by Alan Paton
– So after he had washed their feet, and had sat down, he said to them, Do you understand what I have done? If I, your Lord and Master have washed your feet, you ought also to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.
But young David McGillivray does not hear these words. He has left the Holy Church of Zion, and has gone to find his editor at all costs.
Young McGillivray has got the story of the year, there can’t be any doubt about that. In the whole of South Africa his paper alone carried the great story, and it enjoyed pride of place for twenty-four hours, because the afternoon papers don’t publish on Good Friday. It was the front-page story, with great black headlines like those that tell of war, or the eruption of Krakatoa, or a rugby victory over New Zealand. Even on Saturday morning it was still the big story, Acting Chief Justice Kisses Black Woman’s Feet. No fewer than three papers had those identical words, and that’s not surprising, for how else can you tell that story?
Well, for better or for worse the story has gone round the nation. It’s the kind of story that hardly any South African could be indifferent to. You either like it or you don’t like it. They don’t like it at all in the Palace of Justice or the Union Buildings. As for the judges in Bloemfontein, most of them don’t like it. Such things are not done and, if they are done, they should not be seen to be done. Some people think that Judge Olivier did it on purpose, but those who know him well don’t believe that at all. In fact most judges don’t believe it. Probably no one reads a news item with greater clarity than a judge, and young McGillivray’s story makes it quite clear that he was in Bochabela for quite another purpose.
Perhaps it’s wrong to say that the story has gone right round the nation. Die Stem of Pretoria has not mentioned the strange happening in Bloemfontein and, as far as the South African Broadcasting Corporation is concerned, it didn’t happen at all. The English press — ah well, of course, of course, but they do blow things up, don’t they?
And on Saturday two of the great papers of the world, The Times of London, and the New York Times, told the story. Stories like that place the South African ambassador in Washington in a most unsatisfactory position. In the White House such an event is regarded as a redeeming act in the history of a wayward nation, but in the embassy it is regarded as an act destructive of the tireless propaganda that goes out in praise of separate coexistence and separate education and separate worship and separate lavatorial accommodation.
– Judge.
– Yes, Mr. Buti.
– I am ashamed to look at you, judge. I didn’t know that that young man was from the newspaper. You asked for it to be private, but now everybody knows it.
– That’s not your fault, Mr. Buti.
– So you forgive me?
– There’s nothing to forgive, but if you wish me to forgive you for nothing, I do so.
– That makes me better, judge. But apart from that, you did a great work. You helped to heal the pain of the Bosman funeral. There’s nothing else that could have done it. I could preach a thousand sermons and I couldn’t do it. I told you about the boy who said that Jesus taught that we should love our enemies because he did not have to live in Bochabela. He told me on the Friday that he was sorry. And, judge, the people want to give a new name to the church. It will still be the Holy Church of Zion, because all our churches are called that, but they want to call the church in Bochabela the Church of the Washing of the Feet. Some wanted to call it the Church of the Kissing of the Feet, but most of them thought we must keep to the Bible.
– Very sensible.
– And I want to ask you one more thing, judge.
– Ask it then.
– It’s not an easy question, judge. But people are saying that the Government will be angry with what you have done, and that you will not become the Chief Judge of South Africa. Is that so?
– I do not know, Mr. Buti. It may be so, and it may not. But taking part in your service on Thursday is to me more important than the chief-justiceship. Think no more about it.
In view of the many misunderstandings that have arisen, the Bloemfontein Herald wishes to make it clear that its representative, Mr. David McGillivray, did not go to Bochabela to attend the Maundy Thursday service at the Holy Church of Zion. He went there to investigate a totally unrelated matter, and it is wholly coincidental that he was able to attend the service known as the Washing of the Feet, the full report of which appeared in our edition of yesterday.
— The Editor.
The Acting Chief Justice
Court of Appeal
Bloemfontein
My sisters and I were brought up by my mother to have great respect for judges, especially the judges of Bloemfontein. So don’t think it is easy for me to write to you.
You are a disgrace to the Court of Appeal. A judge is not supposed to go looking for publicity, but when he gets his publicity by kissing the feet of a black dolly in front of a whole congregation, then he loses the respect of people like me, and believe me, there are lots of people like me.
If a man like you kisses the feet of a black dolly in public, then imagine what he does in private. I bet he kisses a lot of things besides feet. How can you stand the smell and the fuzziness? You disgust me speechless.
Sometimes I think I would like to leave my country, if it can produce a judge like you. But I’ll stay around while we have men like Dr. Hendrik to stand up for the white nation. Last year Dr. Hendrik made a law to stop white and black going to the same church, and it is a scandal when a judge breaks it. I’m not an educated person, but I go mad trying to understand how a judge can break the law, and why nothing happens to him. Too big, I suppose, eh?
I’d just like to tell you one thing. In the Anglican Church, to which I belong but I don’t like it, we have a service called the Washing of the Feet. There’s no service called the Kissing of the Feet. You not only insult the white nation. You insult the white church too.
I sign myself
Proud White Christian Woman
– Pappie!
– Daughter, what are you doing here?
– I came to see you, pappie.
– And what about Dirk and the children?
– Dirk said I must come. We’re so proud of you, pappie, for what you have done for our nation.
– Daughter, let me breathe. You mustn’t choke me like that. I’m not used to it any more.
– Ma would have been proud too. It wasn’t only for our country, pappie, but for our Afrikaner people. There’s something going wrong with us. Our hearts are growing too hard, pappie. That’s why it is so wonderful.
– It wasn’t my idea, daughter. It was the idea of the Reverend Isaiah Buti, minister of the Holy Church of Zion. He wanted to reassure his people after the Bosman funeral. And I couldn’t say no to him. But it was never meant to be public. There just happened to be a young newspaperman in Bochabela that evening, and he saw the Acting Chief Justice arrive in his car, and he thought he’d find out what the judge was up to.
– Well, I’m glad he did. What a shame if no one had ever known. Tell me, pappie, why did you kiss Martha’s feet? Was it an impulse?
– I suppose it was. After I had dried the feet, I held them in my hands, and I thought of how far they had walked for our family. And suddenly, daughter, I saw Martha and you when you were a child, and I remembered clearly how she would kiss your feet. So I thought to myself, if she can kiss my daughter’s feet, why can I not kiss her feet? No, daughter, leave me alone. I’m all dressed to go to the court, and I don’t want to be messed up.
– Pappie, it was wonderful. But I don’t suppose everyone thought it was wonderful.
– You can be sure about that.
– I know someone who will be very angry with you.
– Who’s that?
– Long Tom. He thinks the judges belong to him.
– Don’t be irreverent, child. You mustn’t speak about our Ministers like that.
– Indeed.
– Nice ones?
– Yes, nice ones. People hesitate before they send nasty messages to judges. Except this one. Read it, daughter.
He watched her face while she read it, anger and shock, and then anger.
– How can people write letters like that, pappie? How can a woman do it?
– She must be a sick woman. You should pity her, daughter. Now I must go, and you must go and see Martha.
– I’ve seen her, pappie. I did what you did. I kissed her. Do you know, I haven’t kissed her since I was small? Do you know, pappie, you’ve freed me from something? It’s usually children who free their parents, isn’t it? Well, it’s my father who freed me. I said to Martha, What have you been up to? What’s all this about you in the papers? She looked very coy and said Mr. Buti had trapped her into it. But she didn’t mind, she said. Now she was ready to die.
– Did she say that?
– Yes.
– It’s a strange country we live in, daughter, that a black woman says she is ready to die because a white man has kissed her feet in a church. Is it because she has been with him so long? Or is it because he is a judge? Or is it just because he’s white? I think about these things a lot, daughter, but I don’t know the answers. Oh yes, I know one answer. It is that our debt is incomputable.
– Pappie!
– Yes.
– One thing more and then you can go. Does this mean that Minister Long Tom won’t make you Chief Justice?
– I suppose it does, child. But don’t let it worry you, because it doesn’t worry your father. Listen, how long are you going to stay with me?
– Dirk says I can stay three days. I came just to tell you that you’re top of my list of favourite men. Now you can go to court.
Yes, it is indeed a strange country we live in. Down in Durban Mr. Thomas Ndlovu is to receive a medal from the City Council in recognition of his brave action in going to the rescue of a twelve-year-old white boy, who, having climbed halfway up the more or less perpendicular face of Mitchell’s Quarry, found that he could go no further, nor could he come down. When it was clear that the boy might panic, Mr. Ndlovu, showing more courage than skill, climbed up to join the small boy till the police arrived. By this time a crowd of several hundreds had gathered at the foot of the face, most of them Africans and Indians. The crowd had watched the small boy’s progress with groans and sighs, but now they cheered Mr. Ndlovu on with jests and laughter, and gave him an ovation when he joined the small boy.
The arrival of the police was greeted with great good humour, and in five minutes the small white boy was on the quarry floor, lost to sight in a cheering crowd, shouting their joy and congratulations. In another few minutes Mr. Ndlovu also reached the floor, and was lost to sight also. When the police decided to take the small climber home, Mr. Ndlovu held up a detaining hand and first led the boy to the noticeboard, which read, No Climbing, By Order. What he said, no one heard, for it was lost in an outburst of catcalls, laughter, jeering and cheering.
Mr. Lodewyk Prinsloo, a clerk-in-charge in the employ of the South African Railways and Harbours, had risen to his present position from humble beginnings, and now owned a comfortable and unpretentious house at 14 Kensington Road, Claremont, Cape. The Prinsloos were a respectable and conventional couple, and the sitting-room was furnished with an old-fashioned sofa and armchairs, while on the walls were colour photographs of his parents and his wife’s parents, of their own wedding, and their three children. The photographs portrayed his parents and hers as unsophisticated and worthy. There were also two pictures, of a mountain and lake that could well have been in Norway, except that there was some kind of balustraded terrace at the water’s edge which looked as though it belonged to the Mediterranean rather than to the cold north, and this conclusion was strengthened by the presence in each picture of two beautiful women in diaphanous robes such as could only have been worn in the warm south. The two women were up early, for the sun had not yet appeared over the mountain, although its rising was clearly imminent.
It was Mr. Prinsloo’s day off, and he was reading the newspaper in his sitting-room, when his wife announced that two gentlemen wished to see him. She looked apprehensive and examined his face to see if she could find some clue as to the identity and business of the callers. When she brought them in, he understood her apprehensiveness at once. He could see that they were men of tremendous authority. He had never read Kafka, but if he had he would have recognised them. They wore black suits, and did not smile when they greeted him, or offer to shake hands. One of them said to Mrs. Prinsloo, Mevrou, you must excuse us, we wish to speak privately to your husband, and she left the room more apprehensive than ever.
Mr. Prinsloo was used to inspectors. The Railways and Harbours employed many kinds of them. They inspected passengers’ tickets, buildings, railway lines, railway offices, docks, tugs, public conveniences, bridges, and by their inspections kept the great organisation, so to speak, on the move. The inspectoral body exhibited a wide range of characteristics and temperaments — some inspectors were morose, some fussy, some authoritarian, some jolly and not to be feared at all. But Mr. Prinsloo knew intuitively that his visitors were men of awesome power, and he was filled with fear, not a general fear but a particular one, the one that he had lived with all his life.
He did not ask his visitors to sit down. It was they who sat themselves down, and then intimated that he should be seated. The first inspector opened the conversation.
– Mr. Prinsloo, let us begin our business. You are Lodewyk Hofmeyr Prinsloo, are you not?
– Yes, inspector.
– And you were born on the second day of February 1914 in the city of Cape Town?
Yes, inspector.
– You married Petronella Margaretha van Vollenstein on the sixth day of June 1942 in the city of Cape Town?
– Yes, inspector.
– Mr. Prinsloo, how do you explain the fact that on your birth certificate you are classified as coloured, but on your marriage certificate as white?
It is not easy for a man to answer questions when he is filled with terror, but Mr. Prinsloo knew that his terror counted for nothing with the two inspectors.
– I put myself down as white, meneer. My whole family passed for white. My father was a white man, and my mother was a coloured woman, but she was as white as my father. That is their picture there, inspectors.
– Mr. Prinsloo, we do not have anything to do with racial classification. I am from the Department of Labour, and it is my duty to inform you that as a coloured man you are not allowed to hold the position of clerk-in-charge in the Railways and Harbours Administration.
– You mean? You mean . . .
– Yes, you are discharged as from today, but the Administration will not only honour its debt in regard to holiday leave, but will also give you an additional three months on full pay.
– Mr. Prinsloo, I am an inspector charged with the administration of the Group Areas Act, and it is my duty to inform you that you will no longer be able to live in Claremont. This is an expropriation order signed by the chairman of the Board and you will be paid an amount to be determined by the Board. The Board will allow you three months to find a property that you can buy or rent in any area designated as a group area for coloured people.
Mr. Prinsloo had given up all attempts to keep up any kind of appearances. He sat on the old-fashioned sofa with his head between his hands. The second inspector was moved to some kind of pity for him, the kind of pity that one might feel for someone who has been dealt with so pitilessly.
– There is one more thing that you must face, Mr. Prinsloo. Let me tell you at once that your marriage will not be affected. It took place in 1942 and at that time such a marriage was legal. But your children will be affected. They cannot any longer attend any school designated for white children. However, I am informed by the Cape Department of Education that your children need
not be moved from their present schools until you have found a property that you can rent or purchase, and that of course you must do within three months from today.
– But my job? That is finished?
– Yes. You are discharged as from today. Have you any private belongings in your office?
– No.
– Then we shall go. Do not trouble. We can find our way.
They had hardly gone before his wife was at his side. He lifted his head from between his hands and looked at her with some kind of inexpressible grief.
– Lodewyk, what did they want?
He wiped the tears from his eyes, but was not yet able to answer her.
– Lodewyk, I am asking you, what did they want?
– They . . . well . . . they came . . .
– Yes, why did they come?
– They came, Petronella, to bring bad news.
– Bad news? Bad news what about? Your job, Lodewyk?
– Yes, my job.
– You’ve lost it?
– Yes. I am discharged. From today.
– Why are you discharged?
And when he did not answer her, she said,
– Have you stolen money?
– No, I have not stolen money.
– Then why? For God’s sake, speak, Lodewyk. I am your wife. I have a right to know.
– They say, Petronella, they say, they say, I am a coloured man.
She shrank from him. She too was filled with fear.
– Lodewyk, are you a coloured man?
– I was born coloured. They have examined my birth certificate. But I’ve always gone as white. My whole family went as white.
– But you were born coloured?
– Yes.
– And you married me knowing that you were coloured?
– Yes. I mean, I knew I was born coloured.
– How could you do such a thing?
– I loved you, Petronella.
She gave a wild, hysterical laugh that he had never heard in all their sixteen years of married life. Her face was contorted with anger, not anger at the black-suited inspectors, or at the cruelty of such laws, but at the man who had deceived her sixteen years before, and who today had destroyed the security and respectability of her life.