Jack of Diamonds (101 page)

I then leapt to my feet and went over to Daniel, who was working frantically on Piet Wenzel. He looked up at me and his eyes said everything I needed to know. He shook his head silently. I took over and worked on him for a further five minutes, but there was not a sign of life in the white diamond driller. Milo had dressed the cut on Piet’s head, taping the dressing down. I ripped it off and examined the wound. It went deep into his crushed skull, and I could see his bloodied brains. Clearly, Piet Wenzel had been dead before he’d even hit the water. ‘He’s dead, the
bwana
is dead,’ I announced to his gang.

‘You focking killed him, you
bastard
!’ I looked up to see Klaas Potgieter pointing at Piet Wenzel’s body with a shaking finger. ‘You saved the
kaffir
!’ he screamed. ‘You saved a focking
kaffir
and let a white man die! I saw it! I saw it with my own focking eyes! You’re not going to get away with this, you hear?’

The coroner’s inquest held in Ndola reached the conclusion that Piet Wenzel had died from a fractured skull caused by a falling rock, and that he had not drowned. Although the finding was a relief, it didn’t alter the fact that a good man had died. Everyone seemed to know that it was the second time I had saved an African’s life, but this time
before
attending to the white man. I’d given artificial respiration to an anonymous
kaffir
first, and not to an Afrikaner diamond driller who was supposed to be my friend.

Jannie Coetzee had suspended me, not, I hasten to say, out of malice, but as a precaution. ‘Jack, this time they’re going to get you. Better you stay away, don’t go underground. Shorty Bronkhorst has volunteered to do a double shift. Sorry, man, but I’m going to have to suspend you; the diamond drillers are calling for some blood to be spilled, if you know what I mean.’

The diamond drillers and the miners’ union were said to be almost mutinous because I’d been ‘allowed to get away with’ the African amputation incident, as Jacob’s rescue had become officially known. It didn’t help that Adorjan Hajdu, the Hungarian pipe fitter, steadfastly maintained that I’d done all I could, that the African was the first to be hauled up, by me, and that Milo had attended to the wound on Piet Wenzel’s forehead under my instructions. I was, after all, a ‘focking foreigner’, so what could you expect?

‘Why didn’t he leave the
kaffir
and look for Piet Wenzel?’ seemed to be the question everyone was asking.

Despite the coroner’s finding, I took Jannie Coetzee’s advice and remained locked in my rondavel with Diamond Jim. Jannie’d originally posted two black constables outside to protect me if there was any trouble, but after the coroner brought down his verdict, they left. Noel White and the others who’d taken part in the poker game had all come to visit in the lead-up to the coroner’s inquest and assure me that they had not joined in the general baying for my blood.

Then, at six on the morning of the day following the coroner’s verdict, I woke to the sound of Noel’s voice and saw his face at the barred window of my rondavel. ‘Quick, Jack, open the door. Lemme in!’ he hissed. I jumped up and hastened to open the door, wearing only a pair of pyjama shorts.

‘What is it?’ I asked, his face telling me enough for me to know that this wasn’t a social call.

‘Jack, get dressed fast, grab what you can; I’ve got the van outside, engine running. They’re coming for you.’

‘Who?’

‘Jesus, mate, who fucking knows? A mob of miners, the Krauts, others, what’s it matter. We haven’t any fucking time. Where’s your bag? Ferchrissake, can you stop that fucking bird screeching!’

Five minutes later, with whatever I could grab and with Diamond Jim on my shoulder, we were into the Volkswagen and on the road out of town. Noel had been given just enough warning, it seemed from Jannie Coetzee, and we were away without being seen or followed. I’d locked the door of the rondavel and closed the wooden shutters that covered the barred windows in the rainy season, so nobody would have known I wasn’t hiding inside.

On the way to Ndola, Noel said, ‘You’re not a real fast learner, Jack Reed.’ He guffawed, but when I didn’t join in, he went on, ‘There’s a train at eight o’clock that goes south-east, all the way to Beira on the Portuguese East African coast, with the usual coupla hundred stops on the way, of course. You okay for money, mate? I brought some extra cash just in case.’

‘Yeah, I’m fine, thanks, Noel. And how will I ever pay you back?’

‘You already have, Jack. You’re a good mate, and I’ll never forget that poker game, and . . . that was a good thing you did, saving those two black guys. I’d like to think I’d do the same, but I doubt it.’

We arrived at the Ndola station with only a few minutes to spare before the train pulled out, but Noel knew the stationmaster, who delayed departure just long enough for him to buy me a first-class ticket and find me a compartment of my own. When I reached for my wallet, he tut-tutted at me. ‘Instructions from Jannie Coetzee, mate.’ Then he saw me onto the train and into my compartment with Diamond Jim.

Standing on the platform, looking up at DJ and me through the window, he handed me an envelope. ‘Jannie says it’s what the mine owes you: your copper bonus until the end of the year.’

The guard blew his whistle and the locomotive let out its loud whistle as the train started to move.

‘Good luck, buddy!’ Noel called. It was the first time I’d heard him say ‘buddy’. What a good mate.

We reached the outskirts of the town and five minutes later were travelling through the countryside. I reached into my pocket for my harmonica and began to play ‘Love Me or Leave Me’ as Diamond Jim kept time on my shoulder with his feet and head. Then, just as I was about to lower the harmonica and sing the lyrics, he began to whistle. He whistled the entire verse without a mistake.

Love me or leave me and let me be lonely

You won’t believe me but I love you only

I’d rather be lonely than happy with somebody else . . .

Then, cocking his head on one side, he said in a croaky voice, ‘I love you, Bridgett.’

EPILOGUE

Dear Reader,

‘The time has come,’ the Walrus said,

‘To talk of many things:

Of shoes – and ships – and sealing-wax –

Of cabbages – and kings –

And why the sea is boiling hot –

And whether pigs have wings.’

I imagine somewhere in the twenty or so novels I’ve written, most of the subjects in Lewis Carroll’s lovely poem will have been touched upon. But now, alas, my ‘use-by’ date is almost upon me and there won’t be sufficient time to write the sequel to
Jack of Diamonds
.

However, I thought you might like to know what happened to Jack and his offsider, the incorrigible, attention-seeking Diamond Jim.

I’d kept in touch with the Ethiopian diplomat Berihun Kidane and his lovely wife, Fenet, whom I’d met on my way to Africa. Once I’d reached Beira on the East Coast I cabled him in Nigeria. Unusually, Fenet replied, insisting in the strongest terms that I travel to Ethiopia, where their family would be able to help me. I cabled Peter Adams, first officer of the
Roybank
, which had brought me to Angola, asking about ships sailing north. He informed me a Bank Line vessel would soon dock in Beira and, while it didn’t normally take passengers, he’d make the arrangements. I could then sail further up the coast into the Gulf of Aden and disembark at the port in Djibouti, a small country that was part of French Somaliland and adjoined Ethiopia. From there I could cross the border and travel to Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, by train.

In Addis I was met by Abrihet, Fenet’s younger sister, and at the first sight of her my heart began to pound. Younger than Fenet, and ten years my junior, she’d been a toddler when her family followed the Emperor Haile Selassie into exile, and settled in Bath in England, but, like her sister, she’d received an exclusive public-school education before returning to Ethiopia as a sophisticated Anglophile. Her name means ‘she shines’, and, I must say, it suited her perfectly. I found myself instantly bewitched.

Diamond Jim and I had been alone for a long time and, although he whistled ‘Love Me or Leave Me’ each day to remind me of Bridgett, I couldn’t convince myself I would ever see her again. Now luck had smiled on me once more, bringing a second gorgeous woman into my life to love, who miraculously seemed to return my feelings. She also grew to adore Diamond Jim, who soon greeted her each morning with the words ‘Abrihet, you’re beautiful!’

Before long, Abrihet and I were married in Holy Trinity Cathedral in Addis Ababa, with rather more pomp than I would have liked, but Abrihet was from a powerful and devout noble family for whom all the trappings of the Ethiopian orthodox Christian church were necessary. To my dismay Diamond Jim wasn’t allowed into the church. At least there was a precedent: President Andrew Jackson’s parrot had been ejected from his funeral service because he kept cussing.

Abrihet was a virgin, but quickly proved to be a passionate and generous woman and we were happier than I’d have thought possible. Within weeks she became pregnant, to the enormous pleasure of her family, for whom fecundity was proof of a successful marriage.

Thanks to her family’s connections, I had been put in charge of the Royal Emergency Medical Centre in Addis Ababa. Jack’s luck strikes again! It seemed I would never fully free myself from caring women stepping in to help me or even to save my life, but what the heck. I was as happy as I could be away from a jazz club and a card table.

Abrihet’s family were close to Emperor Haile Selassie and, knowing of my passion for music, they arranged for me to be one of the musical directors of the emperor’s imperial brass band, originally comprising forty Armenian orphans adopted by him and trained as musicians. I didn’t like to think of the parallels with my own story – music must have come to the rescue of countless children – but I feel sure that if people played music rather than spoke to each other, this world would be a much better place.

Our daughter was born before our first wedding anniversary, and we named her Ayana Rebekkah – Ayana, meaning beautiful flower, and Rebekkah, meaning to bind. Certainly that little girl bound me to her and her beautiful mother with unbreakable ties, or so I believed.

My mom was desperate to meet her first granddaughter, but Nick and I both thought it was too dangerous. We’d been writing to each other using the private post-office box set up by Nick’s contacts in Canadian Intelligence, and my contacts in the Ethiopian diplomatic corps. We were careful never to give away my whereabouts, which made it almost impossible to arrange for my mom to come for a visit. Perhaps I was paranoid, especially after all this time, but I kept remembering how they’d hunted down Johnny Diamond, and now I had at least two precious reasons to live.

One of Mom’s letters carried the sad news of Joe’s death. That I would never now be able to show him the musician I had become in Las Vegas hit me with renewed strength. I could almost hear him say, ‘Jazzboy, you done real good. That phrasing real subtle, my man!’ I grieved for the old man who had come closer than anyone to being a father figure to me. With the loss of Joe, Miss Frostbite could no longer continue with her piano routine, and went into retirement. The Jazz Warehouse was purchased by the twins, who now saw themselves as entrepreneurs, with their long, elegant fingers in several pies. Hector was still head chef at the Jazz Warehouse, and his daughter, Sue Stinchcombe, had become a very successful model in Canada.

There is little call for jazz harmonica players or, for that matter, poker players, in Ethiopia, so I had plenty of leisure time to work with Diamond Jim on what started out as a playful jazz routine with a bit of repartee, which we worked out between us. I was constantly amazed by his intelligence and devotion, not to mention his gift for mimicry. I estimated his vocabulary consisted of nearly seven hundred words and numbers, the meaning of most of which he clearly understood.

Almost from the moment she set eyes on him, my little Ayana loved Diamond Jim but, while he tolerated her, he always greeted her with ‘Oh boy! Here comes trouble!’ Despite sweet-talking Abrihet, Diamond Jim was a one-man bird.