Tandia

by Bryce Courtenay

  Jannie watched as his father dismounted and used his apron to wipe himself before he pulled up his trousers and buckled on his heavy leather butcher's belt and knife sporran which contained a slicing and boning knife.

  To Jannie's dismay his father turned and walked directly towards where he hid, crouched between two dressed sheep carcasses and directly behind a large pig, the pig's pink snout only inches from his own nose. Jannie's father stopped and, removing the larger of the two knives from his belt, he cut quickly around the neck of the pig until its head was attacked to its pink body only by the spinal cord. With a grunt the huge man snapped the spine where the neck met the skull and neatly severed it with the boning knife, removing it from the carcass. The head came away in his hands to reveal Jannie's frightened face staring up at him.

  The butcher gave no sign of recognizing his son. Indeed, for a few moments, as he walked away with the pig's head held by its purple-pink ears, Jannie believed his father hadn't seen him, that the unexpected image of his son crouched behind the pig's carcass somehow hadn't registered. He remained crouched where he was, too frightened to move. 'Here, take this, kaffir!' he heard his father say, then add, 'Go out the back, come back next week same time!'

  Then the woman's timid voice. 'Dankie, baas.'

  The small boy's terror rose as he heard his father's footsteps which finally came to a halt directly in front -of him. The butcher wore black workman's boots and their caps were dirty with grease, to which bits of sawdust clung. Jannie saw a small piece of meat, a piece of white and pink spotted mince, caught in between the shoelaces of the left boot. Then the headless pig's carcass was pushed aside and his father's hand shot out, grabbing him by his hair, yanking him to his feet.

  Jannie was too terrified even to scream, though the pain was horrific. His father released his grip on his hair and grabbing him by his shirt front he hoisted him into the air. Holding him with one hand aloft he hooked the back of his shirt into the hook from which the headless pig already hung. Then he eased Jannie down so that his small body was completely encased by the carcass of the pig.

  His father had yet to say a word and Jannie was too frightened to scream. The big man drew the boning knife from its leather apron holster and sliced into the pig's thighs on either side of the boy's throat. 'Just like a Jew can't eat pork, so a Boer can't have a kaffir woman, that's why a kaffir is so lekker. Your papa likes to be nice to kaffir women. When you grow up you will see, you will too! You saw nothing, boy, you hear?' He ran the back of the blade across the small boy's throat.

  The butcher returned two hours later, when Jannie was blue. His teeth were chattering and he was beginning to pass out from the cold. He removed his six-year-old son from the hook and left him in the sun in the yard at the back of the butcher shop. to thaw out.

  It was the visual metaphor conjured up in his head immediately after he'd pulled the imaginary trigger to blow Peekay apart that sometimes compensated Geldenhuis for his own nightmare. In his sick mind he would savour the scene that followed in his imagination. He could see the homicide squad arriving. After surveying the scene they might even suspect it was him, but as he'd killed the black whore as well, there would be no clues. He'd ordered the gold-plated, .45-calibre bullet from an American mail-order company in Jacksonville Alabama nearly three years ago and he'd never shown the bullet with its filed nose to anyone, preferring it to lie warm to the touch and secret in his pocket where he could reach down and finger it. The boys in the murder squad would look down at the blown-away white man's head between the black whore's thighs and smile, and one of them would be sure to smirk and make the obvious crack. Forever afterwards people would talk about Peekay the rooinek lawyer…whose brains were wasted on useless black cunts.

  Jannie Geldenhuis found himself head of the Vereeniging Special Branch in charge of nothing in particular. Although there was a great amount of unrest in other parts of South Africa over the government's infamous 'endorsing out' laws, Vereeniging's model African township was quiet as always.

  As a member of the Special Branch Geldenhuis wasn't involved in regular police duties, his brief being essentially political, concerned with demonstrations, sabotage and antigovernment activity.

  The murder trial had knocked him about severely and he would have been almost happy to be away from the spotlight had, for instance, someone else rather than Peekay been involved in his prosecution. What ate at him was not the original conviction for murder, but the fact that his trial and the publicity it had caused had allowed Peekay to rise to prominence as a brilliant young barrister while, at the same time, leading to his own ignominious demise. Added to this, the new posting had removed him from daily contact with the Red File and the long-planned revenge the meticulously researched details within it represented for him.

  From the inception of the law partnership Geldenhuis had been keeping tabs on the daily movements of Levy & Peekay. The two young barristers were under constant surveillance and for the past year this had also involved Gideon Mandoma who'd joined as an articled clerk. Mandoma and also the 'coloured whore', Tandia Patel, who'd graduated from law school in Durban to join Red as a junior, already had secret police files of their own which were as carefully annotated and updated as those of Peekay and Hymie. Hymie was proving the most difficult to keep tabs on; he was involved more in the world of business and finance which was by its very nature secretive; also, he seemed to exercise a natural caution which often made his movements hard to follow.

  Peekay was different. His work was in the courts and he seemed to attract publicity without necessarily seeking it. The cases he took on were often considered hopeless and his clients unlikely to be able to pay, although Hymie would see to it that the firm always had one big corporate litigation case going. 'Peekay, you've got to help finance our legal charity work with a bit of corporate robbery,' Hymie would tell him. Peekay proved to be as astute and tough in this area as he 'was in the other and, more and more, large companies involved in litigation were seeking his services. It infuriated Geldenhuis when large corporations, some even run by Afrikaners, such as the Volkskas Bank, would retain Red. On more than one occasion; accompanied by Colonel Klaasens, he would pay a discreet visit to such a company and sometimes with good results, though often enough it was the two men's connection with the Broederbond which made more of an impression on the company directors than their official status as police officers.

  Despite these efforts Peekay and Hymie seemed to have more legal work in the corporate sector than they could conveniently handle. Sometimes, to their enormous chagrin, the board of directors of a large company would find themselves unexpectedly facing a coloured woman who chain-smoked as she asked them rapid-fire questions and who showed a grasp of the problems involving their brief which confounded her beguiling looks, leaving most of them in open-mouthed disbelief after she'd departed.

  Peekay and Hymie would wait for the inevitable phone call to come through on the day after Tandia had visited a company to report on the initial brief given to Levy & Peekay. The reaction was almost always the same. The chairman was disappointed, the company had expected a principal of Levy & Peekay to represent them.

  The dialogue which followed became a familiar litany. Typical of such incidents was a phone call intended for Peekay but received instead by Hymie. The caller's name was Jordaan and he was chairman of a medium-sized mining exploration group. Jordaan, after the usual pleasantries, spoke of his disappointment at not receiving the services of a principal of Levy & Peekay.

  'But Miss Patel is a principal, Mr Jordaan,' Hymie replied. There was a pause as Jordaan absorbed this first shock. A coloured woman was a principal of a Johannesburg law practice? What the hell was he getting his company mixed up in? 'Ja, okay, but you know what we mean, Mr Levy,' he said, recovering quickly.

  'You see, we have only men on the board. A woman lawyer would be awkward.' Jordaan paused then added, 'Especially with a mining compa
ny!'

  'Your case, Mr Jordaan? I understand it involves a dispute with a group of cotton farmers over damming a river in a small catchment area to supply water for a bauxite mine you intend to open?'

  Hymie could almost hear the sigh of relief on the other end, 'Ja, that's right, I'm glad you know the details, Mr Levy.'

  'We all read the notes from the initial brief, Mr Jordaan. Your case will be heard in the Lands Court. As far as I understand, women are perfectly at liberty to represent a disputation in this court?'

  'Well, ja, I suppose, but these matters are not of concern for a woman, we'd feel safer with a male lawyer, you know, well it's just that mining…it's a man's business,' Jordaan repeated.

  'Are you suggesting that a woman's mind isn't capable of understanding how a sluice system works or how many gallons of water you require to process a ton of bauxite ore?' Hymie waited expectantly; it was around this time that the threat would come.

  It came from Jordaan, right on cue. 'Mr Levy, I'm a plain man, a miner. We thought Mr Peekay was going to take the case, that's all! If this is not so and you personally also refuse to represent us, then we will make other arrangements!'

  Hymie knew Jordaan as anything but a plain man and if he'd ever shovelled a spadeful of dirt it had been to plant a commemoration tree at some girl's school or outside a new corporation building. Hymie's voice was dismissive. 'Yes, of course, you must do that, Mr Jordaan, but, as I said before, it places us in a damned awkward spot.'

  'I don't see that at all, my company wants to brief you or Mr Peekay! Not some…some unknown…'

  'Kaffir girl?' Hymie interjected softly.

  'No, lawyer! Some unknown lawyer! We are not racist, we just want to win our case.'

  'Ah ha! that's just it, Mr Jordaan. You see, the partners have reviewed your brief as we do with all important litigation. We believe you have a difficult case, though not an impossible one to win. What you're going to need is a clear strategy, yet one which is likely to catch your opposition by surprise. Miss Patel has come up with just such a strategy. She has done her initial research and is now thoroughly familiar with your brief. We believe she is the person most suited to the successful conclusion of your case.' Hymie's tone was deliberately a little pompous, though still extremely polite. At this point he paused just a fraction longer than might be expected before continuing, 'It would be unthinkable to remove my colleague from your case. More even than this, it would be a matter of such poor legal judgement as to be reprehensible. As you put it, you want to win and so, of course, do we.'

  Hymie's calming voice together with his good manners made it difficult for the managing director of the mining company to retain his aggressive manner on the phone. But Jordaan wasn't a pushover, prepared, as many others had been, to capitulate and accept Tandia onto their case.

  'Nevertheless I must insist, Mr Levy.' Jordaan said stubbornly.

  Hymie's voice was buttery with assurance. 'Well, if you insist, Mr Jordaan, of course we accept our dismissal as your counsel in the best legal spirit though, in parting, I hope you will agree this is not due to any legal incompetence on behalf of our female partner?'

  Hymie held the receiver closer to the Nagra tape recorder winding silently beside him. 'Of course not, Mr Levy! No hard feelings, you hear? Naturally we expect to pay you for the work she has already done.'

  'Thank you, Mr Jordaan, but that will not be necessary. Our initial briefing is always without charge and as the partner who did the subsequent work has proved personally, though not professionally, unsuitable to you, it would not be appropriate to send you an account for our services.'

  Jordaan's voice sounded relieved that the matter was resolved. 'Thank you, Mr Levy. I hope you understand, this has not been easy for me?'

  'Please! Think no more about it, Mr Jordaan. You have released Miss Patel from all obligation to your company; we owe each other nothing and you are free to engage any advocate you wish.'

  'Yes, thank you, Mr Levy. I'm glad we were able to resolve this little matter without acrimony.'

  'Mr Jordaan!' Hymie replied expansively, 'This is the legal profession. We don't take things personally. When Miss Patel accepts the brief to represent the group of cotton farmers against you, I know you will understand this is a perfectly professional thing for her to do?'

  Of the four people who most obviously represented Red - Peekay, Hymie, Tandia and Gideon, Jannie Geldenhuis concerned himself perhaps the least with Tandia. He still had the original 'confession' he'd forced out of her at the Cato Manor police station, admitting that she was a whore. When the time came it alone would be enough to completely discredit her. He also had the personal matter of Bluey Jay to resolve and this too he would bring to a head when the time was right. But, after Peekay, Gideon Mandoma was Geldenhuis's most constant source of concern; though once again, it wasn't the Zulu boxer's well-documented and rapid rise in the ANC which concerned him most (the police informers, planted as moles within the ANC, could be relied upon to keep him informed). Rather, it was Mandoma's ambition to be something else. This aspect of Mandoma's life completely puzzled the young police lieutenant. Gideon Mandoma was apparently seriously concerned with the job of being a law clerk with Levy & Peekay and with part-time university attendance to gain his LLB degree at Witwatersrand University.

  Geldenhuis prided himself that if you stuck with an apparent conundrum long enough, eventually the riddles in a plot presented their solutions politely to you. People were predictable and if you studied them sufficiently you could discern their personal patterns. Everything has a pattern, every human being has an intellectual thumb print. 'Why?' Geldenhuis would ask himself. Why would Gideon go to work every morning when he'd successfully defended his title five times? By most white standards and by all black ones, he was filthy rich. Most boxers, even the white ones, squander their money and when they're not in training have a good time. Mandoma's actions were against everything he knew about African behaviour. Gideon had everything he needed to be powerful among his own people; he was a folk hero and he was rich. Africans saw education only as a means of achieving the kind of status Gideon already enjoyed a hundred times over.

  Geldenhuis didn't believe that Africans were altruistic; history had showed that the tribes killed each other for power and material possession - cattle and land. In modern black society this had become money and influence. If Gideon already had all these things, including a rapidly growing respect in the ANC, why then would he make things hard for himself by working as a humble clerk in a law firm?

  One afternoon' during the second trial, Opperman, the police advocate defending them, was droning on about what constituted abduction and, in particular, abduction of a black man whom the lawyer contended might simply have walked out of Baragwanath Hospital himself.'

  'Because, your honour, that's what the Bantu people do all the time! They get treated and then, during the night sometime, they abscond so they don't have to pay the bill!' It was old ground and Geldenhuis had heard it all before and so he'd turned his attention to the riddle of Mandoma's involvement with Red. And then it came to him. Of course! Gideon was thinking long term. The Zulu chief was thinking way ahead to when he was much older and an African lawyer with many years of service to his people. Geldenhuis gasped inwardly at the audacity of the idea. Mandoma was preparing to be the first black prime minister of South Africa!

  The idea shocked him beyond belief and later in the police car as they drove back to Pretoria he mentioned it to Colonel Klaasens. 'I think I've worked it out. Why would a world boxing champion want to be the kaffir boy who makes the tea and carries messages around the place?' He looked steadily at Klaasens. 'You want to know why? I'm telling you something for nothing. Mandoma sees himself one day as the first black prime minister of South Africa and what's more, so does Peekay and the Jew!'

  Klaasens laughed but then stopped abruptly and suddenly looked serious, as thoug
h he too had come to a realization. 'No, Jannie, you're wrong!' He paused. 'He wants to be the president! We going to be a republic pretty soon, they're all talking about it in Pretoria. Verwoerd wants the British off his back. The black bastard thinks eventually their side will win in this country and he's making early plans, he wants to be the first black president!' He paused, his finger raised dramatically. 'Not just him, that kaffir boetie bastard, Peekay, he's the one who sees himself as the fucking prime minister!'

  Geldenhuis was almost bowled over by the logic of the remark. It was all the more surprising coming from Klaasens, an impulsive and therefore dangerous man, but not a deep thinker. Geldenhuis simply hadn't thought it through; the pattern fitted both men perfectly. The Zulu chief who rose to the top of the black nation and won the respect of the other tribes as a boxer and later as a lawyer; brilliant Oxford-trained advocate who'd always been the champion of the black people. In a multiracial South Africa with a white minority which, initially anyway, possessed the wealth and industrial muscle, it made almost perfect sense! Geldenhuis secretly blamed his senior officer for preparing him incorrectly for the Mandoma fight. They'd concentrated on working for Mandoma's head, believing he cut easily around the eyes, that if hit consistently they would pump up and close down. But Mandoma took everything Geldehuis managed to throw at his head and in the end was able to see clearly enough to slam the policeman clear through the ropes. He flushed just thinking about the humiliation. He was going to nail Mandoma, but the case against the Zulu boxer would be tighter than a nun's twat. He wasn't stupid and he wasn't Klaasens. He'd do it by the book and he'd put the bastard away for ever where they could break his spirit and turn the would-be president of South Africa into a gibbering black monkey.