Tandia

by Bryce Courtenay

  It was nice hearing the words. Tandia could almost believe them when Peekay spoke them. Dreamers are like that, they can make you believe things. They believe the morning star is playing with them. She found it was nice believing, even easy, if only for these few moments.

  Peekay pushed her gently from him, his tone lighter as he spoke. 'Okay, kid, let's kick the dust. It's half an hour's walk to where Dee and Dum are meeting us; drink your coffee and let's vamoose!' He stooped down and, picking up a blanket, started to fold it, gripping the edge of the blanket in his mouth and bringing the two ends together.

  Dee and Dum were waiting for them when, just after half past four, they arrived at Pig Rock. It had been light for twenty minutes but was still cold, the early sunlight not yet bright enough to warm them. The twins saw them coming and ran squealing to meet them, each of them grabbing Peekay by a hand and dancing about him like young girls, though they were women in their mid thirties. 'Stop!' Peekay said laughing, 'Where are your manners? This is Tandia, who I have talked to you about many times.'

  Dee and Dum stopped and turned to Tandia, both held their arms out and they hugged her simultaneously. The gesture was one of total openness and generosity; they were including her into their circle, for they instinctively guessed that Peekay loved this beautiful woman. 'Welcome, our sister,' they said simultaneously, as though they'd rehearsed the line. But Peekay knew it wasn't rehearsed; he'd seen them do it all their lives, as if they shared a collective brain, or at least a connected one. He doubted very much if the two girls could exist apart from each other for more than a few hours, though he couldn't remember them ever apart for even this long.

  Tandia liked them immediately; she was amazed by the process of falling in love. She found that she was able to let her defences down and allow the warmth of Dee and Dum to come straight through to her. It was like a rebirth.

  'Thank you, my sisters,' she said, hugging them back.

  'Come on, you silly izaLukazi! Tandy and me must be gone, the sun will be high in a minute. Where are my mountain clothes?'

  'We have brought everything. More than you asked!'

  'We can't carry more. We have to travel light. Tandy isn't accustomed to the mountains.'

  'That is why we are coming.' Dee said. Peekay looked stem. 'No, Dee, you can't!'

  Dum stood directly in Peekay's path, her legs firmly planted, slightly apart, arms folded. She seemed suddenly like a big woman, though he could never remember ever seeing her like this. Dum now stood beside her, unconsciously striking the same pose. 'You are in danger! You who belong to us, who is our flesh and our heart-blood, you cannot tell us a lie!' Dum cried.

  'No, you cannot tell us a lie. It is in our skin, it is hurting us all over!' Dee said and both of them started to rub their folded arms and roll their shoulders, moaning softly.

  'We will carry for you!' Dum said suddenly. She pointed at Tandia. 'Tandy is beautiful, but she has no legs for the mountains. Her ankles, look at them, pfft! They could snap like a chicken bone! If she falls, if she hurts her leg, who will carry her?'

  Peekay had to admit they had a point. Tandia was both unfit and unaccustomed to the sort of climbing they would need to do. The likelihood of her spraining her ankle or falling was considerable. Peekay knew the twins could walk all day, that even if they had to carry Tandia in a stretcher, they'd make it over the top.

  'What about the missus?' Peekay asked, thinking of his mother's objections.

  'We have written a letter!' Dee spoke in English,'

  'Gon wun day missus pliz, Dee, Dum,' she said proudly, repeating the exact words in the note they'd left for his mother.

  'She will be angry,' Dum added, 'but you are our hear,," blood! There is danger in our kraal, we must be with you.'

  'Okay!' Peekay said, making his mind up suddenly. If they could distribute the weight between them so that Tandia carried nothing they would make better time and there would be less likelihood of her injuring herself.

  The twins wiped tears away, dabbing their eyes with identical gestures, as though they'd been choreographed. Thank you, Peekay,' they said, their voices soft and loving, 'we will protect you.'

  Peekay loved them both fiercely, but now he frowned, hiding his feelings. 'Now! Where are my mountain clothes?' He looked down with distaste at the rumpled grey pinstripe lawyer's suit he was wearing.

  'They are on the Pig Rock,' both girls shouted.

  Peekay went up to the rock to find his mountain clothes laid out on it, his old shirt and khaki pants ironed and starched. His anorak too had been washed within an inch of its life with precise creases down the centre of both sleeves. His thick grey socks were laid side by side, lined up perfectly with both toes pointing in the same direction. His climbing boots were waterproofed with fresh dubbin and his old khaki cloth hat, torn and mended a hundred times also bore the signs of having been starched and ironed. Even his belt and the worn and scuffed sheath of his hunting knife were polished. He climbed into the clothes which were not uncomfortable despite the liberal starching they'd received, but he felt stupidly neat in the perfectly creased khaki trousers which had been patched in a dozen places.

  The girls took the blankets Peekay had brought along and quickly redistributed the stuff in Peekay's rucksack plus the provisions they'd brought, folding the blankets around it so that they ended up with two neat bundles tied at the top. These they lifted to their heads, where they balanced easily, leaving their hands free. Peekay's rucksack now contained only his mountain gear, spikes, climbing hammer, and small axe as well as a torch and Doc's battered binoculars. Hanging over the top of his rucksack was a coil of rope. It all felt light and comfortable as they set out.

  Peekay allowed Dee and Dum to set the pace, placing Tandia between them. They were both experienced bush walkers, accustomed to the mountain terrain and would set a pace which would allow Tandia to continue far longer without a rest than if he attempted to do the same thing. By the end of the day they would have travelled further than if he tried to hurry them along the easy bits and nurse Tandia up the steeper slopes. Mountain climbing is like digging; you end up with a deeper hole if you go at it at a steady pace.

  By half past six they were over the foothills and about to begin the climb into the high mountains. Tandia had kept up well, but Peekay could see she was tired and needed a rest. Dee and Dum seemed simultaneously to reach the same decision for they stopped. Dee took a thermos of tea out of a bundle and Dum a flask of water and a couple of cups. She poured water for Tandia first, filling the tin mug. 'Drink it all, Tandy. You have lost much water already.'

  Tandia drank gratefully and handed the empty cup back to Dum. 'Thank you, Dee,' she said.

  Dum held the mug out allowing Dee to fill it with hot, sweet tea. She handed it to Tandia, 'I am Dum,' she said.

  'I will call you both, "Dum-dee-dum!" Then I won't get it wrong!' Tandia laughed.

  As they'd set off Peekay had spoken to the twins in the Shangaan language with which Tandia was not familiar. 'We have five, maybe six hours' lead; you must take this city woman as fast as you can, but do not break her. We are going over Saddleback to Swaziland.'

  'In one day?' Dee asked…

  'It depends how well Tandy lasts. But as far as you can take her.'

  The twins nodded, knowing their task, knowing that how they judged the journey could mean Peekay's life, for they now felt the danger around him strongly. It smelt of death and of hate; they knew their heart-blood was running from a great and calamitous evil.

  The climb to Saddleback normally took five hours from the end of the foothills. On the very top of Saddleback there was a small plateau, about three hundred yards across, like a bald patch, torn by the wind from the leeward side of the mountain. It was composed mostly of rock and scree and tuft grass and the wind usually blew at gale force across it. It was totally exposed but it was the only way across the high mountain
s on foot. After they were across it Peekay knew they would be safe, they'd be on the rainy side of the mountains and, if necessary, could leave the path and conceal themselves within the dense mountain scrub and even in the rainforest in the high kloofs.

  Ten minutes later they started to climb again, this time in earnest. Two and a half hours later, with stops of five minutes every half hour to rest Tandia, they reached a spot where Peekay could see the valley for the last time. He took the binoculars from his rucksack and focused them. In the deep blue distance the de Kaap valley looked peaceful; in one or two places smoke rose straight up where a small bush fire burned and a scud of low cloud lay just below the far escarpment. Then he heard the faint sound of a small aircraft, a buzz like an angry bee rising in the clear morning.

  Sound carries remarkably far in the mountains. He looked carefully, scanning the length of the valley until he finally saw it, a Piper Cherokee still fairly high but heading towards the town which was concealed, tucked below the foothills. Geldenhuis had arrived.

  If it took the police colonel an hour to get underway, they had about three and a half hours' lead. Peekay made a rough calculation; if Tandia didn't crack they would make it over the top, but only just. His only concern was to get over Saddleback; concealed in the deep mountain scrub the police would be no match for him unless they had a bloody good black tracker, and even then he felt confident that he could avoid his pursuers.

  A police transport vehicle and squad car was waiting at the small airport when Geldenhuis arrived. Beside them stood seven white police constables and a sergeant, formed into a rough squad. The sergeant brought them to attention and saluted. 'Sergeant Maritz, Colonel!'

  'Stand your men at ease, Sergeant,' Geldenhuis said. He was dressed in fatigues and carried a police semi-automatic rifle slung over his shoulder. He wore no pistol on his webbing belt; in its place was a hunting knife whose leather handle was topped with a death's head. Some knives rest peacefully on a man's hips, mere decoration or affectation, used for cutting fishing line or sharpening twigs. Even though its blade wasn't visible this wasn't that kind of knife. It was purpose built, the kind of knife a man would give a name and would also speak to, but always with respect in his voice.

  'Is there anyone here who knows this country?' Geldenhuis asked.

  'Yes, sir, we have a black tracker who says he knows it well. He looked over to a middle-aged African who was seated under a nearby syringa tree. 'Buya lapa!' he called in Fanagalo. The man scrambled to his feet and came running over. He was a little man dressed in an old army greatcoat and he smiled, showing only four yellow teeth in his mouth. 'He's a Swazi and he says he comes from up near Havelock on the Swazi border; he says he knows the mountains round here very well.'

  'You mean he's not your regular police tracker?'

  'No, Colonel, this isn't our area; the Nelspruit area is flatter country, our trackers don't come over this way.'

  'What about the local police?'

  'Well, Colonel, if I may say so, they're not too pleased about this. I mean, us people from Nelspruit police taking over an' all.' He pointed to the little Swazi who now stood fifteen or so feet from them, waiting to be asked to step forward, 'They sent this guy.'

  Geldenhuis said, 'Okay, fuck them!' He ignored the little black man and turned to the map. 'Let's see if the kaffir knows what he's talking about.'

  'There are several paths up through the foothills but they all seem to eventually converge going through this gorge; after this it's straight up over the top, a single path. We have to get to them somewhere between this gorge and the top of Saddleback. If they get over the top the kaffir says you can forget it, it's dense bush and scrub and from what I understand, Peekay knows the country well from when he was a kid.'

  Geldenhuis turned the map upside down and called the little Swazi over. 'Show us where to go,' he demanded in Zulu, pointing to the map.

  The little Swazi looked at the map. 'Even if you turn it the right side up I can't read it, baas,' he said in Siswati, 'For reading maps I am no good.'

  Geldenhuis grinned despite himself, at least the bastard wasn't a fool. 'Explain then how we go,' he demanded.

  'There are four ways, baas. One is longest, but it is shortest, because the path is good. All the paths they come to a gorge, then same path all the way over the mountain.'

  'How many hours to the top?'

  The black man seemed to think for a moment, counting on the fingers of one hand. 'Six, six hours I think, baas. It is very, very hard.'

  'The top of the mountain where the path crosses, is it very rocky?'

  'No, baas, by that mountain is only grass by the top,' Julius ran his hand over his head. 'Like the baas head.'

  'Well, the kaffir seems to know his way. It's six hours to Saddleback.' He turned to the men, 'Have you brought enough food and water? Remember you've got to come back as well.' Geldenhuis grinned, looking up at the high mountains, 'Have a good climb, you hear.'

  'You won't be coming, Colonel?' Sergeant Maritz asked, surprised.

  'Ja, I'll see you up there.' Geldenhuis didn't explain any further. 'Okay, man, now I want to talk about the terrorist.' He cleared his throat. 'You already know there are two of them, a woman and a man who is supposed to be a pretty big hero around these parts, you all know who I am talking about. I don't want to mention his name because when a man turns against his country the only name you can call him is a dog. A fucking mongrel! I'd like them taken alive. But I'd rather they were dead than free.' He sighed, 'Okay, you know how I feel? That's why I'm not using the local police for this job. If we kill their hero, it's bad public relations for the Barberton police and I don't want the whole fucking town up in arms. But someone who aids a known terrorist to escape is a terrorist too! If any of you feel differently about this then say so now, you hear?'

  Geldenhuis looked at the men standing in front of him. 'This isn't police work, man! This is fighting for your country! You are helping to rid South Africa of the scum!' He waited, looking at each of them, but the men kept silent, most of them with their eyes downcast. 'Okay, I'm waiting for a helicopter to come up from the military base at Komaatipoort. We're going to try to squeeze the bastards between me and you guys coming up. I'll land on Saddleback and ambush them if they manage to get that far before you reach them. Okay, you better get going. Good luck.' Geldenhuis turned to the sergeant beside him and shook his hand, 'Thank you for your co-operation, Sergeant Maritz. If we pull this one off I'll see all your men get a commendation from Pretoria.'

  The men marched off and one of them, a corporal named Shorty Bronkhorst who was known as the station wit, snorted, 'The bastard thinks he's John fucking Wayne!'

  Captain Julius Dube had come down from Bulembu, crossing into South Africa to do some serious shopping in Barberton. It wasn't quite as close as Pigg's Peak on his side of the border, but he wanted a double bed and inner-spring mattress. To go with his newfound military status he'd paid the lobola, bridal price, for a second wife, a young and nubile intombi from a good family. Their wedding gift to themselves was to be the bed, a status symbol probably closer to a general than a captain, but Julian was ambitious.

  However, the choice of double beds with inner springs in Pigg's Peak was decidedly limited. Barberton was three times as close as Mbabane, the Swazi capital, and also likely to prove a better shopping venue. Julius was fairly careless about borders and while his papers were in order he failed to get a required stamp from the police station on the South African side of the frontier. He'd come down from Havelock in the bus and had passed a police road block on the road but had thought nothing of it. Later, having selected a bed and mattress and arranged for it to be brought up by lorry to the Bulembu border post in two days, he'd celebrated at a shebeen in the native location where one or two jam tins of mqombothi too many had made him conspicuous. He'd been picked up by the local police and accommodated in a cell for the night. />
  The routine for being caught was standard, he'd be sjamboked (five lashes to discourage future temporary immigration) then put on the bus to Havelock, handcuffed to the bus seat and the key given to the driver. When they got to Havelock the bus driver would deliver him to the local police sergeant who would come out and officially unlock him, give him a stiff kick up his already very blistered backside and escort him to the border.

  Julius had been waiting at the sergeant's desk to be released and his wallet and sundry shopping returned to him before being taken out into the yard of the police station to get sjamboked and put on the bus. Then the call had come through to the front desk from the Nelspruit police asking for a black tracker who knew the local mountains.

  Captain Dube was not a man to be easily daunted. He was a mountain man born and bred. He'd once been a tracker in the Swaziland police; besides he knew these particular mountains like the back of his hand. He'd also heard Peekay's name mentioned in the conversation and details as to why a tracker was required. The Onoshobishobi Ingelosi was in a great deal of shit and Julius wasn't the sort of officer who walks away from a crisis. The rest was astonishing, even to a smooth operator like himself. He wondered fleetingly whether Somojo had a hand in it somewhere, seeing as the Onoshobishobi Ingelosi was involved. The white police sergeant seemed angry with the police from Nelspruit and when Julius, who like all Africans kept every official paper he'd ever received, had shown him his honourable discharge notice from The Royal Swaziland Police Constabulary he'd given him the job of taking the police contingent from Nelspruit over the mountains. The sergeant had also let him off the mandatory sjambok on the basis that it might inhibit his walking speed.

  Thus Captain Julius Dube's finest hour had been thrust upon him as though miraculously. He could already see his next promotion and wondered to himself whether a rank existed somewhere above a captain but below a general. Julius knew one thing for sure; it was going to be a very long day in the mountains for the Boer policemen, and their chances of reaching Saddleback were about the same as his of growing a fresh set of molars.