Although Jestina was not crying – she was too shocked and stricken to do so – Genie put an arm around her. It was the adult who was supposed to comfort the child; Jestina felt Genie was growing up before her time. She resented her having to do so. Why could those sojas in their red berets not have left them alone?
‘I was in the sunflower field,’ Genie said. ‘I saw the sojas coming. I heard the noise. The rat-a-tat-tat. The screaming. The smell of burning flesh. When they were leaving, they stopped their army truck next to the field. One of them got out and lit a cigarette. He struck another match. I think he meant to set the field on fire but another soja, the one driving the truck, asked him what sunflowers had ever done to him and told him to put out the match. The other soja did as he was told and then got back into the truck. I ran here … to the Hadebes. I found this.’
Eventually, the adult put her arm around the child. ‘They played Don Williams,’ Jestina whispered, her voice trembling, as though this was the real horror of the story. ‘They actually put Don Williams on the gramophone and then did what they did.’ Jestina looked at Genie, her eyes searching. ‘How could anyone who listens to Don Williams do such a thing?’
‘They probably did not know that we also love Don Williams,’ Genie said, sounding almost certain. ‘If they had known, they wouldn’t have done this. They wouldn’t have done any of it.’ It almost made perfect sense.
Jestina looked at Genie with pity. ‘Oh, they knew. They knew we love Don Williams. They knew and still they did this.’
At some point Jestina and Genie must have fallen asleep because a loud bang woke them up. Someone was knocking on the door. Before they could fully comprehend what was happening, the door was flung open. Jestina and Genie shrank further into the corner. Someone shone a torch into the room. A handful of the compound’s residents strode into the kitchen but stopped short when they saw Mr and Mrs Hadebe slumped over the kitchen table – for ever holding their peace. The torchlight swivelled and found Jestina and Genie tucked away in the corner.
‘What happened here?’ the torchbearer demanded.
Jestina was about to answer truthfully but Genie rushed to say, ‘It was the sojas … They killed Mr and Mrs Hadebe with rat poison.’
There was silence. Then there was grumbling.
‘Is that Golide’s daughter?’ an angry voice inquired.
‘Yes,’ the torchbearer answered.
‘She needs to come out here.’
There was more grumbling. It sounded as if an argument was about to begin.
Genie was about to stand up but Jestina held her down.
‘What do you want with the girl?’ Jestina asked.
‘Who is asking?’
‘Jestina Nxumalo.’
‘You’re Elizabeth’s friend. You need to come out as well.’
The grumbling outside got louder.
‘None of this would have happened were it not for Golide. They were looking for him. They did this because of him,’ the angry voice outside called out.
‘But the girl has done nothing. Neither has Jestina,’ said someone else.
‘They probably know where Golide and Elizabeth are. They can tell us.’
‘Where are your parents?’ the torchbearer asked.
‘They flew away,’ Genie said.
‘I told you. They ran away,’ the angry voice shouted. ‘They knew the sojas were coming for him and they ran away. And left us to … The girl needs to come out.’
‘Do you honestly think that if they knew the sojas were coming they would have left their daughter behind?’
‘Not all parents are made the same. Some are made to leave their children behind.’
‘It is simply not true that the sojas came here for Golide. Things like this … like what happened here today … have been happening throughout the region for years. We all know this,’ a voice said, trying to reason.
‘Did you not hear them specifically ask for him by name? Did you not hear them shout, “Where is Golide Gumede?” You are a liar if you say that you did not! How many of us were asked where we were hiding him? I was. If he had been here when the sojas came, none of this would have happened. They would have taken him away and that would have been the end of that. My son, Sikhumbuzo, would be alive and listening to a story around the fire right now, not in the well. This is all Golide’s fault.’
‘I think they would have done what they did anyway. They just needed an excuse to justify their actions. Golide was that excuse.’
‘But they have been talking about unity for months now, talking about peace.’
‘Perhaps they only did so to make us relax … to lull us into a false sense of security … to catch us unawares.’
‘I don’t care about unity. I don’t care about peace. All I care about is that they asked for Golide Gumede by name,’ the angry voice said. ‘It is all because of what happened to the Vickers Viscount all those years ago. You cannot shoot down a plane and get away with it. The white man will not let you.’
‘No white man came here today.’
‘Golide is a madman, I have been saying it for years.’
‘But why would the sojas come all this way to kill a madman?’
‘And his followers.’
‘Watch what you say. My son, Sikhumbuzo, was no follower of Golide Gumede.’
‘I saw your son with my own eyes touching those giant silver wings and looking at them like he had seen the glory. You are a liar if you say he was not a follower.’
‘Those we buried were all followers – all died except the girl and Jestina.’
There was more grumbling. The argument was becoming more heated.
‘Hey … you … you … What is this girl’s name again? Funny name … difficult name … English name … you … you …’ the angry voice stuttered.
‘What is your name?’ the torchbearer asked Genie.
‘Imogen.’
‘Imo … what?’
‘Imogen.’
‘What kind of name is that?’ a voice outside asked.
‘They’ve always thought they were better than us, those two – Elizabeth with her blonde wig, always singing country-and-western music; Golide always tinkering with that monstrosity of his and believing himself capable of flight – and giving their daughter a name fit for the Queen of England,’ another voice added.
‘You can call me Genie if you like,’ Genie said.
There was a long silence.
‘Jestina,’ the angry voice shouted, ‘you take this girl … Imo … Imo … this Genie … and the two of you go and never come back here again. Do you understand me?’
‘Yes,’ Jestina said.
‘What about my parents? When they come back?’ Genie asked before Jestina clamped a hand over her mouth.
‘You don’t need to worry about them,’ the angry voice said with uncharacteristic calmness.
Genie obviously would have liked to say something to that, but Jestina would not let her speak.
The torchbearer and the handful of others that had entered the kitchen left. The crowd outside also dispersed. Jestina and Genie were left behind in the silent darkness with only each other and the resting-in-peace Hadebes for company.
In the very early hours of the morning Jestina stood up. She grabbed hold of Genie’s hand. Genie had no choice but to stand up as well. She looked at the Hadebes, hoping that they too would stand up.
‘Don’t look back. Never look back,’ Jestina said, looking resolutely ahead, leading by example. She dragged Genie along as they exited the Hadebes’ house.
‘What about my parents?’
‘People will tell them where we’ve gone.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘Somewhere over the hills. Somewhere far away from here.’
‘Will my parents be able to find me there?’
‘Yes,’ Jestina said, without looking at Genie.
‘Is that where Marcus is? Somewhere over the hills?’
‘Yes.’
‘Isn’t that where evil resides?’
‘Evil?’ Jestina said. ‘Evil has a way of finding you wherever you reside. Evil found us here today,’ she said, finally looking at Genie. ‘Then again, evil is everywhere … and in everyone, really. No one is inherently evil. But we are all of us capable of evil,’ Jestina said as she looked at the charred remains of the petrified man with the crooked teeth. He was still where the compound residents had left him.
‘I see,’ Genie said, turning her head to look at the man.
The truth was that Jestina did not understand the workings of evil. She had always thought that evil was a thing that you cannot see. But now it turned out that evil could take the form of men wearing military camouflage and red berets who listened to Don Williams and had qualms about burning down sunflowers, but apparently none about making a middle-aged couple drink rat poison.
‘If you had told me yesterday morning that by the end of the day I would have killed the Hadebes, I would have laughed at the ridiculousness of that notion. Who, after all, cuts off the hand that feeds them? And yet here I am … here we are,’ Jestina sighed, leading Genie towards the charred man. ‘There was a time, not so long ago, that we thought only white people capable of such hatred and anger, such evil. We know better now. We know different. Evil does not discriminate. It visits all of us with equal opportunity.’
Jestina and Genie gently picked up the charred man, carefully carried him to the well, and let him free-fall to its bottom. If either of them noticed that the charred man’s heart had calcified into a precious and beautiful something, neither of them let on – they had already witnessed too many things that defied articulation.
Jestina allowed them to make one stop: the Gumede’s home. They entered the house. It had been ransacked. The sofa cushions and the mattresses had been bayoneted and gutted. Pots and pans cluttered the floor. There was broken glass everywhere because the windows had been smashed, quite unnecessarily. The sight of Golide’s Lovemore Majaivana LP collection, crushed into a million vinyl pieces that could never be put back together again, broke Jestina’s heart. Golide always listened to Lovemore Majaivana when he was working on his silver wings. It was almost as if the sojas knew that and therefore let loose their fury on the vinyl. This was destruction simply for destruction’s sake. Jestina watched as Genie pulled down a ladder and used it to climb into the ceiling. This should have surprised Jestina, but nothing could or would ever surprise her again. Genie re-emerged moments later carrying, in one hand, a suitcase that she had obviously packed for exactly such a moment in her life and, in the other, Penelope and Specs.
‘We should not let this change us,’ Jestina said with authority as she took hold of Genie’s hand again. ‘If we let it change us then they will have won.’
As they walked past the sunflower field, Genie ran a hand over the closest stalks. ‘This is not an ending of my choosing. From now on I will choose my own endings,’ she said. There was a conviction and determination in Genie’s voice that made Jestina believe her.
Holding hands and watching the day breaking, Jestina and Genie waited for the MacKenzie bus that would carry them away from the Beauford Farm and Estate.
PART III
THE PRESENT
VALENTINE
Valentine Tanaka looks at The Man Himself and cannot help but think that he does not quite fit in these surroundings – he is too large for the medium-sized office, too modern for the antiquated furnishings, and too shiny for the dust-covered surfaces. There was a time when the size of The Man Himself bespoke a presence to be reckoned with, but that was years ago when the country was newly independent and The Man Himself had just taken over The Organisation of Domestic Affairs. He had carried his weight with authority, he had been nimble on his feet – a man of activity, dashing out of cars, bounding up and down stairs, never out of breath, a reminder of his predecessor, Emil Coetzee. But now here he sits, wheezing, sweating, unable to catch his breath; now his considerable weight, no longer athletic (time had seen to that), hangs off him, giving him a sagging appearance that promises to fold in on itself some day soon. This is why, even as he sits, he needs to prop himself up with a cane.
There is that familiar glint in the eyes of The Man Himself – mischief, malice, mayhem. Valentine can never really tell which one it is. The glint always makes Valentine wonder what kind of schoolchild The Man Himself had been. Because he has never been able to imagine The Man Himself as a boy, he always conjures up a miniature version of The Man Himself, sitting behind a desk (the old-fashioned kind that you opened and that had as its pride an immaculate inkwell) on a slotted wooden chair that pinches (not that the miniature The Man Himself knows this because at this very moment his bottom is off this chair), his hand eagerly raised as he screams ‘Me, me, me’, leaning over his desk, trying to get the attention of a colonial schoolmaster whose studied lack of interest lets everyone know, without a doubt, that he is British. ‘Me, me, me,’ the miniature The Man Himself screams. ‘Absolutely no need for all this excitement, I assure you,’ the disinterested schoolmaster says. ‘A hand quietly raised will get my attention. But I suppose it cannot be helped, it is in your natures to make a cacophony … empty vessels and all that.’ Valentine watches as the eyes of the miniature The Man Himself glinted – mischief, malice, mayhem.
‘I suppose you are wondering to what you owe the pleasure of my company,’ The Man Himself says as he wipes his face with a pristine white handkerchief, interrupting Valentine’s reverie.
‘Yes … sir.’
The Man Himself looks at Valentine, long and hard. Valentine knows that it is best not to look away. The Man Himself reaches into his pocket, his eyes never leaving Valentine’s, and places something carefully on the table.
‘You owe it to this.’
Valentine looks at the thing on the table. It is the most precious and beautiful something that he has ever seen. Its beauty makes him want to touch it. He only realises that he has reached out his hand to touch it when The Man Himself snatches it up and secrets it away in his pocket.
‘I would like to think that you and I are friends.’
Valentine cannot help but think that The Man Himself starts many conversations in this way, conversations that do not end particularly well for the listener.
‘Or am I wrong? Are we not friends?’
‘We are friends.’
‘Good. That is what I thought, why I knew I could trust you.’ The Man Himself looks at Valentine long and hard again. ‘I can trust you, can’t I?’
‘Yes, yes. You can trust me,’ Valentine says, not particularly liking who he is at this moment – a man so uncertain that all he can do is try to please.
‘Good. I knew I could,’ The Man Himself says as he once again removes the precious and beautiful something from his pocket, places it between his thumb and forefinger and rolls it back and forth, making it glimmer like a beacon. He no longer trusts Valentine enough to place it on the table between them. ‘As soon as I saw it, I thought, Valentine Tanaka will be the man for this job. He is someone who can be trusted … a friend.’
Valentine is too mesmerised by the precious and beautiful something to look at The Man Himself.
‘You’ll never guess where I found it,’ The Man Himself says, looking particularly pleased with himself. ‘The Beauford Farm and Estate.’
‘The Beauford Farm and Estate?’ says Valentine. And with these words, he feels as though a spell has been broken.
‘Yes. The farm has been taken over by the war veterans, of course.’
‘Of course.’
The Beauford Farm and Estate being taken over by war veterans had made the headlines some years before. The Organisation had not intervened in any way … until now.
The Man Himself shifts his gaze away from Valentine to a pile of dusty papers resting on a window ledge behind Valentine. ‘While I … we … appreciate their service to this country, their self-sacrifice during the war, they are squatting on the lan
d illegally and something will obviously have to be done about that,’ The Man Himself says to the pile of papers.
‘Obviously.’
The Man Himself shifts his gaze back to Valentine.
Mischief. Malice. Mayhem.
‘I knew you would understand,’ The Man Himself says. ‘I knew you were the man for the job.’
The Man Himself leans heavily on his cane and then struggles to stand up. The scrape of the chair along the floor takes Valentine back to the classroom where the miniature The Man Himself is screaming ‘Me, me, me’, trying to get the attention of the ever-disinterested British schoolmaster.
‘Beatrice Beit-Beauford still has the title deeds. Legally, the farm belongs to her,’ The Man Himself says as he returns the precious and beautiful something to his pocket.
‘I see.’
‘I knew you would.’
KUKI
Kuki Carmichael puts her hand on the door handle and takes a deep breath. She does this once every week and it never gets any easier. She looks at her liver-spotted and wrinkled hand and grimaces. When did she become so bloody old? How did she allow this to happen to her? She studies her reflection in the rear-view mirror – a shrivelled, sunburnt face with a smear of strawberry-red lipstick. ‘Ugh!’ It is a sound that comes from the back of her throat in disgust. Perhaps she looks good for eighty-one, but to be honest, she has no idea what a good-looking eighty-one-year old should look like. It had never occurred to her that she would live this long. And if it had occurred to her, she would probably have thought she would be a blithering idiot by now. But no, unfortunately Kuki has all her wits about her – a brain as sharp as it was fifty years ago. Sharp enough now to let her know that she looks like a prune. ‘Enough of that, Kicks!’ she says out loud, clapping her hands together to snap herself out of it. She lifts her cardigan and the biscuit packets that she has concealed in it off the passenger seat. She places the package securely under her arm before pushing open the door with some effort. When did the door become so damn heavy? She gets out of the car as quickly as her years allow. Standing in the bright sunshine, she takes a deep breath and without allowing herself to give it a moment’s thought she marches towards the building. The Princess Margaret Retirement Home. She supposes it is a kindness to call it a retirement home instead of what it really is: a home for the old, abandoned, misbegotten and forgotten.
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