Tandia

by Bryce Courtenay

  Mama Tequila had been blessed with a limited talent as a singer and in her youth when she wasn't at the bioscope picking up what she thought of as Black American language, she used to sit around in bars waiting for a singing gig. She liked to dance and she liked a drink and she was just sufficiently light-skinned to pass for white in a nightclub. She also discovered before she was Tandia's age that men couldn't keep their hands off her. The rest, as they say in the classics, just came naturally and she was retired as a chanteuse and on the game full time before she was nineteen.

  There was very little Mama Tequila didn't know about men and nothing about them that she trusted, unless it was the wilfulness of their one-eyed snakes. She'd had a hundred or more affairs with men in her life and none of them had turned out well. Mama Tequila knew how to make money out of men but men always seemed to end up making a monkey out of her.

  At sixty-five she'd given up hope of being loved without being robbed and purchased Bluey Jay. The year she'd taken off to repair and restore the beautiful old house had seen her also fall in love again, this time with the thing she had created. Now, five years later, she was running the prettiest and, some said, the best whorehouse in the Southern Hemisphere.

  On Sunday mornings Tandia often rose early to help Mama Tequila in the kitchen. At Bluey Jay everyone worked for their living and this included Tandia. Mama Tequila kept her promise to Or Louis and Tandia was kept on her feet at all times doing her share to keep the house running smoothly.

  Juicey Fruit picked Tandia up from school at three o'clock and they were back at Bluey Jay by a quarter to four. She was then allowed an hour or so for homework. At five o'clock she took over from Josie the cook or one of the girls as room maid. She would replace the bottom sheet and clean the wash basin, placing fresh towels beside it after each client. Tandia would work from five in the evening until half past nine, when she was packed off to bed and the other girls took over as room maids again until one in the morning, when the house closed.

  On Saturdays, Bluey Jay only opened at half past six in the evening and Tandia was required to work through until closing. With the boys from the boats invading Bluey Jay, the joint would be jumping from early evening, and every hand was needed. Two coloured women also came out from Durban around five and worked with Tandia to keep the linen changed and the rooms clean. After Bluey Jay had closed down for the night, the two ladies would sleep in the servants' quarters at the back of the house and Juicey Fruit Mambo would take them back to town on Sunday morning when he drove Sarah to early Mass.

  The chew the fat chats had made Tandia an expert in the theory of how to make a man happy, and Mama Tequila referred to her as the 'wise young, virgin'. Mama Tequila saw no point in not exposing her to the finer details of the game. Tandia was a coloured girl, though a very clever one, and the more she knew about life, the better she might be at surviving it. The life of a high-class whore for a girl with a coloured skin was a damn sight better than most and Tandia had the looks and brains to go right to the top. Mama Tequila had very little time for dumb, lazy women and she demanded the highest standards from the eight she employed at Bluey Jay. 'Whores with a future' was how she described them.

  Hester liked the idea of being a whore with a future. She was a back-slidden Pentecostal and it worried her a lot. Before she became a whore she'd worked in a fish factory, scaling and filleting fish and packing the fillets into trays of crushed ice. She had suffered from permanent chilblains and it was here, in the freezing fish hall standing up to her ankles in water, where she had first developed nasal polyps. For her efforts Hester had earned five pounds a week with overtime. The only thing she had going for her was her skill with a filleting knife and the fact that God loved her; as a born-again Christian she was absolutely, positively guaranteed a place in heaven.

  It was an evangelical chorus much favoured by Pastor Mulvery, the new preacher at the Assembly of God mission hall she attended that finally decided her destiny.

  I will make you fishers of men,

  fishers of men,

  fishers of men.

  I will make you fishers of men,

  if you only follow me!

  Hester finally realised in the middle of singing this dumb chorus one Sunday morning that Jesus Christ had recruited mostly fishermen as his disciples. Which meant that somewhere on the shores of Galilee there had to be a fish factory where they dumped their catch for girls like her to clean and pack. Working in a fish factory with Jesus Christ as the foreman wasn't Hester's idea of heaven and so she'd become a whore, which seemed much the more intelligent option when you had enormous boobs which even the pastor couldn't take his eyes off during prayer meetings. She'd open her eyes in the middle of all the 'Hallelujahs' and 'Praise the Lords' and see him looking straight at them, his eyes almost standing out on stalks! So when Mama Tequila described Hester as a whore with a future, she liked it a lot.

  Hester wasn't surprised or even cynical when Pastor Mulvery had turned up one day at Bluey Jay, ostensibly to witness to the girls, but after half an hour with Mama Tequila he'd paid his money and had his way with Hester. After which he'd asked her to pray with him, saying he'd ask God in his infinite mercy to forgive them both because, 'We know'd not what we were doing.' The Bible didn't say anything about Jesus doing anything for the girls who worked in the fish factory on the shores of Galilee, but now it seemed, all of a sudden, he was walking around forgiving whores all over the place. She felt grateful to Pastor Mulvery, with his sticking-out buck teeth which had trouble sucking on her big boobs, for pointing this out to her.

  Sometimes the chew the fat chats would get quite specific. One Sunday morning, a month or so after Tandia arrived at Bluey Jay and after she had started school again, Sarah asked a question about fellatio. 'Mama T, last week old Coetzee, you know, the magistrate from Pinetown? He couldn't get it up, too much brandy, so I tried to give him a number three, but it was hopeless. It just keeps hanging there like a old piece of biltong!'

  Even though the girls had all laughed, this was serious business. Mama Tequila guaranteed satisfaction and it meant Sarah would have to give him a free session next time he came.

  Mama Tequila rose slowly and waddled over to one of the shiplapped kitchen cupboards. From her apron she took the large bunch of keys which she carried about her person at all times. Selecting a small key, she unlocked the cupboard and withdrew the chamois leather drawstring bag which contained Herman the Hottentot.

  Herman the Hottentot was an eight-inch, beautifully carved, wooden penis standing at full erection. The carving, complete with testicles, was of sneezewood, a handsome, finely grained rose-red wood darkening to golden brown with a beautiful satin lustre. The detail was meticulous and the piece was much, much better than a simple pornographic curio. It also looked to be fairly old and someone, not Mama Tequila, had bored a hole into its flattened back and glued into it a one inch piece of pine dowelling to act as a hand grip.

  In fact, Herman the Hottentot, so purposefully carved, would have made an awkward dildo. But for Mama Tequila's purposes it was ideal.

  The girls were all seated at the breakfast table with Mama Tequila at the top in her specially reinforced bentwood chair. Now she held Herman the Hottentot up and demonstrated with the tips of her fingers how to begin the massage and then, bringing the carving to her lips, she showed how the stimulation was completed with the lips and the mouth. She placed Herman the Hottentot back on the table in front of her. 'You can do it perfect, but sometimes you going nowhere, man, the one-eyed snake is fast asleep. You can feel and kiss and stroke and suck, but you won't make that old one-eyed snake stand up. So you got to tell it a story where it is the hero.' Mama Tequila paused. 'You see, the mind makes the best erections. If you can get the mind on your side, then nearly always, the one-eyed snake will open his eye and stand to attention. In a case like magistrate Coetzee, you have to talk dirty, but not filthy, you hear? For Coetzee, w
ho is Dutch Reformed Church, dirty is okay, he can understand dirty, but filthy reminds him you a whore. He a magistrate, he don't like that!'

  'Mama T, how do you know the difference between dirty and filthy?' Hester asked. 'I always thought they the same thing? With the Pentecostals they all banned, even saying "hell" and "dammit", they not allowed.'

  Mama Tequila shook her head. 'Ag, never mind that, Hester, language is a wonderful thing, you can play with it, get it just right, like a acrobat on the high wire in the circus, balanced just perfect. If you got the right words, I'm telling you, you can get a man like old Coetzee to stand up every time!'

  The girls all stopped eating. This was always the best part of a chew the fat chat. When Mama T got going there was nobody on the game who was better. Now looking over at Tandia she said, 'Make some more coffee please, skatterbol.' Tandia rose from the table as Mama Tequila took a cork-tip out of her silver cigarette case and lit it with her Zippo. 'Here the words you going to say,' she drew on her cigarette and the lighted end glowed brightly as she inhaled deeply; then with her head thrown back she exhaled a surprising amount of the smoke up towards the ceiling where the big fan caught it and dispersed it over the room.

  'When you begin, you speak very slow, you hear? Like you a clairvoyant or something. Coetzee, you a naughty boy! I seen you, I seen you looking at her, the little kaffir girl. You hiding behind this big rock, I seen you, man, hiding there where the kaffir women come to wash themselves. This little kaffir girl, she maybe thirteen, fourteen, the same age as you, but she very mature, a woman already. The water on her, it makes her black skin shine and her bottom is nice and tight and round and firm, hey? Her legs is long and her little boobies, they perfect, turned up and big enough for only one handful. She is washing herself and the soap and her hands as they go all over her body, they your hands, man! You can feel they your hands. Her hands go between her legs. Her bottom, it moves round slowly as she washes there. She is a kaffir, a dirty kaffir, who you not allowed to touch. But your snake inside your pants, this snake doesn't know this. No, man! No way this snake knows. It wants to touch, there is a place it wants to go.' Mama Tequila picked up Herman the Hottentot and allowed her fingers to do wondrous things to it, demonstrating what they should be doing while the words were weaving their way into the mind of Coetzee the magistrate. The girls watched, completely fascinated as Mama Tequila continued her verbal titillation. 'Now all the other women, they go away, only the one your snake wants, she stays, the forbidden fruit is alone in the hot sun and cool water. The water she splashes over her body rinses away the soap. Then she sits down in the river and goes under and then stands up, her beautiful black body shining with the water running off her. She begins to come out, her feet are splashing in the shallow water now. She walks towards the big rock, her hips slow, nice, to where you are hiding. She lies down, right there on the warm river sand next to the rock. She lies there with her wet, shining black body and she closes her eyes. You take off your short pants and your snake is free, strong, standing up, a white man's big strong…' Mama Tequila laughed suddenly and almost simultaneously the girls around the table let out a surprised sigh. 'Ag, damn!' Hester cried, dismayed that she wasn't going to hear the end.

  Mama Tequila chuckled, 'Then, Sarah, if old Coetzee is not the most upstanding citizen you ever seen, then you better call the ambulance, you hear? Because for damn sure, he's dead!'

  The girls all laughed and clapped. 'That was a good one, Mama T,' Sarah said, and they all nodded agreement. Mama Tequila was the best teacher; they all felt warm and needed and very superior. They were whores with a future.

  Mama Tequila turned to see what Tandia was doing with the coffee. She was nowhere to be seen and Sarah jumped up and ran towards the big AGA stove. Tandia was pressed up against her corner of the alcove biting her hand, the tears running down the cheeks, her shoulders heaving with the effort to contain her emotion. Blood ran from the corner of her mouth where she had bitten into her hand.

  'Oh my God!' Sarah stretched out her arms and bent down to embrace Tandia. She took the little girl in her arms and started to rock her. 'Shhh! Don't cry, Tandy. It's only pretend, don't cry, skatterbol, no one can hurt you, you hear? You safe here.'

  The girls had all risen from the table and crowded around the cooking alcove. 'Let her go!' It was Mama Tequila's voice. Confused, Sarah looked up first at Mama Tequila and then back to Tandia. 'Leave her, you hear!' She turned to the girls. 'Out! Go to your rooms! You too Sarah, go now, jong, before I lose my temper.'

  Sarah released Tandia, propping her up against the split logs stacked against the rear wall of the alcove. 'Maak gou,' Mama Tequila said in Afrikaans, a language she rarely spoke and only when she was upset. Sarah rose quickly and left the room, following the other girls out.

  Mama Tequila remained standing for perhaps fifteen minutes until Tandia began to calm down. 'Go to the table, Miss Tandy!' she ordered, turning slowly and moving across the room to the big club chair.

  Tandia rose and, sniffing, sat at the table. Mama Tequila held a cork-tip in her hand which she now fed slowly into her mouth and lit with the Zippo. She withdrew the cigarette and pushed the smoke out lazily. 'Why you crying, Miss Tandy?'

  'You, you know why, M…mama T,' Tandia sobbed.

  When Mama Tequila spoke again her voice was sharp. 'Now you listen to me, you little shit!' She lowered her voice as Tandia looked up at her in tearful alarm. 'You listen good, you hear? You can leave today, take your basin and pack your things.' She reached for her bag on the small table and started to rummage through it until she found her purse. She opened the clip and removed five crumpled onepound notes which she flung down onto the floor in front of her. 'Take it, it's the five pounds we took out of your pants when you came here. Before tonight you out, gone from this place, you understand!'

  Tandia's world collapsed about her. She'd only heard half of Mama Tequila's titillation talk to the girls when she found herself back in the cemetery talking to the dead Patel and then it all happened again, the handcuffs and the marble cross and the big, hard white man inside her! 'Please Mama T, let me stay! Please! I will do anything. Anything you want, jus' let me stay here, I beg you Mama T!'

  Mama Tequila looked at Tandia and began to talk softly. 'You not special, Miss Tandy, you dirt. You nothing. You know why? Because you a coloured person who is sorry for herself. Inside you like a white person, inside you rotten white meat, you got a white heart. You think something bad happened to you? Wragtig, I'm telling you, you don't know what bad is! Rape! Rape is nothing, you hear? When Sarah was six her daddy raped her, when she was eleven he threw her out the house because he was putting his slang into her baby sister. At thirteen she a whore already, already working on the streets. But she's not sorry for herself, all the others is the same, some of my girls are worse even than that!'

  'Please forgive me, Mama T, I swear on my mother's grave, it will never happen again. Please, I won't feel sorry for myself ever again, just let me stay!'

  'Miss Tandy, this a whorehouse! The business we got here is to fuck men.' She pointed at Herman the Hottentot. 'Around here that is the boss. Hester and Sarah and Jasmine and Colleen and Hettie, Doreen, Johanna an' Marie, they all got one job, to make him happy. But they my whores, you hear? What happened before is over, finish and klaar, a white person can cry about yesterday, they got that luxury; for a coloured person there is no yesterday, you got to use all your courage and your strength to stay alive for today. You waste it on yesterday, you a dead kaffir. You understan' what I'm saying, girl?'

  Tandia nodded, then sniffed and wiped her nostrils with the back of her hand. There was blood on her hand where she'd bitten herself and now the blood smeared over her face. She was just like the woman, the black shebeen whore at the police station. 'Yes, I will try, Mama T.'

  'Try is not enough, Miss Tandy. If you going to be a whore, you going to be a whore with a future. If you going to be a l
awyer they going to try to kill you. And they not going to rest until they got you on the slab, the mortuary, a dead kaffir lawyer! You got to make yourself so when they stick the knife into your heart the blade break. When they get another one, it break also! And another and another. Then maybe you can have a future too!'

  Tandia's voice was hardly a whisper. 'Please Mama T let me stay?'

  'Miss Tandy, this the first and last time, you hear?'

  Tandia rose from her chair and rushed over to Mama Tequila and hugged her. 'Thank you, Mama T, I will not let you down.'

  Mama Tequila patted Tandia on the back and then pushed her away, but she did so gently and Tandia knew she'd been saved. 'Go now, you can tell everyone they can come out of their rooms.'

  Tandia was walking towards the kitchen door to leave when Mama Tequila called her back. 'No more what you doing with Sarah. No more, you hear?'

  'Yes, Mama T,' Tandia whispered.

  The hot coastal summer passed for Tandia as she entered her final year at high school. Except for Sundays, when she and Juicey Fruit Mambo would head for the high mountains, her time was taken up with work at Bluey Jay or school work.

  Tandia had been brought down to solid ground with a terrible thump after the Herman the Hottentot incident. She was smart enough to realise that she would be required to adapt absolutely to the environment of Bluey Jay, that Mama Tequila would tolerate nothing less. Her quiet, shy ways would have to go. At sixteen Tandia had spent the larger part of her waking hours by herself, if not always physically, certainly in her head. The habit of going for long periods without talking was inappropriate at Bluey Jay, which was a rowdy, aggressive place, loud with vulgar laughter- and sudden melodramatic tears.

  To Tandia's astonishment the girls all seemed to cry for the wrong reasons. Never for the past which had been steeped with misery, but over such dumb things as a quarrel about whose turn it was to do something in the kitchen or simply because two of them were wearing the same colour gown or stayed too long in the bathroom, silly stuff which Tandia couldn't imagine even getting upset about.