by Carol Gibbs
“We’ve got a baby brother!” I laugh. And when I’m inside our gate, I fall to my knees and give thanks. The baby is a boy, which means Jesus listened to my prayers.
“Get ready,” says Daddy after supper.
We give our faces a lick and a promise, and then we’re off!
The front door of the Leighwood Nursing Home is wide open. There are asters in a vase on a desk and a stern-looking nurse in a starched white uniform and a veil. We want to run up the steps, but Daddy grabs our arms.
“Put your best foot forward and behave. You can be poor, but you don’t have to show it.”
I wipe my nose on my jersey sleeve and push my hair out of my eyes. We’re scared of the nurse who gives us sidelong glances. Gabriel doesn’t like the hospital smells. His face turns pale, his legs go weak and he has to take deep breaths because it reminds him of the Hope Street Clinic where they have a strong man to hold you down and the dentist has to hide the syringe.
Mommy is sitting up in bed, wearing a pink bed jacket, a present from Aunty Ruby.
Next to her bed is a big bowl of blue flowers.
“C-congratulations on the b-birth of your s-son. From the l-ladies in the p-prayer circle, G-Gospel H-Hall, Crawford,” reads Gabriel.
The nurse’s starched uniform rustles as she places the baby in Mommy’s arms.
“Please can I hold him?”
“His neck is still floppy.”
He has dark, damp curls stuck to his forehead. His tiny thumb is in his mouth and his little fingers curl around our daddy’s pinkie. Daddy and Mommy exchange glances and smile.
“Look at the birthmark on his neck,” says Mommy. “When he cries it gets mottled and it spreads.”
I don’t know what mottled means, but I’m jealous of him because he’s getting all the attention.
“Who do you think he looks like?” I ask Desiree when we’re in bed.
“He looks like Daddy and I think they are going to name him Jacob.”
“D-do you know O-ouma is practising for her f-finals?” asks Gabriel, out of the blue.
“What does that mean?”
“Kicking the b-bucket. Going to h-heaven.”
“How do you know?”
“I heard D-Daddy telling M-Mommy.”
“Why’s she dying?”
“There’s s-something wrong w-with her b-bum.”
“Like Aunty Beryl’s bunches of grapes?”
“No more sugar mice if she dies,” says Desiree.
“Shush, in there! You’ve got school to-morrow.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Edna’s arms are full of arum lilies.
“Go pick wild flowers. Your mommy’s coming home. Don’t pick Duiwelskos and lick your fingers. Devil’s food is poisonous! And pick some hotnotsvye and geraniums for me.”
“She tells u-us to h-h-hurry a-and now she wants us t-to dawdle over h-her hotnotsvye.”
We pick narcissus, snowdrops, yellow butter-flowers, and freesias, Daddy’s favourite. Every vase has been pressed into service, even the empty Ball jars from Ouma’s grape jam.
“Well done! It looks like the Garden of Eden in the Bible,” says Edna, “But where are my hotnotsvye and my geraniums?”
“We’ll p-pick yy-your figs and geraniums tomorrow.”
From the wardrobe Edna fetches a present wrapped in blue paper.
“The present is from your ouma.”
Mommy steps through the front door, breathes in deeply, then starts to cry. Daddy stands beside her and his eyes are red. Desiree and I can’t understand what she has to cry about, because she has a brand-new baby in her arms and a room full of flowers. Edna takes Mommy into the bedroom. When she sees the flowers around the cot and the present from Ouma, Mommy cries worse than ever. Daddy flutters his eyelashes, the way he does when he is uncomfortable and sober and he doesn’t know what to do with himself.
“What’s his name?”
“His name is Jacob.”
“Let’s take some snaps.”
It’s my turn first. I hold his soft warm body tight against mine. The dark curls stick damply to his forehead and he smells of sour milk.
“Smile!”
Click. Daddy then hands the tightly wrapped bundle to Gabriel, who shuffles his feet and hurriedly flashes his beautiful even white teeth.
“Don’t d-drop him.”
Desiree sits up straight and holds baby Jacob to the side. She smiles straight at him. Desiree is lucky, because whichever way she faces there will always be one dimple visible. Then it’s Mommy’s turn. She’s wearing a dress with soft folds, and her forget-me-not eyes are still full of tears.
“Mommy looks like the Madonna in St Mary’s Cathedral,” whispers Desiree.
“There’s something sad we have to tell you …” Mommy’s throat is hoarse. “Ouma has passed on. She will never get to see Jacob.”
Daddy drops his head onto his chest. Mommy is crying softly beside him. Even Edna is crying and soon we are too. Jacob wails and Mommy goes into the bedroom to feed him and Daddy follows her. Edna sighs and crosses herself.
The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.
Our Father …
We pray with her. We can’t understand why we had to lose our ouma to gain a baby brother.
Alice arrives out of breath and gulping air.
“Come and see the baby. It’s dead.”
“Is it a boy or a girl?”
“It’s a boy. They wanted to name him Sven.”
“Why is the baby dead?”
“I don’t know, but hurry up.”
“Is your mother still alive?”
Our feet echo in the silent passage. I reach for Alice’s hand as we stand at the foot of the bed. Mrs Haroldson’s eyes are redrimmed and she is cradling the dead baby in her arms. Verses from the Bible pop into my mind.
Yea though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death, I shall fear no evil.
There are no texts above Mrs Haroldson’s bed to protect her from evil, no angels with wings outstretched and no Jesus with a bleeding heart and bloody thorns on His head.
“I suppose that’s life,” mutters Mrs Haroldson.
I inch along the bed to get a better look. Alice stares into her dead brother’s face. The baby’s little head is covered in fine blond hair. His skin is so pale it looks like the wax left under our fingernails when we dig into the play-play fruit at my Aunty Catherine-Jean’s house and I can see his fine blue veins. His blank eyes look up at the ceiling as though he’s staring at heaven. Mrs Haroldson puts her hand over his face and closes his eyelids. I don’t understand why he can’t breathe and neither does Alice. We run behind the garage and drop to our knees.
“Please, Jesus, make the baby come alive, but if You really can’t, please put him at Your right hand with lots of angels to look after him. Amen.”
The tears roll down Alice’s cheeks. If the baby has to stay dead at least he will end up in heaven.
The Haroldsons didn’t call Two-Coffee-One-Milk and they buried the baby right there in their own back yard. I hope they remembered to put pennies on his eyes so they don’t pop open under the ground. Mommy says if the social worker comes, they will be in for it. The children point out the spot to us. The fowls peck and scratch just inches away from the dead baby’s head. Mommy says the Haroldsons have to concentrate on feeding the living. Alice is sad, even though she doesn’t have to wash piles of dirty nappies floating in the bath.
“Mrs Haroldson will be sitting in the Kritz in no time at all,” says Daddy, “sighing over Robert Mitchum or Victor Mature or some other film star.”
We are lucky that there is no sadness around our new baby at home. Jackie, with his little head of soft brown curls, is adorable. I hold the banana-shaped glass bottle to his lips and he finds the teat and sucks greedily. I lay him on his tummy across my lap and rub his back, the way Mommy does, until the burps come out. Mommy explains why he’s called Jackie.
“We can’t have two Jacobs. It
would be too confusing.”
We are so glad Jackie is alive. The dead baby gives me nightmares, lying out in the cold under the stars. What if the pennies slip?
Oupa pours his coffee into his saucer to cool, because he doesn’t want to burn his lips. He pats his droopy moustache. It’s Sunday and Oupa has come a long way to see his new grandchild. He never uses a bus or a train because of his short fuse. It’s no good for his blood pressure to fight with the driver or the conductor, so he goes everywhere on his Soloped. We all wish we had a Soloped because you sail along without having to pedal. Oupa tells us the top speed of the Soloped is only ten miles an hour. No wonder it takes him so long to travel all the way from Parow, but his wide-brimmed grey hat, the one with the feather stuck in the shiny band, stays put like the cowboys’ hats in the bioscope.
As always, he’s dressed in a suit with a waistcoat and he is wearing a collar and tie. In his lapel is a red carnation picked from his garden and his gold watch chain loops across his tummy. Oupa has a tonteldoos to light his pipe. It’s a tiny brass box, with a little chain soldered onto the lid. Daddy once had to fix it with his blowlamp, with soldering wire and flux. Around his arm Oupa wears a black band made from the same material as my school girdle, the same as Daddy. It’s called a mourning band and it shows respect for our dead ouma.
Back in Parow, Oupa stays in a room on the side of the garage now, because Ouma died in their bedroom and that was too much for him. His cousin lives in the big house, with the smells from the Beatrice stove and the gardenia bushes. But Oupa still has the soft skin kaross he made for Ouma and his fishing rods hang on the wall. Outside his door, vegetables grow in neat rows and sweetpeas climb up a special bamboo trellis that reaches right up to his chest.
“Colleen, tell Mommy Oupa is waiting to see Jacob.”
We are not allowed to call him Jackie in front of Oupa. Oupa says boys have to have family names, so you can keep track of them. Although I get to feed Jackie with a bottle sometimes, he still breastfeeds. Now Jackie is lying in Mommy’s arms, sucking her titty as milk dribbles down his chin. One arm is tucked tight under her armpit and his free hand is caught loosely in hers.
“Daddy says Oupa is waiting,” I whisper to Mommy in her room.
“Your father wants everything yesterday, just like your oupa.” Mommy wipes Jackie’s mouth with his bib and smiles into his little face.
“Jacob, he looks just like you,” smiles Oupa as Mommy puts Jackie in his arms. “Your ma would have been very happy.”
After lunch we carry the Globe chairs into the backyard. Oupa lights his pipe. He pretends his moustache is on fire and smacks himself around the face. We collapse laughing.
“Let’s dance and sing for Oupa!” Desiree whispers in my ear.
She dresses in a strange frock she’s made of lace doilies and drags me along. We stand in front of Oupa’s chair and sing songs we learned at school. We bow and Oupa claps. Gabriel is embarrassed. He thinks it’s daft to sing for your oupa. Then Desiree makes us all traipse inside where the plank floor is hard and she tap dances round and round Oupa’s chair, so he can almost touch her. She makes eyes at me and I move the chairs so she can end with a backbend. Oupa claps and she climbs onto his lap.
“Your father is a hard man to crack, but just look at Desiree, she’s stealing his heart,” Mommy leans over to whisper to Daddy.
With his big thick fingers Oupa fishes his watch out of his waistcoat pocket.
“When the watch says three o’clock I have to leave, but first I have to rest. When I say totsiens, I might have a beurt for you in the bag of the Soloped.”
That word beurt means present, says Gabriel, and we can’t wait. I wonder if Desiree is the only one who will get a beurt because she danced for him. I’m shy, but I did sing. Oupa wakes up on the dot of three, goes into the lavatory and stays inside for a long time.
“Shh! Here he comes.”
Oupa’s braces dangle by his sides. When the men’s braces dangle by their sides, it means they did a number two.
“It’s no good l-l-looking for pennies, Oupa hasn’t h-had a drink, so his j-judgement is good.”
Oupa goes to the bathroom to wash his hands. We watch impatiently through the crack in the door as he pulls up his cuffs and the stretchy, silver bands that hold up his sleeves.
“Jacob, let’s take some snaps,” suggests Mommy.
Can’t they hurry up? I can’t wait to see what’s in the black bag. But Oupa sits with baby Jacob on his lap, staring sadly into space, thinking of our dead ouma. Daddy holds the Box Brownie low and cups his hand around the top to block the light. Desiree and I sit on either side of Oupa. Desiree takes his big, rough hand in hers.
“Say cheese.”
Desiree smiles her dazzling smile and I wonder if my cleft chin will show up in the snap.
Finally, Oupa crosses the yard to his Soloped, undoes the silver buckles of the bag and reaches inside.
“Have you been good?”
“Yes!” we chorus eagerly.
Sugar mice! Just the same as my ouma used to bring when she was still alive, mint green, chocolate and pink with long string tails and black liquorice eyes. He dishes them out to all of us, then Mommy gives us the eye.
“Go and play until we call you to say goodbye.”
The grown-ups have their last cup of coffee, then Oupa kisses us, crams his hat on his head, and clips shiny bands round his trouser legs. He lets Gabriel start the Soloped’s engine and then waits as we race to the corner. We watch as Oupa comes down the street with his tie over his shoulder and his hat brim flipped back like the man on the pony express. He waves like the clockwork man in the tiny engine on Cape Town station. Then he turns and comes back. He plucks the carnation from his lapel and flings it to Desiree. She scampers to pick it up and blows him a kiss.
“Desiree has stolen his heart all right! Did you see, Jacob, your father had tears in his eyes? And fancy remembering what your mother used to bring the children! He’s getting soft in his old age.”
Daddy has tears in his eyes and he swallows the lump in his throat.
Desiree and I half walk, half run up Adderley Street. Excited by the Saturday-night sights and sounds, we flit from one bright shop window to the next. Gabriel runs beside a hansom cab, trying to keep up with the horse. The driver, wearing a black top hat and holding a long whip, slows down so Gabriel can keep pace. We’re all sleeping at Grandma’s house because Jackie is going to be christened at St George’s Cathedral in the morning.
We wake to the sound of cups clattering. We dress in yesterday’s clothes and help carry the cups to the lounge.
“Be careful,” warns Grandma. “Those are irreplaceable.”
She’s sentimental because our six-foot-under grandpa gave them to her.
“Be careful, Skinny Legs with the butter fingers,” says Desiree.
Grandma covers the table with a big net that looks like a bride’s veil. She has made hundreds of iced cakes and there are sweets for the children and beers for the men. Desiree and I bath Jackie in Grandma’s big bath. We wash between his toes and fat fingers. He screws his eyes up when we clean his ears. When he’s squeaky clean Grandma brings Jackie’s dress.
“Why does Jackie have to wear a dress?” Gabriel is horrified. “It’s not a dress,” Grandma laughs. “It’s a christening robe. My mother made it a long time ago. It’s been handed down through the entire family. You all wore it too.”
“Why is it yellow?”
“Because it’s so old.”
Jackie looks beautiful in his dress. Mommy puts on his soft white shoes that tie with teddy-bear eye buttons like the ones on the ankle straps of our shoes, wraps him in his shawl, brushes his curls and he’s ready for his big day.
Grandma takes us into her sewing room. She touches each bolt of cloth in turn. “Seersucker, muslin, gingham, water taffeta, velvet, broderie anglaise …”
We love hearing the names.
“… Voile, crêpe de chine, satin, hou
ndstooth check, pique, paisley and Oxford blue.”
Then she pushes the door closed.
“Surprise!”
Hanging on the hook behind the door are the prettiest dresses me and Desiree have ever seen. Peter Pan collars, puff sleeves and stiff pink skirts.
“I’ve been saving the pretty pink organza especially. Fit for princesses!”
Desiree and I glow like lights on a Christmas tree. We throw our arms around Grandma’s neck, one on each side, and plant kisses on her soft wrinkled cheeks.
“Thank you, Grandma!”
Yesterday’s dresses lie crumpled on the floor as we slip on the new dresses. The material smells new and it whispers as it swishes around our legs. We pose holding Jackie on the straight-backed horsehair chairs in the lounge. Daddy arrives from Cape Town station because the van is out of commission. He never sleeps at Grandma’s house if he can help it. Careful not to rub our precious new dresses against the whitewashed walls on Grandma’s stoep, we watch as Uncle Gottfried drives up Queen Victoria Street. Looking smart in his pinstripe suit, he opens the door of his brand-new, out-of-the-box, black DKW for Mommy. She sits in front with Jackie on her lap. Desiree, Grandma, Daddy and I cram into the back. Desiree fluffs her skirt out. I try to do the same, but there’s not enough room.
Gabriel has loped ahead and he’s waiting on the steps with the aunts and uncles I love. Aunty Martha, waiting for Uncle Gottfried, has a fluffy hat with gloves to match and Aunty Beryl has orange ostrich feathers on her hat and a handbag big enough to hold the three-legged dog.
“J-Jesus l-loves dogs, b-but they’re not allowed in ch-church.”
“Isn’t this wonderful,” says Grandma. “Three generations gathered together.”
Church bells peal loudly as we climb the steps.
We’re all quiet while the service is on, but that all changes after the priest lowers Jackie’s head over the font. He sprinkles drops of water on Jackie’s head, making the sign of the cross and Jackie lets out a yell.
