A Time for Courage

by Margaret Graham

  She walked out through the yard to the garden at the side. Frances sat beneath a parasol in one of two wicker chairs. Yes, thought Hannah, I am home.

  A hammock was strung between two trees and a swing hung from a frame which Hannah knew that Joe had made because it was simple and strong.

  She walked to Frances and sat in the deck-chair alongside her. ‘Would you like some tea?’ she asked. ‘It will be ready in ten minutes.’

  She smiled as the older woman started from her sleep and turned. ‘How are you Hannah?’ she murmured, her eyes still heavy with sleep, her voice thick.

  ‘I’m fine, go back to sleep,’ Hannah said softly and lay back in her chair. The garden was full of flowers, Michaelmas daisies, montbretia, lavender and roses which were full-headed and alive with scent. There were daisies and buttercups in the lawn and no neat box hedges, no black patches.

  ‘They’ve all gone to the sea,’ Frances said. ‘For a picnic. Maureen’s sister is here with her family and five others.’

  ‘Joe too?’ Hannah asked.

  ‘He’s delivering some small tables to the station. He seems to be doing very well, my dear.’

  Hannah closed her eyes. ‘I knew he would,’ she replied.

  As the day passed and morning changed to afternoon she took Frances by the arm and strolled round the garden. The tightness in her body was leaving and she was less tired. She deadheaded a yellow rose-bush near to a gap in the elder hedge. The gap had been replanted with a young sumach but they did not know why.

  ‘Joe wondered if you would like to go and see Eliza and Sam?’ Frances asked. ‘I did write to Eliza and say that we would like to meet them again. It was so nice having them to stay for Christmas.’

  Hannah nodded. The wind was rustling the tops of the trees now. ‘We’ll ask them here,’ she said because this house was where her mother was now and where her father had never been. He had been to Eliza’s.

  Joe returned from the town in time for tea. He had bought Chelsea buns and they sat in the garden around the table, comfortable in their chairs and the chair-legs dug into the grass as he told them that his parents were in America where his father was exhibiting his paintings in Boston and Washington.

  ‘They have taken some of my smaller pieces,’ he said, his grin wide.

  ‘Didn’t you want to go?’ asked Hannah, passing a cup to Frances. The wind was no stronger and it was still warm.

  ‘I have work to do here,’ he said. ‘The rest can wait.’

  Hannah looked at him, at his eyes which looked out across the garden to the distant sea, at the fulness of his face, the colour of his skin. He was so much better now but it seemed that everyone was waiting.

  ‘You don’t have to wait,’ she said. ‘I could always ask Eliza or Sam or someone to take over.’ But she knew that there was no one else. She poured his tea, not looking at him as he took it.

  ‘I’ll wait. I’m in no hurry,’ he drawled.

  Still Hannah did not look at him or Frances, whom she had seen nodding at Joe.

  ‘You must tell me if you reach the stage when you can wait no longer,’ she murmured and for a while there was silence, though the birds still sang and darted from bush to shrub to tree.

  He watched her face and knew that he loved her more than life itself and that he would wait for ever because one day she would know that she loved him too. Hannah took a Chelsea bun, it was dusted with sugar and coiled round and round. She eased it apart, winding the soft pastry around her finger as she used to do with his wood shavings.

  ‘I’d slap you if you were one of the girls,’ Frances said and they all laughed.

  ‘What was in the gap where the sumach has been planted?’ she asked, chewing at a piece of bun which had broken as she coiled it. It was sweet and soft and fresh.

  Joe hesitated.

  ‘What was there?’ she asked again.

  ‘A lilac,’ he said and he looked not at her but at the roses which grew in the bed nearby. ‘This is your home and so I took it down.’

  Hannah saw the bedroom again and then felt the axe in her hands and smelt lilac so strongly suddenly that she could not believe there was none in the garden but there was not. Joe had seen to that.

  Over the weeks Hannah grew strong again and the tiredness eased. They went to the sea with the brown, round children who could not believe the space after the narrow London streets. She sat on the sand and watched as the mothers paddled and held on to their husbands’ hands. She held small children on her knee, kissing the softness of their arms, smelling the sweetness of their skins and laughing into their necks so that they laughed too.

  Joe threw balls for small boys holding bats he had made and she laughed as he missed catches. Frances read to the children with rickets who could not run. Hannah took them in the sea and they floated and used limbs too frail to move on land.

  Frances asked her if she missed Arthur and Hannah replied that she was used to being away from Arthur, it was the way they lived their lives. She did not care for shooting and hunting, Henley and Cowes, and he did not care for Cornwall.

  They talked together of the school that she would one day start and Frances agreed that yes, she would help too, but when she heard that it would be down here, where the sky was wide and the wind was clear, she asked about Arthur.

  Hannah shrugged and thought how far away the future seemed.

  She walked in the sand with bare feet, feeling the grains beneath her toes, she swam in the water and loved the freedom, the feel of the salt as it tightened and dried on her skin.

  She cooked in the kitchen with the women; they taught her what Cook had taught them. How to cure bacon, how to baste the joint, how to make lard into small cannon-balls. She taught them how to budget, how to read, and knew that she must help them to find better jobs when they returned. She met old Sunday friends and new ones.

  Esther wrote asking if she could come down but Hannah replied saying that there was no room. She did not want to see her cousin here. This was her home.

  Joe made a kite and one day they took the children on the moor and Hannah ran up the slope, the breath heaving in her chest and as the children leapt down again with Joe, the wind snapping at the yellow kite, tugging at the tail, she lay on the ground and looked at them and at the moss which looked like fir trees close to.

  She heard their cries and shrieks as she lay on her back on the hill and watched the kite and then she rolled over and saw that the children were paddling in the stream, their skirts tucked up in their knickers, their trousers rolled up over their knees and Joe looked and waved and climbed the hill.

  His breath came in pants as he sat down beside her, the string of the kite straining in his hands. His feet were bare and his trousers rolled above the knee. He had strong legs and his hairs were thick and blond. Hannah looked away.

  ‘Sit up, you lazy creature,’ he laughed, his forehead glistening with sweat, ‘and take the string. Everyone should fly a kite or they ain’t worth a nickel, ma’am.’

  Hannah laughed and pushed herself up on to her knees and took the string; her hair had come loose and she had put the pins in her pockets, shaking her hair free, hoping that the rootless patch had now grown over.

  She sat down and felt the tug of the kite at the end of the line. Joe was close now and his hand pulled on the string. ‘Keep working it, Hannah, or she’ll fall to the ground.’

  She turned. His face was close and his eyes followed the swoops of the kite. He laughed, his chin lifting, and he looked down at her, but she had looked from him to the moor, to the children.

  There was such peace here, she thought, smelling his skin near to her, knowing that his hand was on the string, close to hers. It was good to have him close.

  ‘I’d love to fly,’ Joe said and he put his arm round her, taking the kite in both his hands. ‘I’d love to be up there, feeling the air rushing through my hair, seeing so far.’ His breath was in her hair and she leant back against him. Yes, it was so good to have him
close.

  Eliza and Sam came over the day before they left. Joe showed them their apple-loft. The slats were half-empty with wrinkled red and green apples lying along half their length and Eliza said that Hannah must write to Harry and tell him that Joe’s fruit was no better than Sam’s.

  Eliza had lost the dark circles beneath her eyes but she had not forgotten Simon; Hannah knew that because neither had she. She had thought of him as Joe took her hand when they walked back from the moor with the kite and the children. It had made her feel warm and safe as Uncle Simon had always done.

  They moved down through the stable leaving the smell of the apples behind and Hannah looked at the pony who was dry and clean and fresh. She stopped and ran her hand over his flank and Joe had stayed with her.

  ‘I shall be sorry to go,’ she said.

  ‘Stay then,’ Joe replied.

  ‘I can’t. You must know that.’

  Joe did but he still wanted to make her stay though he did not try. He loved her too much.

  They walked out through the yard past the bicycles, the hoops, the tops, the dolls’ prams which were all collected at the side of the stable. Hannah paused looking at a doll which had fallen from the pram and lay with its head broken, displaying white eyes on metal stalks. She turned away looking from the yard out to the garden, to the flowers and the people she loved, knowing that tomorrow she would be back in London, that the time for peace was over.

  17

  Kimberley proved to be worse for Baralong and therefore for Harry too, though he had been pleased at first to reach the open mines, the bustle, the singing wires. Momentarily the change in his surroundings made his blood quicken, his enthusiasm stir again after being buried deep inside him by too many years in the gold-fields. He had stood and watched the endless industry inside the big hole: the men, the buckets, the pulleys, the diamonds which did not glint in this rough state but looked like children’s klip-klip or jack-stones.

  Baralong though was searched each day at the end of the shift, his nostrils, throat and ears examined. He had to jump the pole in the compound and almost immediately Harry lost his joy again but he could say nothing to stop it. He could only talk to his friend quietly, grip his arm as they walked to the steam engine or pulled at a bucket.

  ‘Soon we will be away from here,’ he said but it was not to be as soon as they wished for it took time for Harry to accumulate sufficient funds while still maintaining a life which allayed suspicion amongst his fellow managers. There were still the clubs and bars, still the bets, still laughter which was sour in his throat. He managed to send money to the hospital though and that helped him to sleep at night.

  Baralong did not go to his homeland at the end of his spell of work. He stayed and worked another period because he could not stand the thought of the days in the locked room, naked with only leather fingerless gloves to wear, sitting amongst his own excrement while this was searched for the diamonds that he might have stolen. He sent his money back to his village through another worker.

  Harry took no leave either but worked as his mate did and no one thought it strange for they knew he longed to be back with Esther but needed that all important handful of money first and, after two long years, they had almost enough. He had written to Esther saying that it would not be long now and she had replied that 1913 was such fun at the moment, she could easily wait. Hannah had given her a badge and the suffragettes were in the newspapers all the time; such excitement, darling, she had written. Harry had smiled and put the letter with all the others that he kept in the locked medicine chest, along with the rope he had cut from the horse-chestnut tree. Its green leaves seemed an impossible dream out here.

  He was at the rim on the day when Frank rode up, the day he was never to forget. The men were working deep in the hole, the wires were singing, the buckets were travelling up and down, up and down. His eyes were sore from the limestone and cement of the ridge and he had been rubbing them, not looking at the team working nearest to him. He had pulled his hat low over his eyes and thought of the wagon he had bought and furtively stored in the old zinc-covered shed down from the house which he had rented. It was full now of picks, shovels, sieves, pots and pans. He had one kettle and four sheepskins because he did not know whether Simon’s homestead would have furniture or not, for it was to his own property he had decided they must travel when the time came. He nodded to himself, a sheepskin was comfortable but took little room in the wagon.

  He would take a barrel of salted pork or mutton, mealie, potatoes, tea and sugar but he had not collected them yet. They still had two weeks until Baralong had finished his stint but somehow they must leave before he could be put through the indignity of the search and it was of this he was thinking when he heard Frank’s voice.

  ‘Harry, do you know where your mate is?’ Frank called. He was on horseback and sweat stained his shirt but he still looked a gentleman in his cravat and jacket. It was summer weather although it was the start of the South African winter, Harry thought as he turned to look down the track. It was April 1913 and everywhere was parched after the hot season. He hoped there would be rain soon, even if it was only a light shower. He looked to the sky and then past Frank to the track.

  No, he thought. He did not know where Baralong was. He should be back by now. There was no point in checking the watch his father had given him, it had become clogged with dust months ago. He checked the sun again. Well past midday. Where was he?

  Harry shaded his face with his hand and looked up at Frank. They had barely spoken since Frank had arrived last year, sent across from the Rand to work here for two years; there was too much that Harry wanted to hide, too much that he thought Frank already suspected. The other man’s beard was full of dust. Harry was still clean-shaven except for his moustache.

  ‘He went for tools from the store for me,’ he shrugged. ‘Sometime this morning.’

  Frank leant forward, his arm on his pommel as he flicked at flies with his crop.

  ‘Went without his pass, didn’t he, old man.’

  The words dropped slowly into Harry’s head. He watched the crop, the end was slashed into many fronds and then he moved. Gripping the crop, pulling it from Frank’s grasp.

  ‘He never goes without his pass.’ He was close to the man now, close to his laughing mouth and he wanted to put his boot into that face. He could not hear the noise of the mine or see it, though it was there all around him. All he could see was Baralong’s pass, his bloody pass. He couldn’t have gone without the bloody pass, he wanted to shout.

  Frank pulled back from his grasp, smoothing his coat where Harry had creased it with his hand. ‘Well, he didn’t have it this time, old man. He’s back at the compound. If you hurry you might be in time to see the whipping.’

  He reined his horse round, spurring him into a gallop and his dust blew into Harry’s mouth and eyes but he didn’t notice for he was already running, back to the office past black men who stared at this boss who ran. Bosses never ran in this heat. The black men ran for them.

  Kim was in the shade of the wooden shed and was unsaddled and Harry cursed as he heaved the saddle on and strained and pulled at the girth as Kim shifted, blowing out his stomach. Harry cursed again and slapped the animal and he pulled again and this time he secured the buckle and dragged the horse out into the sunlight, heaving himself up on the stirrup, throwing his leg over and spurring the horse on before he was seated. The fool, how could he have forgotten? But even as he thought this Harry knew that Baralong would never have done something as stupid as that. He must have lost it. Oh God.

  He could not see the compound from the rim but he wasn’t looking, he was too busy riding. He galloped the horse past columns of kaffirs, white foremen, sheds and carts. He dug in his heels, leaning forward, breathing in the dust which was thrown up, tugging Kim to one side as the manager stepped from his office on to the dry track but he did not stop. The manager of the mine called.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Harry, where are you
going?’ But he did not answer, just dragged his cravat up round his face knowing he would ride the man down if necessary but it wasn’t. The mine manager stepped back, his hands up, alarm on his face as he watched Harry ride on past without checking his speed.

  ‘Get on, Kim, get on,’ he shouted, leaving the man behind. Down the tracks leading down the mines, past wagons and trolleys, past more labourers hunched beneath their loads and still he could not see the compound and now he was looking.

  ‘Please let me be in time,’ he said. ‘Let me be in time.’ His cravat became wet from his words but as he saw the fence and the horse which Frank had ridden, as he reined in at the entrance, as he leapt down and did not hobble Kim he saw that he was not in time and it was as though the scene was frozen, as though no one moved and there seemed to be silence.

  Across the bare cracked earth, through the gate, he could see that Baralong was still tied to the wagon wheel. His back was wet with blood which did not show as the fox’s had shown against the white snow. It had dripped to the ground which was now stained with dull red patches. There was movement now; he saw Baralong’s head lift slightly and the men turn as they heard him pass through the gates, but then they looked back to his mate again and now he heard the murmur of their voices. Harry walked faster now, breathing rapidly from the ride, from disgust and rage. He pushed Frank aside and the men who ringed the wheel. Flies were on Baralong’s back, he could see them moving, hear their hum and he wanted to vomit.

  He walked to his friends and his legs were steady and so was his voice as he said to the white man who wore a slouch hat and no jacket and still panted as he held the whip, ‘I’ll take over now.’ He took the whip and laid it against the wagon, gently so that it would not fall and now there really was silence from the crowd. He must be careful, he knew that. Harry undid the leather thongs which tied the black hands wide to the rim of the wheel and he said nothing but worked in time with the gasping breath of Baralong, seeing the fish as it lay on the bank and his father’s dark hands as he crushed its head.