All Things Bright and Broken

by Carol Gibbs

  “What does your daddy do?”

  “It’s called Phrenology. He examines people’s heads.”

  Desiree and I look at one another and we are both thinking lice. Why else would he examine their heads?

  “For lumps and bumps,” explains Monica, but we are none the wiser.

  Monica’s mother has swarthy skin, a big bosom and bright red lips. She doesn’t bother with dinky curlers at night. She looks a fright. Mommy would say Mrs Sherwell looks like the wreck of the Hesperus. It’s Friday and the Sherwells are Catholic, so she gives us a pound note and sends us to the Portuguese fish shop on the corner.

  “Don’t lose the money and watch out for the skollies hanging about!”

  It’s just getting dark and the street is busy. Skollies take their chances hitching rides on the lit-up double-decker buses. When the conductor is upstairs, they hang onto the silver pole and when they want to get off, they just step off backwards, at an angle.

  “Watch out for bats also,” says Monica. “If they get tangled in your hair you’ll never get them out.”

  I cover my hair with my hands, all the way to the shop.

  The skollies wear their trousers low on their hips and the legs are cut off short, so their ankles stick out. They swagger along the pavements as though the world belongs to them, cupping their skywe in tattooed hands and taking long pulls on the cigarettes. They make kissing sounds as the girls pass and sing rude songs.

  Emma Kalema, sê maar vir djou grêma,

  Emma wil ’n baby hê …

  Monica explains that the skollie wants Emma Kalema to tell her grandma she wants a baby.

  The skollies don’t bother us. They prey on other gangs, but Daddy says the day will come. Daar kom ’n dag. Skollies have their guns with them at all times, even in the House of God, in case there’s a gang war. They cut the shape of the gun out of the pages of the Bible then they slip the gun between the covers so it looks innocent. They cut right through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, but the biggest sin is not having any respect for our Father who art in heaven.

  I take my hands off my head. The fish shop is packed and smells deliciously of chips frying and vinegar. The Portuguese dips pieces of fish into rich batter the colour of egg. There’s a Moslem man dressed in white and an old lady with no teeth dressed in black. I wonder how she eats. Children with dirty faces clutch their pennies and they push in, but the Portuguese knows they’ve only come for penny broos, bruised fruit, and he serves his other customers first.

  A skollie walks in and the customers fall silent. He wears pinstriped trousers and a matching waistcoat. His shirt cuffs are folded back to show off his tattoos, a dagger and the word Mother. His front teeth are missing and he wears a cap covered in badges back to front on his head. I’m standing right beside him and I can see his sandals hardly have soles and he has dirt between his toes. The Portuguese serves him first because he doesn’t want any trouble.

  “Can I helpa you?”

  The skollie has a matchstick in his mouth and he rolls it around from left to right, past the gap. He takes the stick from his mouth and points.

  “Gee da stukkie stokvis, pakkie tickey Cavalla Tips en ’n box of mêtjies.”

  “Salt and vinegar?”

  “Ja, put ma on.”

  “Datta be ten pence.”

  “Ek’s tickey short.”

  “It’s awright … Here, taka da fish, you hava da tickey on da house.”

  The skollie swaggers out and the fish shop comes alive again. The old woman in black elbows her way to the front. The man in white is cross and leaves, unable to wait. We are at the back of the queue and hungry, but at last it’s Monica’s turn.

  “Six pieces, please.”

  “You wanna salt and vinegar? Yes?”

  Back at the Sherwells’ kitchen table in Woodstock we sit and eat our piece of stockfish. This is really living. You don’t even need fish oil and a frying pan, just so long as you have the money. I wonder what my mommy is having for supper. I hope the brandy bottle was empty when Daddy got home and I hope he is playing his Afrikaans records and Mommy is doing her knitting and they’re both sitting in the lounge peaceful and happy, but I doubt it because it’s Friday. Brandy night.

  We sleep two to a bed in Monica’s room in the attic. Before we go to sleep Monica teaches us:

  If Woodstock could stock wood,

  all the wood that Woodstock could stock,

  how much wood would Woodstock stock

  if Woodstock could stock wood.

  And so I forget to say my prayers to ask Jesus to keep my mommy safe. The next morning, Professor Sherwell calls Desiree behind his office door and he tries to examine parts of her that have nothing to do with her head. We never visit Woodstock again. The bread is rapidly rising and the sugar beans are soaking in the cream basin with the green line. Mommy has done her jobs and now they’ve gone to the Kritz. Daddy has left a bag of peanuts for us, all to ourselves, and we devour peanuts until its time to brush our teeth. I hope Gabriel and Desiree don’t bully me tonight. They frighten me when they lock me in our room and tell me scary stories of ghosts and the boogey man chasing me. Witch’s Child and Skinny Legs are their favourite names for me. But Desiree has other ideas tonight. She wants to play ball with our Sunday treat, the watermelon Daddy bought from the man with the horse and cart. She flicks her middle finger at the watermelon to test the ripeness just the way Daddy does and then she heaves the watermelon at me. It falls through my arms and bursts wide open. There’s a trickle of pink juice on the floor. Giggling nervously, we prop the watermelon on the wooden draining board, crack to the wall and dive into the safety of our beds. If Daddy finds out, we’re in for it.

  The next day we have such fun at the lunch table. Daddy sits quiet as a mouse with a snot bubble in his nose. We just stare at him and don’t say anything, but then he bursts out laughing and takes the torch bulb out of his nostril.

  “P-please can I take it to s-s-school?”

  We all fall about giggling. I like it when my daddy jokes with us.

  Later, when it’s time for our weekly bath, Desiree and Gabriel and I start getting things ready.

  “I’ll fetch the newspaper. You fetch the danna balls.”

  Desiree touches a match to the newspaper and the pine cones.

  “Hallie-ha, we just burnt a picture of a holy man!”

  “Who’s he?”

  “Mahatma G-g-gandhi,” says Gabriel.

  We sit on the edge of the bath, swinging our legs back and forth. The smoky smell fills the tiny bathroom and the copper geyser thrums. Bandages hang limply around the weeping veld sores on my ankles. Daddy says they’ll never get better if I pick them. I’ve had them for weeks and we’ve tried everything, from boracic ointment and Zambuk to poultices made from bread and blue soap, but nothing helps. When I’m in bed the crusty yellow scabs get stuck to the sheets.

  Desiree is perched on the edge of the bath with her legs wide apart.

  “Fresh water coming in.” Her stream of hot yellow pee hits me full in the face.

  I brace my skinny legs against the side of the bath and try to do the same, but my pee only dribbles into the bath. I’ll get her when my bladder is full.

  “E-every drop h-helps, said the old lady who p-peed in the sea,” says Gabriel.

  “Will you wash my back if I wash yours?” asks Desiree.

  Despite our fights, there are no hard feelings between us because we need each other too much.

  Suddenly the door bursts open and Daddy is standing there with a face like thunder. He has a wet dishcloth over his shoulder. “Who dropped the watermelon?”

  “Wasn’t me.”

  “She made me.”

  “Didn’t.”

  “Did.”

  Daddy closes the bathroom door. “Die man is nou dood.”

  The wet dishcloth is just a blur, as he lashes out this way and that. The hiding is worse than ever because we’re bare and his aim is sober. His face is as red a
s our one-bar heater.

  “You two will stay in your room all afternoon.”

  Behind the closed door Desiree sticks her tongue out at Daddy and wiggles her fingers back and forth on either side of her head.

  “He can stick his watermelon!”

  Desiree makes me laugh and cry all at the same time.

  We lie on our bed putting spit on the angry red marks. Sparks are flying in the kitchen.

  “Jacob, it’s only a watermelon. They didn’t mean it.”

  “They’ve got to learn a lesson about other people’s possessions, even if it is only a watermelon. Right is right and wrong is wrong.”

  “Such a fuss over a watermelon!”

  But Daddy wears the trousers in this house and what he says is law. He only has to look at us and we quake in our boots, but he can also be nice. Sometimes when he comes home from work, he steps through the door and asks if we’ve been good.

  “Yes!” we chorus.

  “Close your eyes. Open your eyes.”

  Standing on the kitchen table, drinking water from a glass, is an ostrich. There are real feathers stuck to the ostrich’s bum and it’s wearing a black hat. The ostrich bends and takes a big drink and then it lifts its long neck to swallow. We rest our elbows on the table, chins in our hands, watching for ages, amazed. Daddy says he knows how it works, but if he tells it will spoil the magic. Leonore has lots of nice things in her house, but not an ostrich drinking from a glass.

  Christmas and Easter he buys us a case of Coo-ee cool drinks and on a Sunday when he’s resting he lets us climb all over him and pester him to take us to Blouberg beach. When he plays his Afrikaans records he lets us stand on his feet and dance around the lounge with him. He covers our eyes and when he takes his hands away we are dizzy and we’re in a part of the house where we would least expect. I wish he would always be so nice to us. I wish his veins wouldn’t throb in his neck and his eyes wouldn’t pop out of his head. Most of all, I wish the special drunk people’s powder would work.

  Desiree flings her colouring book aside.

  “Let’s go. He’s asleep.”

  “What if he catches us?”

  Gabriel is in the yard, oiling the chain on his new bike. It came from Cape Town on the train, in the guard’s van, wrapped up in hessian and tied with hairy string. Gabriel has a smile on his face for weeks. He polishes his bike until it shines and he worries when it rains.

  “Rust is the w-w-worst thing that can h-happen to metal.”

  “Please, Gabriel, can I ride your bike?”

  “Y-you two are already in t-trouble.”

  His forehead creases in a frown, but he lifts me over the cross bar. My feet just touch the pedals so I have to stand up straight. Gabriel gives me a shove and I’m off. Melbourne Road lies ahead of me and Mrs Parsons’s gate looms big, but the handlebars are frozen in position. It’s a head-on. I go over the top and land on my back. I know just how Woody Woodpecker feels when he has stars around his head. I lie there moaning and looking up at the blank blue sky. Then the space is filled by Gabriel’s puckered-up face.

  “L-look … l-look what you’ve d-done to m-my bike.”

  He abbas me home while Desiree pushes the bike. The wheel makes a funny sound.

  “Shush, don’t wake Daddy!”

  Gabriel lays me on my bed. Desiree wipes the blood from my knees. The stars have gone, but I have a sore head. Mommy puts brown paper soaked in vinegar on my forehead.

  “Shhh, you know how cross your father gets.”

  The stink of the vinegar makes me cough, but I cough under the blankets, so I don’t make a noise.

  I’m sitting on the floor, leaning against the armchair. Our tummies are full and we are like a real family. Desiree is doing French knitting. Gabriel is whittling away at a new stick for playing kennetjie. Daddy is reading the newspaper and smoking his pipe and cracking peanut shells for me. Mommy looks happy. She looks pretty as her knitting needles go click-click and there’s another row in my Desert Scene jersey. I can’t wait to see the pyramids grow. I hope Mommy stays up all night, like the shoemakers’ elves in the storybook. I love my mommy and tonight I love my daddy. He smells of tobacco and she smells of eau de cologne. She’s saving her Evening in Paris for when they go dancing at the Blue Moon.

  The next morning everyone is excited and I can’t wait. I clean my boots and run into trouble for messing shoe-white on the kitchen floor. We are not allowed to put our shoes and boots on the table. Mommy says it brings bad luck into the house and we wouldn’t want that. I’m wearing my white accordion-pleated skirt with my Jack-and-Jill Fair Isle jersey. The permanent pleats stay in our accordion skirts forever and ever and you don’t even have to iron them. Desiree has the same skirt and is wearing her Cinderella Fair Isle jersey. We’re going to the Grand Parade where a photograph was taken of Uncle Nick wearing his Royal Navy uniform and throwing the mace high in the air.

  Aunty Dolly is very excited. She hasn’t seen the Royal Family since she left England. Mr Finneran has to lead the cavalcade and Aunty Dolly says it’s an honour. He’s happy for her, but he’s not so fond of the King and Queen of England, because he’s Irish. In any case, it’s his job. We watch Mr Finneran slip a brass plate around his buttons and shine them with Brasso. Spencer and Gabriel clean the BSA motorbike until it shines like a mirror in the sun. They polish his leather puttees and put bootblack on the wheels. As a reward, Mr Finneran takes them for a slow ride round the block. Our teacher has given us medals to pin on our blazers, but I don’t have a blazer, so I pin it on my jersey instead. I keep touching mine to make sure it’s still there, because Alice says they are made of real gold.

  Aunty Dolly drives us to Rondebosch in the Prefect with Spencer and Maureen. We stand in the hot sun, clutching our Union Jack flags. Aunty Dolly’s face glows as Mr Finneran leads the black car along Rhodes Drive, the Union Jack fluttering in the stiff breeze. We scream his name, but he doesn’t turn around. We wave our flags madly, but we catch only a glimpse of the Royal Family and then they are gone.

  Now we hope to see more of them. The Parade is chock-a-block. The best peanuts in the whole wide world come from Mr Essop’s stall, opposite the flower sellers and round the corner from Movie Snaps. White pigeon poep runs down the nose of a statue of a man, over his chin and right down his shirt, past his fly buttons and down his legs. Daddy is standing on the steps and I’m sitting on his shoulders. This will be the second time today that we’ve seen the Royal Family. Everyone has paper dolls of the princesses. They were nearly sold out, but Mr Chong kept them for us until payday. We only have one set and we have to share. Their clothes are grand, with necklaces and sashes and all sorts of hats. We play with them endlessly and we practise how to curtsey because we want to be just like them.

  The City Hall is all lit up like a palace. A huge Union Jack drapes the balcony and there are flags everywhere. The Royal Family steps onto the balcony and waves to wild applause. I wave back, sending secret messages to Elizabeth and Margaret. I wonder if they’ve seen me. God save the King! People throw their hats up into the sky. What if they catch someone else’s hat? They could catch lice and they will have the devil’s own job getting rid of them. I keep both my hands on Daddy’s hat so he can’t throw it into the sky.

  High as a bird in the sky, I can see everything, but the next minute I’m down on the ground, because it’s Desiree’s turn. There’s hardly any room to practise my curtsey. I put one foot back, cross my legs and bend my knees, then fall over and clutch at Daddy’s trousers. The man standing beside me grabs my arm and his cigarette brushes against me, making red sparks in the dark.

  “Steady on.”

  I crane my neck and stand on my toes, but all I can see is the top of a palm tree. Then Daddy lifts me onto his shoulders again and I can see Elizabeth and Margaret waving. The people cheer, stomping and whistling, and the navy band starts up. They’re all wearing white, so it’s hard to tell which one is Uncle Nick, but I know he’s there, looking handsome
, playing the trumpet with his stiff upper lip and his chest out, because he was born in England and he speaks the Queen’s English.

  The huge crowd sings ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ and then suddenly it’s all over, not like at the bioscope, when The End appears on the screen and you have time to think about what you’ve just seen. People mill around the Grand Parade, not wanting to go home.

  “Shall we have some peanuts?”

  We fight our way to stall number six on the other side of the Parade. It’s all lit up and Mr Essop is selling Union Jacks.

  “How may I help you, sir?

  “A pound of monkey nuts.”

  Mr Essop weighs the brown paper bag. “That will be nine pence please.”

  “What about some sour figs?” asks Mommy.

  Spit runs to the front of my mouth.

  By the time we get back to the van, Table Mountain is already floodlit and the sky is silver and everything is melting together.

  “Y-you can’t s-sleep now. What about s-supper?”

  I rub my eyes and sit up straight in the back of the van to try to stay awake.

  “Don’t their arms get tired from waving?”

  “They d-don’t have very m-much to do. After supper, the servants w-wash them u-u-under their arms, because the n-next day they have to w-wave again.”

  “Mommy says they’re groomed from when they are little.”

  “What does groomed mean?”

  “It means they have to sit quite still and set an example.”

  I’d like to be a princess, but I don’t know if I could learn to sit still and be an example.

  “Look, Gabriel! The horses have fluffy hair growing over their feet.”

  “They’re called Clydesdales and they’re bred overseas.”

  We watch them tossing their manes. The men slip nosebags over their heads and the dry smell of bran fills our nostrils.