Power of the Sword - Smith Wilbur - Страница 157
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Sergeant, what would you do if it were your wife or mother who needed you? The sergeant glanced around him sheepishly. I tell you what I'll do, sir. My men are going to open the roadblock for one minute and we are going to turn our backs. I never saw you and I don't know nothing about you. The streets were deserted but littered with debris, loose stones and bricks and broken glass that crunched under the tyres of the Jaguar. Shasa drove fast, appalled at the destruction he saw around him, slitting his eyes against the drifts of smoke that obscured his vision every few hundred yards.
Once or twice he saw figures lurking in the alleys, or watching from the upper windows of the undamaged buildings, but nobody attempted to stop him or attack him.
Nevertheless, it was with intense relief that he reached the police station in Victoria Road, and the protection of the hastily marshalled police riot squads.
Tara Malcomess. The sergeant at the front desk of the charge office recognized the name immediately. Yes, you could say that we know about her! After all, it took four of my men to carry her in here.
What are the charges, Sergeant? Let me see, He consulted the charge sheet. So far we have only got attending an unlawful assembly, wilful destruction of property, inciting to violence, using abusive and threatening language, obstructing the police in the execution of their duty, assaulting a policeman and,or policemen, common assault, assault with an offensive weapon and,or assault with intent. I will put up her bail. That, sir, will cost a pretty penny, I should say. Her father is Colonel Malcomess, the cabinet minister. Well, why didn't you say so before? Please wait here, sir. Tara had a blackened eye and her blouse was torn; her auburn hair stood up in tangled disarray as she peered out at Shasa between the bars of her cell.
What about Huey? she demanded.
Huey can cook in Hades for I care. Then I'm going to cook with him, Tara declared truculently. I'm not leaving here without him. Shasa recognized the obstinate set of her madonna-like features, and sighed. So it cost him one hundred pounds fifty for Tara and fifty for Huey.
I'll be damned if I will give him a lift though, Shasa declared.
Fifty quid is enough for any little bolshevik. He can walk back to his kennel from here. Tara climbed into the front seat of the Jaguar and folded her arms defiantly. Neither of them spoke as Shasa gunned the motor and pulled away with unnecessary violence, burning blue smoke off the bac tyres.
Instead of heading back towards the affluent white southern suburbs, he sent the Jaguar roaring up the lower slopes of Devil's Peak and parked at one of the viewpoints overlooking the smoking and damaged buildings of District Six.
What are you doing? she demanded, as he switched off the engine.
Don't you want to have a look at your handiwork? he asked coldly. Surely you are proud of what you have achieved.
She shifted uneasily in her seat. That wasn't us, she muttered. 'That was the skollie boys and the gangsters. My dear Tara, that is how revolution is supposed to work.
The criminal elements are encouraged to destroy the existing system, to break down the rule of law and order, and then the leaders step in and restore order again by shooting the revolutionaries. Haven't you studied the teachings of your idol Lenin? It was the fault of the police Yes, it's always the fault of the police, that's also part of Lenin's plan. It isn't like that Shut up, he snapped at her. Just for once shut up and listen to me. Up to now I've put up with your Joan of Arc act. It was silly and naive but I tolerated it because I loved you. But when you start burning down people's homes and throwing bricks and bombs, then I don't think it's so funny any more. Don't you dare condescend to me, she flared.
Look, Tara, look down there at the smoke and flames.
Those are the people you pretend to care for, those are the people who you say you want to help. Those are their homes and livelihoods that you have put the torch to. I didn't think, I No, you certainly didn't think. But I am going to tell you something now and you'd better remember it. if you try to destroy this land I love and make its people suffer, then you become my enemy and I will fight you to the death., She was silent for a long time, her head turned away from him and then at last she said softly, Will you take me home, Please? He took the long way home over Kloof Nek and along the Atlantic coast, circling around the far side of Table Mountain to avoid the riot-torn areas and they never spoke again until he parked at last in front of the Malcomess home in Newlands.
Perhaps you are right, Tara said. Perhaps we really are enemies. She climbed out of the Jaguar and stood looking down at him as he sat behind the wheel in the open cockpit.
Goodbye Shasa, she said softly, sadly, and went into the house.
Goodbye, Tara, he whispered. Goodbye, my beloved enemy!
All the Courtneys were gathered in the front room of Weltevreden.
Sir Garrick and Anna sat on the long sofa which was covered with striped Regency patterned damask. They had come down from Natal for Sir Garry's birthday, and the week before they had all climbed Table Mountain for the traditional birthday picnic. it had been a merry occasion and the Ou Baas, General Ian Christian Smuts, had been with them, as he nearly always was.
Sir Garry and Lady Anna had planned to return home a few days reviously, but then the ghastly news of the German invation of Poland had broken and they had stayed on at Weltevrede. It was only right that the family should be together in these desperate days.
The two of them held hands like young lovers as they sat close together. Since his last birthday, Sir Garry had grown a small silver goatee beard, perhaps in unconscious imitation of his old friend General smuts. it increased his scholarly mien and added a little touch of distinction to his pale aesthetic features. He leaned slightly forward on the sofa, inclined towards his wife but with his attentionontheradio cabinet over which Shasa Courtney was fussing, twiddling the tuning knobs and frowning at the crackle and whine of static.
The BBC is on the forty-one-metre band, Centaine told him sharply and glanced at her diamond-studded wristwatch. Do be quick, cheri, or we will miss the transmission!
,Ah! Shasa smiled as the static cleared and the chimes of Big Ben rang out clearly. As they died away the announcer spoke.
Twelve hundred hours Greenwich Mean Time and in place of the news we are broadcasting a statement by Mr Neville Chamberlain the prime minister,, Turn it up, cheri, Centaine ordered anxiously, and the fateful words, measured and grave, boomed into the elegant room.
They listened to it all in complete silence. Sir Garry's beard quivered, and he took the steel-rimmed spectacles off his nose and absentmindedly chewed on one of the side frames. Beside him Anna wriggled forward onto the edge of the sofa, her thick thighs spread under their own weight; her face slowly turned a deeper shade of brick and her grip on her husband's hand tightened as she stared at the radio in its mahogany cabinet.
Centaine sat in the tall wingbacked chair beside the huge stone fireplace. She looked like a young girl in a white summer dress with a wide yellow ribbon around her slim waist. She was thirty-nine years old, but there was not yet a single thread of silver in the dense dark curls of her hair and her skin was clear, the faint crow's feet at the corners of her eyes smoothed almost entirely by expensive oils and creams. She leaned an elbow on the arm of the chair, and while with one finger she touched her cheek, she never took her eyes off her son.
Shasa paced the long room, moving from the radio cabinet in its niche between the long flowered curtains, across the highly polished parquet floor with its scattering of oriental carpets until he reached the grand concert piano that stood against the main wall of bookcases at the far end of the room, then turning and coming back with quick restless paces, his hands clasped behind his back, his head bowed in concentration.
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