4

Water was terribly scarce at the station. It was supplied by the train, and with this they somehow managed to cook and eat—but bathing was out of the question. The local well had also run dry. One day, he heard of a reservoir about three miles from the station where good water could be found, and fish too.

Drawn by the allure of a bath and a catch of fish, he set off one day after seeing the morning train on its way. A Somali porter, who knew the way, went with him to show him the path. He had had his fishing tackle sent from Mombasa. The reservoir was of a moderate size, surrounded by a jungle of tall grass and yucca trees, with a low hill nearby. After finishing his bath in the water, he cast his line for a couple of hours and caught a good number of small, catfish-like fish. It had been a long time since he’d had fish on his plate, but he could not delay any longer—he had to be back at the station by four in the afternoon to see the evening train through.

He began to go fishing often, sometimes with company, but usually alone. The hardship of going without a bath had also come to an end.

The summer grew steadily more fierce. An African summer is a terrible thing—after nine in the morning, it was impossible to go out in the sun. After eleven, it seemed to Shankar as if the world was ablaze in every direction. And yet, he heard from people on the train that this was nothing compared to the heat of Central and Southern Africa.

Soon, an event occurred that would turn the course of Shankar’s life onto a different path. One morning, Shankar had gone fishing. It was three in the afternoon by the time he was returning. When he was about a mile from the station, a sound reached his ears from somewhere in that sun-scorched wilderness—a faint, agonized voice, muttering something. Following the sound, he walked a little way and saw someone sitting in the meagre patch of shade beneath a yucca tree.

Shankar walked swiftly towards him. The man was a European, dressed in a patched, tattered, and grimy suit. He had a full red beard, large eyes, and handsome features. It was clear that his body had once been powerful, but now, likely from illness, hardship, and starvation, he was gaunt. The man was slumped exhaustedly against the trunk of the tree. His grimy sola topi had fallen from his head and lay to one side; beside him was a large, khaki cloth bag.

Shankar asked in English, “Where are you coming from?”

Instead of answering, the man brought a hand to his mouth, miming the act of drinking, and said, “A little water! Water!”

Shankar said, “There’s no water here! Can you make it to the station if you lean on me?”

With great difficulty, the man leaned on him for a while, but towards the end he was virtually draped over Shankar’s shoulder by the time they reached the platform. Helping him had made Shankar late; the afternoon train had already passed in his absence. He made a bed for the man in the station house, gave him water to revive him, and brought him some food. The man rallied a little, but Shankar could see he had a high fever. His body was completely broken by long periods of irregular living, exhaustion, and starvation—he would not be well in a few days.

A little later, the man introduced himself. His name was Diego Alvarez. He was Portuguese by birth, though the African sun had burned his skin to the colour of copper.

Shankar let him stay at the station for the night. But the man’s illness put him in a difficult position—there was no medicine here, no doctor. The morning train did not go towards Mombasa, but the guard on the afternoon train might agree to take the sick man. But the night was still long. If only the afternoon train had been there when he arrived at the station, there would have been no problem.

Shankar sat up all night by the patient’s side. The man had no strength left in him. His illness was most likely caused by hardship and hunger. He had no one in this faraway land—if Shankar did not look after him, who would? Ever since childhood, he had been unable to bear the sight of others’ suffering. The way Shankar tended to him all through the night, no one from his own family could have done more.

That night, as the moon was rising from behind the low range of hills to the north-east, and the silent, midnight hour shimmered, the fearsome roar of a lion suddenly shattered the quiet of the plain. The patient had been dozing—the lion’s call made him sit bolt upright in bed. Shankar said, “Don’t be afraid. Lie down. It’s a lion roaring outside. The door is closed.”

Then Shankar slowly opened the door and stepped out onto the platform. As he stood there, taking in his surroundings, the extraordinary beauty of the night seemed to cast a spell on him. The moon was rising on the distant horizon; the yucca trees cast long shadows from east to west; the sea of grass was mysterious and still. The lion was roaring from somewhere within five hundred yards of the station quarters. But he had grown used to the sound of lions lately—it no longer frightened him as it once had.

The beauty of the night so captivated him that he almost forgot the lion’s proximity.

He went back inside the station house. The clock chimed two, tong, tong. As he entered the room, he saw the patient sitting up in bed. He said, “Give me some water, I’m thirsty.”

The man could speak English very well. Shankar poured water from the tin and gave it to him.

The man’s fever seemed to have abated. He said, “What were you saying? Did you think I was afraid? Diego Alvarez, afraid? Young man, you do not know Diego Alvarez.” A strange smile, a mixture of despair, sorrow, and scorn, appeared on the man’s lips. He fell back exhaustedly against the pillow. That smile made Shankar think: this is no ordinary man. Then his eyes fell on the man’s hands. The fingers were short and thick; the hands were veined like ropes; and beneath the coppery beard, the set of his chin spoke of a man of iron will. Now that the fever had subsided a little, it was as if the real man was slowly emerging. The man said, “Come closer. You have done a great deal for me. My own son could not have done more. But let me tell you something—I will not live. My heart tells me my time is up. I want to repay your kindness. Are you an Indian? How much do you earn here? Since you have left your country and come so far for such a meagre salary, you must have courage, and the strength to endure hardship. Listen to my words carefully, but you must promise that you will not reveal to anyone what I tell you today—not before I die.”

Shankar gave him his word. Then, as that strange night gradually gave way to dawn, the man told him a story so astonishing, so incredible, that it was the kind one usually only reads in novels.

The Story of Diego Alvarez

Young man, how old would you be? Twenty-two? When you were just a baby in your mother’s arms—twenty years ago, around 1888 or ’89, I was prospecting for gold in the hills and jungles north of the Cape Colony. I was young then, and no danger in the world seemed like a danger to me.

I bought my supplies in the town of Bulawayo and set off alone, with only two donkeys to carry my things. I crossed the Zambezi River and travelled on. The path and the country were completely unknown to me—nothing but small hills, grasslands, and, from time to time, the villages of Kaffirs. Gradually, human habitation seemed to thin out, and I reached a place where, I believe, no European had ever set foot before.

Wherever I saw a river or a stream, or a hill, the first thing I did was search for a vein of gold. In South Africa, people had become rich by finding all sorts of things; since childhood, I had heard so many tales about it. It was the glamour of those stories that had drawn me to Africa. But I wandered from place to place for two years in vain. The hardships I endured in those two years were unbearable. On one occasion, I found something, only to lose it again.

That day, I had shot a deer in the morning. I pitched my tent, cooked the meat, and lay down for the afternoon, because in those parts it is impossible to travel in the afternoon sun—the temperature in summer ranges from 115 to 130 degrees. After my rest, I was cleaning my rifle when I noticed that the foresight on the barrel was missing. Without a foresight, a rifle’s aim is never true. I searched everywhere for it, but couldn’t find it. Nearby was a mound of stones, and on it I noticed some kind of hard, white substance. The substance was present in several places on the mound. I picked out a grain of it, ground it down, and for the time being, fashioned it into a foresight and fixed it to the end of my rifle barrel. Then, in the late afternoon, I set off again, heading north. Where I had pitched my tent that day, I gradually forgot.

About fifteen days later, I met an Englishman, who, like me, was prospecting for gold. He had two Matabele porters with him. We were happy to find each other. His name was Jim Carter, a vagabond like myself, though he was older than me. One day, Jim was examining my rifle when something suddenly caught his eye, and he looked astonished. He asked me, “What’s this on your foresight?” Then, after hearing my story, he grew very excited. “Don’t you see?” he said. “This thing is pure silver, native silver! Where this is found, there is usually a silver mine. I reckon you could get at least nine thousand ounces of silver per ton of rock there. Let’s go to that place at once. We’re going to be millionaires.”

To make a long story short, I went back with Carter, retracing my steps. But despite four months of trying, of enduring unbearable hardships, of getting lost time and again in the vast, featureless, desert-like veld and coming to the very brink of death, I could not for the life of me pinpoint that spot. When I had struck my tent and left that day, I hadn’t paid much attention to the location. On the African veld, there are hardly any landmarks to help you find an old place—everything looks the same. After many frustrating attempts, we finally gave up hope of the silver mine and headed towards the Guai River. Jim Carter never left my side after that; he was with me until his death. It still pains me to think of his tragic end.

The misery of thirst seemed to us the worst of all hardships on this journey. So we decided from then on to follow the course of a river. We lived by hunting the animals of the forest, and if we occasionally found a Kaffir village, we would get sweet potatoes, chickens, and other things from there.

Once, after crossing the Orange River, we had taken shelter in a Kaffir village about fifty miles away. That afternoon, the daughter of the village chief suddenly fell violently ill. We went to see her—a little naked girl of five or six, writhing on the ground, apparently in terrible pain in her stomach. Everyone was weeping and wailing. A demon had surely possessed the girl, they said; it would not leave until it had killed her. By questioning her and her parents, we learned only that she had gone to the edge of the forest, and had been possessed by a spirit ever since. Seeing her condition, I realized she had eaten too many of some wild fruit and had a stomach-ache. We asked her if she had eaten any. She said yes, she had. Unripe fruit? No, the girl said, not the fruit, the seeds of the fruit. The seeds themselves were the food.

One dose of a homeopathic remedy cast out her demon. We had a medicine box with us. We became very popular in the village. For fifteen days, we remained guests of the chief. We would hunt eland and invite the Kaffirs to a feast of meat at night. When it was time to leave, the Kaffir chief said, “You white men love white stones, don’t you? They are fine things to play with. Would you like a white stone? Wait, I’ll show you.” A little later, he returned and placed in our hands a white stone the size of a fig. Jim and I gasped in astonishment—it was a diamond! An uncut diamond, straight from a mine or the alluvial soil above it!

The Kaffir chief said, “Take it. You see that big mountain in the distance, the one that looks like smoke? If you walk from here, you can reach it in one moon. I’ve heard there are many white stones like this in that mountain. We have never gone there; it is not a good place. A demon called the Bunyip lives there. Many moons ago, three brave men from our village went to that mountain against everyone’s advice, and they never returned. Another time, a white man like you came. That was a long, long time ago, many moons before our time, in the time of our fathers and grandfathers. He went there and never came back.”

As soon as we left the Kaffir village, we consulted our map. The distant, hazy, indistinct shape was the Richtersveld mountain range—the wildest, most unknown, vast, and perilous region in all of southern Africa. No civilized man had ever set foot in that region, save for a few fearless explorers and geographers. Most of that vast expanse of forest and mountain was completely uncharted; there were no maps of it, and no one could say what lay within.

The blood of Jim Carter and I began to race. We both decided at that very moment that this realm of forest and mountain was waiting for our arrival, hiding its vast treasure trove from the eyes of the world. We had to go there.

About seventeen days after leaving the Kaffir village, we entered the dense forest at the foot of the mountain range.

As I said before, this range is located in an extremely remote part of southern Africa. We did not even see any Kaffir villages near the forest. From the look of the jungle, it seemed that a woodcutter’s axe had never touched this place.

We had reached the edge of the forest a little before sunset. On Jim Carter’s advice, we pitched our tent there to rest for the night. Jim gathered wood from the forest and lit a fire; I set about cooking. I had shot a pair of birds that morning, and the plan was to pluck them and roast them. I was busy with the task of plucking the birds when Jim said, “Leave the birds. Make two cups of coffee first.”

The fire was already lit. I put water on to heat and went back to plucking the birds, when the roar of a lion was heard very close by. Jim took his gun and went out. I said, “It’s getting dark, don’t go too far.” After that, as I was plucking the birds, I heard two gunshots from just outside the jungle, not far away. A short pause, then another shot. Then, all was quiet. About ten minutes passed. When Jim didn’t return, I took my own rifle and walked a little way in the direction of the shots, and saw Jim coming towards me, dragging something heavy behind him. Seeing me, he said, “A magnificent skin. If we leave it at the edge of the forest, the hyenas will finish it. Let’s drag it to the tent.”

Together, we dragged the huge body of the lion to the fire in front of the tent. Then, night fell. After eating, we lay down to sleep.

Late in the night, I was woken by the roar of a lion. It was calling from a short distance from the tent. In the darkness, I couldn’t tell exactly how far. I sat up in bed, rifle in hand. Jim merely said once, “The mate of the one from this evening.”

With that, he calmly turned over and went back to sleep. I went outside the tent and saw that the fire had gone out. There was some kindling nearby, so I used it to build the fire up again. Then I went back and lay down.

The next morning, we rose and entered the jungle. After going a short distance, we met a few Kaffirs. They had come to hunt deer. We offered them tobacco, hoping to hire them as porters and guides.

They said, “You say that because you don’t know. Men do not come into this forest. If you value your lives, go back. That mountain range is relatively low. Beyond it, there is a stretch of flat land, surrounded by dense forest, and beyond that, another range, even higher than this one. That flat land in the middle of the forest is very dangerous. The Bunyip lives there. If you fall into the Bunyip’s hands, you will never return. No one goes there. You think we will go there to die for the sake of tobacco? If you know what’s good for you, you won’t go either.”

We asked, “What is a Bunyip?”

They did not know. But they made it perfectly clear that although they did not know what a Bunyip was, they knew very well the harm it could do.

Fear was not in our nature, and certainly not in Jim Carter’s. He became even more determined. He had to solve this mystery of the Bunyip—whether he found diamonds or not. If only I had understood then that death was drawing him on, unseen!

The old man stopped here, panting a little. Shankar was now overcome with curiosity; he had never heard such a story before. Looking at the dying Diego Alvarez’s tattered clothes and rope-veined hands, looking into the two eyes that shone like steel from beneath his weathered eyebrows, Shankar’s heart filled with respect and affection.

Here was a true man.

Alvarez said, “Another glass of water—”

After drinking the water, the old man began to speak again.

Yes, listen to what happened next. We entered the heart of the dense forest. Such huge trees, giant ferns, orchids and lianas of every imaginable colour; in places the forest was dense and impenetrable. The undergrowth beneath the great trees was so thick with thorns like fish-hooks, and the leaves overhead were so densely entwined, that it was doubtful if sunlight had ever entered that jungle. The sky was not visible. The nuisance of baboons was everywhere in the jungle; on the branches of the large trees sat troops of them—infants, youngsters, old ones, youths. Many a time, I saw that they paid no mind to the presence of men. They bared their teeth to frighten us. A few of the old chief baboons were truly ferocious; if we hadn’t had guns in our hands, they would have attacked us without hesitation. Jim Carter said, “At least we will never want for food in this jungle.”

We spent seven or eight days in that dense jungle. Jim Carter had been right; every day, a baboon gave its life to provide us with food. Small and large springs flowed down from the high mountain to various parts of the forest, so there was no lack of water. Once, however, this led to danger. One afternoon, we had come to the edge of a spring and were setting up to roast a haunch of baboon over a fire we’d lit, when Jim, in a fit of thirst, went and drank from the spring. A short while later, he began to vomit continuously. He had a terrible pain in his stomach. I knew a little science; my suspicions aroused, I tested the water and found it was laced with mineral arsenic. It must have been washing down from a layer of arsenic higher up the mountain. I gave him an antidote from my homeopathic kit, and by evening, Jim had recovered.

Once we were deep in the forest, we encountered no wild animals other than the baboons and, occasionally, a venomous snake or two. I leave out the birds and butterflies, of course. For nowhere else can one see such a variety of colours and species of birds and butterflies as in these tropical jungles. Besides, they do not fall into the category of what one generally means by ‘wild beasts’.

First, we came upon a spur of the Richtersveld range, which ran parallel to the main, principal range, but was comparatively lower. After crossing it, we descended into a vast, forested valley and pitched our tent. A small river flowed through the valley. Jim and I were delighted to see the river, as it is often from the banks of such rivers that one finds clues to mineral deposits.

We went about testing the sand on various parts of the river, but found nothing anywhere. There wasn’t so much as a speck of gold in the river’s sand. We gradually grew disheartened. By then, some twenty or twenty-two days had passed. One evening, while drinking coffee, Jim said, ‘Look, my gut tells me we’ll find gold here. Let’s stay a while longer.’

Another twenty days went by. The baboon meat had become unbearable and utterly unappetizing. Even a man like Jim grew despondent. I said, ‘Why go on, Jim? Let’s turn back now. Those men in the Kaffir village cheated us. There’s nothing here.’

Jim said, ‘This mountain range has many spurs. I won’t leave until we’ve seen them all.’

One day, as we were sitting by the bed of the mountain river sifting sand, Jim and I simultaneously spotted a small, yellowish stone, half-buried in a pile of pebbles. We both quickly dug it out. Our faces lit up with joy and astonishment. Jim said, ‘Diego, our labours have finally paid off! You recognise it, don’t you?’

I understood, too. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But it’s been washed here by the river’s current. The mine itself isn’t here.’

The stone was of the famous yellow diamond variety from South Africa. Of course, this was no cause for great celebration, as it only proved that somewhere in an unknown, inaccessible region of this vast mountain range, there was a yellow diamond mine. A piece from one of its strata had been washed down by the river. Finding that mother lode would demand superhuman effort, patience, and courage. We would not have lacked that effort, courage, or patience, but the demon that stood guard over the priceless diamond mine of that mysterious mountain-forest blocked our way in a completely unexpected fashion. One day towards evening, we were resting in a clearing in the forest. Before us in the clearing stood a palm tree, and around its trunk at the base was a very thick thicket. Suddenly we saw something shaking that enormous palm tree so violently that its dry upper fronds were rustling noisily and swaying, just as they would in a storm. The whole tree was moving with it.

We were astonished. There was no wind at all, so why was the palm tree shaking? It seemed to us as if someone was grabbing the trunk of the palm and shaking it. Jim immediately went into the thicket at the base of the trunk to see what was happening.

A moment after he went in, I heard a piercing scream and ran, grabbing my rifle—entering the thicket, I saw Jim lying in the undergrowth, his body drenched in blood—some terribly powerful beast had ripped him open with its sharp claws from his face down to his chest, just like someone ripping open an old pillow to pull out the cotton. Jim only said, ‘The devil himself—the devil incarnate—’

Gesturing with his hand, he said, ‘Run—run!’

And then Jim died. On the trunk of the palm tree, I saw what looked like a piece of thick, hard hide stuck to the bark. It occurred to me that some terribly strong animal had been rubbing its body against the palm tree; that was why the tree had been shaking like that. I could find no trace of the beast. I carried Jim’s body out into the open and, rifle in hand, went to the other side of the thicket. There, on the ground, I saw the tracks of some unknown animal; it had only three toes on its foot. I followed the tracks for some distance until, a little way into the jungle, they led to the mouth of a cave. Near the entrance to the cave, on the dry sand, were the marks of that unknown, terrifying beast’s large, three-toed paw.

By then, darkness had fallen. There I stood, alone in that uninhabited wilderness, in an unknown valley ringed by mountains, tracking an even more unknown, terribly powerful beast. Looking to my right, I saw in the deepening twilight a towering wall of basalt rising almost four thousand feet, dense with forest upon forest. Very high up, on the crown of a bamboo grove on the mountain, there seemed to be a faint touch of reddish sunlight—or perhaps my eyes were deceiving me, and it was just a reflection of the endless sky.

I thought that it would not be wise to enter the cave or even to stand there at that hour.

I returned to the tent with Jim’s body. All night I sat with his corpse, a fire lit and my rifle at the ready.

The next day, after burying Jim, I set out again in search of that beast. But the trouble was, though I searched a great deal, I could not for the life of me find that cave or even the palm tree again. There are many such caves in various parts of the mountains. Who knows which cave I had seen in the evening darkness?

It was impossible to remain without a companion in the forests of the formidable Richtersveld range. After walking for fifteen days, I reached that Kaffir settlement. They recognised me and treated me with great hospitality. I told them the story of Jim’s death.

Hearing it, their faces grew strange with fear—their small eyes widened in terror. They said, ‘Disaster! The Bunyip! That is the very fear that keeps anyone from going there.’

From the Kaffir settlement, I walked another five days and found a Dutch launch on the banks of the Orange River. Aboard it, I reached the civilized world.

I was never able to go back towards the Richtersveld mountains. I tried many times. But then the Boer War broke out. I went to the war. I was wounded and spent a long time in a hospital in Pretoria. After that, once I recovered, I found work in an orange orchard and have been there ever since.

After living a quiet life for four or five years, I grew restless, and so I set out again. But I’ve grown old, young man. I feel my travels are about to end.

You keep this map. It has a rough drawing of the Richtersveld mountains and the river where we found the diamond. If you have the courage, go there. You’ll become a rich man. Since the Boer War, one or two diamond mines, large and small, have been discovered in that region, near the Vaal River. But no one knows the location where we found our diamond. You should go.

Having finished his story, Diego Alvarez sank back wearily against his pillow and lay down.