All that day, the last day of March, the cableway to the top of Table Mountain had operated normally. Every half hour the car on the summit descended, and the car below ascended, both operating on the same endless cable. The entire journey took seven minutes.
Passengers going up or coming down gawked at the magnificent panorama over the head of the blase conductor in each car. In his upper-station cabin the driver of the week, Clobber, hunched conscientiously over his controls during each run, and was usually able to relax for the rest of the half hour.
In the restaurant on the summit, Mrs Orvin worked and chatted and sold curios and postcards and buttered scones, and showed customers how to post their cards in the little box which would ensure their stamps would be canceled with a special Table Mountain franking.
In the box-office at the lower station, the station master, Brander, sold tickets for the journey, and chatted with the conductor who happened to be down at the time, and drank tea.
Then, at 5.30 p.m., the siren moaned its warning that the last trip of the day was about to commence. Into the upper car came the last straggling sightseers, the engineer on duty, Mrs Orvin, and the conductor, Skager. Alone in the lower car was the other conductor, Heston, who would sleep overnight on the summit.
Then two bells rang, and the cars were on their way. For the space of seven minutes Clobber and the Native labourer, Ben, were the only two on top of the mountain. Then the cars docked, and Heston stepped jauntily on to the landing platform.
He joined Clobber, but neither spoke. Their dislike was mutual and obvious. They ate their evening meal in silence.
Clobber picked up a book. Heston took a short walk, and then went to bed.
Some hours later, he woke up. Somewhere in the blackness of the room he could hear Clobber snoring softly.
Heston bared his teeth. Snore now, he thought, snore now. But tomorrow…
The night began to grow less black. The stars faded first, then the lights far below in the city also winked out. The east changed colour. The sun rose.
It was tomorrow.
Brander came into the room which housed the lower landing platform, and peered myopically up along the giant stretch of steel rope.
The old Cape Coloured, Piet, was sweeping out the car which had remained overnight at the lower station – the right-hand car. He said: “Dag [1], Baas Brander.”
“Dag, Piet,” said Brander.
Two thousand feet above, the upper station looked like a doll’s house, perched on the edge of the cliff. The outlines of Table Mountain stood deep-etched by the morning sun. On the flat top of the elevation there was no sign of cloud – the tablecloth, as people in Cape Town call it – and there was no stirring of the air.
Brander thought: Good weather. We will be operating all day.
Piet was sweeping carefully, poking the broom edgeways into the corners of the car. He noticed Brander looking at him, and his old parchment flat-nosed face creased suddenly into a myriad of grins “Baas Dimble is the engineer today,” he said. “The car must be very clean.”
“That’s right, Piet,” said Brander. “Make a good job for Baas Dimble. You still have twenty minutes.”
In the upper station, Clobber settled himself in his chair in the driver’s cabin, and opened the latest issue of Armchair Scientist. He had just about enough time, he reckoned, to finish the latest article on the new rocket fuels before the test run at nine-thirty.
Line by line his eyes swallowed words, phrases and sentences. Then, interrupting the even flow of his thoughts, he felt the uneasy consciousness of eyes staring at the back of his neck. He had an annoying mental image of Heston’s thin lips contorting in a sardonic smile.
He turned. It was Heston, but this time his face was unusually serious. “Did I interrupt you?” he asked.
“Oh, go to hell,” said Clobber. He marked the place in his magazine, and put it down. He asked: “Well?”
“I wanted a few words with you,” said Heston.
“If it’s chit-chat you’re after, find someone else.”
Heston looked hurt. “It’s… well, it’s rather a personal problem. Do you mind?”
“All right. Go ahead.”
“I’m a bit worried about the trip down.”
“Why? You know as well as I do that nothing can go wrong with the cable.”
“No, it’s not that. It’s just… Look, Clobber, I don’t want you to think I’m pulling your leg, because I’m really very serious. I don’t think I’m going to get down alive. You see, yesterday was my birthday – I turned thirty-one and it was 31 March – and I had to spend last night up here. Now, I’m not being superstitious or anything, but I’ve been warned that the day after my birthday I’d not be alive if my first trip was from the top to the bottom of the mountain. If I hadn’t forgotten, I’d have changed shifts with someone, but as it is…”
“Look here, Heston, if you’re not bluffing, you’re the biggest damned fool-”
“I’m not bluffing, Clobber. I mean it. You see, I haven’t got a relation in the world. If anything does happen, I’d like to see that each of the men gets something of mine as a sort of keepsake. You can have my watch. Dimble gets my binoculars-”
“Sure, sure. And your million-rand bank account goes to Little Orphan Annie. Don’t be a damned fool. Who gave you this idiotic warning, anyway?”
“I had a dream-”
“Get to hell out of here, you little rat! Coming here and-”
“But I mean it, Clobber-”
“Get out! It would be a damned good thing for all of us if you didn’t reach the bottom alive!”
Dimble, neat and officious but friendly, arrived at the lower station wagon, and with him were Skager and Mrs Orvin.
Brander shuffled forward to meet them.
“Nice day,” said Dimble. “What’s your time, Brander? Nine twenty-five? Good, our watches agree. Everything ship-shape here? Fine.”
Skager scratched a pimple on his neck.
Mrs Orvin said: “How’s your hand, Mr Brander?”
The station-master peered below his glasses at his left hand, which was neatly bound with fresh white bandages. “Getting better slowly, thanks. It’s still a little painful. I can’t use it much, yet.”
“Don’t like that Heston,” said Dimble. “Nasty trick he played on you, Brander.”
“Perhaps it wasn’t a trick, Mr Dimble. Perhaps he didn’t know the other end of the iron was hot.”
“Nonsense,” said Mrs Orvin. “He probably heated it up, specially. I can believe anything of him. Impertinent, that’s what he is.”
“Even if he did do it,” said Brander, “I can’t bear any hard feelings.”
Dimble said: “You’re a religious man, eh, Brander? All right in its way, but too impractical. No good turning the other cheek to a chap like Heston. Probably give you another clout for good measure. No, I’m different. If he’d done it to me, I’d have my knife into him.”
“He’ll get a knife into him one of these days,” said Skager, darkly. He hesitated. “He’ll be coming down in the first car, won’t he?”
“Yes,” said Brander.
“And it’s just about time,” said Dimble. “We’d better get in our car. After you, Mrs Orvin. So long, Brander.”
“Goodbye, Mr Dimble – Mrs Orvin – Skager.”
Heston came through the door leading to the landing platform at the upper station. In the car, the Native Ben was still sweeping.
“Hurry up, you lazy black swine,” said Heston. “What in hell have you been doing with yourself this morning? It’s almost time to go, and you’re still messing about. Get out of my way.”
The Native looked at him with a snarl. “You mustn’t talk to me like that. I’m not your dog. I’ve been twenty years with this company, and in all that time nobody’s ever spoken to me like that-”