rhodes" bulk had appeared in the doorway of the carriage, and a shocked hush fell upon them all.

  "Oh Ralph, what will Mama say? Couldn't you have stopped him?"

  "Nobody stops him," Ralph murmured, without releasing her. "Besides this is going to be better than a cock-fight, any day." As he said it, Robyn St. John, drawn by the commotion, came out onto the step of the homestead. Her face, still flushed from the heat of the stove, was radiant with a smile of welcome for her latest guests, but the smile shrivelled when she recognized the man in the doorway of the carriage.

  She stiffened, and the flush receded from her face, leaving it icy pale.

  "Mr. Rhodes," she said clearly in the silence. "I am delighted that you have come to Khami Mission." Mr. Rhodes" eyes flickered as though she had slapped him across the face. He had expected anything but that, and he inclined his head with cautious gallantry, but Robyn went on. "Because it gives me a heaven-sent opportunity to order you not to set a foot over my threshold." Mr. Rhodes bowed with relief, he did not like unresolved positions over which he had no control.

  "Let us grant that your jurisdiction reaches that far," he agreed.

  "But this side of that threshold, the ground on which I stand belongs to the BSA Company of which I am Chairman.-" "No, sir," Robyn denied hotly, "the Company has granted me the usufruct.-" "A fine legal point."

  Mr. Rhodes shook his head gravely. "I will ask my -Administrator to give us a ruling on that." The Administrator was Doctor Leander Starr Jameson. "But in the meantime, I should like to raise a glass to the happiness of the young couple." "I assure you, Mr. Rhodes, that you will not be served refreshment at Khami." Mr. Rhodes nodded at Jordan, and he hurried back to the mule coach. In "a flurry of activity he supervised the uniformed servants who unpacked the camp chairs and tables and placed them in the shade of the tender growth that the spathodea trees had put out since the locust plague.

  As Mr. Rhodes and his party settled themselves, Jordan fired the cork from the first bottle of champagne and spilled a frothy deluge into a crystal glass, and Robyn St. John disappeared abruptly from the veranda.

  Ralph placed Jonathan in Cathy's arms. "She's up to something," he said, and sprinted across the lawns. He vaulted over the low veranda wall and burst into the livingroom just as Robyn lifted the shotgun down from its rack above the fireplace.

  "Aunt Robyn, what are you doing?" "Changing the cartridges, taking out the birdshot and putting in big loopers!" "My darling mother-in-law, you cannot do that," Ralph protested, and edged towards her.

  "Not use big loopers?" Robyn circled him warily, keeping out of reach, holding the shotgun with its ornate curly hammers at the level of her chest.

  "You cannot shoot him." "Why not?" "Think of the scandal."

  "Scandal and I have been travelling companions as long as I can remember." "Then think of the mess, "Ralph urged her.

  "I'll do it on the lawn," Robyn said, and Ralph knew that she meant it. He sought desperately for inspiration, and found it.

  "Number SixV he cried, and Robyn froze and stared at him.

  "Number Six, "Thou shalt not kill"." "God was not speaking of Cecil Rhodes," Robyn said, but her eyes wavered.

  "If the Almighty was allowing open season on specified targets, I'm sure He would have put in a footnote." Ralph pursued his advantage, and Robyn sighed and turned back to the leather cartridge bag on its hook.

  "Now what are you doing? "Ralph demanded suspiciously. "Changing back to birdshot," Robyn muttered. "God didn't say anything about flesh wounds." But Ralph seized the stock of the shotgun and with only a token of resistance Robyn relinquished it.

  "O Ralph she whispered. "The effrontery of that man. I wish I was allowed to swear." "God will understand," Ralph encouraged her.

  "Damn him to bloody hell!" she said.<
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  "Better?" "Not much." "Here," he said, and slipped the silver flask from his back pocket.

  She took a swallow, and blinked at the tears of anger that stung her eyes.

  "Better?" "A little," she admitted. "What must I do, Ralph?"

  "Conduct yourself with frosty dignity." "Right." She lifted her chin determinedly and marched back onto the veranda.

  Under the spathodea trees, Jordan had donned a crisp white apron and tall chef's cap, and was serving champagne and huge golden Cornish pasties to whoever wanted them. The veranda, which had been crowded with guests before the arrival of the mule coach, was now deserted, and there was a jovial throng around Mr. Rhodes.

  "We will start cooking the sausage," Robyn told Juba. "Get your girls busy." "They aren't even married yet, Nomusa," Juba protested.

  "The wedding is not until five o'clock-" "Feed them," Robyn ordered.

  "I'll back my sausage against Jordan Ballantyne's pasties to bring "em back." "And I'll put my money on Mr. Rhodes" champagne to keep "em there," Ralph told her. "Can you match it?" "I haven't a drop, Ralph," Robyn admitted. "I have beer and brandy, but not champagne." With a single glance, Ralph caught the eye of one of the younger guests on the lawn. He was the manager of Ralph's General Dealer's shop in Bulawayo.

  He read Ralph's expression, and hurried up the steps to his side, listened intently to his instructions for a few seconds, and then ran to his horse.

  "Where did you send him?" Robyn demanded.

  "A convoy of my wagons arrived today. They will not have unloaded yet. We'll have a wagon full of bubbly out here within a few hours."

  "I'll never be able to repay you for this, Ralph." For a moment Robyn considered him, and then for the first time ever she stood on tiptoe and gave him a light dry kiss on the lips, before hurrying back to her kitchen.

  Ralph's wagon hove over the hill at a dramatic moment. Jordan was down to his last bottle of champagne, the empty green bottles formed an untidy hillock behind his stall, and the crowd had already begun to drift across to the barbecue pits on which Robyn's celebrated spiced beef sausage was sizzling in clouds of aromatic steam.

  Isazi brought the wagon to a halt below the veranda, and, like a conjuror, drew back the canvas hood to reveal the contents. The crowd flocked away to leave Mr. Rhodes sitting alone beside his fancy coach.

  Within minutes Jordan sidled up beside his brother. "Ralph, Mr. Rhodes would like to purchase a few cases of your best champagne." "I'm not selling in job lots. Tell him it's a full wagon or nothing. "Ralph smiled genially. "At twenty pounds a bottle." "That's piracy, "Jordan gasped.

  "It's also the only available champagne in Matabeleland." "Mr. Rhodes will not be pleased." "I'll be pleased enough for both of us," Ralph assured him. "Tell him it's cash, in advance." While Jordan went with the bad news to his master, Ralph sauntered across to the bridegroom and put one arm around his shoulder.

  "Be grateful to me, Harry my boy. Your wedding is going to be a hundred-year legend, but have you told the lovely Victoria about her honeymoon yet?" "Not yet," Harry Mellow admitted.

  "Wise decision, laddie. Wankie's country does not have the appeal of the bridal suite at the Mount Nelson Hotel in Cape Town." "She will understand," Harry said with more force than belief.

  "Of course she will," Ralph agreed, and turned to meet Jordan who returned brandishing the cheque which Mr. Rhodes had scribbled on a tattered champagne label.

  "How charjningly appropriate," Ralph murmured, and tucked it into his top pocket. "I'll send Isazi back to fetch the next wagon." The rumour of wagon loads of free champagne for all at Khami Mission turned Bulawayo into a ghost town. Unable to compete with these prices, the barman of the Grand Hotel closed down his deserted premises and joined the exodus southwards. As soon as the news reached them, the umpires called "stumps" on the cricket match being played on the police parade ground, and the twenty-two players still in their flannels formed a guard of honour for Isazi's wagon, while behind them followed what remained of the town's population on horse, cycle or foot.

  The little Mission church could hold only a fraction of the invited and uninvited, the rest of them overflowed into the grounds, though the heaviest concentrations were always to be found around the two widely separated champ pagne wagons. Copious draughts of warm champagne had made the men sentimentally boisterous and many of the women loudly weepy, so a thunderous acclaim greeted the bride when she at last made her appearance on the Mission veranda.

  On her brother-in-law's arm, and attended by her sisters, Victoria made her way down the alley that opened for her across the lawn.

  She was pretty enough to begin with, with her green eyes shining and the vivid coppery mass of her hair upon the white satin of her dress, but when she returned the same way, this time on the arm of her new husband, she was truly beautiful.

  "All right," Ralph announced. "It's all legal now the party can truly begin." He signalled to the band, a hastily assembled quartet led by, Matabeleland's only undertaker on the fiddle, and they launched into a spirited Gilbert and Sullivan. This was the only sheet music available north of the Limpopo. Each member of the quartet provided his own interpretation of The Mikado, so that the dancers could waltz or polka to it as the inclination and the champagne dictated.

  By dawn of the following day, the party had started to warm up, and the first fist-fight broke out behind the church. However, Ralph settled it by announcing to the shirt sleeved contestants, "This will never do, gentlemen, it is an occasion of joy and goodwill towards all mankind." And then before they realized his intention, he dropped them on their backs in quick succession with a left and right swing that neither of them saw coming. Then he helped them solicitously back onto their feet and led them weaving groggily to the nearest drink wagon.

  By dawn on the second day, the party was in full swing. The bride and bridegroom, reluctant to miss a moment of the fun, had not yet left on their honeymoon and were leading the dancing under the spathodea trees. Mr. Rhodes, who had rested during the night in the mule coach, now emerged and ate a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs cooked by Jordan over the open fire, washed it down with a tumbler of champagne, and was moved to oratory. He stood on the driver's seat of the coach and spoke with all his usual eloquence and charisma honed to an edge by a sense of occasion and his own burning belief in his subject.

  "My Rhodesians," he addressed his audience, and they took it as an endearment rather than a claim to ownership, and loved him for it.

  "Together you and I have made a great leap forward towards the day when the map of Africa will be painted pink from Cape Town to Cairo, when this fair continent will be set beside India, a great diamond beside a lustrous ruby, in the crown of our beloved Queen.-" They cheered him, the Americans and Greeks and Italians and Irish as loudly as the subjects of the "beloved Queen" herself.

  Robyn St. John endured half an hour of these sentiments before she lost control of the frosty dignity that Ralph had counselled, and from the veranda of the homestead she began a counter reading of her own, as yet unpublished, poetry. "Mild melancholy and sedate he stands Tending another's herds upon the field.

  His father's once, where now the white man builds His home and issues forth his proud commands. His dark eyes flash not, his listless hand Leans on the shepherd staff, no more he wields The gleaming steel, but to the oppressor yields.-" Her high, clear voice rang over Mr. Rhodes', heads turned back and forth between the two of them like the spectators at a tennis match.

  "This is only a beginning," Mr. Rhodes raised his volume, (a great beginning, yes but a beginning nonetheless. There are ignorant and arrogant men, not all of them black," and even the dullest listener recognized that the allusion was to old Kruger, the Boer president of the South African Republic in the Transvaal, "who must be allowed the opportunity to come beneath the shield of the pox britannica of their own free will, rather than be driven to it by force of arms." His audience was once again entranced, until Robyn selected another of her w
orks in matching warlike mood, and let fly with. "He scorns the hurt, nor regards the scar Of recent wound, but burnishes for war His assegai and targe of buffalo-hide.