They continued circling the mercenaries’ barracks, on their left passing the long barrack-like building in which all the women and children slept, followed by the compound’s double gates, as usual propped wide open with a pair of guards lounging, one to each side.
The roughly circular compound was crudely but effectively palisaded by planks lashed together with thick vines and wire. It appeared rather rickety in places and wouldn’t be impossible to break through, but if they escaped and fled, where would they go?
The simple fact that they had no real clue where they were and how far it might be to any form of safe harbor, along with the knowledge of the hideous retribution Dubois would unquestionably inflict on those left behind should any of them successfully flee, ensured that they continued apparently acquiescent in their captivity.
They were anything but, yet circumstances and Dubois had forced them to be pragmatic.
They couldn’t escape unless they got everyone out all at once and until they knew in which direction safety lay and how long it would take them to reach it.
Skirting the captives’ communal area—a circle of logs surrounding a large fire pit—Katherine and Harriet walked slowly past the long building where the men slept and on past the open maw of the mine. Unless dispatched on some other chore, all the male captives labored inside the tunnel, now more than fifty yards long, that had been hacked, inch by foot, more or less straight into the side of a steep hill that rose abruptly from the jungle floor, as if some elemental force had thrust it upward. The hillside above the mine entrance was relatively sheer.
As she and Harriet passed the mine, they both looked inside. Although lanternlight played on the walls, glinting off the roughly hewn planes, none of the men were presently visible; they would all be farther down, hacking out the remnants of the original deposit, or with Dixon supposedly examining the second pipe—a rock formation associated with diamonds—that Dixon had, thank the Lord, discovered to the right of the original find.
If he hadn’t found that second pipe, the mine would already be on its last legs, and they would be facing death.
That new deposit had given them a second wind, as it were, in that it held out the chance of surviving long enough to figure out some way to escape.
That it was up to them to save themselves was now accepted by all. Initially, they’d waited, simply surviving, in the expectation that help would arrive in the form of a rescue party sent from the settlement.
It had seemed inconceivable that this many adults, women as well as men, many with positions and connections in the community, let alone the small army of children, could be snatched from one place without any hue and cry being raised.
But weeks and then months had passed, and no rescue had come.
With their hopes dashed, for a while, they’d grown dispirited and despairing.
But they were English, after all. They’d rallied.
And grown increasingly resolute in their determination to survive and, eventually, escape.
They hadn’t yet figured out how to do it, but they would.
Katherine never wavered from that stance, because to do so would mean that there was no hope, not for her or any of the ragtag group of children she now considered as being in her care.
Part of that group lay ahead, mostly older girls crouched by a pile of ore that the boys, both younger and older, plus the few younger girls, had fetched out of the mine. That was the role the children played. The boys and young girls darted in and around the men as they worked, grubbing out and collecting all the rock pieces as they fell from the walls and loading the rock into woven baskets. They then lugged the filled baskets outside and upended them onto the pile the older girls were sorting.
The girls sat or crouched in the shade cast by a crude movable awning Katherine had persuaded Dubois to provide and steadily worked their way through the pile of ore dumped before them. The diamonds came out of the mine heavily encrusted with a mixture of ores. The girls examined each clump of broken rock, searching for the signs they’d been taught signified that a diamond lay within. They tapped the rock, listening for the sound, then searched for the lines where diamond met ore. The girls sorted and, eventually, passed the potential diamonds to the women, who more carefully cleaned each find using small chisels and hammers to tap off the encrustations, ultimately rendering the raw diamonds small enough and light enough for transport.
The captives had heard that the cleaned stones were sent to Amsterdam via ships passing through Freetown harbor.
The rocks the girls discarded they threw into another pile. Closer to the compound’s perimeter, a massive pile of discarded rocks testified to the amount the men had already hacked out of the earth, that the children had gathered and sorted.
Katherine and Harriet paused beside the girls, responding with gentle, encouraging smiles as several glanced up.
One of the older girls, fair haired and pale skinned, asked Katherine, “Will you be around later?” She pointed to the already large pile of discarded ore. “We’ll be getting through a good amount today.”
Katherine nodded; it was part of her Dubois-decreed duties to check over the discarded ore for any obvious diamonds the girls might have missed. “I’ll be back this afternoon.”
The sound of approaching footsteps had Katherine and Harriet turning to see who was coming their way. Hillsythe, a tall, loose-limbed, brown-haired man, was walking from the medical hut in company with Jed Mathers, one of the carpenters. Hillsythe was a gentleman and, regardless of the rough clothes he now wore, was a commanding figure in their small community. He was also one of those with some degree of medical training, and Jed had a bandaged wrist.
As the pair drew level with Katherine and Harriet, Hillsythe slowed, then halted. He nodded at Jed. “Avoid using that hand for at least the rest of the day. Grab one of the boys to help you.”
“Aye. I’ll do that.” Jed dipped his head respectfully to Katherine and Harriet, then continued on his way to the mine.
Hillsythe lingered. His gaze on Jed, he murmured, “We’re going to have to move forward into the second tunnel soon. There’s too little of the first deposit left.”
“So I understand,” Katherine said. “I assume the principal question remaining is how we manage output from the second pipe once Dixon opens it for mining.”
Hillsythe inclined his head, both in agreement and in unconsciously elegant farewell. “Tonight, then. As usual after dinner.”
Katherine stood with Harriet and watched Hillsythe trail Jed back to the mine. Dixon had been the only officer Dubois and his masters in the settlement who were managing the scheme had intended to snatch. Because of his expertise, Dixon had been a necessity. What the schemers hadn’t counted on was that other officers would be dispatched to find Dixon. First had come Lieutenant William Hopkins, who’d been followed by Lieutenant Thomas Fanshawe, both navy men, and finally Hillsythe—who didn’t have a rank and wasn’t army or navy, yet was transparently someone of military background.
Initially, Dubois had been exceedingly unhappy about having more officers foisted upon him; he was far from a fool—he knew danger when he saw it. However, from Dubois’s point of view, the advent of Hopkins, the first officer to arrive after Dixon, had instead proved to be an unlooked-for bonus. The disconnected rabble of other men—many sailors or navvies snatched off the docks—had recognized the authority Will Hopkins carried as naturally as a cloak. Although he was only in his late twenties, Will’s grasp of command was innate, and the men had responded.
And Will had been clever enough to see that playing to Dubois’s liking for efficiency and smooth operations would, in the short to medium term, be