The Cry of the Go-Away Bird

by Andrea Eames

  Neither Mum nor I told him about seeing Jonah in the crowd. We both knew that it would only make things worse.

  Another man was killed on a farm near the Coopers’. Several more were beaten. I was not meant to know these things, but I could not help it. The knowledge of what was happening seemed to pass from white to white at impossible speed, as if we were all connected by lines that quivered with each new attack. Every white we talked to seemed to be suffering from headaches those days.

  When I got home from school, dropped off by a friend’s mother, Mum and Steve were waiting for me. I took my backpack off slowly, unwilling to hear what they had to tell me.

  ‘Do you want a drink?’ said Mum.

  ‘Okay.’

  She poured me a Diet Coke with ice. I sat down.

  ‘It’s about Sean,’ Mum says.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘He’s fine.’

  ‘But what happened?’

  Sean had been picked up from school by a man he thought was one of his father’s drivers. It was an easy mistake. Slipping into that back seat, head full of rugby scores, homework and what-I’m-doing-on-the-weekend, he saw the black face in the rear-view mirror. And if he did not recognise him, well, there were always new workers.

  The car seemed to be heading back to the farm, but pulled down a side road unexpectedly. Sean was probably suspicious. He was a farmer’s son, a BB-gun killer-of-pigeons, a Shona-speaking, barefoot, Bush-savvy, tough kid. Alarm bells would have gone off.

  More men were waiting down the side street. They beat him almost unconscious. Sean was tall and broad for seventeen and had the beginnings of a beard, but he could not hold his own against four or five guys.

  ‘He put up a bluddy good fight,’ said Steve. He told us that one of Sean’s eyes was completely closed and that he needed stitches on the side of his head. Apparently he also had a broken rib.

  ‘Are the Coopers staying?’ I asked Mum.

  ‘Ja, for now,’ said Mum.

  ‘Why is Sean staying after what happened?’

  ‘He wants to.’

  ‘And Mr Cooper is letting him?’

  Mum shrugged. ‘Sean will own the farm one day. I suppose Mr Cooper thinks he needs to be here.’

  I remembered Mr Cooper coming to pick us up the day we saw the elephant. I remembered him clapping Sean over the ear, and telling him to be more careful, that being the Baas’s son would not save him.

  I thought of Sean as he was when I first met him. He seemed so much older than me, so grown-up and sophisticated. I remembered riding on the back of his motorbike, breathing in the smell of fresh sweat and cotton washed in Persil.

  Lately, I had been amazed at my own ability to take anything that happened and turn it into normality, like skin growing over a scab, and I could already feel this new and horrible event being absorbed into all the others.

  I would have told Kurai about this, but she had gone. She left me a knotted bracelet of her old braids, as a joke.

  ‘I’ll get a weave in the States,’ she said. ‘They can do it properly there.’

  I wore them on my wrist. They were black and red, with little blobs of glue on the ends to keep them from unravelling. They smelled of Vaseline, and left a scraped, red lesion on my wrist. I did not loosen them, though. I thought I needed that reminder.

  Ian, the man who said he would drape Rhodesian flags all over his house and blow it up before the War Vets could take it, left Zimbabwe. On his way back from a neighbouring farm he had been taken by the War Vets and beaten with a fan belt. After six hours, he was released. He came back to the farm with welts on his back, a grim mouth and shaking hands. He packed a couple of suitcases, booked tickets to Australia and told his wife to get the children ready to leave the next day.

  ‘Don’t be a bluddy sissy, man,’ said Steve. ‘Don’t be a chicken.’

  ‘Don’t you bluddy tell me I’m a chicken,’ said Ian. He had welts all over his face and neck. ‘Don’t you bluddy tell me. It’s not worth it, man. I have two kids under five. It’s not worth it for a piece of bluddy dirt.’

  ‘Ja, well, send the kids to Harare. Stay here and fight the bastards.’

  Ian looked old. The stubble on his jaw had started to come through as grey hairs. ‘This isn’t a war we can win, man. I’m not watching my kids die at the hands of these Kaffirs. You stay if you want. I’m buggering off. Let them have the land, for all the good it will do them.’

  Mum, Steve and I drove them to the airport. The kids played a clapping game in the back.

  Ian and his wife were silent.

  We drove through farmland and bush on the way to the airport – golden grasses on both sides. Ian had a basket of avocados on his lap.

  ‘You know you won’t be able to take that into Australia,’ said Mum. ‘They’ll make you throw it away.’

  ‘Ja, I know.’

  The car smelled of warm avocado, a sweet, buttery smell like sunlight.

  ‘Now can we go?’ Mum asked Steve.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ he said.

  I wondered what it would take to persuade us.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Again, we heard nothing for almost a week. Then we heard that the War Vets had invaded the Coopers’ farm. They were killing the game for food.

  ‘Mr Cooper got some death threats,’ said Mum. She said it as if she were saying he got some bread at the supermarket. ‘So he asked some of the other guys on the farm to stay at the homestead.’

  ‘Does he have guns?’ I asked.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Mum. ‘That would be asking for trouble. He probably has them, but he’s not going to shoot at these guys and get them angry.’

  ‘Is he going to be okay? Is Sean all right?’

  ‘They’re fine so far. The Vets are just camped outside, toyi-toyi-ing. Like on Mary and Pieter’s farm.’

  I imagined Mr Cooper winning the War Vets over, as he won everyone else over. He would go out to them with his smile and outstretched hands, palms up, and talk to them in perfect Shona, complete with swear words and dirty jokes, and they would love him like everyone else seemed to. I wished I could believe my own lies.

  Mum did not go to work that week, but kept in touch by phone. She worked on her computer at the hotel, muttering under her breath. If she was scared, she hid it well.

  ‘I have to go back,’ she said after a few days.

  ‘Why?’ I stared at her.

  ‘Just to get some papers and things,’ she said.

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘It’s fine.’ She seemed calm.

  ‘You can’t go.’

  ‘It’s no big deal,’ said Mum. ‘And I have to get that stuff out. I won’t stay.’

  ‘You can’t go. Something might happen.’

  ‘Nothing will happen.’

  ‘Does Steve know you’re going?’

  ‘He doesn’t need to know. It’s not a big deal.’

  Steve would not have let Mum go alone.

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  ‘Like hell you are.’

  ‘I’m not letting you go by yourself.’

  ‘I’m a big girl,’ said Mum. ‘I survived the last Bush War, didn’t I?’

  ‘Mum!’ I could smell her perfume. She looked fragile, bird-boned. She could break with one snap. ‘I’m not letting you go by yourself.’

  Mum stared at me, and I stared back.

  ‘Do you really need to get that stuff?’ I asked.

  ‘Ja.’

  ‘Then I’m coming.’ I hoped that this strange, superstitious bond our family had created over the last few months would hold true. We did things together.

  Mum pressed her lips together. Then, ‘All right,’ she said. And she went to the kitchen to make us sandwiches to take for lunch. As if we would have time to eat them.

  It is strange how invincible we still felt. It would never happen to us. It could never happen to me.

  Mum took one of the rifles. ‘I told Steve we should have
bought a bluddy pistol,’ she said, ‘Something that would fit in the glove box.’

  She laid the rifle along the back seat of the car. It took up the whole seat. ‘Do you know how to use it?’ she said.

  ‘Ja, I think so.’

  Mum gave me a quick tutorial. ‘Then you just point and shoot. Okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Not that we’ll need it.’

  We pulled out of the driveway.

  ‘Have you heard anything from Mr Cooper?’ I asked.

  ‘Ja. Apparently things are okay. He took the War Vets out a crate of Castle Lagers, which kept them pretty happy.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘He says it should be safe enough. We’ll go, pick up the stuff and come straight back. And if anything happens we’ll just drive right through. We’ll be fine.’

  ‘Okay.’

  The drive to the farm was just like any other. The heat haze shimmered trees and fences into streaks of colour. I saw a mirage on the road that moved with us, always staying one step ahead. We passed a jeep loaded with young men carrying rifles who laughed and waved at us. I did not know whether to wave back or avoid meeting their eyes, so I lifted my hand slightly and stared above their heads. I remembered the ‘Sweet and Sour’ game Hennie and I used to play back in Chinhoyi.

  Mum played the easy listening station on the radio, and we argued over the channels like we always did. The air conditioning was on, but I wound down the window and gulped in the sweet-grass smell of the air. The sky arched above us, pure and holy and untouched, and it filled me with a strange serenity.

  ‘Here we are,’ said Mum when we turned into the farm driveway. There were no piccanins playing on the side of the road. There was not even any breeze in the blue gums. We could hear every stone thrown up by the tyres.

  ‘Shit,’ said Mum as one hit the windscreen, leaving a tiny cracked star.

  When we reached the offices, we saw that there were no other cars in the car park. The roads were deserted, and the farm equipment was still and silent.

  Mr Cooper was at the office when we got there. His arms were crossed and he was smiling, squinting into the sun. ‘Howzit, girls,’ he said as we got out of the car.

  Mum had radioed him to tell him we were coming.

  ‘Everything all right, Mark?’ she asked.

  ‘Ja. They’re still saying I need to be out of there by tomorrow, but we haven’t had too much trouble.’

  Mr Cooper had a black eye and a cut on his head. We did not ask about them.

  ‘Right, I’m going to head back up to the house,’ said Mr Cooper. He put his hat back on. It was a broad-brimmed farmer hat and it made him look like a caricature. His eyes crinkled in a smile. ‘Cheers.’

  Mum looked for the file. I went outside and sat on the step, looking out at the white sandy earth and scrubby grass that passed for a lawn. I saw something moving in the grass and I squinted to make it out.

  The snake lifted its broad, blunt head and stared at me. It had a long, tarmac-grey body and a flat, puppet-like line of mouth. We looked at each other. I felt the sun burning my back through my T-shirt.

  I opened my mouth to say something to Mum, but no noise came out.

  The snake swayed its head to the side, slowly. It gave me one last glance from stone eyes and I felt its cold-blooded spirit reach into my head. We were here before you. We will be here long after you have gone. And we do not much care what happens to you.

  It stroked the grass back with its long body, and was gone. The sun was already reddening the back of my neck and arms. I was pale and unsuitable, my feet soft and easily pierced by thorns. The ideas in my head did not work in this place which obeyed older, sterner rules.

  ‘Got it,’ said Mum, coming out of the office. ‘Let’s make a move.’

  I did not tell her about the snake. We were about to get into the car – in fact, one of my legs was already half-in – when we heard a voice.

  ‘Medem! Medem!’ Lettuce ran up to us, panting and worried.

  ‘Hello, Lettuce,’ said Mum. She swung the keys from her finger in an impatient circle.

  ‘Medem, where is the Big Baas?’

  ‘He has gone back to the Big House,’ said Mum. She half-turned, as if she were going to jump in the car. She seemed irritated. ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Agh, I need to speak to the Big Baas, Medem.’

  ‘I told you, he is at the house.’ Mum wanted him to spit it out. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘They are coming, Medem. The War Vets. There is big big trouble coming.’

  Mum stopped jingling the car keys. ‘Lettuce, go and find the farm managers and tell them, okay?’

  Lettuce shook his head and turned away. He had tried to tell the Big Baas. It was not his fault that the Big Baas was not here.

  ‘Come on.’ Mum started the car. ‘Get Mark on the radio,’ she said.

  ‘Mark?’

  ‘Mr Cooper. Come on, use your brain.’

  I fumbled for the buttons. ‘I can’t do it.’

  ‘Here.’ Mum took it, but before she could do anything there was a crackle on the radio.

  ‘Mum, it’s Mr Cooper.’

  He was sending out a general SOS to all units. Mum turned the car around with a grinding noise and a cloud of sandy soil, and we started driving back.

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘It’ll be fine,’ she said. She held the wheel of the car in one hand and the radio in the other. She was talking to the farm managers. The car hiccupped over stones in the road.

  ‘Mum, what can we do?’ We were two women in an old car with an old rifle. ‘Mum, we have to go home.’

  ‘They say they’re taking the house now,’ said the farm manager on the radio.

  ‘But he had until tomorrow!’

  ‘Ja, well, these guys aren’t fussed about that. They’re hopped up on mbanje.’

  ‘We’re coming.’

  ‘Hell, no, you guys should get out of here.’

  But Mum accelerated up the slope to the farmstead.

  ‘Mum, slow down! We’re going to be the first ones there!’

  We were almost at the homestead. Mum was still driving fast. We could hear drumbeats.

  The electric gate hung off its hinges, and we stopped just outside it. I jerked forward and cracked my head on the windscreen.

  ‘Mum!’

  Mum was staring at something outside the window. Shumba was slumped on the ground like a stained rug. His spine was flayed open. There was a stain like oil on the sand of the driveway, but it was not oil.

  ‘Mum?’

  We heard shouts; loud voices, speaking in Shona, and laughter; something that might have been a gunshot. We saw the abandoned open-top jeeps parked haphazardly outside the gate; the cigarette butts in the driveway. We saw the broken French windows. The radio spat static, and died.

  Mum started to struggle with the keys in the ignition, but her fingers were not working. They looked almost blue with cold. I could not help her, because I could not move.

  ‘The Baas! Medem! The Baas!’ Mr Cooper’s new maid emerged from the bushes, where she had been crouching, and ran to us. There was blood on her apron. Mum rolled down the window. I was afraid of her, afraid of what she had to say, and I could see that Mum was too.

  ‘Where is Mr Cooper?’

  The maid’s mouth flapped open, helpless. There was blood on her teeth. She moved her lips, but made no sound.

  ‘Where is Mr Cooper?’ asked Mum again. She did not wind down the window any further. She did not open the car door. I wondered if she felt, like I did, that we would be safe as long as we stayed inside the car. I knew it was not true, but I gripped my seatbelt to my chest all the same.

  ‘The War Vets, Medem! They are inside the house!’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘He is dead, Medem! The War Vets!’

  Blood in the dust. So much of it. Too much to have come from Shumba alone. The War Vets had not spotted us. I could smell urine, and I knew it was com
ing from me.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘They shot him in the head, Medem!’

  Mr Cooper. Dead.

  I leaned forward and forced my cold lips to form the words. ‘Where is Sean?’

  ‘Sean?’ She still seemed dazed.

  ‘The Small Baas.’

  ‘I do not know, Medem.’

  ‘But he is here.’

  ‘I have not seen him.’

  Mum and I looked at each other. The maid began to scrabble at the handle of the back door.

  ‘Voertsek,’ said Mum.

  ‘But Medem, they will find me. Take me to the village.’ Her hands were curled into claws.

  ‘We are not going to the village.’

  The maid stared at us. Then she turned and ran down the road, clutching her skirts and kicking up the dust with bare feet.

  Mum got the car started. Her hands shook so much that the keys rattled together, and she accelerated so hard that I felt my brain pressing back against my skull. We juddered over the gravel, reversed, and narrowly missed hitting the iron gate, which hung off its hinges. Mum could not keep the car steady and we wove across the road, skittering on the stones. We came to rest facing the right way. We sat breathing shallow breaths.

  This happened in less than two minutes. I saw the red lights flashing at me from the clock on the car dashboard. As I watched, it clicked over from seven minutes after one to eight minutes.

  ‘We have to go,’ said Mum, but made no move to start driving again.

  ‘Mum! Where’s Sean?’

  ‘Maybe he got away. I don’t know.’ She looked at her hands on the wheel as if they did not belong to her.

  ‘We have to find him.’

  Mum looked at me. Her face was whiter than it had ever been. She looked colourless compared to the War Vets, a pale ghost.

  ‘Elise, we can’t go back there looking for him. You know that.’

  Her mouth was shapeless, like a baby’s when it is about to cry.

  ‘But I know where he is.’ I did, suddenly, with absolute certainty.

  Mum drove around the property to the back fence, where the corrugated iron generator shed leaned up against the wall.

  ‘We can’t get in, the back gate is locked.’ Her hands were still shaking so hard that they were a blur on the wheel.

  ‘I can climb over.’