I was fascinated, utterly fascinated. I’d never seen such a thing: it was extraordinary. You couldn’t make out the slightest false move.
‘Listen, mate, I’ve been shooting craps for ever. I started on the Butte when I was eight. I’ve risked shooting them, mate, I’ve risked shooting them with dice like that, and do you know where? On the crap-table at the Gare de l’Est, in the days of Roger Sole and Co.’
‘I remember. There were some very quaint specimens there.’
‘You don’t have to tell me. And among the regulars, as well as the wide boys and the pimps and the odds and sods, there were cops as famous as Jojo-le-Beau, the pimp-cop from La Madeleine, and specialists from the gambling squad. And they were done as brown as the rest. So you see there’s no coming unstuck if you shoot these craps in a miners’ camp.’
‘True enough.’
‘But get this: the one place is as dangerous as the other. At the Gare de l’Est the crooks were as quick on the draw as the miners. Just one difference: in Paris you shoot and you light out as quick as you can. At the mine, you shoot and stay put. There are no pigs: the miners make their own laws.’ He paused, slowly emptied his glass, and went on, ‘Well now, Papillon, are you coming with me?’
I reflected for a moment; but not for long. The adventure tempted me. It was risky, without doubt; those miners would not be choir-boys – far from it; but there might be big money to be picked up. Come on, Papillon, banco on Jojo! And again I said to him, ‘When do we leave?’
‘Tomorrow afternoon, if you like: at five, after the heat of the day. That’ll give us time to get things together. We’ll travel by night at first. You got a gun?’
‘No.’
‘A good knife?’
‘No knife.’
‘Never mind. I’ll look after that. Ciao.’
I went back to the house, thinking about Maria. She’d certainly rather I went into the bush than to Caracas. I’d leave Picolino with her. And then tomorrow, on my way for the diamonds! And seven! And eleven! Once, siete! Et sept, et onze! I was there already: all I had left to do was to learn all the numbers in Spanish, English, Brazilian and Italian.
I found José at home. I told him I’d changed my mind. Caracas would be for another time; at present I was going off with an old white-haired Frenchman called Jojo to the diamond-mines.
‘What are you going with him as?’
‘As his partner, of course.’
‘He always gives his partners half his winnings.’
‘That’s the rule. Do you know men who’ve worked with him?’
‘Three.’
‘Did they make plenty of money?’
‘I don’t know. I dare say they did. Each one of them made three or four trips.’
‘And what about after those three or four trips?’
‘After? They never came back.’
‘Why not? Did they settle down there at the mines?’
‘No. They were dead.’
‘Is that right? Fever?’
‘No. Killed by the miners.’
‘Oh. Jojo must be a lucky guy, if he always got out of it.’
‘Yes. But Jojo, he’s very knowing. He never wins much himself: he works it so that his partner wins.’
‘I see. So it’s the other man who’s in danger; not him. It’s as well to know. Thanks, José.’
‘You’re not going, now that I’ve told you that?’
‘One last question, and give me the straight answer: is there a chance of coming back with a lot of dough after two or three trips?’
‘Sure.’
‘So Jojo is rich. Why does he go back there, then? I saw him loading the mules.’
‘To begin with Jojo doesn’t risk anything, as I said. Secondly, he was certainly not going off. Those mules belong to his father-in-law. He made up his mind to go because he met you.’
‘But what about the stuff he was loading, or getting ready to load?’
‘How do you know it was for him?’
‘Oh-ho. What other advice have you got?’
‘Don’t go.’
‘Not that. I’ve made up my mind to go. What else?’
José bent his head as if to think. A long pause. When he looked up again his face was bright. His eyes shone with intelligence, and slowly, drawing out his words, he said, ‘Listen to the advice of a man who knows that world through and through. Every time there’s a big game, a real big game – when there’s a heap of diamonds in front of you and everything is at the boiling-point, get up unexpectedly and don’t sit there with your winnings. Say you’ve got a belly-ache and go straight to the john. You don’t come back, of course; and that night you sleep somewhere else, not in your own place.’
‘Pretty good, José. And what else?’
‘Although the buyers at the mine pay a good deal less than the ones in El Callao or Ciudad Bolivar, you want to sell them all the diamonds you win – sell them every day. And don’t ever take the cash. Make them give you receipts in your name so as to cash them at El Callao or Ciudad Bolivar. Do the same with foreign banknotes. You say you’re afraid of losing everything you’ve won in a single day and so you avoid the risk by never having much on you. And you tell everybody just what you’re doing, so it becomes well known.’
‘So that way I’ll have a chance of coming back?’
‘Yes. You’ll have a chance of coming back alive, if God wills.’
‘Thanks, José. Buenas noches.’
Lying in Maria’s arms, exhausted with love, my head in the hollow of her shoulder, I felt her breath on my cheek. In the darkness, before I closed my eyes, I saw a heap of diamonds in front of me. Gently I picked them up, as though I were playing with them, and put them into the little canvas bag that all miners carry; then I got up right away and having looked round I said to Jojo, ‘Keep my place. I’m going to the john. I’ll be back in a minute.’ And as I dropped off, there were José’s knowing eyes, shining full of light – only people who live very close to nature have eyes like that.
The morning passed quickly. Everything was settled. Picolino was to stay there: he would be well cared for. I kissed everybody. Maria shone with delight. She knew that if I went to the mines I should have to come back this way, whereas Caracas never gave back the men who went to live there. She went with me as far as the meeting-place. Five o’clock; Jojo was there, and in great form. ‘Hello there, mate! OK? You’re prompt – fine, fine! The sun will be down in an hour. It’s better that way. There’s no one who can follow you at night.’
A dozen kisses for my true love and I climbed into the saddle. Jojo fixed the stirrups for me and just as we were setting off Maria said to me, ‘And above all, mi amor, don’t forget to go to the lavatory at the right moment.’
I burst out laughing as I dug my heels into the mule. ‘You were listening behind the door, you Judas!’
‘When you love, it’s natural.’
Now we were away, Jojo on a horse and me on a mule. The virgin forest has its roads, and they are called piques. A pique is a passage about two yards wide that has gradually been cut out through the trees; and the men who pass along keep it clear with their machêtes. On either side, a wall of green: