Master of the Game Read Online Free PDF Page A

to get dressed. His pants and shirt were stiff with dirt, and he hated to put them back on. He would have to buy a change of clothes, and this reminded him once more of how little money he had. And he was hungry again.
    Jamie left the bathhouse and pushed his way down the crowded street to a saloon called the Sundowner. He ordered a beer and lunch. Lamb cutlets with tomatoes, and sausage and potato salad and pickles. While he ate, he listened to the hopeful conversations around him.
    “…I hear they found a stone near Colesberg weighin’ twenty-one carats. Mark you, if there’s one diamond up there, there’s plenty more…”
    “…There’s a new diamond find up in Hebron. I’m thinkin’ of goin’ there…”
    “You’re a fool. The big diamonds are in the Orange River…”
    At the bar, a bearded customer in a collarless, striped-flannel shirt and corduroy trousers was nursing a shandygaff in a large glass. “I got cleaned out in Hebron,” he confided to the bartender. “I need me a grubstake.”
    The bartender was a large, fleshy, bald-headed man with a broken, twisted nose and ferret eyes. He laughed. “Hell, man, who doesn’t? Why do you think I’m tendin’ bar? As soon as I have enough money, I’m gonna hightail it up the Orange myself.” He wiped the bar with a dirty rag. “But I’ll tell you what you might do, mister. See Salomon ven der Merwe. He owns the general store and half the town.”
    “What good’ll that do me?”
    “If he likes you, he might stake you.”
    The customer looked at him. “Yeah? You really think he might?”
    “He’s done it for a few fellows I know of. You put up your labor, he puts up the money. You split fifty-fifty.”
    Jamie McGregor’s thoughts leaped ahead. He had been confident that the hundred and twenty pounds he had left would be enough to buy the equipment and food he would need to survive, but the prices in Klipdrift were astonishing. He had noticed in Van der Merwe’s store that a hundred-pound sack of Australian flour cost five pounds. One pound of sugar cost a shilling. A bottle of beer cost five shillings. Biscuits were three shillings a pound, and fresh eggs sold for seven shillings a dozen. At that rate, his money would not last long. My God , Jamie thought, at home we could live for a year on what three meals cost here . But if he could get the backing of someone wealthy, like Mr. van der Merwe…Jamie hastily paid for his food and hurried back to the general store.
    Salomon van der Merwe was behind the counter, removing the rifles from a wooden crate. He was a small man, with a thin, pinched face framed by Dundreary whiskers. He had sandy hair, tiny black eyes, a bulbous nose and pursed lips. His daughter must take after her mother , Jamie thought. “Excuse me, sir…”
    Van der Merwe looked up. “Ja?”
    “Mr. van der Merwe? My name is Jamie McGregor, sir. I’m from Scotland. I came here to find diamonds.”
    “ Ja? So?”
    “I hear you sometimes back prospectors.”
    Van der Merwe grumbled, “ Myn magtig! Who spreads these stories? I help out a few diggers, and everyone thinks I’m Santa Claus.”
    “I’ve saved a hundred and twenty pounds,” Jamie said earnestly. “But I see that it’s not going to buy me much here. I’ll go out to the bush with just a shovel if I have to, but I figure my chances would be a lot better if I had a mule and some proper equipment.”
    Van der Merwe was studying him with those small, black eyes. “ Wat denk ye? What makes you think you can find diamonds?”
    “I’ve come halfway around the world, Mr. van der Merwe, and I’m not going to leave here until I’m rich. If the diamonds are out there, I’ll find them. If you help me, I’ll make us both rich.”
    Van der Merwe grunted, turned his back on Jamie and continued unloading the rifles. Jamie stood there awkwardly, not knowing what more to say. When Van der Merwe spoke again, his question caught Jamie off guard. “You travel here by bullock