by Graham Lang
Hazel and the Baldwins pick me up just after seven. We set off to Kwekwe in the Baldwins’ hire car, a Peugeot sedan with a broken air conditioner; Hugo and Cecil up front with Hugo driving, Hazel and me in the back with the urn containing Vic’s ashes between us. It soon becomes hot and uncomfortable, even with all the windows wound down. Only Hazel seems unperturbed by the heat. A sheen of sweat covers the faces of Hugo and Cecil, now both clad in short trousers and safari-style shirts. Thongs on their chubby white feet. Hugo appears to believe in the necessity of non-stop conversation; he talks and talks, about politics – the war in Iraq, Islamic fundamentalism (dropping a ‘nucular’ bomb on northern Pakistan is his answer to finding Osama Bin Laden); and social issues – pornography and the internet, bad role models (the solution to the likes of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, he says, is to recommission the pillory and shoot the paparazzi). Vic unplugged. Cecil is more circumspect. A man of few words. I remember how mercilessly Hugo and his brothers used to tease him about his lisp, their singsong incantations: My name ith Thethil. My mommy thays I’m thpethal. Thpethal Thethil. Thpethal ’cauth I’m Thethil . . . on and on they’d go until Cecil erupted and fists started flying and Vic would have to go hunting for a stick.
Still, Hugo’s garrulousness spares the rest of us from any major contributions to solving the world’s problems. Hazel seems her old self, laughing at the odd hybrid accents of us three ‘boys’ – a curious mishmash indeed. ‘Isn’t it fascinating?’ she says. ‘All these funny half-Rhodesian accents. What strange mongrels you are!’
Hugo and Cecil opt for a quick stop at a butchery in Gweru for some biltong. The best on the planet, Hugo claims. Or it used to be. Hazel and I wait in the car while they lumber inside like two bulls, the sweaty seats of their trousers plastered against their fat backsides.
Hazel huffs. ‘My goodness, just look at the size of those boys! They’ve just had breakfast and all they can think about is stuffing their bellies! They must spend half their lives on the loo.’
Perish the thought. We wait, watching the throngs of people in the shade of shop awnings. ‘Nothing else to do but stand around waiting for better days,’ Hazel says. ‘Dear me, such a waste. Such a waste . . .’
She lights a cigarette and takes a few drags, blowing the smoke out the window. ‘I was hoping I’d get a chance to talk to you alone. I’m sorry about Clara. I’d so hoped you two might make a future together. You seemed so suited.’
‘We are suited, perhaps for not the best of reasons.’
Hazel smiles. ‘She exasperates me, that girl. All of her relationships have been the same. I thought it might be different with you.’
I laugh. ‘What? Did you think our allergies to commitment would cancel each other out? Maybe it’s for the best.’
‘I’m fond of you, Frank. I’m sorry it’s like this. I wish it was different. For Clara’s sake, I wish it was different.’
‘I’m sorry too, but she’s done a good thing.’
Hazel nods. ‘Yes, I can’t look a gift horse in the mouth.’
The Baldwins return to the car. Hugo plonks a huge brown paper bag full of sliced biltong between the seats. ‘Help yourselves,’ he says. Hazel declines. As we proceed on our journey, Hugo and Cecil tuck into the biltong with unseemly zeal. It keeps Hugo’s jaws occupied for a while, at least. I manage to salvage a few pieces; the biltong is, as Hugo claimed, superb.
As we cross the Kwekwe River, ten kilometres from the town, I recall my earlier visit to Sunnyside – the people occupying my old home, the two men and the women watching me from the veranda while I took photographs, the kids begging for money. The sense of unease. It seems a lifetime ago. I think of the derelict house and wonder about the power of place, about the deep pull of nostalgia. What are places of origin, other than fonts of loss and longing? Why is it our human lot to yearn for the past, when such yearning is surely futile?
Coelum non animam mutant qui trans mare currunt. Those who cross the sea change the sky above them, but not their souls. Of all the Latin that was drummed into my head at school, this imperial dictum by the Roman poet Horace is all that remains. English-speaking whites in Africa will always be British was the implication. But a broader implication – that the place, the home, from which the soul emanates also remains unchanged – strikes me now as sadly delusional. Those who travel away from home seldom realise that while their souls may remain unchanged, their home, like everything else, transforms with time. There are no souls so lost as those chained to the past. To the memory of home. Like me, they return to find their home inhabited by strangers. Only its shell recognisable.
At Kwekwe’s outskirts a faded blue Standard Bank sign greets us with the confident slogan: Inspired. Motivated. Involved. Hugo pipes up: ‘Anyone need a pit-stop in Kwekwe?’
‘I’m fine,’ Hazel replies. ‘Do you want to go past your old house, Frank?’
‘No thanks.’
‘Are you sure? It’s no trouble.’
‘I’m sure.’
It takes only a couple of minutes to drive through Kwekwe, along the avenue of jacaranda trees with their white-painted trunks, past the high school and post office, down through the shabby heart of the town. I’m engulfed again by that strange déjà vu I experienced during my first visit. Everything so familiar, yet another place entirely. Hazel points out the old shop she owned, now, like many others, empty and boarded up. We pass a mosque with an emerald green dome on the northern outskirts, the only building in good nick, and emerge again into the shimmering countryside.
A few kilometres beyond the Sebakwe River we turn off the Harare road and head east along a rough dirt road towards Dutchman’s Pool. Horizons dance behind heatwaves. The roadside scrub is coated with fine brown dust lifted by passing vehicles. We turn off again onto a road heading north-east towards a range of hills called the Great Dyke. Granite sandveld, dry, mostly infertile; cattle country, though now the land appears devoid of stock. Dense msasa woodlands peter into patchy acacia bush and open grassland vleis. Some lowveld trees, mopani and baobab. Hugo ceases his gabbling; the brothers gaze pensively at the familiar countryside, pointing out a landmark here and there. I wonder what their memories hold. In what esteem do they hold this place that was once their home? We’ve passed several squatter camps flanking the road; mud huts and makeshift shanties surrounded by meagre plots of brown, withered maize. People emerge languidly from these dwellings to watch us pass by, heedless of the dust swept up by the car. The only animals we see are a few dogs scavenging around the settlements, starving wretches with tails between their legs.
We cross the Great Dyke and come within sight of the ranch. A mood of unease permeates the car. The Baldwins become increasingly jittery. ‘Hope it’s okay driving around these parts,’ Hugo says. ‘Maybe we should’ve checked with the authorities.’
Hazel scoffs at the notion. ‘Authorities? What authorities?’ She remains calm, gazing ahead serenely, as though every problem of the world has some divine purpose. She is adamant that we go on, insisting it was Vic’s wish to have his ashes spread next to a spring near the Baldwins’ old homestead, a place he remembered as being always lush and green and loud with birdsong. ‘It took the thought of dying to bring out the poet in him,’ she ruminates. Without her, I suspect Hugo and Cecil might have dumped Vic’s ashes on the side of the road and beat a hasty retreat back to the safety of the main road.
At last Hugo pulls up at the entrance to the ranch. He is surprised to see the old sign – a half-log, grey with age, with the name Thorn Drift carved into it – still hanging by two chains from the bough of a dead gum tree next to the gatepost, which once boasted a gate. He and Cecil gaze apprehensively up the old road that used to wind for a couple of kilometres through thick bush before you came to the homestead. Now it runs only as far as a dozen or so huts a few hundred metres from the entrance.
Hugo shakes his hea
d. ‘No way we can drive on that road. Remember how sandy it was, Cess? We had to put gravel on it every year. I bet it’s never been maintained since Dad got kicked off. What d’you reckon, Cess?’
Cecil shakes his head too. ‘No way.’
‘Park here,’ Hazel says. ‘We can walk.’
Hugo and Cecil look at her as though she is touched.
‘What?’ Cecil says, pointing at the squatter camp. ‘Walk through there? You’ve got to be kidding, Hathel. No way!’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake! You boys are frightened of your own shadows. Have you ever heard of diplomacy?’
Hugo grunts and looks back up the road. ‘If you want to take a stroll through that happy little hamlet, be my guest, Hazel.’
A woman tending a fire in front of one of the huts spies us. She shouts out something; people emerge from the huts. Soon a mob of about twenty stands there watching us. A buzz of talk. Some men begin to walk towards the car.
‘Drive in,’ Hazel says. ‘The road looks fine to me.’
‘Bullshit,’ Hugo replies. ‘They’ve got axes and knobkerries.’
Hazel rolls her eyes. ‘Axes and knobkerries are like socks and shoes in this country. It doesn’t mean they’re hostile.’
Hugo is gripping the steering wheel, his knuckles white. ‘I’m not taking this car onto that bloody road. Look at it! A bloody sand trap. If we get stuck, then we’re really stuffed.’
‘Dear me! You young fellows! So quick to fear the worst, hey?’
In this matter I find myself squarely in the Baldwins’ camp. ‘We shouldn’t be taking unnecessary risks, Hazel,’ I say.
Hazel sighs, exasperated. ‘We’re just throwing some ash on the ground, for heaven’s sake. It’ll be fine if we just explain.’
With the car running, we wait for the group of men, six or so, to approach. The man leading the procession is old and wizened with a white goatee. His tattered khaki overalls look as if a grenade exploded in them. As he comes closer, Cecil exclaims: ‘Well, I’ll be buggered, Hugo! Geth who that ith?’
‘Holy Moly!’ Hugo says, the realisation hitting him. He turns to Hazel and laughs. ‘That’s our cookboy – old Bobo!’
‘Bobo? I wouldn’t be calling a dignified old African man a baboon in modern Zimbabwe,’ Hazel says. ‘However endearing you may think it is.’
Hugo looks stricken. ‘Oh, for Chrissake! What was his real name, Cess?’
‘Thit, I dunno.’
Hugo almost yells: ‘Shilling! That’s it – Shilling!’
‘Thank Chritht!’ Cecil sighs.
Hazel chuckles. ‘You mean he had a demeaning nickname before you gave him another one.’
Hugo switches off the engine. ‘Shilling was a good munt, hey Cess? He won’t cause any crap with us.’
He and Cecil climb out of the car and walk towards the approaching men, their thongs making thok thok sounds. Both sweat profusely in the midday sun, their skin pale, anaemic. As they meet with Shilling and the other men, Hugo affects his now familiar show of heartiness. He jaws away, shaking Shilling’s hand enthusiastically, African-style, all smiles and laughter. Cecil does likewise, shaking the other men’s hands too. Shilling does not appear to reciprocate with any pleasantries. His face is like stone. No smiles, no laughter from the men flanking him either. They just watch the fawning white men impassively. Hugo babbles on, gesticulating towards the car, pointing in all directions.
‘What’s he saying?’ I say.
‘I don’t know,’ Hazel replies. ‘I don’t speak Shona.’
‘Doesn’t look as though he’s making much headway.’
Hazel raises her eyebrows and nods. The sun burns down with a fierce intensity. We open the back doors to let the air through.
‘I’m not sure if this was the brightest of ideas,’ I say.
‘I didn’t think anyone would object to us just throwing some ash on the ground.’
Now Shilling is talking, loud and angry. He points his knobkerrie emphatically at the car. Go, the gesture says. You and your brother, go! Hugo begins to argue, his voice plaintive. Shilling shakes his head briskly and points the knobkerrie again. When Hugo continues to argue, Shilling switches the knobkerrie around in his grip, so that the ball is in his hand, and, without further ado, whacks Hugo hard across the side of the head with the other end. He clouts him again across the shoulders. The other men raise their knobkerries and axes and feint at Cecil who stumbles backwards in fright. Hugo stands there dumbly holding his head, apparently in shock. Another clout across the head from Shilling elicits a short, high-pitched yelp. Needing no further indication as to the status of their welcome, the Baldwins turn and walk smartly back towards the car. When Shilling and the men begin to follow, waving their weapons in the air, Hugo and Cecil bolt like spooked cattle. The pent-up breath in me escapes like a slow puncture. Oh Christ, I think, what have we got ourselves into here? Hazel, usually so calm and composed, grips my arm tightly. It occurs to me to jump into the driver’s seat and prepare for a quick getaway but the keys, I notice with dismay, are not in the ignition.
‘Christ, Hazel. We’re completely bloody helpless!’
Hazel doesn’t reply. She just watches Hugo and Cecil stampeding towards us, knees pumping, her nails digging into my arm. The Baldwins pile into the car. Cecil has lost a thong. In a wild panic Hugo fumbles for the keys in his pocket; he starts the engine and stalls while attempting to reverse out of the entrance. Suddenly Shilling and his men are around us, brandishing their weapons. Eyes wide, teeth bared, shouting and taunting. One of them strikes the bonnet with an axe; the blade breaks through the metal and remains lodged. A deafening banging as they pound the roof with knobkerries. Cecil yells in terror. Hugo starts the engine again and wheelspins backwards, away from the men. Back on the road, he slams the car into gear and roars off in the direction we came. His ear is bleeding; blood is soaking the collar of his shirt. ‘Fucking bastards!’ he curses. He and Cecil are streaming with sweat; they pant, open-mouthed, like dogs. I look back: Shilling is clowning around, dancing in small circles, waving his knobkerrie surmounted by Cecil’s lost thong. The men around him laugh and cheer.
Hazel takes some tissues from her bag and dabs at Hugo’s ear. He winces.
‘Here, hold this until the bleeding stops,’ she says.
Hugo holds the tissue against his ear with his left hand. He is driving, one-handed, like a maniac; the car careens around bends, the axe embedded in the bonnet swinging from side to side. Shilling and his mob have long since disappeared from view; still, Hugo guns along. Hazel reaches over the seat and taps his shoulder. ‘Slow down, Hugo,’ she says.
‘That bloody old kaffir!’
‘Stop the car, Hugo,’ Hazel says. ‘Come on, calm down.’
‘We shouldn’t have come here in the first place! I’m sick of this bloody country! These idiots can have it for all I care!’
‘You’re forgetting something, aren’t you?’
‘Bugger the ashes, Hazel!’
‘Please stop the car, Hugo.’
‘Hazel, I am not –’
Cecil almost shouts: ‘Lithen to her, Hugo! Pull over, man!’
Hugo heaves a long, loud sigh, jams on the brakes and skids to a halt in the middle of the road. Just the distant chortling of a dove filters through the seething silence.
‘Now, let’s think about this, boys,’ Hazel says. ‘We’ve got a job to do here.’
Hugo puts the car into neutral and applies the handbrake. We get out and inspect the damage. Cecil wrenches the axe out of the bonnet and flings it angrily into the bush. Hugo runs his hand over the roof of the car, peppered with small round dents. He wipes the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. ‘Christ almighty!’ he curses. ‘Who’s going to fix this, hey?’
Jervis’s saturnine visage looms. ‘I can rec
ommend someone,’ I say.
Hazel asks: ‘Where’s the boundary of your property, boys?’
‘Back a bit,’ Cecil replies.
Hugo says, ‘That bloody spring is out of the question, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘We’ll just have to compromise, then, won’t we?’ Hazel argues. ‘I suppose it doesn’t matter where precisely we spread the ashes.’
‘Yeah,’ Cecil agrees. ‘Anywhere on the farm will do.’
We drive back to where the boundary of the farm begins, near a derelict cattle-loading ramp. From this point we can see at least a kilometre in all directions; there’s no sign of life anywhere, no huts, no people. We clamber through the barbed-wire fence near the ramp. Hugo and Cecil glance around nervously, trespassers on their own land. We walk towards a windmill near a baobab tree, some fifty metres from the fence. Cecil steps gingerly on his one bare foot. Hazel carries the urn with both hands against her breast. The windmill’s pump shaft is broken and the rusted blades spin futilely in the fickle breeze. We stop and stand together. The heat is like a weight on our shoulders. The bushes around us aloud with insects. The windmill squeaks and rattles as it turns.
Hazel hands the urn to Hugo. ‘This is for you boys to do.’
Hugo nods and takes the urn. With sudden tears gushing down his face, he opens the urn and shakes some of the ashes onto the ground. It lies almost invisible on the powdery earth. He hands the urn to Cecil who spreads some more. Then Cecil gives the urn to Hazel; she empties it.
They stand silently. The windmill squeaks and rattles. Insects sing. Hugo puts his hand on Cecil’s shoulder and says in a choked voice: ‘I’ve already said my piece at the funeral. Hope you’re satisfied, old man. But I can just imagine you looking down at us, bitching like hell because we didn’t do exactly what you wanted. Anyway, now you’re back on your land – back home again. Rest in peace, you old tyrant. Say howzit to Mom for us.’
Cecil bows his head, staring grimly at the ground. Sweat drips from his nose. The words in him seem to burst like the sounds from a drowning man’s mouth. ‘Well, Dad, here we are. Hope you’re happy back where you belong. Back on your land. Too bad how it all ended. I got only one thing to thay: Demanded love ith not love. God be with you, old man.’