African Quilt : 24 Modern African Stories (9781101617441)

by Solomon, Barbara H. (EDT); Rampone, W. Reginald, Jr. (EDT)

  Whenever she was home there was silence between us. I no longer wanted to know anything about what she was doing, where or how.

  I lay awake for hours on my bed. Lying like that, I seemed to feel parts of my body beat and throb inside me, the way I have seen big machines doing, pounding and pounding and pushing and pulling and pouring some water into one hole which came out at another end. I stretched myself so many times so as to feel tired and sleepy.

  When I did sleep, my dreams were full of painful things.

  One evening I made up my mind, after putting it off many times. I told my boyfriend that I did not want him any longer. He looked hurt, and that hurt me too. He left.

  The thought of the African doctor was still with me and it pained me to know that I should never see him again; unless I met him in the street on a Thursday afternoon. But he had a car. Even if I did meet him by luck, how could I make him see that I loved him? Ach, I do not believe he would even stop to think what kind of woman I am. Part of that winter was a time of longing and burning for me. I say part because there are always things to keep servants busy whose white people go to the sea for the winter.

  To tell the truth, winter was the time for servants; not nannies, because they went with their madams so as to look after the children. Those like me stayed behind to look after the house and dogs. In winter so many families went away that the dogs remained the masters and madams. You could see them walk like white people in the streets. Silent but with plenty of power. And when you saw them you knew that they were full of more nonsense and fancies in the house.

  There was so little work to do.

  One week word was whispered round that a home-boy of ours was going to hold a party in his room on Saturday. I think we all took it for a joke. How could the man be so bold and stupid? The police were always driving about at night looking for black people; and if the whites next door heard the party noise—oho! But still, we were full of joy and wanted to go. As for Dick, he opened his big mouth and nearly fainted when he heard of it and that I was really going.

  During the day on the big Saturday Kate came.

  She seemed a little less wild. But I was not ready to talk to her. I was surprised to hear myself answer her when she said to me Mother says you do not like a marriage between a white girl and a black man, Karabo.

  Then she was silent.

  She says But I want to help him, Karabo.

  I ask her I say You want to help him to do what?

  To go higher and higher, to the top.

  I knew I wanted to say so much that was boiling in my chest. I could not say it. I thought of Lilian Ngoyi at the Black Crow, what she said to us. But I was mixed up in my head and in my blood.

  You still agree with my mother?

  All I could say was I said to your mother I had never seen a black man and a white woman marrying, you hear me? What I think about it is my business.

  I remembered that I wanted to iron my party dress and so I left her. My mind was full of the party again and I was glad because Kate and the doctor would not worry my peace that day. And the next day the sun would shine for all of us, Kate or no Kate, doctor or no doctor.

  The house where our home-boy worked was hidden from the main road by a number of trees. But although we asked a number of questions and counted many fingers of bad luck until we had no more hands for fingers, we put on our best pay-while-you-wear dresses and suits and clothes bought from boys who had stolen them, and went to our home-boy’s party. We whispered all the way while we climbed up to the house. Someone who knew told us that the white people next door were away for the winter. Oh, so that is the thing! we said.

  We poured into the garden through the back and stood in front of his room laughing quietly. He came from the big house behind us, and were we not struck dumb when he told us to go into the white people’s house! Was he mad? We walked in with slow footsteps that seemed to be sniffing at the floor, not sure of anything. Soon we were standing and sitting all over on the nice warm cushions and the heaters were on. Our home-boy turned the lights low. I counted fifteen people inside. We saw how we loved one another’s evening dress. The boys were smart too.

  Our home-boy’s girlfriend Naomi was busy in the kitchen preparing food. He took out glasses and cold drinks—fruit juice, tomato juice, ginger beers, and so many other kinds of soft drink. It was just too nice. The tarts, the biscuits, the snacks, the cakes, woo, that was a party, I tell you. I think I ate more ginger cake than I had ever done in my life. Naomi had baked some of the things. Our home-boy came to me and said I do not want the police to come here and have reason to arrest us, so I am not serving hot drinks, not even beer. There is no law that we cannot have parties, is there? So we can feel free. Our use of this house is the master’s business. If I had asked him he would have thought me mad.

  I say to him I say, You have a strong liver to do such a thing.

  He laughed.

  He played pennywhistle music on gramophone records—Miriam Makeba, Dorothy Masuka, and other African singers and players. We danced and the party became more and more noisy and more happy. Hai, those girls Miriam and Dorothy, they can sing, I tell you! We ate more and laughed more and told more stories. In the middle of the party, our home-boy called us to listen to what he was going to say. Then he told us how he and a friend of his in Orlando collected money to bet on a horse for the July Handicap in Durban. They did this each year but lost. Now they had won two hundred pounds. We all clapped hands and cheered. Two hundred pounds woo!

  You should go and sit at home and just eat time, I say to him. He laughs and says You have no understanding not one little bit.

  To all of us he says Now my brothers and sisters enjoy yourselves. At home I should slaughter a goat for us to feast and thank our ancestors. But this is town life and we must thank them with tea and cake and all those sweet things. I know some people think I must be so bold that I could be midwife to a lion that is giving birth, but enjoy yourselves and have no fear.

  Madam came back looking strong and fresh.

  The very week she arrived the police had begun again to search servants’ rooms. They were looking for what they called loafers and men without passes who they said were living with friends in the suburbs against the law. Our dog’s-meat boys became scarce because of the police. A boy who had a girlfriend in the kitchens, as we say, always told his friends that he was coming for dog’s meat when he meant he was visiting his girl. This was because we gave our boy-friends part of the meat the white people bought for the dogs and us.

  One night a white and a black policeman entered Mrs. Plum’s yard. They said they had come to search. She says no, they cannot. They say Yes, they must do it. She answers No. They forced their way to the back, to Dick’s room and mine. Mrs. Plum took the hose that was running in the front garden and quickly went round to the back. I cut across the floor to see what she was going to say to the men. They were talking to Dick, using dirty words. Mrs. Plum did not wait, she just pointed the hose at the two policemen. This seemed to surprise them. They turned round and she pointed it into their faces. Without their seeing me I went to the tap at the corner of the house and opened it more. I could see Dick, like me, was trying to keep down his laughter. They shouted and tried to wave the water away, but she kept the hose pointing at them, now moving it up and down. They turned and ran through the back gate, swearing the while.

  That fixes them, Mrs. Plum said.

  The next day the morning paper reported it.

  They arrived in the afternoon—the two policemen—with another. They pointed out Mrs. Plum and she was led to the police station. They took her away to answer for stopping the police while they were doing their work.

  She came back and said she had paid bail.

  At the magistrate’s court, Madam was told that she had done a bad thing. She would have to pay a fine or else go
to prison for fourteen days. She said she would go to jail to show that she felt she was not in the wrong.

  Kate came and tried to tell her that she was doing something silly going to jail for a small thing like that. She tells Madam she says This is not even a thing to take to the high court. Pay the money. What is £5?

  Madam went to jail.

  She looked very sad when she came out. I thought of what Lilian Ngoyi often said to us: You must be ready to go to jail for the things you believe are true and for which you are taken by the police. What did Mrs. Plum really believe about me, Chimane, Dick, and all the other black people? I asked myself. I did not know. But from all those things she was writing for the papers and all those meetings she was going to where white people talked about black people and the way they are treated by the government, from what those white women with black bands over their shoulders were doing standing where a white government man was going to pass, I said to myself I said This woman, hai, I do not know she seems to think very much of us black people. But why was she so sad?

  Kate came back home to stay after this. She still played the big gramophone loud-loud-loud and twisted her body at her waist until I thought it was going to break. Then I saw a young white man come often to see her. I watched them through the opening near the hinges of the door between the kitchen and the sitting room where they sat. I saw them kiss each other for a long time. I saw him lift up Kate’s dress and her white-white legs begin to tremble, and—oh I am afraid to say more, my heart was beating hard. She called him Jim. I thought it was funny because white people in the shops call black men Jim.

  Kate had begun to play with Jim when I met a boy who loved me and I loved. He was much stronger than the one I sent away and I loved him more, much more. The face of the doctor came to my mind often, but it did not hurt me so any more. I stopped looking at Kate and her Jim through openings. We spoke to each other, Kate and I, almost as freely as before but not quite. She and her mother were friends again.

  Hallo, Karabo, I heard Chimane call me one morning as I was starching my apron. I answered. I went to the line to hang it. I saw she was standing at the fence, so I knew she had something to tell me. I went to her.

  Hallo!

  Hallo, Chimane!

  O kae?

  Ke teng. Wena?

  At that moment a woman came out through the back door of the house where Chimane was working.

  I have not seen that one before, I say, pointing with my head.

  Chimane looked back. Oh, that one. Hei, daughter-of-the-people, hei, you have not seen miracles. You know this is Madam’s mother-in-law as you see her there. Did I never tell you about her?

  No, never.

  White people, nonsense. You know what? That poor woman is here now for two days. She has to cook for herself and I cook for the family.

  On the same stove?

  Yes. She comes after me when I have finished.

  She has her own food to cook?

  Yes, Karabo. White people have no heart no sense.

  What will eat them up if they share their food?

  Ask me, just ask me. God! She clapped her hands to show that only God knew, and it was His business, not ours.

  Chimane asks me she says, Have you heard from home?

  I tell her I say, Oh daughter-of-the-people, more and more deaths. Something is finishing the people at home. My mother has written. She says they are all right, my father too and my sisters, except for the people who have died. Malebo, the one who lived alone in the house I showed you last year, a white house, he is gone. Then teacher Sedimo. He was very thin and looked sick all the time. He taught my sisters not me. His mother-in-law you remember I told you died last year—no, the year before. Mother says also there is a woman she does not think I remember because I last saw her when I was a small girl she passed away in Zeerust she was my mother’s greatest friend when they were girls. She would have gone to her burial if it was not because she has swollen feet.

  How are the feet?

  She says they are still giving her trouble. I ask Chimane, How are your people at Nokaneng? They have not written?

  She shook her head.

  I could see from her eyes that her mind was on another thing and not her people at that moment.

  Wait for me Chimane eh, forgive me, I have scones in the oven, eh! I will just take them out and come back, eh!

  When I came back to her Chimane was wiping her eyes. They were wet.

  Karabo, you know what?

  E—e. I shook my head.

  I am heavy with child.

  Hau!

  There was a moment of silence.

  Who is it, Chimane?

  Timi. He came back only to give me this.

  But he loves you. What does he say have you told him?

  I told him yesterday. We met in town.

  I remembered I had not seen her at the Black Crow.

  Are you sure, Chimane? You have missed a month?

  She nodded her head.

  Timi himself—he did not use the thing?

  I only saw after he finished, that he had not.

  Why? What does he say?

  He tells me he says I should not worry I can be his wife.

  Timi is a good boy, Chimane. How many of these boys with town ways who know too much will even say Yes it is my child?

  Hai, Karabo, you are telling me other things now. Do you not see that I have not worked long enough for my people? If I marry now who will look after them when I am the only child?

  Hm. I hear your words. It is true. I tried to think of something soothing to say.

  Then I say You can talk it over with Timi. You can go home and when the child is born you look after it for three months and when you are married you come to town to work and can put your money together to help the old people while they are looking after the child.

  What shall we be eating all the time I am at home? It is not like those days gone past when we had land and our mother could go to the fields until the child was ready to arrive.

  The light goes out in my mind and I cannot think of the right answer. How many times have I feared the same thing! Luck and the mercy of the gods that is all I live by. That is all we live by—all of us.

  Listen, Karabo. I must be going to make tea for Madam. It will soon strike half-past ten.

  I went back to the house. As Madam was not in yet, I threw myself on the divan in the sitting room. Malan came sniffing at my legs. I put my foot under its fat belly and shoved it up and away from me so that it cried tjunk—tjunk—tjunk as it went out. I say to it I say Go and tell your brother what I have done to you and tell him to try it and see what I will do. Tell your grandmother when she comes home too.

  When I lifted my eyes he was standing in the kitchen door, Dick. He says to me he says Hau! now you have also begun to speak to dogs!

  I did not reply. I just looked at him, his mouth ever stretched out like the mouth of a bag, and I passed to my room.

  I sat on my bed and looked at my face in the mirror. Since the morning I had been feeling as if a black cloud were hanging over me, pressing on my head and shoulders. I do not know how long I sat there. Then I smelled Madam. What was it? Where was she? After a few moments I knew what it was. My perfume and scent. I used the same cosmetics as Mrs. Plum’s. I should have been used to it by now. But this morning—why did I smell Mrs. Plum like this? Then, without knowing why, I asked myself I said, Why have I been using the same cosmetics as Madam? I wanted to throw them all out. I stopped. And then I took all the things and threw them into the dustbin. I was going to buy other kinds on Thursday; finished!

  I could not sit down. I went out and into the white people’s house. I walked through and the smell of the house made me sick and seemed to fill up my throat. I went to the bat
hroom without knowing why. It was full of the smell of Madam. Dick was cleaning the bath. I stood at the door and looked at him cleaning the dirt out of the bath, dirt from Madam’s body. Sies! I said aloud. To myself I said, Why cannot people wash the dirt of their own bodies out of the bath? Before Dick knew I was near I went out. Ach, I said again to myself, why should I think about it now when I have been doing their washing for so long and cleaned the bath many times when Dick was ill. I had held worse things from her body times without number . . .

  I went out and stood midway between the house and my room, looking into the next yard. The three-legged grey cat next door came to the fence and our eyes met. I do not know how long we stood like that looking at each other. I was thinking, Why don’t you go and look at your grandmother like that? when it turned away and mewed hopping on the three legs. Just like someone who feels pity for you.

  In my room I looked into the mirror on the chest of drawers. I thought Is this Karabo this?

  Thursday came, and the afternoon off. At the Black Crow I did not see Chimane. I wondered about her. In the evening I found a note under my door. It told me if Chimane was not back that evening I should know that she was at 660 3rd Avenue, Alexandra Township. I was not to tell the white people.

  I asked Dick if he could not go to Alexandra with me after I had washed the dishes. At first he was unwilling. But I said to him I said, Chimane will not believe that you refused to come with me when she sees me alone. He agreed.

  On the bus Dick told me much about his younger sister whom he was helping with money to stay at school until she finished; so that she could become a nurse and a midwife. He was very fond of her, as far as I could find out. He said he prayed always that he should not lose his job, as he had done many times before, after staying a few weeks only at each job; because of this he had to borrow monies from people to pay his sister’s school fees, to buy her clothes and books. He spoke of her as if she were his sweetheart. She was clever at school, pretty (she was this in the photo Dick had shown me before). She was in Orlando Township. She looked after his old people, although she was only thirteen years of age. He said to me he said Today I still owe many people because I keep losing my job. You must try to stay with Mrs. Plum, I said.