“And remember them?”
“Yes, sir. Mostly.”
“Remarkable!”
“Yeah,” Barney said. He really didn’t think it was so remarkable. He didn’t see how anyone could fail to learn the beauty of words that took one away from his everyday life. “I know The Bells by heart. I seen that one at least ten times. Even paid to see it a couple o’ times.”
The man shook his head in amazement. “You are a most remarkable young man, Barney Isaacs.” He fished into the pocket of his waistcoat, bringing forth a card case and extracting one. “Here’s my card. If you ever get back to Cape Town — and I’m afraid there is a strong possibility of that in the very near future, from what I’ve heard of the diamond trade since our arrival this morning — please look me up.”
Barney took the card, read it, and looked up. “Sure, Mr. Breedon. Only—”
“Yes?”
“Like I said before,” Barney said, a touch of desperation in his voice, “how d’you get to Kimberley if you ain’t got no twenty quid to spare?”
“And also have pride? Then you walk.” Mr. Breedon held up his hand hurriedly at the angry flash in Barney’s eyes. “I’m not making fun of you,” he said quietly, and pointed. “You go back along Darling Street, back across Adderley, past Greenmarket Square — you can’t miss it, it’s the main market square — and a bit west of that, a few blocks at the most, you’ll find Riebeeck Square. It’s an outspan—”
“A what?”
“An outspan,” Breedon said patiently. “A place where ox wagons come to discharge their goods and rest their oxen and pick up new cargo for the interior. ‘Outspan’ means to unhitch the oxen from the span, to take them out, so to speak. I understand one can arrange with the driver of one of the wagons to walk alongside the cart for the sum of five pounds. It takes a few months to make the trip that way, of course.”
“I got time,” Barney said. In his mind he had more time than money, but he really didn’t have any excess of either. Still, he was relieved to know there was a way to get to Kimberley within his budget, within, in fact, the sum he had won in the fight. He had a feeling his total capital wouldn’t be too much before he managed to start making his fortune. Although, of course, his brother Harry had made it and he hadn’t even won a boxing match on board the ship he’d arrived on.
“And you’re sure you won’t accept any help from me?”
“I’m sure, but thanks, Mr. Breedon.” Barney tucked the card into a pocket, reached down and raised his two suitcases. He grinned at Mr. Breedon. “Thanks again.”
“That’s quite all right,” Breedon said, and watched Barney march off back toward Adderley Street, his suitcases banging against his legs. Maybe this one won’t be back, he thought. Maybe this one will actually make it up in — what did they call it now? Kimberley? — but unfortunately, he added to himself a bit sadly, I am forced to doubt it. A most unusual boy, though. Shakespeare! And in that atrocious East End Cockney accent! With a faint smile at the recollection and a contemplative shake of his head, Mr. Breedon turned back to dickering with the muletrain driver for the transport he required for printing plates for his new presses in Bloemfontein.
The outspan was like a smaller Grand Parade, but far quieter, more subdued, as if the greater time it required to travel by ox wagon made for a slower pace in all activities connected with the slower-moving beasts, a lesser urgency, a more relaxed atmosphere. There were drays drawn up beside many of the sturdy wooden wagons, some loading, others unloading. The unhitched oxen grazed quietly along the edge of the square, or lay passively watching the activity about them with their doelike eyes, patient and uncomplaining, their huge jaws moving rhythmically as they chewed their cuds. Barney walked up to the first wagon he came to. The driver, sitting on an upturned empty nail keg and watching men load his wagon, removed his pipe from his mouth and considered Barney dourly. Barney looked back, wondering how to begin.
“Sir—”
“What, boy?”
“You goin’ to Kimberley?”
“No.” A simple question answered simply. The pipe was replaced between the thin lips; the driver’s attention returned to the wagon and the men loading it.
“D’you know anyone who is? Goin’ to Kimberley, I mean.”
The driver sighed at this insistence that he speak once again. “Andries.”
“What?”
“Andries Pirow. That wagon.” The pipe was momentarily pointed and then was clamped once more between the thin lips.
“Thanks.” Barney walked over to the indicated wagon and set his suitcases down again. The driver was lying under the wagon, sleeping, his broad-brimmed leather hat spread over his face, his booted legs sprawled out, extending from beneath the wagon. The wagon itself appeared loaded; the usual Conestoga-type curved cover had been forsaken in this instance in favor of the canvas being held taut against the bulky load, and was tightly lashed at the corners. Only at the rear end of the wagon had a separate piece of canvas been raised, allowing access to the wagon’s contents there without the necessity of disturbing the carefully stowed load in the front. From the curved steel bar holding this separate cover swung bags and small casks; a battered teapot hung there as well. Barney squatted to peer beneath the wagon at the sleeping man.
“Sir?” A faint snore, muffled by the hat, was his only response. Barney hesitated a moment and then put out his hand, tentatively touching the rough-spun shirt. “Sir?” Again there was no response. Barney looked back over his shoulder at the first driver helplessly. The man returned the look with no expression at all. Barney turned back to the sleeping Andries, shaking him gently once again. “Sir?”
“Like this.”
Barney looked up in surprise. The first driver had abandoned his nail keg and was standing beside him. The man drew back his foot and kicked the boot sole of the sleeping man with all his force. “On’y way,” he said succinctly, removing his pipe to speak. “Ol’ Andries, he sleep like a dead.” He replaced the pipe in his mouth, walked back to his inverted nail keg, and sat down.
The blow, however, had the desired effect. Andries Pirow pushed the hat from across his face and looked around to see who or what had brought him from his slumber. Then he crawled from beneath the wagon and stood up, yawning prodigiously. He was a huge man in his mid-forties with a face that had been deeply lined by wind and sun; he wore a graying beard that had been cut square a few inches from his chin. His hands were the largest hands Barney had ever seen on a human being. Andries stretched and yawned again, and then stared at Barney. Barney backed up a step.
“I didn’t kick you, mister—”
“I know.” Andries stared at the other driver a moment; the man returned his stare without the slightest change of expression. Andries bit back a smile and turned to Barney. “Well? You want to talk to me, boy?”
Barney fought down his first flush of anger. He was getting tired of being called “boy.” And he was, after all, a paying customer, or anyway, at least a potential one. “You goin’ to Kimberley?”
“I am.”
“I want to go with you. They said — five quid’d do it.”
Andries shook his head. “I’m not a wagon for passasier. No people. Got a load of machinery for Dutoitspan. No room.”
“I’ll walk. They said I’d have to, anyways.”
“Your bags won’t walk.”
“I’ll—” Barney fell silent. Obviously he wasn’t going to carry his two heavy suitcases all the way to Kimberley.