The other big powers France, our chaps and yours have given him the wink. Of course, they'll all squeal like blazes, and make all sorts of protests at the League of Nations but nobody is about to stop old Benito making a big grab for Ethiopia. hail Selassie, the king of kings, knows it and so is princes and roses an c ieftains and merry men.
And they are desperately trying to prepare some kind of defence.
That's where I come in, old boy."
"Why must they buy from you at the prices you say they are offering?
Surely they could get this sort of stuff direct from the manufacturers?"
"Embargo, old chap. The League of Nations have slapped an arms embargo on the whole of Eritrea, Somaliland and Ethiopia. No imports of war material into the area.
It's intended to reduce tension but of course it works out completely one-sided. Mussolini doesn't have to go shopping for his armaments he has all the guns, aircraft and armour that he needs already landed at Eritrea. just ready to go and the jolly old Ethiopia has a few ancient rifles and a lot of those long two-anded swords. It should be a close match.
You aren't drinking your Charlie Champers?"
"I think I'll go get myself a Tusker. Back in a minute. "Jake rose and moved to the door and Gareth shook his head sadly.
"You've got taste buds like a crocodile's back. Tusker, forsooth, when I'm offering you a vintage Charlie." It was more for a chance to think out his position and plan his moves than desire for beer that made Jake seek the bar in the front room. He leaned against the counter in the crowded room, and his mind went swiftly over what Gareth Swales had told him. He tried to decide how much was fact and how much was fantasy. How the facts affected him and where, if there were any, the profits to himself might lie.
He had almost decided not to involve himself in the deal there were too many thorns along that path and to go ahead with his original intentions, selling the engines as cane-crushing units when he was made the victim of one of those coincidences which were too neat not to be one of the sardonic jokes of fate.
Beside him at the bar were two young men in the sober dress of clerks or accountants. Each of them had a girl tucked under his arm and they fondled them absentmindedly as they talked in loud assertive voices.
Jake had been too busy making his decision to follow this conversation until a name caught his attention.
"By the way, did you hear that Anglo Sugar has gone bang?"
"No, I
don't believe it."
"It's true. Heard it from the Master of the Court himself.
They say they've gone bust for half a million."
"Good God that's the third big company this month."
"It's hard times we live in. This will bring down a lot of little men with it." Jake agreed silently. He poured the beer into his glass, tossed a coin on the counter and headed back for the private lounge.
They were hard times indeed, Jake thought. This was the second time in as many months that he had been caught up in them.
The freighter on which he had arrived in Dares Salaam as chief engineer had been seized by the sheriff of the court as surety in a bankruptcy action. The owners had gone bust in London, and the ship had been unable to pay off.
Jake had walked down the gang-plank with all his worldly possessions in the kit-bag over his shoulder abandoning his claim to almost six months" back wages, together with all his savings in the bankrupt company's pension fund.
He had just started to shape up with the cane-crusher contract, when once again the tidal waves of depression sweeping across the world had swamped him. They were all going bang the big ones and the small, and Jake Barton now found himself the owner of five armoured cars for which there remained but a single buyer in the market.
Gareth was standing by the window, looking down to the harbor where the lights of the anchored ships flickered across the dark waters. He turned to face Jake and went on as though there had been no break in the conversation.
"While we are still being disgustingly honest with each other, let me estimate that the Ethiopians would pay as much as a thousand pounds each for those vehicles. Of course, they would have to be spruced up.
A coat of paint, and a machine gun in the turret."
"I'm still listening. "Jake sank back on the couch.
"I have the buyer lined up and the Vickers machine without which the cars have no value. You have the guns, vehicles themselves and the technical know-how to get them working." Jake was seeing a different man in Gareth Swales now.
The lazy drawling voice and foppish manner were gone. He spoke crisply and once again there was the piratical blue sparkle in his eyes.
"I have never worked with a partner before. I always knew I could do it better on my own but I've had a chance to get a good look at you.
This could be the first time. What do you think?"
"If you cross me, Gareth I will truly roast your chestnuts for you."
Gareth threw back his head and laughed delightedly. "I believe you really would, Jake!" He crossed the room and offered his hand.
"Equal partners. You put in the cars, and I'll throw in my pile of goodies everything down the middle?" he asked, and Jake took the hand.
"Right down the middle he agreed.
"That's enough business for tonight let's meet the ladies." Jake suggested that Gareth as a full partner might like to assist in refitting the engines and painting the body work of the cars, and Gareth blanched and lit a cheroot.
"Look here, old chap. Don't let's take this equal partners lark too far. Manual labour isn't really my style at all."
"I'll have to hire a gang, then."
"Please don't stint yourself Hire what and who you need." Gareth waved the cheroot magnanimously. "I've got to get down to the docks, grease a few palms and that sort of thing. Then I'm dining at Government House this evening, making the contacts that may be useful to us, you understand?" In a ricksha, bearing the silver champagne bucket full of Tusker, Gareth appeared at the camp under the mahogany trees the following morning to find half a dozen blacks labouring under Jake's supervision. The colour Jake had chosen was a businesslike battleship grey, and one of the cars had received its first coat. The effect was miraculous.
The vehicle had been transformed from a slovenly wreck into a formidable-looking war machine.
"By Jove," Gareth enthused. "Even I am impressed. The old Ethiops will go wild." He walked along the line of cars, and stopped at the end. "Only three being painted. What about these two?"
"I
explained to you. There are only three runners." lOok, old chap.
Don't let's be too fussy. Slap paint on all of them and I'll put them into the package. We aren't selling with a guarantee, what?"
Gareth smiled brilliantly and winked at Jake. "By the time the complaints come in, you and I will have moved on and no forwarding address." He did not realize that the suggestion was trampling rudely on Jake's craftsman's pride, until he saw the now familiar stiffening of the wide shoulders and the colour coming up Jake's neck.
Half an hour later they were still arguing.
"I've got a reputation on three oceans and across seven seas that I'm not likely to pass up for a couple of pox-ridden old bangers like these," shouted Jake, and he kicked the wheel of one of the condemned vehicles. "Nobody's ever going to say that Jake Barton sold a bum."
Gareth had swiftly gained a working knowledge of his man's temper. He knew instinctively that they were on the very brink of physical violence and quite suddenly he changed his attitude.
"Listen, old chap. There's no point in shouting at each other-2 "I am not shouting-" roared Jake.