Master of the Game (11 page)

They were driving along the Vaal River when Margaret spoke. “Ian, you know how much I—” She did not know how to go on. “That is, you and I—” In desperation she blurted out, “How do you feel about marriage?”

Jamie laughed. “I’m all for it, Margaret. I’m all for it.”

She joined him in his laughter. It was the happiest moment of her life.

On Sunday morning, Salomon van der Merwe invited Jamie to accompany him and Margaret to church. The Nederduits Hervormde Kerk was a large, impressive building done in bastard
Gothic, with the pulpit at one end and a huge organ at the other. When they walked in the door, Van der Merwe was greeted with great respect.

“I helped build this church,” he told Jamie proudly. “I’m a deacon here.”

The service was brimstone and hellfire, and Van der Merwe sat there, rapt, nodding eagerly, accepting the minister’s every word.

He’s God’s man on Sunday
, Jamie thought,
and the rest of the week he belongs to the devil
.

Van der Merwe had placed himself between the two young people, but Margaret was conscious of Jamie’s nearness all through the service.
It’s a good thing
—she smiled nervously to herself—
that the minister doesn’t know what I’m thinking about
.

That evening, Jamie went to visit the Sundowner Saloon. Smit was behind the bar serving drinks. His face brightened when he saw Jamie.

“Good evenin’, Mr. Travis. What will you have, sir? The usual?”

“Not tonight, Smit. I want to talk to you. In the back room.”

“Certainly, sir.” Smit scented money to be made. He turned to his assistant. “Mind the bar.”

The back room of the Sundowner was no more than a closet, but it afforded privacy. It contained a round table with four chairs, and in the center of the table was a lantern. Smit lit it.

“Sit down,” Jamie said.

Smit took a chair. “Yes, sir. How can I help you?”

“It’s you I’ve come to help, Smit.”

Smit beamed. “Really, sir?”

“Yes.” Jamie took out a long, thin cigar and lighted it. “I’ve decided to let you live.”

An uncertain look flickered over Smit’s face. “I—I don’t understand, Mr. Travis.”

“Not Travis. The name is McGregor. Jamie McGregor. Remember? A year ago you set me up to be killed. At the barn. For Van der Merwe.”

Smit was frowning now, suddenly wary. “I don’t know what—”

“Shut up and listen to me.” Jamie’s voice was like a whiplash.

Jamie could see the wheels turning in Smit’s mind. He was trying to reconcile the face of the white-haired man in front of him with the eager youth of a year before.

“I’m still alive, and I’m rich—rich enough to hire men to burn this place down and you with it. Are you with me so far, Smit?”

Smit started to protest his ignorance, but he looked into Jamie McGregor’s eyes and saw the danger there. Smit said cautiously, “Yes, sir…”

“Van der Merwe pays you to send prospectors to him so he can cheat them out of what they find. That’s an interesting little partnership. How much does he pay you?”

There was a silence. Smit was caught between two powerful forces. He did not know which way to jump.

“How much?”

“Two percent,” he said reluctantly.

“I’ll give you five. From now on when a likely prospect comes in, you’ll send him to me. I’ll finance him. The difference is that he’ll get his fair share and you’ll get yours. Did you really think Van der Merwe was paying you two percent of what he made? You’re a fool.”

Smit nodded. “Right, Mr. Trav—Mr. McGregor. I understand.”

Jamie rose to his feet. “Not completely.” He leaned over the table. “You’re thinking of going to Van der Merwe and telling him about our little conversation. That way, you can collect from both of us. There’s only one problem with that, Smit.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “If you do, you’re a dead man.”

Jamie was getting dressed when he heard a tentative knock at the door. He listened, and it was repeated. He walked over to the door and opened it. Margaret stood there.

“Come in, Maggie,” Jamie said. “Is something wrong?” It was the first time she had come to his hotel room. She stepped inside, but now that she was face to face with him, she found it difficult to speak. She had lain awake all night, wondering how to tell him the news. She was afraid he might never want to see her again.

She looked into his eyes. “Ian, I’m going to have your baby.”

His face was so still that Margaret was terrified that she had lost him. And suddenly his expression changed to such joy that all her doubts were instantly wiped out. He grabbed her arms and said, “That’s wonderful, Maggie! Wonderful! Have you told your father?”

Margaret pulled back in alarm. “Oh, no! He—” She walked over to the Victorian green-plush sofa and sat down. “You don’t know Father. He—he would never understand.”

Jamie was hurriedly putting on his shirt. “Come on, we’re going to tell him together.”

“Are you sure everything will be all right, Ian?”

“I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.”

Salomon van der Merwe was measuring out strips of biltong for a prospector when Jamie and Margaret strode into the shop. “Ah, Ian! I’ll be with you in a moment.” He hurriedly finished with the customer and walked over to Jamie. “And how is everything this fine day?” Van der Merwe asked.

“It couldn’t be better,” Jamie said happily. “Your Maggie’s going to have a baby.”

There was a sudden stillness in the air. “I—I don’t understand,” Van der Merwe stuttered.

“It’s very simple. I’ve gotten her pregnant.”

The color drained from Van der Merwe’s face. He turned wildly from one to the other. “This—this isn’t true?” A maelstrom of conflicting emotions whirled through Salomon van der Merwe’s head. The terrible shock of his precious daughter losing her virginity…getting pregnant…He would be the laughing stock of the town. But Ian Travis was a very wealthy man. And if they got married quickly…

Van der Merwe turned to Jamie. “You’ll get married immediately, of course.”

Jamie looked at him in surprise. “
Married?
You’d allow Maggie to marry a stupid bairn who let you cheat him out of what belonged to him?”

Van der Merwe’s head was spinning. “What are you talking about, Ian? I never—”

“My name’s not Ian,” Jamie said harshly. “I’m Jamie McGregor. Dinna you recognize me?” He saw the bewildered expression on Van der Merwe’s face. “Nae, a course you don’t. That boy is dead. You killed him. But I’m not a man to hold a grudge, Van der Merwe. So I’m giving you a gift. My seed in your daughter’s belly.”

And Jamie turned and walked out, leaving the two of them staring after him, stunned.

Margaret had listened in shocked disbelief. He could not mean what he had just said.
He loved her
! He—

Salomon van der Merwe turned on his daughter, in the throes of a terrible rage. “You whore!” he screamed.
“Whore! Get out! Get out of here!”

Margaret stood stock-still, unable to grasp the meaning of the awful thing that was happening. Ian blamed her for something her father had done. Ian thought she was part of something bad.
Who was Jamie McGregor? Who—?

“Go!” Van der Merwe hit her hard across the face. “I never want to see you again as long as I live.”

Margaret stood there, rooted, her heart pounding, gasping for breath. Her father’s face was that of a madman. She turned and fled from the store, not looking back.

Salomon van der Merwe stood there watching her go, gripped by despair. He had seen what happened to other men’s daughters who had disgraced themselves. They had been forced to stand up in church and be publicly pilloried and then exiled from the community. It was proper and fitting punishment, exactly what they deserved. But his Margaret had been given a decent, God-fearing upbringing.
How could she have betrayed him like this?
Van der Merwe visualized his daughter’s naked body, coupling with that man, writhing in heat like animals, and he began to have an erection.

He put a Closed sign on the front door of the store and lay on his bed without the strength or the will to move. When word got around town, he would become an object of derision. He would be either pitied or blamed for his daughter’s depravity. Either way, it would be unbearable. He had to make certain no one learned about it. He would send the whore out of his sight forever. He knelt and prayed:
O, God! How could you do this to me, your loyal servant? Why have you forsaken me? Let her die, O Lord Let them both die…
.

The Sundowner Saloon was crowded with noon trade when Jamie entered. He walked over to the bar and turned to face the room. “Your attention, please!” The conversation tapered off into silence. “Drinks on the house for everybody.”

“What is it?” Smit asked. “A new strike?”

Jamie laughed. “In a way, my friend. Salomon van der Merwe’s unmarried daughter is pregnant. Mr. van der Merwe wants everybody to help him celebrate.”

Smit whispered, “Oh, Jesus!”

“Jesus had nothing to do with it. Just Jamie McGregor.”

Within an hour, everyone in Klipdrift had heard the news. How Ian Travis was really Jamie McGregor, and how he had gotten Van der Merwe’s daughter pregnant. Margaret van der Merwe had fooled the whole town.

“She doesn’t look like the kind, does she?”

“Still waters run deep, they say.”

“I wonder how many other men in this town have dipped their wick in that well?”

“She’s a shapely girl. I could use a piece of that myself.”

“Why don’t you ask her? She’s givin’ it away.”

And the men laughed.

When Salomon van der Merwe left his store that afternoon, he had come to terms with the dreadful catastrophe that had befallen him. He would send Margaret to Cape Town on the next coach. She could have her bastard there, and there was no need for anyone in Klipdrift to know his shame. Van der Merwe stepped out into the street, hugging his secret, a smile pasted on his lips.

“Afternoon, Mr. van der Merwe. I hear you might be stockin’ some extra baby clothes.”

“Good day, Salomon. Hear you’re gonna get a little helper for your store soon.”

“Hello there, Salomon. I hear a bird watcher just spotted a new species out near the Vaal River. Yes, sir, a stork!”

Salomon van der Merwe turned and blindly stumbled back into his shop, bolting the door behind him.

At the Sundowner Saloon, Jamie was having a whiskey, listening to the flood of gossip around him. It was the biggest
scandal Klipdrift had ever had, and the pleasure the townspeople took in it was intense.
I wish
, Jamie thought,
that Banda were here with me to enjoy this
. This was payment for what Salomon van der Merwe had done to Banda’s sister, what he had done to Jamie and to—how many others? But this was only part payment for all the things Salomon van der Merwe had done, just the beginning. Jamie’s vengeance would not be complete until Van der Merwe had been totally destroyed. As for Margaret, he had no sympathy for her. She was in on it. What had she said the first day they met?
My father might be the one to help you. He knows everything
. She was a Van der Merwe too, and Jamie would destroy both of them.

Smit walked over to where Jamie was sitting. “Kin I talk to you a minute, Mr. McGregor?”

“What is it?”

Smit cleared his throat self-consciously. “I know a couple of prospectors who have ten claims up near Pniel. They’re producin’ diamonds, but these fellas don’t have the money to get the proper equipment to work their claim. They’re lookin’ for a partner. I thought you might be interested.”

Jamie studied him. “These are the men you talked to Van der Merwe about, right?”

Smit nodded, surprised. “Yes, sir. But I been thinkin’ over your proposition. I’d rather do business with you.”

Jamie pulled out a long, thin cigar, and Smit hastened to light it. “Keep talking.”

Smit did.

In the beginning, prostitution in Klipdrift was on a haphazard basis. The prostitutes were mostly black women, working in sleazy, back-street brothels. The first white prostitutes to arrive in town were part-time barmaids. But as diamond strikes increased and the town prospered, more white prostitutes appeared.

There were now half a dozen sporting houses on the outskirts of Klipdrift, wooden railway huts with tin roofs. The one exception was Madam Agnes’s, a respectable-looking two-story frame
structure on Bree Street, off Loop Street, the main thoroughfare, where the wives of the townspeople would not be offended by having to pass in front of it. It was patronized by the husbands of those wives, and by any strangers in town who could afford it. It was expensive, but the women were young and uninhibited, and gave good value for the money. Drinks were served in a reasonably well-decorated drawing room, and it was a rule of Madam Agnes’s that no customer was ever rushed or shortchanged. Madam Agnes herself was a cheerful, robust redhead in her mid-thirties. She had worked at a brothel in London and been attracted to South Africa by the tales of easy money to be picked up in a mining town like Klipdrift. She had saved enough to open her own establishment, and business had flourished from the beginning.

Madam Agnes prided herself on her understanding of men, but Jamie McGregor was a puzzle to her. He visited often, spent money freely and was always pleasant to the women, but he seemed withdrawn, remote and untouchable. His eyes were what fascinated Agnes. They were pale, bottomless pools, cold. Unlike the other patrons of her house, he never spoke about himself or his past. Madam Agnes had heard hours earlier that Jamie McGregor had deliberately gotten Salomon van der Merwe’s daughter pregnant and then refused to marry her.
The bastard!
Madam Agnes thought. But she had to admit that he was an attractive bastard. She watched Jamie now as he walked down the red-carpeted stairs, politely said good night and left.

When Jamie arrived back at his hotel, Margaret was in his room, staring out the window. She turned as Jamie walked in.

“Hello, Jamie.” Her voice was atremble.

“What are you doing here?”

“I had to talk to you.”

“We have nothing to talk about.”

“I know why you’re doing this. You hate my father.” Margaret moved closer to him. “But you have to know that whatever it was he did to you, I knew nothing about. Please—I beg of you—believe that. Don’t hate me. I love you too much.”

Jamie looked at her coldly. “That’s
your
problem, isn’t it?”

“Please don’t look at me like that. You love me, too…”

He was not listening. He was again taking the terrible journey to Paardspan where he had almost died…and moving the boulders on the riverbanks until he was ready to drop…and finally, miraculously, finding the diamonds… Handing them to Van der Merwe and hearing Van der Merwe’s voice saying,
You misunderstood me, boy. I don’t need any partners. You’re working for me… I’m giving you twenty-four hours to get out of town
. And then the savage beating…He was smelling the vultures again, feeling their sharp beaks tear into his flesh…

As though from a distance, he heard Margaret’s voice. “Don’t you remember? I—belong—to—you… I love you.”

He shook himself out of his reverie and looked at her.
Love
. He no longer had any idea what the word meant. Van der Merwe had burned every emotion out of him except hate. He lived on that. It was his elixir, his lifeblood. It was what had kept him alive when he fought the sharks and crossed the reef, and crawled over the mines at the diamond fields of the Namib Desert. Poets wrote about love, and singers sang about it, and perhaps it was real, perhaps it existed. But love was for other men. Not for Jamie McGregor.

“You’re Salomon van der Merwe’s daughter. You’re carrying his grandchild in your belly. Get out.”

There was nowhere for Margaret to go. She loved her father, and she needed his forgiveness, but she knew he would never—could never—forgive her. He would make her life a living hell. But she had no choice. She had to go to someone.

Margaret left the hotel and walked toward her father’s store. She felt that everyone she passed was staring at her. Some of the men smiled insinuatingly, and she held her head high and walked on. When she reached the store, she hesitated, then stepped inside. The store was deserted. Her father came out from the back.

“Father…”

“You!”
The contempt in his voice was a physical slap. He
moved closer, and she could smell the whiskey on his breath. “I want you to get out of this town. Now. Tonight. You’re never to come near here again. Do you hear me? Never!” He pulled some bills from his pocket and threw them on the floor. “Take them and get out.”

“I’m carrying your grandchild.”

“You’re carrying the devil’s child!” He moved closer to her, and his hands were knotted into fists. “Every time people see you strutting around like a whore, they’ll think of my shame. When you’re gone, they’ll forget it.”

She looked at him for a long, lost moment, then turned and blindly stumbled out the door.

“The money, whore!” he yelled. “You forgot the money!”

There was a cheap boardinghouse at the outskirts of town, and Margaret made her way to it, her mind in a turmoil. When she reached it, she went looking for Mrs. Owens, the landlady. Mrs. Owens was a plump, pleasant-faced woman in her fifties, whose husband had brought her to Klipdrift and abandoned her. A lesser woman would have crumbled, but Mrs. Owens was a survivor. She had seen a good many people in trouble in this town, but never anyone in more trouble than the seventeen-year-old girl who stood before her now.

“You wanted to see me?”

“Yes. I was wondering if—if perhaps you had a job for me here.”

“A job? Doing what?”

“Anything. I’m a good cook. I can wait on tables. I’ll make the beds. I—I’ll—” There was desperation in her voice. “Oh, please,” she begged. “Anything!”

Mrs. Owens looked at the trembling girl standing there in front of her, and it broke her heart. “I suppose I could use an extra hand. How soon can you start?” She could see the relief that lighted Margaret’s face.