Yellowbone

by Ekow Duker

  ‘Where’s your father now?’

  ‘In Afghanistan somewhere,’ Nigel replied with a shrug. ‘Apparently he’s pretty good at throwing grenades into caves and shooting poor buggers with dirty rags wrapped around their heads.’

  Just then, the lamplight fell across Nigel’s face and exacerbated his lost boy look. Something melted inside Karabo. She took Nigel’s hand and led him towards a fenced garden just ahead. There was a sign in white letters on a dark green background that read Private Enclosure. Please keep gate closed at all times. On the other side of the gate was another sign telling the residents to Vacate the garden at dusk.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ whispered Karabo. ‘It doesn’t apply to us.’

  ‘But …’ Nigel began to say, only for Karabo to place her finger against his lips.

  ‘We’re not residents,’ she said.

  She drew Nigel through the metal gate and shut it behind them. She held his hand and hurried off the footpath and into a copse where they wouldn’t be seen. She didn’t really care if they were. She glanced up at the warped, twisted branches of a large tree above them, then leaned against the trunk with her cheek pressed against the bark. There was an earthy odour all around her, the sort one smells in a grocery that sells only organic food. Karabo stretched her arms around the tree’s girth as far as they could go. It was just the three of them, Nigel, the tree and her.

  A cool gust of air wafted across Karabo’s buttocks as Nigel pulled down her trousers. Her feet sank into the soil at the foot of the tree and she felt a burst of panic. She spread her legs a little more and tried to stand on tiptoe on the tree’s roots where it was firmer but she needn’t have worried. Nigel held her waist in both hands and knelt down behind her. She knew instinctively what he was going to do and she arched her back to make it easier for him to find her. She wondered if she smelled good down there and felt anxious all over again. But Nigel buried his head between the cheeks of her ass with such ferocity, it was like Saddam lapping greedily at a bowl of water after a morning spent running in the sun.

  No one had ever licked her there before, not even Tracey or Joelene Jacobs. The tip of Nigel’s tongue was like a blunt-nosed arrow. It jabbed into Karabo’s arsehole with such delicious insistence, she would have fallen back if he hadn’t held her steady. A wet trickle slid down the inside of Karabo’s thigh as her fingers scrabbled against the peeling bark of the tree. Nigel’s face was completely underneath her now, his neck bent backwards at an impossible angle in a pose reminiscent of a blue crane gobbling down a fish. She ground herself against his mouth, not caring if she broke his neck or not. Her hands slipped off the tree and for a moment, she was weightless. She was flying through a darkened landscape, with an Englishman’s tongue inside her. She came with a series of violent tremors, her sinews tensed to the point of breaking. It felt as if armies of archers were shooting volleys of pleasure into her brain. Then one after the other, the archers ran out of arrows. The last one to hit Karabo caused her no more sensation than a mild trembling as it struck home.

  ‘Would you really kill to have the Guadagnini?’ she murmured. Her cheek was pressed hard against the tree and her eyes were still closed.

  Nigel grunted and she took that to mean no.

  ‘You mustn’t say things like that, Nigel,’ she said. ‘It only brings bad luck.’

  ‘But it’s my violin, I can say what I want.’

  ‘It’s technically yours. Your mother hasn’t given it to you yet.’

  ‘Christ, there’s nothing technical about it! It’s mine by right. Everybody knows that!’

  His voice was gruff and when she turned to look at him, his eyes were unnaturally hard and bright.

  ‘I … I can’t get it out of my mind,’ he said in a hoarse voice. ‘It was wonderful.’

  ‘I assume you’re talking about the violin and not about having sex?’

  Nigel groaned and rubbed his eyes. ‘It’s not just any violin, Karabo. It’s a Guadagnini! I can’t even begin to describe what it was like. Tell me, what’s the most magical thing you’ve ever experienced?’

  ‘You’re asking me this after I just came?’ she said, pulling up her trousers.

  He went on as if he hadn’t heard her. ‘Whatever it was, multiply the feeling by one hundred and even then you wouldn’t be close.’

  ‘A thousand maybe?’ Karabo said playfully.

  Frantically, Nigel began to search his pockets. The words tumbled out of his mouth in barely coherent order. ‘I’ve got my keys to my mother’s house. We could go back and get the violin. It wouldn’t be too difficult. My mother’s alone and when she’s had a bit to drink, it’s almost impossible to wake her.’

  He was pacing in front of the tree with his hands describing strange figures in the air.

  ‘Stop it, Nigel!’ Karabo said sharply. ‘You’re frightening me.’ Then she added in a gentler tone, ‘I know it sucks but you’ve got to try and let it go.’

  Nigel stopped in his tracks. He seemed to collapse in on himself, like a builder’s ladder that has been folded abruptly in two. Then he came close to Karabo and hugged her.

  ‘God I love you, Karabo,’ he said with a muffled groan. ‘You’re the only one I can say these things to. Even if I can’t really do it.’ He held the keys in his outstretched palm and looked at them for a moment. Then he tossed them in the air and in one fluid motion, put them back in his pocket.

  ‘We’d better be going,’ he said.

  He led the way this time and Karabo followed him out of the gate. She caught up to him and slipped an arm around his waist.

  ‘You’ve never said that before,’ she whispered. ‘Do you really love me, Nigel?’

  He grunted and this time she took that to be a yes.

  CHAPTER 30

  André rang the bell to Mrs Summerscales’ house. He heard light footsteps and then a voice rang out.

  ‘Who is it?’

  Mrs Summerscales’ voice was tight with apprehension and André leaned into the door. ‘I’m so sorry to trouble you, Mrs Summerscales,’ he said. ‘It’s André Potgieter. May I come in?’

  ‘Did you forget something?’ she asked sharply when she opened the door.

  ‘I came back to see if you were all right,’ André said.

  She looked at him a moment and sighed. ‘I suppose you’d better come in.’

  She led André to the kitchen and pointed at a brushed aluminium stool perched beneath the centre island.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting anyone,’ she said. ‘For a moment there I thought it might be Mark.’

  ‘Mark?’

  ‘My husband. Ex-husband, if you like. Nigel’s father. He’s in Afghanistan.’ André thought he could detect an undertone of bitterness propping up her voice. ‘Even if he were home on leave, he wouldn’t come here. He’s the strong silent type, you see. It took him almost two decades to admit he preferred the solitude of the Cotswolds to the clink and chatter of South Kensington.’

  Mrs Summerscales looked at André and the stillness of her gaze unnerved him. He began to regret having come.

  ‘What will you have?’ Mrs Summerscales asked.

  ‘I really don’t want to trouble you,’ André began to say but she cut him off brusquely.

  ‘You’re already here, Potgieter. I won’t ask again.’

  ‘I’ll have a coffee then. Black with no sugar.’

  She made it quickly and brought the coffee across to him on a wooden tray with ornamental metal handles.

  ‘Aren’t you having any?’ he asked.

  ‘Not at this time of night. It will only keep me up and I have no desire to stare at the ceiling all night.’

  Gingerly, she lifted herself onto the stool next to André. The inverted triangle of pale, speckled skin at her chest pointed the way to small, girlish breasts. Her calves were slightly muscled, probably from much walking, and were covered in a fine down of chalky hair. Her face was pale and drawn and André guessed that the confrontation with Nigel had worn her out. In h
er exhaustion, she forgot her usual decorum and sat with her legs spread wide apart. She reminded André of a street vendor, albeit an elegant one, with a tray of small wares to sell.

  ‘I wanted to apologise,’ André said. ‘I had no right to blurt out that you were selling the violin.’

  Mrs Summerscales gave him a wry smile. ‘What’s done is done. To be honest, I was rather relieved that you took the task of telling Nigel out of my hands. I might have done it more delicately but I suppose South Africans are known for being blunt and to the point.’

  ‘Where is the Guadagnini?’ André asked. He looked around him.

  ‘It’s in the sitting room.’

  ‘Oh.’ André said. He looked away for he did not want Mrs Summerscales to see the longing in his eyes. He cupped the mug in his hands and blew on it until the vapour rose up and steamed his face.

  ‘You told me the other day the Guadagnini has been in your family for decades. How did you come to own it, if you don’t mind me asking?’

  ‘I don’t mind at all. My father left it to me. And the house too. Philip, my late brother, got my father’s notebooks and a set of dried butterflies. They didn’t really get on, you see.’

  A tic pulsed on Mrs Summerscales’ cheek, then fell back into the mesh of fine wrinkles and disappeared.

  ‘And where did your father get the violin?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ Mrs Summerscales said. ‘It’s always been in the house. Not this house,’ she added. ‘We grew up in Singapore.’

  ‘Was your father a musician?’

  Mrs Summerscales laughed harshly. ‘Crispin Spencer? Not a chance! He was very proud of the violin though. He showed it off to anyone who came to our house. He made them take off their shoes and stand in a line like they were punters at a peep show.’

  André raised an eyebrow at her sudden crudeness.

  ‘But how did he come to own the violin in the first place?’

  ‘I never bothered to ask,’ Mrs Summerscales said with some impatience. ‘The story making the rounds at one time was that Guadagnini gave it to our great-great-grandfather.’

  ‘Really? Giovanni Guadagnini himself?’

  Mrs Summerscales shrugged. ‘Apparently he did the old Italian some extraordinary service. Saved his life or something heroic like that. Does it matter?’

  ‘I hope you don’t mind me saying so,’ André said, ‘but that sounds suspiciously like a fairytale. Did any of your relatives live in Italy in the seventeen hundreds?’

  ‘I don’t believe any of the Spencers ventured much further than their local pub. Would you like to see the violin again?’

  André couldn’t hide his pleasure. ‘I … I’d love to,’ he said. Mrs Summerscales took him by the hand and led him to the sitting room where the Guadagnini was once again displayed in the glass cabinet on the wall.

  André could hardly contain himself. He walked quickly towards the violin, then drew up abruptly. Embarrassed, he glanced at Mrs Summerscales.

  ‘Go on,’ she said. ‘You’ve been panting after the Guadagnini like a bitch in heat.’

  She seemed intent on being crude but André was so exhilarated, her words barely registered. His hands shook a little as he opened the cabinet with the key Mrs Summerscales gave him, and reached inside for the violin. ‘It’s so beautifully constructed,’ he said in a halting voice. ‘You’d never think it was almost three hundred years old.’

  He peered inside the stylised opening on either side of the bridge and pulled a face.

  ‘There’s no signature,’ he said accusingly.

  ‘Oh, it’s in there all right.’ Mrs Summerscales replied. ‘Turn your head and look through the F hole. No, not that one, the other one. Can you see it now?’

  There was indeed something written inside the violin. The letters were faded and grey and loped unsteadily across the wood.

  ‘Giovanni. Battista. Guadagnini.’

  ‘Cremonensis,’ Mrs Summerscales added, finishing the wording for him. ‘That’s where he worked. In Cremona.’

  ‘I’m aware of that,’ André replied. It annoyed him that she should think he did not know that well-known fact. He lifted his chin and spoke a little pompously.

  ‘Of course the label in a violin is no guarantee of its authenticity. You’d need an expert to do a comparative study of its design and the characteristics of the wood.’

  ‘And the varnish,’ she said. ‘You’re forgetting the varnish.’

  ‘Absolutely. The varnish would have to be analysed as well.’ He looked at Mrs Summerscales with grudging respect. ‘You’ve done all that, haven’t you?’

  ‘Of course I have, Potgieter. We Spencers don’t leave anything to chance.’

  André looked through the skylight at the cloudless expanse above him. He wondered, as he always did, where the angels might be now.

  ‘Must you really sell the violin, Mrs Summerscales?’ he asked. ‘It’s been in your family for such a long time. I agree with Karabo. It’s not a piece of furniture.’

  The smile faded from Mrs Summerscales’ face at the mention of Karabo’s name.

  ‘You’re being sentimental, Potgieter. I don’t appreciate that in a man.’

  André placed the violin against his neck as if he were about to play. ‘Perhaps if you played the violin yourself, you might feel differently.’

  ‘What are you getting at, Potgieter? The other thing I don’t appreciate in a man is coyness.’

  André roused himself with a dog-like shudder and touched the strings lightly with the bow. A note of rare brilliance reverberated across the room. He waited for it to die away before he spoke.

  ‘In the wrong hands, Mrs Summerscales, a violin can be rather like a mail-order bride.’

  ‘A mail-order bride? Go on. I’ve never heard a violin described in this way.’

  ‘Bear with me. From a distance, she looks exotic and sounds incredibly warm. She’s everything you’ve ever wanted. But after you’ve saved up to fly her to London and you undress her for the very first time, you realise with bitter disappointment that her stomach sags and her skin is blotched and pale.’

  Mrs Summerscales’ eyes narrowed into slits. ‘I don’t know where you’re going with this, Potgieter, but I must say, I’m intrigued.’

  He played a brief passage of rapid, querulous notes, then stopped as suddenly as he had started.

  ‘You see, Mrs Summerscales, the voice that you’d only heard in pleasant, teasing snippets before now, reveals itself on close inspection to be hoarse and unpleasant. Before long, you begin to wish she hadn’t come at all. But you’ve invested so much in bringing her over that you start to think it’s your fault. You tell yourself that if only you understood her better, touched her differently or spoke to her more lovingly, then she’d change and be exactly the way you imagined her to be. But that doesn’t work either because in reality, the two of you simply don’t fit. You bought her to complete you, only to realise that she does precisely the opposite. In actual fact, she takes pieces of you away. It’s only a matter of time before you grab her by the neck and throttle her. You just don’t know it yet.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Summerscales,’ André replied sadly. ‘That is all.’

  ‘That’s a very intricate if somewhat racy analogy, Potgieter. But I’m afraid it made little if any sense to me. A mail-order bride? The wrong hands? I’m sorry, but I fail to see what you’re getting at.’

  A small smile played on André’s lips. ‘A violin as magnificent as this should never be disposed of without knowing where it might end up. In fact, my preference would be for it not to be sold at all.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ exclaimed Mrs Summerscales. ‘You’re worried the Guadagnini will end up with someone who doesn’t care much for it?’ The tip of her nose twitched rapidly as though she were a small animal. ‘That would never happen, Potgieter,’ she said. ‘Believe me, anyone who comes close to my asking price will care for it all right.’

  CHAPTER 31
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  Karabo walked around Hereford Square three times before she approached Mrs Summerscales’ door. It wasn’t for good luck or some magic rite. She was bloody scared. She kept as close as she could to the kerb, afraid someone would see her lurking by the parked cars and call the police. That had happened to one of the guys at Bartlett, a Liberian called Mathew. He’d been so blown away by the sight of so many expensive cars parked on the street that, in an innocent stupor, he’d begun peering inside them, one after the other. He hadn’t been in London very long then, less than a week. Before he knew it, two pairs of hands lifted him up by the armpits and threw him in the back of a police van. He’d told Karabo the story with an easy chuckle but the traces of rage and humiliation were still there on his face.

  She couldn’t keep walking around Hereford Square for much longer. Even she would be suspicious of herself. To her surprise, she saw André Potgieter leaving the house and quickly ducked behind a parked car. What was he doing there? Hadn’t he said his goodbyes when she and Nigel had left? She waited for several minutes before she looked up to see if the coast was clear. The lion’s head knocker glinted wickedly in the lamplight. She thought she heard it growl.

  Karabo was trying her hardest to look like a resident out on her evening walk. Her evening constitutional. Wasn’t that what they called it? She was on her fourth circuit, when she felt something sniff at her heels. She yelped in terror and jumped up in the air, her legs flailing like someone had thrown acid on them. But it was only a dog, a fat little creature who stared at her with bright-eyed interest. Simba. The French girls who’d pursued him so earnestly the last time were nowhere to be seen. She was already preparing what she’d say to them if they asked.

  ‘J’étais en train de prendre ma constitution quand j’ai vu ton chien.’

  Simba nudged Karabo’s foot with his nose, no doubt thinking she’d had a change of heart and would offer him a piece of biltong this time. She tried to ignore him but the little dog was as persistent as an Mthatha moneylender. She bent down and scratched the back of Simba’s head the way one would rub a talisman to ward off bad karma. He stretched and rubbed against her shin like a cat.