The White Lioness kw-3

by Henning Mankell

  It seemed to Miranda the moment she had been awaiting for so long had finally arrived. Before now she had always imagined nobody else would be present when she confessed to how she went through Jan Kleyn’s pockets at night, and noted down the words he uttered in his sleep. There would just be the two of them, herself and her daughter. But now she realized things would be different. She wondered why, without even knowing his name, she trusted him so implicitly. Was it his own vulnerability? His lack of confidence in her presence? Was weakness the only thing she dared to trust?

  The joy of liberation, she thought. That’s what I feel right now. Like emerging from the sea and knowing I’m clean.

  “I thought for ages he was just an ordinary civil servant,” she began. “I knew nothing about his crimes. But then I heard.”

  “Who from?”

  “I might tell you. But not yet. You should only say things when the time is ripe.”

  He regretted having interrupted her.

  “But he doesn’t know I know,” she went on. “That has been the advantage I had. Maybe it was my salvation, maybe it’ll be my death. But every time he came to visit us, I got up during the night and emptied his pockets. I copied even the smallest scrap of paper. I listened to the random words he muttered in his sleep. And I passed them on.”

  “Who to?”

  “To the people who look after us.”

  “I look after you.”

  “I don’t even know your name.”

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  “I spoke with black men who lead lives just as secret as Jan Kleyn’s.”

  He had heard rumors. But nothing had ever been proved. He knew the intelligence service, both the civilian and military branches, were always running after their own shadows. There was a persistent rumor that the blacks had their own intelligence service. Maybe linked directly to the ANC, maybe an independent organization. They investigated what the investigators were doing. Their strategies and their identities. He realized this woman, Miranda, was confirming the existence of these people.

  Jan Kleyn is a dead man, he thought. Without his knowing it, his pockets have been picked by the people he regards as the enemy.

  “These last few months,” he said. “I don’t care about the time before then. But what have you found recently?”

  “I’ve already passed it on, and forgotten,” she said. “Why should I strain myself to remember?”

  He could see she was telling the truth. He tried appealing to her one more time. He had to talk with one of the men whose job it was to interpret whatever she found in Jan Kleyn’s pockets. Or what she heard him muttering in his sleep.

  “Why should I trust you?” she asked.

  “You don’t have to,” he said. “There are no guarantees in this life. There are only risks.”

  She sat in silence, and seemed to be thinking.

  “Has he killed a lot of people?” she asked. She was speaking very loudly, and he gathered this was so that her daughter could hear.

  “Yes,” he said. “He’s killed a lot of people.”

  “Blacks?”

  “Blacks.”

  “Who were criminals?”

  “Some were. Some weren’t.”

  “Why did he kill them?”

  “They were people who preferred not to talk. People who had rebelled. Causers of instability.”

  “Like my daughter.”

  “I don’t know your daughter.”

  “But I do.”

  She stood up suddenly.

  “Come back tomorrow,” she said. “There might be somebody here who wants to meet you. Go now.”

  He left the house. When he got to his car parked on a side street, he was sweating. He drove off, thinking about his own weakness. And her strength. Was there a future in which they could come together and be reconciled?

  Matilda did not leave her room when he left. Miranda left her in peace. But that evening she sat on the edge of her bed for a long time.

  The fever came and went in waves.

  “Are you upset?” Miranda asked.

  “No,” replied Matilda. “I hate him even more now.”

  Afterwards Scheepers would remember his visit to Kliptown as a descent into a hell he had thus far managed to avoid in his life. By sticking to the white path mapped out for Afrikaners from the cradle to the grave, he had trodden the path of the one-eyed man. Now he was forced to take the other path, the black path, and what he saw he thought he would never forget. It moved him, it had to move him, because the lives of twenty million people were affected. People who were not allowed to live normal lives, who died early, after lives that were artificially restricted and never given the opportunity to develop.

  He returned to the house in Bezuidenhout at ten the next morning. Miranda answered the door, but it was Matilda who would take him to the man who had expressed a willingness to talk to him. He had the feeling of having been granted a great privilege. Matilda was just as beautiful as her mother. Her skin was lighter, but her eyes were the same. He had difficulty in making out any features of her father in her face. Perhaps she kept him at such a distance, she simply prevented herself from growing to look like him. She greeted him very shyly, merely nodding when he offered his hand. Once again he felt insecure, in the presence of the daughter as well, even though she was only a teenager. He started to feel uneasy about what he had let himself in for. Perhaps Jan Kleyn’s influence over this house was altogether different from what he had been led to believe? But it was too late to back out now. A rusty old car, its exhaust pipe trailing along the ground and the fenders broken off, was parked in front of the house. Without a word Matilda opened the door, and turned to him.

  “I thought he’d be coming here,” said Scheepers doubtfully.

  “We’re going to visit another world,” said Matilda.

  He got into the back seat and was hit by a smell he only later recognized as reminiscent of his childhood’s henhouse. The man behind the wheel had a baseball cap pulled down over his eyes. He turned and looked at him without saying a word. Then they drove away, and the driver and Matilda started a conversation in a language Scheepers did not understand but recognized as Xhosa. They took a southwesterly direction, and Scheepers thought the man was driving much too fast. They soon left central Johannesburg behind them and came onto the complicated network of highways with exits leading off in all directions. Soweto, thought Scheepers. Is that where they’re taking me?

  But they were not headed for Soweto. They passed Meadowland, where the choking smoke lay thick over the dusty countryside. Not far beyond the conglomeration of crumbling houses, dogs, children, hens, wrecked and burned-out cars, the driver slowed down and came to a halt. Matilda got out then came to sit beside him in the back seat. She had a black hood in her hand.

  “You’re not allowed to see from now on,” she said.

  He protested and pushed her hand away.

  “What is there to be afraid of?” she asked. “Make up your mind.”

  He took hold of the hood.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “There are a thousand eyes,” she said. “You are not to see anything. And nobody’s going to see you, either.”

  “That’s not an answer,” he said. “It’s a riddle.”

  “Not for me it isn’t,” she replied. “Make up your mind now!”

  He pulled the hood over his head. They set off again. The road was getting worse all the time. But the driver did not slow down. Scheepers rode with the bumps as best he could. Even so he banged his head on the car roof several times. He lost all count of time. The hood was irritating his face, and his skin started to itch.

  The car slowed down and came to a halt. Somewhere a dog was barking furiously. Music from a radio was coming and going in waves. Despite the hood he could smell the smoke from fires. Matilda helped him out of the car. Then she removed the hood. The sun shone straight into his unprotected eyes, blinding him. When his eyes got used to the light he could see they
were in the middle of a mass of shacks cobbled together from corrugated iron, cardboard cartons, old sacks, sheets of plastic, venetian blinds. There were huts where a car wreck formed one of the rooms. There was a stink of garbage, and a skinny, mangy dog was sniffing at one of his legs. He observed the people who lived out their lives in this destitution. None of them seemed to notice he was there. There was no threat, no curiosity, merely indifference. He did not exist as far as they were concerned.

  “Welcome to Kliptown.” said Matilda. “Maybe it’s Kliptown, maybe it’s some other shantytown. You’d never find your way back here anyway. They all look the same. The destitution is just as bad in all of them, the smells are the same, the inhabitants are the same.”

  She led him into the cluster of shacks. It was like entering a labyrinth that soon swallowed him up, robbed him of his entire past. After a few paces he had totally lost all sense of direction. He thought how absurd it was that he had Jan Kleyn’s daughter by his side. But absurdity was their inheritance, something that was about to be disturbed for the first time, and then destroyed.

  “What can you see?” she asked.

  “The same as you,” he replied.

  “No!” she said sternly. “Are you shocked?”

  “Of course.”

  “I’m not. Shock is a staircase. There are many steps. We are not standing on the same one.”

  “Maybe you’re at the very top?”

  “Nearly.”

  “Is the view different?”

  “You can see further. Zebra grazing in herds, on alert. Antelopes leaping and leaving gravity behind. A cobra that has hidden itself away in an empty termite stack. Woman carrying water.”

  She stopped and turned to face him.

  “I see my own hatred in their eyes,” she said. “But your eyes can’t see that.”

  “What do you want me to say?” he wondered. “I think it’s sheer hell, living like this. The question is, is it my fault?”

  “It might be,” she said. “That depends.”

  They continued deeper into the labyrinth. He would never be able to find his way out alone. I need her, he thought. Like we have always needed the blacks. And she knows it.

  Matilda halted outside a shack that was slightly bigger than the others, even if it was made from the same materials. She squatted by the door, which was shoddily made from a sheet of hardboard.

  “Go on in,” she said. “I’ll wait here.”

  Scheepers went in. At first he had difficulty in distinguishing anything at all in the darkness. Then he made out a simple wooden table, a few wooden chairs, and a smoking kerosene lamp. A man detached himself from the shadows. He gazed at him with a hint of a smile. Scheepers thought he must be about the same age as himself. But the man facing him was more powerfully built, had a beard, and radiated the same kind of dignity as he had found in both Miranda and Matilda.

  “Georg Scheepers,” said the man, bursting into laughter. Then he pointed to one of the chairs.

  “What’s so funny?” asked Scheepers. He had trouble in concealing his growing unease.

  “Nothing,” said the man. “You can call me Steve.”

  “You know why I want to meet you,” said Scheepers.

  “You don’t want to meet me,” said the man who called himself Steve. “You want to meet somebody who can tell you things about Jan Kleyn you don’t know already. That person happens to be me. But it could just as easily have been somebody else.”

  “Can we get to the point?” said Scheepers, who was beginning to get impatient.

  “White men are always short of time,” said Steve. “I’ve never been able to understand why.”

  “Jan Kleyn,” said Scheepers.

  “A dangerous man,” said Steve. “Everybody’s enemy, not just ours. The ravens cry in the night. And we analyze and interpret and think we know something is going to happen, something that could cause chaos. And we wouldn’t want that. Neither the ANC nor de Klerk. That’s why you must first tell me what you know. Then perhaps we can combine to illuminate some of the darkest corners.”

  Scheepers did not tell him everything. But he did divulge the most important points, and even that was a risk. He did not know who he was talking with. Nevertheless, he had no choice. Steve listened, stroking his chin slowly the while.

  “So it’s gone that far,” he said when Scheepers had finished. “We’ve been expecting this. But we really thought some crazy Boer would first try to slit the throat of that traitor de Klerk.”

  “A professional killer,” said Scheepers. “No face, no name. But he might have cropped up before. Not least in the vicinity of Jan Kleyn. Those ravens you were talking about could perhaps do some listening. The man could be white, he could be black. I’ve found an indication that he could be due for a lot of money. A million rand, perhaps more.”

  “It ought to be possible to identify him,” said Steve. “Jan Kleyn only picks the best. If he’s a South African, black or white, we’ll find him.”

  “Find him and stop him,” said Scheepers. “Kill him. We have to work together.”

  “No,” said Steve. “We’re meeting now. But this is the only time. We’re going from two different directions, both on this occasion and in the future. Nothing else is possible.”

  “Why not?”

  “We don’t share each other’s secrets. Everything is still too unsure, too uncertain. We avoid all pacts and agreements unless they are absolutely essential. Don’t forget we’re enemies. And the war in our country has been going on for a very long time. Although you don’t want to recognize that fact.”

  “We see things differently,” said Scheepers.

  “Yes,” said Steve. “We do.”

  The conversation had lasted only a few minutes. Even so, Steve got to his feet and Scheepers gathered it was all over.

  “Miranda exists,” said Steve. “You can contact my world through her.”

  “Yes,” said Scheepers. “She exists. We have to stop this assassination.”

  “Right,” said Steve. “But I guess you are the ones who are going to have to do it. You are still the ones with the resources. I have nothing. Apart from a tin hut. And Miranda. And Matilda. Just imagine what would happen if the assassination came off.”

  “I’d rather not think about it.”

  Steve stared at him for a moment in silence. Then he disappeared through the door without saying goodbye. Scheepers followed him into the bright sunlight. Matilda led him back to the car without speaking. Once again he sat in the back seat with a hood over his head. In the darkness he was already preparing what to say to President de Klerk.

  De Klerk had a recurrent dream about termites.

  He was in a house where every floor, every wall, every piece of furniture had been attacked by the hungry insects. Why he had come to the house, he had no idea. Grass was growing up between the floorboards, the windowpanes were shattered, and the furious chewing of the termites was like an itch in his own body. In his dream he had a very short time in which to write an important speech. His usual shorthand typist had disappeared, and he had to do the work himself. But when he started writing, termites came pouring out of his pen.

  At that point he usually woke up. He would lie in the dark, thinking how the dream might anticipate coming reality. Maybe everything was too late already? What he wanted to achieve, to rescue South Africa from disintegration while still preserving the influence and special status of the whites as far as possible, could well be already too far out of step with black impatience. Only Nelson Mandela could convince him there was no other course to take. De Klerk knew they both shared the same fear. Uncontrolled violence, a chaotic collapse that no one could control, a breeding ground for a brutal military coup intent on revenge, or various ethnic groupings that would fight each other until nothing was left.

  It was ten at night on Thursday, May 21. De Klerk knew the young lawyer Scheepers was already waiting in his anteroom. But de Klerk did not feel ready to receive him just yet
. He was tired, his head bursting with all the problems he was constantly being forced to try and solve. He got up from his desk and went over to one of the high windows. He sometimes felt petrified by all the responsibility resting on his shoulders. He thought it was too much for one man to bear. He sometimes felt an instinctive urge to run away, to make himself invisible, to go straight out into the bush and simply disappear, to fade away into a mirage. But he knew he would not do that. The God he found increasingly difficult to talk to and believe in was maybe still shielding him after all. He wondered how much time he still had. His mood was constantly changing. From being convinced he was already living on borrowed time, he could start believing he had another five years after all. And time was what he needed. His grand design-to delay the transition to a new kind of society for as long as possible, and meanwhile to entice a large number of black voters into his own party-needed time. But he could also see that Nelson Mandela would refuse to allow him time that was not used to pave the way for the transition.

  It seemed to him there was an element of artificiality in everything he did. I too am really an upholder of the impossible dream, that my country will never change. The difference between me and a fanatic madman who wants to defend the impossible dream with open violence is very small.

  Time is running out for South Africa, it seemed to him. What is happening now ought to have happened many years ago. But history does not follow invisible guidelines.

  He returned to his desk and rang the bell. Shortly afterwards Scheepers came in. De Klerk had come to appreciate his energy and thoroughness. He overlooked the streak of naive innocence he also detected in the young lawyer. Even this young Afrikaner had to learn there were sharp rocks under the soft sand.

  He listened to Scheepers’s report with half-closed eyes. The words that got through to him piled up in his consciousness. When Scheepers had finished, de Klerk looked searchingly at him.

  “I take it for granted everything I’ve just heard is true,” said de Klerk.

  “Yes,” replied Scheepers. “No doubt about it.”