by Alan Paton
MY BROTHER’S BIRTHDAY PARTIES were big affairs. We worked for days, my sister-in-law and my niece and I, preparing the foods, and sending the invitations by word of mouth. We invited Malan Afrikaners and Smuts Afrikaners, and the English people and the Jews, any white person indeed except the Apostolics that my brother considered to be traitors to the Church, and those few Afrikaners who did not go to any church. Also we did not invite Flip van Vuuren, because although you could drink what you liked at my brother’s parties, you could not be drunk. And Flip had got very drunk, and had gone from person to person, asking with besotted owlishness, what’s the point of living, what’s the point of life? Then in the extreme of foolishness, he went to Jakob van Vlaanderen himself, sitting in the great chair because of the lameness of his leg, and said to him, what’s the point of living, what’s the point of life? Then when my brother had ignored him with ill-concealed impatience, he had gone to the last extreme of foolishness, and had put his foolish hand on my brother’s arm, and my brother hating to be touched by a stranger, and had said to him again, what’s the point of living, what’s the point of life? So Jakob van Vlaanderen stood up from his chair, and said in a voice of thunder, the point of living is to serve the Lord your God, and to uphold the honour of your church and language and people, take him home.
So Flip’s wife had to come forward, bitter and shamed, and take him home. And my brother stood there for a full minute, looking at us like a lion, in the silence of death, broken only by the stumbling of the home-sent fool.
For my brother liked his liquor, and could drink more than most, but held drunkenness and drunkards in supreme contempt, and trousered women, and smoking women, and the new fashion of twin beds. But he had acquired tolerance for cigarettes, though he did not smoke them himself; and for the cinema, though he seldom went, and when he did he would stand like a chained lion while they played God Save the King; and he had acquired tolerance for dancing, and for Englishmen so long as they did not talk of England as home; and even in his later years for General Smuts, reckoning that the weight of his brain had been too heavy for his spare frame. And when his son Pieter took the red oath and had gone to the war, he would bear no mention of his name, but had restored him to favour when Holland fell, not because he had any special love for Holland, but because it was a small nation, as the Transvaal had been in 1899. This act of restoration he had set down on paper, in language stiff and proper, made still more stiff and proper by the language of Holland itself, which they had taught when he was at school. But he made it clear in his letter that this was a change of circumstance and not of heart. And I tell you too, so that you may know what power he had, that after it was known about the letter, many of the young men of the grass country took the red oath and went to the war; and it is a lie to say, as some do, that a soldier could not come in uniform to our Church.
You could sit or you could stand at these parties, and you could eat heavy or light, boerewors and frikkadel, with hot meats of beef and mutton and fowl and turkey, and cold meats the same, with salads and lettuce, beetroot, tomato, cucumber, and potatoes, hot and cold, boiled and roasted, and sweetened pumpkin and squash and green peas and beans, and gravies of several kinds; and after that, melktert and koeksusters and pannekoek and konfyt. You could drink heavy or light too, orange drinks and lemon drinks, home-made not bought, and home-made gingerbeer; and all the Cape wines, the dry and the sweet, the red and the white; and the Cape brandies and the ginger and peach brandies and van der Hum; and even Scotch whisky that no one else could get at all, except perhaps the captain and the magistrate.
After my brother had said the grace, he sat down at the head of the long table because of the lameness of his leg, and those that came later would go to him to pay their respects; and he would accept them sitting, and would not stand again, except for the very old, and the captain and his mother, and the magistrate. He was gay and full of jokes, and the jokes that he liked best were the sly ones about man and wife, and the burden that each was to the other; but he drew a strict line between what was permissible and what was not permissible, yet because its exact position was known only to himself, it was best not to make such jokes at all, but just to laugh at the ones he made.
It was a family day for the van Vlaanderens. They were all there from Buitenverwagting, Frans and his wife and their children; Henrietta and her silent husband, who spoke as much at a birthday party as at any other time; Emily and her husband from Johannesburg. I myself was in and out of the room, and each time I returned to it, I looked for Pieter and Nella; and I was not the only one who was eager for them to come, for Frans’s son Koos said to me, where’s Uncle Pieter? Then I said he must keep watch for us both, and if I were out of the room he must come at once and call me, when his Uncle Pieter came.
So I was there when they arrived, he tall and handsome in his dark blue suit. I looked at once for his present, and I confess I was nervous when I saw it truly was a book.
— It is a book, I said.
— I told you it was a book.
— Pieter, what book is it?
— I told you. The Life of Smuts.
But when he saw I was nervous, he repented at once.
— Of course not, he said.
— What is it, Pieter?
— Wait and see, he said.
We went, he and his mother and Nella and Martha and Frans and his wife and the boy Koos and I, to the head of the long table. They put their presents on the table, and my brother pushed away his plate to deal with them the better, and I could see that he wondered what the one might be, but I am sure he did not dream it could be a book, for I told you he read no book but one; so maybe he thought it was some box or case. Nella’s present was handkerchiefs, of the big coloured kind that he liked.
— Thank you, daughter, he said.
He stood up and kissed her, then sat down again. Then he opened the wrappings of the book, and could have no doubt that it would be a book. And he opened it slowly, like someone watchful. And it was a book of birds, with a coloured cover of all the kingfishers, and we all were a little more at ease, for he was a lover of all birds. But there was something else too, for the book was called The Birds of South Africa, and I told you that the words, South Africa, even in English, were holy words.
— The Birds of South Africa, he said in his heavy English.
He sat for a while looking at the kingfishers, with some kind of silence come over him, which kept us silent also. He opened the book, and when he saw how white and shining were the pages, he put it down again, and wiped his hands on the table napkin. Then he took out his spectacles, and took one of Nella’s big coloured handkerchiefs, and wiped the spectacles, bending down over them, and taking his time, like a man taken off his guard, and wanting a moment to recover. Then he put on his spectacles and opened the book, and it came open at the coloured plate of the wild ducks and geese, and he studied them like a man who studied them yet did not quite study them. He turned other pages, and you could see that he was astonished that there was such a book, and by the numbers of the plates, and their colours also. His eyes went from one bird to another, and you knew that he was feeling under some kind of power of the book, and did not wish to fall under it openly; but being a clean man and honest, he did not wish to hide it altogether.
At last he said, almost like a man defeated, it’s a book, it’s a book. And Martha suddenly giggled and kissed him on the head, so that he growled like a lion. And my sister-in-law looked at her son with a look of pride that had all the care gone out of it, and he stood there, looking proud himself.
Then my brother growled at him, you took a risk to give me a book.
He closed it and looked at the cover again.
— An Englishman, he said, go and eat.
He pushed the book away from him, and pulled back his plate, and my sister-in-law and I took Pieter and Nella to eat, my sister-in-law holding on to her son happy and proud. Ag, but so were we all.
— You’re clever,
I said.
He grinned at me.
— Of course, he said. Have you just found out? Then Japie came up, full of jokes, and he began with his Ta’ Mina’s and his Ta’ Sophie’s that I dislike, but he kissed me and that I liked. And he was pleased to see us all after all these years, but most pleased to see Pieter, and kept calling him old brother, which is another of the foolish expressions that he has, and he uses it, if not in every sentence, then almost as much.
My sister-in-law said to him, Japie, are you still playing rugby?
Japie’s face fell at once, and from joking he was serious, because that is what rugby can do to a man.
— I haven’t played for six years, he said, I’m forbidden.
My sister-in-law was at once all love and care, and said, why, Japie? And he looked downcast, indeed he cast his eyes on the floor, and said, my lungs. And my sister-in-law said gently, Japie, we hadn’t heard.
He shrugged his shoulders, once, twice, and spoke as though it was a thing that had to be, and one did not weep for it any more.
— Lungs, he said. Breath. I run on the field, but my breath can’t keep up with me.
Then he laughed his disgusting laugh, and all the more when he saw our faces change from concern to sheepishness.
— So I forbade it, he said.
Then he laughed again.
— The Oubaas will think you’re drunk, I said.
We all gave a glance at my brother, but he was not attending to us, for Sybrand Wessels was sitting with him, and they were looking at the book of the birds.
— I am drunk, he said. Aren’t I with you all again? Ag, he could say things like that, that is why you forgave him for being a clown. We all stood and sat there, watching Pieter and Nella have their food. We had a little wine, and we laughed and remembered as though the world would go on like that forever, full of warmth and pleasure; and Japie told us many jokes, of which I write down the only one that I remember.
— Old brother, he said to Pieter, you know they sent me to Klerksdorp for a week, and I wiped out juvenile delinquency.
Pieter humouring him, said, how?
— Well, the week before I got there one klonkie got into trouble. But the week I was there no klonkies at all.
Then he laughed, in the way that by now you know. And we all laughed too. Yes, I remember that time, it was the last time we were all so together. And the light came into the dark and sombre face, and I seeing it, and seeing the face so changed and warm, prayed there in my heart, in front of them all not knowing, for his peace. For though it was Japie who talked, it was he who was the centre of us all, he stood there tall and straight in the warmth of our love, and it was he who destroyed us all. And why, why, why? God knows, I do not know.
Then what should happen but that Anna should take him away from us, right from his mother’s arm; but she is a kind of cousin, and had some kind of right, seeing we had had him so long. She smokes and wears the yellow trousers that I most dislike, but of course not in my brother’s house, nor in her father’s either, though why she has never been found out is a wonder to me; but she works in Pretoria and that is maybe why. She has never married, and says openly that Pieter is the only one she would have married, and he married someone else; and she says it so openly that one does not know if it is true or not. She took him away from us to get her a drink, and he turned round and grinned at us all, and we endured it; though we were disappointed we endured it, because he turned round at us, and because we had had him so long, and because the girl had some kind of right. But I could have smacked her where one smacks, as I once did when she was a child.
I saw Koos was disconsolate, and I went to him.
— Hurry, I said, there’s no one with your grandfather. Go and ask him how he likes his book.
Then I went off to the kitchen, where old Izak and Lena, who for all their blackness were good Christian souls, were working their heads off for the old master’s party. It was a good thing I went, for the two extra girls from the location had put all the dirty glasses in the sink, and were going to pour hot water on them. For I tell you, these great parties may look smooth and fine, but what happens in the kitchen is what counts.
YES, I THOUGHT TO MYSELF, it’s in the kitchen that the work is done. My brother must have known it, but he never thought one would be touched by a word of thanks. I felt suddenly tired and old, and pitied myself, and remembered my lip and that no man had ever wanted me. I do not dwell on these things in my thoughts, you must not think it. I count my blessings, as they say. For the Lord gave me a good home, and a little money of my own, and a brother that for all his ways was an upright man, and just; and a sister-in-law for whom I would any time die. For she gave me her children to be as my own, especially the one, and knew I loved him perhaps beyond all wisdom, and never denied me. But one does not always count one’s blessings; strange it is that one should go from the sweet mood to the black in one brief moment. I went to the pantry and sat down, and stared at the floor.
— Tante, what’s wrong?
I started at his voice, for I did not hear him come, but it was too late to put on another face. He came and stood by me, and lifted my rough hands, and turned them upwards and looked at them, and moved his thumbs over them with gentleness.
— What’s wrong, he said.
But I would not look at him. He held my hands more tightly, but kept moving his thumbs over their roughness. Then he said, in a voice that meant he would not be silent, I asked you what was wrong.
I pulled my hands away from him.
— Ag, I said, I’m angry that I was born.
But he did not comfort or chide me, or tell me not to be a fool, or say come back to the party, or say anything at all. He stood there, not saying anything, not touching me, and I knew that I had put the black mood into him also, and for shame I could not look at him.
Then he said, it’s I that should be angry I was born.
But I said to him, not looking at him, what do you mean?
But he did not answer me. I got to my feet and took him by the arms, but he looked over me, and I was not tall enough to see his eyes.
— Tell me, I said urgently, tell me.
— Ag, it’s nothing, he said, it comes and it goes.
I tried to go back so that I could see his face, but he held me and would not let me, as though it were important I should not see it until he had time to recover, for he had opened the door of his soul and now repented it. And so strange was this for him, who was himself so strong and sure, and not a man for holding people unless he were in command of himself and them, that I knew it was true that he had opened the door, and that I had forced myself into it, and that he was forcing me out, so that he could shut it again. So I lost my sense, being myself tired and in the black mood, and forgot the bitter lessons that he himself had taught me in the past; and I was vasberade, that is I mean determined, to find out what was wrong. So I went to the pantry door and shut it, and knew the moment I had done it that I had not shut myself in but had shut myself out. He might have said to me, Tante, that’s enough, or he might have said, must I teach you again, but he did not say that, seeing me standing at the door, and knowing I was already humbled and defeated.
— Tante, he said gently, I told you it comes and it goes. What about some coffee?
So I opened the door and said to him brightly, as I might have said to any man, sit down and I’ll get the coffee.
Then I went and got the coffee, with only one thought in my mind, of the high wind at Buitenverwagting twenty years ago, when the boy was in the tree. For my brother and his wife and the children had gone visiting, and had left the boy, sick in bed, with me to look after him. And the servants came running to tell me the boy was in the tree. It was a cypress tree, that at the top grows frail and thin, and it was bending this way and that way in the wind, and at the top of it the boy. I called out to him to come down, but he was drunk with the power to make us afraid. I was mad with fear, and cried and screamed, as I sh
ould never have done before the black nation. Then he stretched his arms above his head, and gripped the small branches with his knees, and bent over backwards and gave some kind of cry, so that if he had fallen he would have fallen to death. I could not watch it any more, nor endure to be so shamed, and I threw my apron over my head and ran crying into the house. Then he was ashamed of his naughtiness, and afraid of what I might tell, so he came down from the tree, and went searching for me in the house, where I sat frightened and shamed and weeping.
— Tante, he said.
But I would not listen to him. He got down on his knees and pulled my hands away from my face.
— I’m sorry, tante, he said.
And at the sound of that in his voice I took him into my arms, with all the passion of a hungry woman, that would have had this child if God had given her one, and would not have asked another, and would not have asked for anything more at all, but only the time and the strength to make him into a man.
Then he stiffened in my arms and looked away from me, as though there were something of which he was ashamed. And the passion went out of me and I was afraid.
— What’s the matter, I said.
— I don’t like it, he said.
— What?
— To be kissed like that.
Then he went away and got into his bed, and that was the way of it. And from that day he had the power over me. And because of that day I did not speak when I should have spoken, and because of me he was destroyed.
WHEN I went back to the pantry with the two cups of coffee, Japie was there, come in search of his friend. He was calling him old brother in every second thing that he said, and opening all the tins in the pantry, as though there were not food enough in the big room where my brother’s party was.