The covenant - James A. Michener [413]
But even as Frank studied this description of himself he had to be amused by one incongruous aspect. 'What's funny?' Rhodes asked testily.
'Your criteria,' Frank said with a chuckle he could not repress. Tapping the paper, he said, 'Mr. Rhodes, you wouldn't qualify on a single item. You hate sports and ridicule us when we engage in them. You took nearly a decade to win your degree. You had little sympathy for the Matabele, until they were thrashed. And as for truth, I've heard you give quite wrong explanations of your acts. Courage you may have, but you weren't in the front line when your revolution took place. And damnit all, you showed no kindliness to Maud. Not only would you fail to win one of your scholarships, you wouldn't even be considered.'
Laughing heartily, Rhodes reached for his will, waved it under Frank's nose and said, 'These criteria are not meant to identify men like me. We who move the world are not pleasant people, but we need pleasant, inoffensive people to help us. These scholarships will uncover such people.' When Frank started to speak, Rhodes interrupted: 'Stay with me, most precious of my young gentlemen, and we shall attain the dreams. You're to administer the scholarships, you know.' As he started to leave the room he turned back to say, 'You're to find me an endless supply of decent chaps just like yourself.' Handing the will back to Frank, he said, 'Think about it.'
For some time Frank sat staring at the floor, anticipating the great times he could have in Oxford, administering the scholarships, but this opportunity vanished when two visitors to his hotel room changed everything.
The first was his cousin, Sir Victor Saltwood, M.P. for Salisbury. He was brief and harsh: 'You've behaved like a damned fool, Frank. I sent you one of the finest young women this world could produce, and what in hell do you do but leave her and go off to some pile of rubble in what they call Rhodesia. And when you come back you get yourself nearly hanged. Your life was saved by that girl, and yet you abandoned her.'
'Mr. Rhodes needed me. You've seen what happened in London.'
'Needed you, yes, but dictate to you how your life should be lived? If you had any gumption, you'd tell him to go to hell, get aboard the next ship, and marry Maud Turner.'
'I'm afraid I've lost her, Victor. I've hardly seen her these past years.'
'You haven't at all. She understands the pressure you were under. After you left her the first time she got herself involved with schools in the farm districts. She's done a splendid job. Her father tells me she's visited your folks at De Kraal, loves them, and is prepared to wait till you come to your senses. But she's only human, Frank, and others want to marry her. She writes me that she's giving you two months.'
'She is!' The world seemed to spin back from the abyss of loneliness which Frank had envisioned for himself. He had supposed that Maud was lost and his life was to be an endless extension of the present, but now his cousin was saying that he had been in communication . . .
'I want to send a cable,' he cried impulsively, and on the back of Mr. Rhodes' proposed will he scribbled: Maud. Sailing home immediately. Marry me the day I arrive, please, please, and save my life.
He was signing it when Mr. Rhodes returned to the room to fetch his will, but before he could reach for it, Frank thrust it at him, his words face up, and said, 'Sir, I think you should be the first to know.'
Displaying no emotion, the great financier read the proposed cable, smiled, and said to Sir Victor, 'Stated in plain language.' He summoned a bellhop and asked him to bring the manager of the hotel. When that gentleman arrived, Rhodes said, 'See that this telegram is filed instanter. And book us two staterooms on the Scot sailing on Friday.'
'No, sir,' Frank said with a firmness that pleased his cousin. 'Idon't want you arguing with me all the way to Cape Town. My mind's quite made up, you know.'
'Of course it is, and properly so. I wish to be present at the wedding.' Turning