by Ekow Duker
Karabo stood outside the gate. She felt out of place, as though the ‘No Jobs’ sign stuck to the gate-post had been placed there especially for her. There was no bell and there was no one in sight she could call out to. She was about to leave when she saw a small figure in the distance. It was a young girl and Karabo called out to her. Her ungainly gait reminded Karabo of Fezeka. She was dressed in a blue cotton uniform that was a size too large for her and as she drew closer to Karabo, her eyes grew wide with apprehension, as if Karabo might leap over the gate and devour her.
Karabo smiled at the girl to reassure her. ‘I’ve come to see Mrs Harrison. Is she in?’
‘Mrs Harrison?’ the girl repeated. ‘Madam?’
‘Yes, Madam.’
‘Who should I say is calling?’ She said the English words with difficulty as if she had memorised what to say to visitors only that morning.
‘Tell her it’s Karabo.’
‘Karabo?’ There was an undertone of disbelief in the girl’s voice.
‘Yes. Mrs Harrison gave me her violin and I’ve come for the bow. She asked me to come.’
The girl considered this for a moment and then tugged hard on the gate. It swung open along a curved furrow in the ground and came to a stop against a small mound of gravel. She beckoned to Karabo.
‘Come with me,’ she said, and led her towards the house.
They didn’t go in by the front door but walked around the building through lush flowerbeds with profusions of bold colour. As they approached the patio, the girl’s footsteps slowed until Karabo, who was much taller, bumped into her with every second step.
Mrs Harrison was lying on her back on a cane sofa with a book clutched between both hands. She sensed rather than saw the maid and shut her book with a loud clap.
‘What is it?’ she asked without turning her head.
‘Please, there is somebody to see you.’ The girl spoke shyly as if it were an oral exam and she was not sure if she had got the phrasing right.
Mrs Harrison let out a loud groan. ‘Who is it and what do they want?’
‘Please, madam, it is a girl. She said you told her to come.’
Mrs Harrison swung her large feet off the sofa and scowled. She still hadn’t seen Karabo.
‘I didn’t ask anyone to come to the house. Really! I’ve had enough of the constant barrage of people who come knocking at the gate in the hope of work. There’s a sign outside saying No Jobs. Didn’t you tell her that?’
Karabo stepped forward with her hand outstretched. ‘It’s me, Mrs Harrison. Karabo.’
‘I don’t know any Karabos,’ Mrs Harrison said, squinting hard at her. ‘You must be at the wrong house.’
‘You asked me to come for the violin bow, Mrs Harrison.’
It took a few moments before Mrs Harrison remembered.
‘You’re the girl from the Spar!’ she cried. ‘Of course! Come in! Come in!’
Karabo smoothed the creases running down her school uniform and stomped her feet discreetly to shake the sprinkling of reddish dust off her shoes.
‘How good of you to come,’ Mrs Harrison said when Karabo had sat down. ‘So you’re here for the bow?’
She turned to the maid. ‘Have you seen it? It’s the thing I used to play my violin with.’ She began to mimic the act of playing the violin to compensate for the maid’s perceived lack of understanding.
‘It is in the garage,’ the maid said quietly. She appeared to be more composed than she’d been earlier and stood a little straighter than before.
‘Oh,’ Mrs Harrison said. ‘Well, go and fetch it then. And bring some tea and ginger biscuits while you’re at it.’
She turned to Karabo. ‘You like ginger biscuits, don’t you?’
‘You really don’t have to, Mrs Harrison,’ Karabo said.
‘Nonsense. And you really must stop apologising for everything when you don’t mean one bit of it. It’s an awful English habit and you’re not English.’
Presently, the girl came back with a steaming teapot on a wooden tray and the violin bow balanced across it. Mrs Harrison took the bow and handed it to Karabo.
‘There you are,’ she said. ‘Now you can play the violin to your heart’s content.’
She leaned forward and poured out two cups of tea and slid one across the table to Karabo.
‘I must say, you don’t look very pleased,’ Mrs Harrison said.
Startled, Karabo lifted her head. ‘Oh it’s not that, Mrs Harrison. I’m very grateful for the bow. And the violin.’
‘What is it then?’
Karabo took a deep breath. ‘I don’t believe I’ll ever play it, Mrs Harrison. I mean, there’s no one to teach me and even if there were, I couldn’t afford the lessons. I just came for the bow because the violin seemed incomplete without it. I like things to be complete, you see.’
‘You’re a funny child,’ Mrs Harrison said kindly. ‘But I understand. I must admit I had this fleeting vision of you becoming a great concert violinist one day. I imagined watching you on television and thinking, “I gave her her very first violin.”’ She laughed and tossed her large head. ‘I know it’s very patronising of me but I couldn’t help it.’
‘I polished it and it looks very pretty now,’ Karabo said shyly. She glanced quickly at Mrs Harrison to see if she might have offended her.
‘I didn’t look after it very well, did I?’ Mrs Harrison replied easily. ‘I dare say I’ve got enough furniture to polish without adding a violin to the list.’
It was common knowledge in Mthatha that the Harrisons employed a small army of domestic workers and gardeners to look after their house. It was hardly likely that Mrs Harrison did any housework herself.
‘I told you about André, didn’t I?’ she asked.
‘Your violin teacher.’
Mrs Harrison nodded. ‘Do you know why I stuck with my lessons for so long?’
She went on without waiting for Karabo to answer. ‘My lessons became an excuse for André to play me something proper from time to time. It was like having my very own violin recital. Now how many people can say that?’
‘Couldn’t you have found another teacher?’
Mrs Harrison shook her head firmly. ‘Not like André. His playing was simply divine. He had this gift, you see …’ Her voice trailed away and she dabbed at her eyes with the corner of her sleeve.
‘Don’t mind me,’ she said. ‘It’s the heat. It’s making me all emotional.’ She paused for a moment as if deciding whether to take Karabo into her confidence. And when she did, her voice grew low and wistful.
‘I was fond of the bugger, you know. We both knew I’d never be any good. My violin playing was simply atrocious.’ She let out a choppy laugh that mutated into a violent fit of coughing.
‘I miss him,’ she said gruffly. ‘The boy could play like an angel.’
Karabo knew better than to say anything and, after a pause, Mrs Harrison carried on.
‘On the first day he didn’t show up,’ Mrs Harrison said, ‘I thought he must have taken ill, he’d been looking rather poorly recently. But he never called or sent a message to explain. I was going to tell him off the next time I saw him. Give him a piece of my mind, that sort of thing.’ She dabbed at her eyes again and sniffed loudly.
‘When he didn’t come the next week, I asked a couple of friends and they said he hadn’t shown up for their lessons either.’
‘Did you try him on his cell phone?’ Karabo offered.
‘He didn’t have one. And that’s when I realised how little I knew about André. I didn’t even know where the bugger lived.’
‘How did you find him in the first place, Mrs Harrison?’
‘In the small ads in the Mthatha Express. But that was a long time ago.’ She looked at Karabo. ‘You must think me such an old fool for telling you all this. I’m not usually this sentimental, you know.’
‘Not at all, Mrs Harrison. I can see your lessons meant a lot to you.’
‘Like I said, they
weren’t really lessons. I only kept at it to hear André play. Then after he left, I couldn’t bear to have the violin in the house any longer. It infuriated me to see it, especially because I couldn’t play properly myself. So I threw it in the back of Bill’s Land Rover and was going to give it away. Then you came along and well, here you are.’
‘Yes, here I am,’ Karabo said. Her tea had grown cold but she stirred it anyway. The clink of silver against porcelain seemed unnaturally loud.
‘Enough about me,’ Mrs Harrison said briskly, drawing her feet up onto the sofa. ‘Tell me about yourself. What grade are you in?’
‘Grade Twelve.’
‘You’re going on to university I presume?’
‘I’d like to.’
Mrs Harrison’s voice sharpened. ‘But you must! You’re much too clever to hang about here. You’ll be making babies of your own and pushing someone else’s pram if you’re not careful.’
Karabo flushed and looked away. She slipped a hand into her pocket and felt the note Inspector Thulisane had given her last Sunday in church. He’d written a long, rambling appeal about making babies with her. He hadn’t said anything about pushing someone else’s pram.
‘You’ll want to study something difficult,’ Mrs Harrison was saying. ‘I’d suggest medicine or engineering. You know, something that will test you and expand your mind.’
‘What did you study, Mrs Harrison?’
Mrs Harrison looked surprised at the question. ‘Me? Why, I never went to college. I followed Bill out here straight after school. He didn’t have a penny then and it broke my mother’s heart to see me go, it did.’
‘She must be proud of you now,’ Karabo said. It seemed inappropriate to say this to an older person but she couldn’t think of anything else to say.
‘Oh, she died before Bill made any money. We couldn’t afford to go back for the funeral. We sent a wreath instead.’
‘At least that counted for something.’
‘They sent it back.’ Mrs Harrison looked around her as if the wreath might be lying on the sideboard or hidden under a table. ‘I haven’t been to England since.’
In the distance they heard the lowing of a bull. Then the sound of tyres crunching up the gravel driveway.
‘That must be Bill,’ Mrs Harrison said in a flat voice.
She didn’t seem overly pleased her husband was back home but Karabo sat up and straightened her skirt. She remembered Bill Harrison as that tall, fair-haired man who used to come to their house when she was small. He’d always come in the middle of the morning when Teacher was away at school. He would ruffle her hair and lift her high above his head until she squealed with delight. But unlike Teacher and Paa Kofi, there was something different about the way Bill Harrison held her. He lifted her as if he were in a hurry, and when she looked down at him, he’d turn his head away. She hadn’t mentioned any of this to Mrs Harrison. Her husband probably wouldn’t remember her anyway.
He was speaking in muffled tones to someone inside the house, probably asking who was there. The sound of his voice made Karabo anxious and she began to fidget with her cup. She placed it on the table, then picked it up again. Mrs Harrison was oblivious to her discomfort and was halfway through a monologue about the growing drought in the Eastern Cape when she stopped in mid-flow and called over her shoulder.
‘Bill! Come and say hello to Karabo.’
There was no reply.
‘That’s Bill for you,’ she said after a while. ‘He’s probably gone out to the back.’
‘I should be going anyway, Mrs Harrison,’ Karabo said. ‘You’ve been very kind. Thank you very much.’
Mrs Harrison insisted on walking her to the gate and they were outside before Karabo remembered she’d left the bow behind.
‘Oh darn! I’ll go and get it for you,’ Mrs Harrison said.
‘No, let me. I remember where it is.’
Karabo ran back into the house the way they had come. She hurried towards the porch, picking her way through sturdy wooden furniture and whimsical glass ornaments. Everything was so cluttered, they could have been on offer in a yard sale. She found the bow where she’d left it and tucked it under her arm. She was making her way back through the house when a door slammed shut behind her. Karabo spun around, half expecting to see Bill Harrison. To her relief, or was it disappointment, there was nobody there.
She found Mrs Harrison bent over a flowerbed, gently tamping the soil around the stem of a drooping hydrangea. She stood up with a groan and grimaced at Karabo.
‘All the best with your studies, young lady,’ she said. ‘Remember what I said about prams and choose something really difficult. By the way, what did you want to study in university?’
‘Architecture,’ Karabo replied.
Mrs Harrison dusted off her hands and stared for a moment at the soil caked beneath her fingernails.
‘Good for you. And where did you want to do that?’
‘At the Bartlett School in London.’
Mrs Harrison’s eyes opened wide. ‘Expensive place, London. You’ll need a fair bit of money for that.’
‘I know,’ Karabo said glumly. ‘I’ve tried everywhere for scholarships.’
The afternoon sun cast Mrs Harrison’s face in a warm glow and wisps of hair fell untidily from the top of her head. She touched Karabo lightly on the arm.
‘Try the Mthatha Women’s Club,’ she said kindly.
‘The Mthatha Women’s Club? I’ve never heard of it.’
‘It’s a bit like the Rotary Club,’ Mrs Harrison said, ‘but without the booze or the grand mission. We have a very small membership but I can put in a word for you, if you like.’
CHAPTER 17
Precious began crying long before Karabo left home. She wished her daughter would leave all at once. Instead, Karabo tortured her mother with an extended goodbye where every little act was a blow to Precious’s heart.
Karabo shrieked like a tokoloshe the day she got her acceptance letter. The sound reverberated so loudly through the house that Saddam began scratching furiously at the kitchen door. Precious knew she should have been happy for Karabo but she couldn’t bring herself to share in her daughter’s joy. Yes, she smiled and hugged Karabo, patted her on the back and did all the things a mother should. But as she watched Karabo run from room to room, waving the letter in the air, Precious’s heart grew unbearably heavy. And when Karabo asked her why she was crying, she lied and said it was because she was so happy.
It irked Precious that somehow Bill’s wife had got involved. She was the first person Karabo told. Not Precious, not Teacher, but Claire Harrison. Precious had come home one afternoon to find Karabo in the kitchen. She was jabbering on her phone like a Pakistani and there were tears streaming down her face.
‘What’s wrong, Karabo? Who are you talking to?’ Precious asked in alarm. But Karabo carried on talking and held up her hand. Precious would need to wait her turn. Clearly, whoever was on the phone with Karabo was more important than her own mother. What was the world coming to?
Karabo prepared a little every day, packing and unpacking her suitcase as if she were at Immigration already and the officials had asked to inspect her luggage. Every night she told her parents about this school in London, the Bartlett School, where she would learn to be an architect. And after she graduated she’d come home and design fantastic buildings all made of glass. Who needed buildings made of glass, Precious thought to herself but didn’t say. That didn’t sound very clever to her.
She bought Karabo a warm jacket from Edgars, one with a fur-lined collar and a smart belt. While she didn’t want Karabo to go, she didn’t want her to be cold either. Karabo took one look at the jacket and said it was too bulky to fit in her bag and that she might have to leave it behind. Precious stared at her, not bothering to hide her hurt and Karabo relented, saying she would take it after all. But when Precious looked in her room, it was rolled up to one side, just waiting to be forgotten.
She screamed at Karab
o the day she came back brandishing her passport with the pages open to show everyone her UK visa. She went for her the way Saddam had attacked Mr Kubeka the other day. Karabo screamed back and said Precious had never been to university or even left South Africa, and now that she was doing both those things, Precious was simply jealous of her. She clapped her hands and hooted at her own mother and Precious, in a fit of incandescent rage, pulled Karabo’s hair and slapped her hard across the face. In the end they each went to their rooms, trembling and exhausted. Karabo didn’t understand; Precious wasn’t jealous of her. It was the thought of her intombazana emhlophe going so far away that was tearing her heart in two.
Karabo and Teacher left Precious out completely after that. They planned every detail of Karabo’s trip, from what time she should wake up on the morning of her departure, to what bus she should take in London. It was as if Precious wasn’t even there.
Mrs Harrison came to the house the week before Karabo left. Precious would have set Saddam on her but the stupid dog licked Mrs Harrison’s hand and buried his nose in her fat crotch. She refused to go outside and watched from the bedroom as Mrs Harrison hugged Karabo and enveloped her in her pink, flabby arms. Teacher and Saddam stood by grinning like twin idiots.
She heard Mrs Harrison ask where she was and Teacher said she’d gone out. He was lying, of course, because he knew very well where Precious was. Then Mrs Harrison took out a little parcel from her bag and gave it to Karabo.
‘This is for your mother,’ she said. It was wrapped in shiny paper and tied with a blue ribbon as if it were Christmas and not the end of August.
Teacher brought the parcel to the bedroom as soon as Mrs Harrison had left. Precious opened it and saw it was a pair of salt and pepper shakers in the form of a shapeless man embracing an equally shapeless woman. With a snort of fury, she hurled the pair against the wall and the shapeless man broke in two.
Grimly, Teacher picked up the pieces. ‘I want you to apologise,’ he said.