by Fred Khumalo
After noting that the farm was intact, he stood and considered going into the house to check if his mother was there; to check if she was still alive. But it was dangerous. He had to go back to where he’d left Matshiliso. From their hideout they would watch for movement on the farm to determine if it was safe to enter the house. If, indeed, the house still belonged to his mother. If, indeed, she was still alive. He strode back to where he’d left Matshiliso.
‘My bokkie, we are going to sleep in the bush tonight,’ De la Rey said. ‘We don’t want to wake my mother in the middle of the night.’
‘That’s sensible. We shouldn’t alarm her,’ she said, smiling to herself as she imagined the shock on his mother’s face at seeing her long-lost son with a native girl on his arm. ‘But are you sure the farm still belongs to your family? Perhaps you should wake up early in the morning, go and see if it’s safe to show our faces there.’
De la Rey nodded. ‘Always had a good head on your shoulders. We’ll spend the night beyond the hills over there, where there are bushes to conceal us.’
Early the following morning, De la Rey crawled out of the bush and, lying on his stomach to survey the valley below, watched his family’s farm intently. He was hoping for some movement on their farm, and on the one next to it. But nothing moved. There were no British soldiers. Not a single soul.
After two hours of observation, he detected movement. Heart thumping, he strained his eyes to assess the figure of a man walking from his family’s barn towards the house. His heart swelled with joy as he recognised his Uncle Gawie. He wanted to rush down to greet his uncle, but he decided to bide his time. He saw Uncle Gawie talking to two black men, obviously giving orders as he pointed towards the barn. Uncle Gawie disappeared into the main house. Some time later, he emerged from the house and walked towards his own cottage, about two hundred metres west of the main house. De la Rey waited. A cool breeze blew wisps of dried yellow grass in quick, confused flurries over the area of veld where he was lying. A lone bird sang its early-morning melody. After more time had passed, during which nothing untoward happened, he decided to fetch Matshiliso.
Together, De la Rey and Matshiliso rode down the hill towards the house, as unobtrusively as they could. There was no one in the yard when they got there. He tethered the horse next to the barn and they walked towards the main house. Apart from a sagging zinc roof and glass missing from the front window, the house, desperately in need of a fresh lick of whitewash, looked just as he remembered it – a nondescript oblong structure with a verandah that led to the voorkamer. The front door was wide open. They walked in and he asked Matshiliso to sit on a chair in the kitchen while he proceeded towards his mother’s bedroom. He wanted to surprise her.
At the door, he cleared his throat loudly. ‘May I please come in?’
‘Gawie …?’ His mother’s voice was querulous. ‘What is it now? What do you want?’
‘I said, may I come in?’
‘No, it is not …’ Her voice caught. ‘It is not my boy …’
In an instant, she was at the door, tears running down her sunken cheeks. Her wrinkled face peeked out from under a black bonnet. Her eyes, which had once been a piercing blue, had lost their lustre: they were now dull, peeking out from sockets like cockroaches tired from too much scurrying away from predators. The large blanket draped over her shoulders was clasped firmly together with a safety pin at her chest. Her voice trembled like the rest of her body. ‘Oh, my boy, what have they done to you? Come in, come in, this is your own mother’s bedroom after all. Come in and tell me about it. What a surprise!’ She started sobbed loudly, burying her head in the folds of his huge coat. ‘Oh, look at you. How you remind me of your pa, with that beard of yours.’ Overcome with emotion, she embraced him tightly. When the shock started to wear off, she looked up and said, ‘You must tell me everything, my son.’
‘Ma, I must show you pictures of some of the men I was with on the front line.’
‘Pictures?’ she asked, suspicion written in her eyes. ‘What do you mean, pictures? Do you now have those machines that take pictures? Where did you get the money to buy that thing?’
‘No, Ma. I think Ma is getting on in years. Ma has forgotten that I am the artist of this republic. I can draw anything, from the big church in town to the most intricate rendering of President Paul Kruger’s face.’
‘Oh, you mean those play-play pictures that you doodled.’
‘They are not doodles, Ma. They are real pictures. They are art.’
‘So, while other men were busy fighting you were busy doodling?’
‘When I am all cleaned up, I’ll show you the pictures. I’ll show you the face of our veldkornet. I’ll show you the face of his wife. I’ll show you the faces of the men I fought alongside of, complete with their rifles and things.’
‘Which reminds me, just days after you went to war I found a whole load of those – um, er, cloths – those cloths that your father used to draw his pictures on. Those hard coarse cloths, man. They have a name …’
‘Canvases?’
‘Yes, I found a whole pile of them. And some oil paints your pa used to keep. All sealed, unopened. I know your father tried to discourage you from painting, said it would make you lazy, yet he himself used to paint like an angel, and still work like a slave on his own farm.’
They laughed together.
She continued, ‘Anyway, those canvas things are in a box, in the barn somewhere. Maybe you want to have a look at them once you’ve rested and cleaned yourself up. Maybe you want to transfer your scribblings onto those big canvas things? Who knows about these things?’
‘Thank you, Ma. I can’t wait to start painting again.’
They sat down on the bed and she embraced him again. Her shoulders started shaking, her voice rose as she bawled like a child. At length, she regained her composure. Quietly, she said, ‘How I almost lost my only son to a stupid war that still doesn’t make sense to me. I know they want our gold, but couldn’t they just discuss or negotiate with us? We are not heathens and savages, after all. We are reasonable. We know how to discuss, how to negotiate like civilised people. Ah, how I hate the British. They have reduced us to kaffir status. Rounding us up like cattle, locking us up. The kaffirs who are used to that kind of thing must have been laughing their heads off.’
‘I’m glad you weren’t in a concentration camp. You look healthy.’ He touched her cheek. Her skin was cold to the touch, and pastry-white in colour. ‘You should go out more often, sit on the veranda and enjoy the sun.’
‘Hhhmphf! What is there to enjoy? Gawie has looked after me well enough, I must say. Over the past few months he’s been working hard, getting the farm back on its feet now that the war is over.’
‘He’s always been a hard worker.’
‘Yes, we’re going to have a good harvest, thanks to him and those kaffirs. They’re good kaffirs. Most others sided with the Brits, hanging onto the petticoats and coat-tails of the Brits the minute Bloemfontein fell into their grubby redneck hands. But Gawie’s kaffirs have been loyal to us, you’ll see them working hard in the fields.’
‘That’s good to hear.’
‘But it’s the other thing that bothers me with Gawie.’
‘What thing?’
‘He doesn’t want to get married, settle down, start a family like any decent man his age.’
‘But you’re being hard on him, Ma. How could he get married in the middle of a war?’
‘The war couldn’t stop him chasing after those kaffir girls like a demented man. I think one of them is now pregnant with his child. What a disgrace. Soon this entire region will be run by half-kaffirs.’
‘Ma,’ he raised his voice, ‘I wish you would stop using that word.’
She recoiled. ‘What word? Kaffir? What has this war done to you?’
‘These people are decent, Ma. You yourself have just told me how they stuck with you through the war, at the risk of being killed by the Brits. That’s loyalty,
Ma.’
He touched her hands reassuringly. There were liver spots on them. He lifted his eyes to her face. Around her cheeks, some veins had burst, leaving crimson webs.
‘So, what do you want me to call these … these girls?’
‘They are natives, Ma, natives.’
‘That was before this war. This war has changed everything. This war saw people we mistook for fellow Europeans treating us like savages, like non-Europeans. Now we’re not going to shrink from our new status. We are going to embrace it. We are of Africa. But the kaffirs remain kaffirs. They are godless. They have no culture. What do they know about diamonds? What can they do with gold?’
‘We had no choice but to fight against the Brits.’
She looked at him with awe. ‘So, you really fought? But what’s this I hear about you joining the Brits?’ She paused, then she added hastily, ‘Ag, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. I am just happy you are back in one piece. Now that you’re back I think I’ll go out more often. The other day I went out and sat on the veranda. And guess what?’
He shrugged his shoulders.
‘I’m sitting there, and this antelope suddenly appears. Just up the hill, over there. It’s just standing there, grazing. And I remember that I haven’t eaten meat in a long time. And there’s meat in front of me.’
He laughed nervously.
‘So I get up, walk back to the house. I am stretching my luck, mos. I know that by the time I get back to the stoep, the bokkie would have long moved on. Anyway, I get your father’s huge rifle. It’s always well-oiled and loaded, since the war started. One has to be ready. Always. I get back on the veranda, with my rifle at the ready. This is my lucky day. The stupid steenbok is still there. I take aim. I think it takes a furtive glance at me. But it doesn’t move. It must be thinking, “Ag, an old rickety bag of bones like that can’t cause me any harm.” I lower the rifle. The bloody thing still doesn’t move. Now I’m taking it personally – I’m angry at the animal for not being scared of me. I take aim. I pull the trigger. Bull’s-eye.’
‘That was well done, Ma.’
De la Rey helped his mother up and, arm in arm, they left the bedroom. As they entered the kitchen, the old woman hesitated at the sight of the black woman seated at her kitchen table, dressed in an ankle-length dress, her head covered in a doek, as was the custom with married African women. She was wearing black, flat-heeled shoes. The older woman stared at the shoes for a long time. Her own feet were bare. Her only pair of shoes was reserved for special occasions – church, or some such. Her eyes travelled back to the younger woman’s headgear, finally resting on her face. Her eyes were downcast, as was the tradition of African women when in the presence of their elders or social superiors.
De la Rey spoke hurriedly. ‘Ma, let me introduce you to—’
‘Why do you allow a meid to sit on my chair? What’s this war done to you? Do you know how far back in the family this chair goes?’
‘But Ma—’
‘Magtig! You know my grandma passed it on to my own pa? And you’re allowing a kaffir meid to sommer sit on it?’
‘All I’m trying to—’
‘Who said I need a housemaid, anyway? This war has bankrupted me. I can’t afford a maid.’
‘You are not listening, Ma!’ he bellowed. ‘This woman is my wife. That’s why we are here. We are going to stay with you here until I am back on my feet and can start my own farm. And, as you can see, she is in the family way.’
His mother’s face seemed to swell like a bullfrog. She muttered to herself, ‘No, no, no.’ She retreated to her bedroom and slammed the door closed. After about twenty minutes, she came out again.
‘Out!’ she hissed, pointing her big-barrelled rifle at her son. ‘Out, off my farm. Out of my life. With your kaffir. Out.’
She squeezed the trigger, hitting a window.
‘OUT! You have betrayed me. You’re no son of mine. I don’t have a son any more.’
CHAPTER 10
They were back to roaming the vast plains of the Free State, De la Rey and Matshiliso – riding by night, sleeping by day. Starving, tired, Matshiliso said, ‘We could always go back to my village.’
‘What?’
‘When the baby comes, they will have no choice but to take us back. You will have to pay all the necessary penalties, and we can get married.’ As an afterthought she added, ‘That is, if you still want to marry me.’
‘Of course we’re going to get married. But in order to pay all those penalties I will need money. Hence I am saying, let’s look for work on the farms, raise some money and then leave.’
‘But you know that no farmer in his right frame of mind would take us on as a couple.’
‘I know that. I think we stand a better chance of finding work in town. Bloemfontein itself. The Indian shopkeepers.’
She seemed to think about it. ‘Do you think they’d be prepared to house us, thus bringing trouble to themselves?’
‘You’re not listening. We are not a couple. At least that’s the story we will tell them. I’m a survivor of the war. I stumbled upon you, a poor pregnant black woman. And I thought, as a good Christian, I couldn’t leave you behind.’
‘Perhaps it could work. How far is town from here? I am totally lost now.’
‘Let’s ride. We shall be there at the break of dawn.’
Jerry paused, refilled his wine glass, then settled back and continued with the story. ‘So now, De la Rey and Matshiliso find lodgings with an Indian shopkeeper in town. In those days, it was not uncommon for the so-called poor whites to work for Jewish and Indian traders. Of course the Indian is clever enough to see through their lies. He understands that they are a couple. But he provides separate sleeping quarters for the both of them. Just in case the authorities come sniffing around.
‘They’d been working for the Indian for a few months when Matshiliso delivered a bouncy baby boy. They named him Roelof de la Rey. There was a celebration at the house, but it was a bit hush-hush as the Indian trader and De la Rey himself feared that the neighbours might start talking. The Indian trader Mr Saloojee and his wife came around to the shabby shack in which the baby had been delivered with the help of a black woman who did washing for the Saloojees. Again, De la Rey was discouraged from spending too much time in the shack where his fiancée and child were confined.
‘One day De la Rey obtained a small loan from the Saloojees. He was going into town to buy some items – medicines, pieces of clothing – for the baby.’
Jerry took a sip from his drink, got up to stretch his legs. ‘Turned out to be the longest walk ever. He never came back. Two weeks passed, a month. No De la Rey. Desperate now, Matshiliso decided she had to gather her things and go back to her village.’ Jerry paused, gathering his thoughts carefully.
‘Mrs Saloojee was livid. “What? With a young piccaninny like that? You can’t leave.” So Matshiliso stayed.
‘And that, my friend,’ said Jerry, ‘is all Pitso’s mother ever told him about his father, Cornelius de la Rey, and the circumstances of his birth.’
CHAPTER 11
Pitso must have been around six when he began to understand his station in life. The building he called home was quite popular in the neighbourhood. It was, after all, Salojee’s General Dealer, where people bought their food supplies. It was also a place of gathering, where both black and white came to collect their post every Wednesday. The building was a two-storey affair. The bottom floor was the commercial hub, while the upper floor served as the sleeping quarters for Mr Salojee, his wife and four children.
After De la Rey left, and Matshiliso stayed, Saloojee had to do some swift thinking. At the back of the store was a warehouse where he stored extra supplies. He converted the storeroom into sleeping quarters for the newly employed young woman and her son. And he transferred his stock to the two shacks which he had used to accommodate – separately – De la Rey and his family.
The room was dark even during the day. It contained a
bed in its corner, a table with a chair, and a suitcase in which they kept their clothes. That was it. Matshiliso ate her meals at the table, while Pitso preferred to sit on an upturned five-litre drum which he had rescued from a rubbish bin.
Mother and child soon acclimatised to this dreary world. It mirrored their lives out there in the street, where they walked as if they were forever shrouded in darkness. No one noticed them. No one spoke to them. The only time they became visible was when a neighbour lost something – a chicken, a piece of clothing from her line. Then the neighbour would point fingers at the boy: ‘They are always stealing, the mixed-race people. That’s all they are good at.’
By that time, Pitso had been baptised at the local church and, on the advice of Mrs Saloojee, had been enrolled at the newly established school for mixed-race children. Mrs Saloojee had even encouraged Matshiliso to hand her child over to the orphanage for mixed-race children, but she refused.
Even though the child had been baptised Roelof de la Rey, his mother also wanted him to understand and appreciate his other cultural heritage – that of her own people. Thus, she had given him the name Pitso. She encouraged him to call himself by the surname Motaung when he was not at school.
‘Roelof de la Rey is your school and church name. But your home name is Pitso Motaung,’ Matshiliso would remind her son.
When Pitso turned three, and Matshiliso thought she had saved enough money to go home and face her people without fear, she took the long trip to the village of her birth. She thumbed a lift with a farmer’s truck travelling in the general direction of her village. The journey took her the entire day, but proved a complete waste of time. Her people had been uprooted from their ancestral home. In fact, the entire village had been obliterated. In its place now stood what was clearly a hugely successful community of British farmers. They had taken advantage of the fecundity of this village along the banks of the Mohokare River and had turned it into the breadbasket of the region, as she would later learn. They planted maize, sunflower and all manner of vegetables. They kept cattle, sheep and pigs, providing a steady supply of carcasses for the butcheries in Bloemfontein and other smaller towns.