by Deon Meyer
Nkosi: And you’re saying I’m the spy? That is ridiculous.
Domingo: Is it?
Nkosi: Yes!
Domingo: And yet, you have the most to gain from providing our enemy with that information . . .
Nkosi: You are a heathen and a liar. I have nothing to gain.
Domingo: If we lost the battle, and they stole the arsenal, you would have had immense leverage to force a new election. And a really good chance to win it. And if we won, you knew it would be safe to take your people to Gariep, because the threat of an enemy attack would diminish for long enough to build up that community. You were the only person on the planet in a win–win situation . . .
Nkosi: Mr President, I will not sit here and listen to one more word from . . . this Philistine. I am leading my people to New Jerusalem. With or without our share, with or without our weapons . . .
Domingo: Why are you not denying my allegations, Pastor?
President Storm: Please, Nkosi, Mr Minister, please . . .
Domingo: Why did you tell your people, ‘Don’t worry. The night is darkest before the dawn.’ Why?
Nkosi: I am done here.
Domingo: I’m going to find proof, Nkosi. And then I’m coming for you . . .
Nero Dlamini
You have to hand it to Nkosi, he was nobody’ s fool. The next day, he came to see me and President Storm. Actually, he came to see Willem, and Willem asked me to sit in, because he needed a witness, he . . . Well, he just wanted someone to confirm the record, for what it was worth.
So, the pastor says, ‘You’re blackmailing me, Willem.’
And Willem says, ‘I do not condone what Domingo did.’
‘But you didn’t stop him,’ says the pastor.
And Willem says, ‘He had legitimate questions.’
And then the pastor says, ‘Does Domingo control you, Willem? Does he run Amanzi?’
Which was a sore point, because there was some truth in that. So Willem does not answer. And the pastor says, ‘You remember when we found the murder weapon that killed Matthew Mbalo? And that little rubber boat. You remember you lied to the people of Amanzi about why we wanted to enlarge Domingo’s forces?’
So Willem says, ‘We all lied, Pastor.’
And Nkosi says, ‘No, Willem, you lied. You, personally. You told the people. And if you don’t give me your word right now that I will get half of all the guns and ammunition, I will tell the people how you deceived them. How you knew there was a big attack coming. And still we lost so many people. Then we will see how many are willing to stay behind.’
We just sat there.
And Nkosi said, ‘You have until 3 April to make your decision.’
Chapter 88
February: V
We had been fifty-six members of Special Ops. Plus Domingo.
After the invasion we were thirty-four. And Domingo was injured.
For three long weeks we didn’t see him, we just heard how he was doing when Sergeant Taljaard returned from the hospital and told us Domingo was in a critical condition. They didn’t know if he was going to make it. Birdy Canary sat with him for hours through the night. Taljaard told us one night how he came quietly into the hospital room and Birdy was sitting holding Domingo’s hand, and what a peculiar scene it was for him. You never imagine Domingo, the obstinate, incorruptible, indestructible Domingo, having his hand held. Later, Taljaard told us Domingo would live. And Domingo recovered. Though he would probably always walk with a slight limp.
But Domingo didn’t need to walk normally, he would still always be Domingo. He would continue to be our commander; it was his mind, his character, his personality that led us, trained us and inspired us.
But we were good for nothing in those weeks. Even though Domingo gave us orders to reorganise into two teams of seventeen each. Even though we obeyed, though we put ourselves through our paces, our exercises, we were useless. We were sheep without a shepherd, drained, sore and sick. We were bruised by the loss of so many comrades, but above all, the loss of the reservists, the ordinary, good people who went to man Sector 3 with such innocent courage, such cheerful pluck. For me that scene was the one I found hardest to banish from my mind, the Enemy walking among them and executing the last survivors with pistol shots to the head. Another confirmation of Domingo’s philosophy that we were animals, cruel animals, heartless and soulless.
It all blunted me, so though I saw Sofia Bergman at Special Ops – she was in the new Team Alpha, I was in my old unit, Bravo – it was as if she wasn’t real, a ghost in a dream, a fantasy I once had that was slowly fading.
I knew thanks to my therapeutic talks with Nero Dlamini previously that I was suffering once more from post-traumatic stress. But I couldn’t escape it, and Nero was too busy helping other people – civilians – to process their loss.
It was Pa who tried to make me whole in those first four weeks.
It began on 9 February, the day of the battle and the slaughter. We walked out of the reserve dog-tired, our rifles trained on the prisoners of war. I saw Pa on the other side of the big gate, where we entered town. He was waiting for me, he came up to me, put his arm around me, and said, ‘I am immensely proud of you.’ His voice was thick with emotion, his arm squeezed me tight. And then he let go of me, not wanting to embarrass me.
On 10 February we rested in the base.
On 11 February they came to collect us with a tractor and a long trailer, all thirty-four of us, and Hennie Fly and Peace Pedi. They paraded us through town. People lined the roads, more than three thousand, they shouted, sang, applauded us, they rained flowers and petals on us. I saw Pa with Okkie on his shoulders. I beckoned to them. Pa came up to the trailer. ‘Can I come too, Nico, can I?’ begged Okkie.
‘You can.’ I took him from Pa.
Pa wept when he passed Okkie to me.
This one time I wasn’t ashamed of Pa’s tears, it made me happy and sad. I wanted to cry too, but the tears got stuck somewhere.
Okkie rode with me on the trailer. He waved at the people, as if he had personally, single-handedly annihilated the Enemy.
That night Pa and I ate together, just the two of us. He made small talk about this and that, knowing I didn’t want to talk about the battle. His voice and eyes were gentle. Just before I went to bed, he said, ‘I would never be able to do what you did, I am too much of a coward. But I know where you got your courage . . .’
After that I saw Pa and Okkie every weekend, Saturday and Sunday, until March, until Domingo came out of hospital, until Pastor Nkosi announced what we later referred to as his Moses plans.
Every Saturday and Sunday I walked and drove with Pa on his rounds, I didn’t speak much, mostly just listened to him. And it was good to listen to Pa, he was so interesting to talk to.
I remember one conversation particularly well. We were outside the town, in the vineyards beside the river. The grapes were being harvested. And the three of us, Pa and Okkie and I, helped where we could. Pa talked to everyone. At four in the afternoon most of the people took a breather, in the cool underneath the willow trees beside the river. Pa looked at them and I could see he was enjoying this moment, this peaceful gathering, so shortly after the destruction of the battle. As if he knew this scene was what we had fought for, this was what had been preserved.
He turned to me and said, ‘You know my project to make some kind of record of our history?’
I nodded. I knew about it, and to my shame for months I had thought it silly, a waste of time.
‘Well, in January, I asked quite a few people what they didn’t miss of the old world, and I got some interesting answers. It got me wondering, what didn’t I miss? Was there anything? Because I . . . You know how I loved the world before the Fever. And you and I lost so much . . . The world lost so much, could there be anything that I wasn’t sorry to see the end of? Something that’s better, here, after the Fever? Then I remembered the longest research project in history, one that stretched over seventy-five years. It beg
an at Harvard in America; they followed the lives of many men, from the time they were eighteen or nineteen years old, into their nineties. One of the big findings that came out of this study was that your happiness in life is primarily determined by good, strong, healthy human relationships. And they not only determined your happiness, but also had an effect on how long you lived. I remember this huge sense of irony when I read about the research back then. Because there we were, in a world where we couldn’t have been more isolated from each other. Where it was increasingly difficult to have those healthy relationships, in marriages, in friendships . . . Even our friendships were more synthetic and digital . . . What I want to say is: that’s the one thing I don’t miss. Because look here. Look at the relationships here . . .’
‘It’s true, Pa,’ I said. Because I could see it, just as he did.
Later we wandered down to the people and he talked with them. During my absence in the months of military duty I had forgotten how good Pa was with people. I sat watching him, and I saw again how he went everywhere, how he talked with everybody. He consoled and encouraged and led, but was purely and absolutely genuine, there was not a trace of the politician’s agenda about him.
In that moment I realised that my father was someone I liked. He was someone I admired and respected all over again. I could see he had forgiven me for my stupid moment of teenage weakness eighteen months ago.
I realised our relationship was whole again.
Until 29 March. Until Domingo came out of hospital.
Chapter 89
March: III
On 29 March Taljaard brought Domingo back from the hospital.
We lined up on the parade ground in front of Special Ops headquarters. The black Jeep drew up and Domingo got out. It was the first time we had seen him after the Battle of Sector 3. We knew he was limping, but we didn’t know how badly.
He handled it in the usual Domingo way. With controlled fury. It looked as if he hated his damaged hip, as if by sheer willpower he would deny any discomfort.
He walked without a cane, with sway-and-halt, sway-and-halt, the dark glasses on, right up to us.
His voice was the same, the tone, the volume, the suppressed menace. He said, ‘You did well. I’m proud of you.’
Taljaard said, ‘We are proud of you, Captain.’
We cheered Domingo. He raised his hand, sternly, his mouth turned down in distaste. We stopped.
‘Enough,’ he said. And he walked into the building, to his office.
Taljaard came to fetch me. ‘Captain wants to see you.’
I jogged to his office and knocked.
‘Come in.’
I went in, closed the door behind me. He was sitting behind his desk. I stood at attention.
‘No. Sit.’ The dark glasses lay on the desktop in front of him; his eyes were the colour of gunmetal.
I didn’t show my surprise. Captain Domingo never invited you to sit down. But I did.
‘I was hard on you,’ he said.
If I said ‘Yes, Captain’, it might create the wrong impression. With Domingo I had learned the best policy was, when in doubt, shut up.
‘Do you know why I was hard on you?’
‘No, Captain.’
‘Because you were an arrogant little arsehole.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘You’re “yes-captaining” me just out of habit now. You were an arrogant little arsehole, Storm. Because you can shoot straight and run fast, and you got lucky with the diesel aeroplane thing, and your pappa is the President. You were insufferable. The good news is, all those things would have turned just about everybody into arrogant little arseholes.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘You weren’t ready for promotion.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘Why weren’t you ready for promotion?’
‘Because I was an arrogant little arsehole, Captain.’
He nodded in satisfaction. ‘Quite right.’
And he grinned faintly, and shifted a little on the chair, perhaps to make his hip more comfortable.
‘In the Battle of Sector 3, you made me proud.’
I said nothing, just enjoyed the rare moment.
‘You showed a keen strategic mind, you showed respect for the chain of command, you showed bravery and discipline.’
Still I kept silent.
‘You’re not going to let the praise go to your head.’
‘No, Captain.’
‘You will for ever refrain from being an arrogant little arsehole.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘You are now ready for promotion.’
He opened a drawer. He took out a pair of insignia, three sergeant’s stripes for each shoulder. ‘Sergeant Storm. It has a ring to it.’ And he put the insignia on the middle of the desk.
‘I want to say something to you, Nico. Man to man.’
It was years since he last called me by my first name.
Domingo looked out of the window, down to the parade ground. ‘There’s nothing like bleeding like a stuck pig from a good hip wound to remind a man of his mortality,’ he said. ‘When I was lying there that day, I thought, damn it all, I won’t have time to train my successor. And I thought of who that successor should be, and lo and behold, I could think of only one little man. Arrogant little arsehole that he might be.’
He looked at me. ‘If you repeat this conversation, I will kill you, understand?’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘From tomorrow we work hard. ’Cause I’m not going to live for ever.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘From tomorrow we work hard, because you are going to be the best sergeant, and you are going to stay very humble.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘From tomorrow we work hard, because you are my designated successor.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
‘Anything you want to say?’
‘Just thank you, Captain.’ But I lied, I wanted to tell him he was Domingo, of course he would live for ever.
‘From tomorrow we work hard. So take the rest of your day off. Go and celebrate your promotion with your family.’
In March in the Year of the Lion there were three different modes of transport for Amanzi citizens. If you needed to travel a few kilometres, your first option was a vehicle, provided it ran on diesel. That was the only fuel we had for our trucks, pick-ups, tractors, a few cars, the single Jeep and, of course, the aeroplane. Because we produced the diesel ourselves, and the supply was still relatively limited, most of it was reserved for agriculture and military purposes.
Should your transport requirement fall into a more personal category, your best bet would be to travel on horseback. We had a growing number of good horses, but there was still a shortage of saddles, and most people had to learn to ride bareback. If, for example, you wanted to visit someone in Petrusville on the spur of the moment, you could probably get a horse at the stables across the Madeliefie Street crossing.
But not if you were a member of Amanzi’s Special Ops Teams. We were required to walk, jog or run, according to the prescription of our commander. Unless he stipulated otherwise in person.
Therefore, on the morning of 29 March, between ten and eleven, I jogged from our base to the Amanzi town centre, so that I could tell Pa about my promotion. And we could celebrate together. I ran to the main gate first, then through the wide U, up the last slope, past the stable, through the town, into Disa Street.
Pa’s work space was in the old post office, when he sometimes did his administration in an open door office.
He wasn’t there. I asked if anybody had seen him.
No, not yet this morning.
Was there a Cabinet meeting?
No, not today. Perhaps the President was at the school, someone said. Or he might be helping at the Orphanage.
I thanked them all, and trotted off to the Orphanage.
It was quiet in the building, the children were outside somewhere. I walked th
rough, and out the other side, towards the vegetable garden.
I heard something, a trace of a voice, a suppressed sound, half a word, or a cry. Behind me, inside somewhere. I turned round.
Maybe Pa was ill, in his room still perhaps. I went there, I didn’t knock, because it was my father and barely yesterday I was still sharing a room with him – that’s how it felt. I opened the door and saw him, with Beryl in his bed.
And they saw me.
Chapter 90
The lions
Sometimes it feels like everything happens at once, just when you least expect it.
On 29 March I was promoted. And I opened the Orphanage door and saw a man I didn’t know. But I recognised the scars of dog’s teeth on his back: it was my father.
I walked back to base. I was bewildered. Dumbstruck. Angry. My father had betrayed me; Pa had hidden this thing from me, for how long? I suddenly thought of nights long ago when Pa would come back to our room late, I thought of moments when I came upon him and Beryl deep in conversation together somewhere. I always imagined the intensity of their conversation was over life-and-death Committee business.
It had been going on for years.
Why did he never tell me? Why didn’t he trust me? What else was he hiding from me?
What about my mother, what about the memory of my mother that he was dishonouring?
It was as if I didn’t know him, my brain couldn’t process or categorise or understand this.
I was angry, and ashamed, mortification seared right through me, because it was Beryl. Jacob once said Beryl liked women. It was the conventional wisdom of the entire community; after all she was an ex-golfer with a muscular physique. There was always whispering behind hands about her and Nero Dlamini’s sexuality. And that was the woman my father chose to have sex with. A lesbian.