Women Are Bloody Marvellous! And Other Stories

by Betty Burton

  In that heat the prisoners laboured, and the old man with the bundle sat without shade watching them, moving only occasionally to mop the back of his neck and the lining of his hat. The white guard had gone into the cool, empty flats and the black guards squatted in the shade and sjamboked flies.

  At mid-day the building-site tea-boy banged an empty oil-drum. The white guard, wearing only uniform trousers and shirt, emerged from the building and shouted at the gang who threw down their tools and stumbled over to some tin sheds. The man was still sitting beside the wall. Suddenly his name came to me, Kumalo! Mr Kumalo. Still I could not remember where I had seen him before. Strange that I should know his name, I mean that he was Mr Kumalo, for nobody that I mixed with ever used anything but a first name for an African — indeed one couple had said that in all their twenty years in the Republic they had never called their servants anything except 'Jim' or 'Mary'.

  I asked all the domestic workers on the first floor if they knew a Mr Kumalo, none of them did. In bed that night I asked John.

  'Reverend Kumalo — 'Cry, the Beloved Country,' he said.

  Of course. How odd. Why...? Then I remembered where and when I had seen the old man, and why I had associated him with the character in the novel. Both real and fictitious men were Zulu. Rev. Kumalo was 'Inkosi' and I had thought that my man must be a chief, both men had gone downhill. The fictitious Kumalo had wandered about Johannesburg looking for his son and had found him in prison. My old man had spoken of 'sickness of the heart' and of being shut up in a cell.

  We had come together briefly, strangely. One afternoon I was in an unfrequented part of the zoo park and had come across a polar bear pacing back and forth, compulsively, in a tiny, grim cage. The old man and I had looked down at the tormented animal. He had asked me about the creature — the 'Ice Bear' he had called it. Until the Mandela Wall, I had not seen him since we had both stood looking at the bear's empty cage after the animal had been destroyed.

  That time at the zoo he was obviously going through a bad time and I would have liked to have said something to him, but I had not been very long in the city, did not understand the nuances of apartheid and was afraid to put a foot wrong, so we did not speak except about the Ice Bear.

  And now here he was watching those men in the wretched prison gang.

  I now knew more about apartheid; the most important thing being that 'Do Not' usually applied mainly to blacks. I became extremely sensitive about asking black Africans anything about themselves, and would have rather been in trouble with the authorities than ask to see a Passbook which on occasion I should have done.

  He came every day for two weeks, arriving in the morning and leaving only after the iron gate clanged shut. And every day I made up my mind to go over the road and speak to him and every day I didn't go. Now the only parts of the wall left standing were two brick piers. On the day they were being broken I decided to speak to the old man.

  The meeting wasn't easy for either of us. He was courteous, said that he remembered me as the Madam at the Ice Bear's cell. I was awkward and hesitant, knowing that I probably appeared patronizing, and aware that the guards were watching and trying to pretend that they were not.

  'You have lost weight,' I said, 'aren't you well?' His head kept up a nodding. Parkinson's Disease or something like that I assumed.

  'I am not so young, M'em.'

  An awkward silence.

  'I live over there ... I have seen you every day.'

  He looked interested.

  'I ... didn't like to come before.'

  'There is one there who brings tea. The one...' He gestured, humped-backed. He said everything slowly, hesitantly, and I guessed that he had never mastered the difficulties of English and Afrikaans.

  'That will be David — he is very kind.'

  He kept up the nodding.

  'Very kind.'

  Another silence.

  'Also he allows the use of...' He could not find the word so mimed washing his hands, then offered, 'Ablutions?'

  We stood again side by side watching torment. He must have made the connection too, but what could he say that would mean anything to a blonde, white-skinned woman, young enough to be his daughter, possibly his granddaughter, who lived in the air-conditioned glass tower across the road? What could I say to him that wouldn't sound inappropriate or fatuous?

  'It is terrible to be in prison — like these men.' And it was fatuous in the utterance.

  'It is so. The mind goes sick.'

  'Like the bear,' I said.

  'The Ice Bear was shot dead.'

  'Men jump from prison windows.'

  I have never known what to make of the look he gave me then. He started to say something but did not finish the sentence, for one of the black guards strode towards us. He said something to the old man that I did not understand. He looked angry and slapped the rhino-tail sjambok against his bare knees, and appeared to be telling the old man to clear off.

  'Leave him alone,' I said. 'He's not bothering anybody.'

  'I say to him to stop bothering the Madam.'

  'I came to speak to him. He's not bothering me.'

  He touched his forehead in salute to me and mumbled an apology; then, turning on his heels military fashion, strode away.

  I felt embarrassed for the old man.

  'It is the job that he does makes him like that,' I said. 'He's probably all right out of uniform.'

  He didn't say anything but just gazed at the last bits of the Mandela Wall being broken down. Still making the association with the Reverend Kumalo of the novel I wondered if this man had been looking for his son. It fitted. David had suggested that the men breaking up the wall by hand, instead of with a bulldozer as the flats had been demolished, were probably political prisoners who were having their noses rubbed in their own handiwork. I guessed that he knew one of the prisoners. Why else had he come day in and day out and sat close to the men doing hard labour?

  Our brief exchanges had been about being behind bars, about madness. And now this prison gang. John had recently suggested that staying in this country caused me to suffer from heightened awareness. Nobody comes casually upon characters from novels acting out the plot.

  'I have two sons,' I said at last.

  He smiled politely, measuring his hand a couple of feet from the ground. 'Small sons?'

  I replied with each of my hands at different levels, 'One not so small. Have you some children?'

  'Yes, M'em.'

  I don't know what pushed me into asking him.

  'Is one of them...?' I indicated the gang.

  'Yes, M'em. I have a son here.' He raised his voice. 'I tell you, M'em, my son is here. I have found him. He ran from his own child. He is ...'he searched for the English word, 'dog ordure!'

  The black guard with the sjambok stepped forward, started in our direction, changed his mind and marched off to the flat that his white superior used as a kind of rest-room.

  'I have found my son. What he does is shameful to my family, my own people.' He was shouting now. 'I pray that the dear Jesus will forgive him, for I cannot. That is the one. Dog ordure!' and he pointed to the black guard with the sjambok.

  3 KIZA

  'Hey! You, boy!'

  Kiza heard her husband's voice.

  'Ja, Baas?' The same voice thick with sleep, he answered his own question.

  Hidden by the tattered canvas curtain, she heard him stir. Mtolo giggled, excited at the novelty of having Grandfather in the hut, Grandfather who talked loudly in his sleep, and introduced the smell of hand-rolled cigarettes into the hut, a man smell.

  She shushed the boy.

  'Be quiet. If you cannot do this, then make yourself useful. Go and collect sticks. See that the mealie-pap does not burn. Sweep the yard.'

  'Why does he call "Hey! You, boy" and then answer himself?'

  ' "He"? Who is "He"? Children these days have no respect. When you talk of your grandfather, be respectful.'

  'But — he asks q
uestions and answers them himself.'

  'You are a chattering monkey. Come and tend the fire.' She tried to put authority into her voice, without success. The boy was the delight of her old age, she kissed the shadow of his footsteps.

  Behind the screen, Ngubeni, with stiff movements, pulled on his patched and mended best trousers. To a gecko, bright green against the smoky brown of the hut roof, he said 'Dier — animal', a reflex action from years of translating into the English and Boer languages before speaking.

  He tied back the canvas curtain and stood looking about the room which was a cube whose walls were pasted with pages cut from white women's magazines — haute cuisine dishes and exotic holiday illustrations being the favourites. A small, enamelled stove, a table and shelves made from soft deal timber, a three-legged stool were pushed back against three walls; on the fourth behind the piece of curtain was the iron-framed bed. On the shelves were displayed those possessions which were prized but seldom used, and several photos in plaster and gilt frames, each gleaming dark face looking very much like the next.

  Squatting against the outside wall, Kiza heard him shuffling about, and the small sounds as he touched objects.

  'I have come home,' he said, and there in the quiet of the tin hut there were no heads to turn as there had been in the city when he conversed with himself.

  'This is my home.' Nodding agreement he went to the washing water and freshened his face and hands.

  Not wishing him to know that he had been overheard, Kiza moved away from the wall and approached the hut from a little way off.

  'You will have some mealie-pap?' she called.

  'A small amount.'

  The old woman lowered her eyelids and shook her head. 'Skin and bone. Small amounts! Small amounts!' Tut-tutting she went to a shelf, took down one of the two willow-patterned bowls displayed there, dusted it with her threadbare apron and went into the yard.

  The old man followed her and watched as she stirred the porridge pot. The boy, Mtolo, commandeered the spoon and took over, Kiza chiding him in the manner of any grandmother with her favourite grandson.

  'Homeland!' said the old man to the open veldt. They looked up from the porridge pot, she indicating to the boy who was ready to comment, that he say nothing.

  'Homeland! Why this place? I have never seen this place! I was born in the city.' He addressed the jagged outline of the horizon.

  'This wife of mine, she was born in the old township before it was pushed back into the earth. Do you remember the shooting?'

  Kiza, not knowing whether he was talking to herself, the mountains or to himself, nodded.

  'It is ready for the milk.'

  The boy's voice was commanding. Kiza scurried to an earthenware crock covered with a wet cloth and brought out a jam-jar of milk, and they both watched with interest as she poured milk while the boy stirred the mealie-pap. Fussily, she filled the patterned bowl, and Mtolo carried his grandfather's breakfast into the hut and placed it on the sanded deal table.

  Kiza and the boy took up places, side by side, on the iron-frame bed that was used as seating during the day, ready to watch the old man eat his homecoming breakfast. He looked into the bowl and sniffed at the steam with pleasure.

  'Hmm, proper mealie-pap,' he said.

  Kiza looked at Mtolo and nodded, she had told him that that was what Grandfather would say.

  The old man was about to start eating when Kiza jumped to her feet and stayed his hand.

  'I have lost my brains today.'

  The boy giggled. 'You cannot lose something you never had.'

  'What are we going to do with you?' she said indulgently.

  Ngubeni waited patiently, hot steam rising from the bowl, interest in food returning at the sweet smell.

  Kiza took down a tin box. Long ago he had bought it, filled with biscuits, on the morning that they had made their marriage vows at the corrugated-iron chapel in Victoria Township. One of the native stores had marked down the boxes in price to a few cents. The biscuits had been their wedding feast.

  On the box lid was a picture of a white king, and she had told her strong, virile husband that she didn't think that the man on the box was much of a king compared with the one beside her. Now, as she removed the lid, she caught his glance for a moment and quickly looked away.

  'I forgot the spoon,' she said, and placed one of her best spoons on the table then went back to sit by the boy.

  'Grandfather. Are you going to stay with us now?'

  The old man pursed his lips and raised his eyebrows suggesting that it was something that he had not much thought about. As though it was a thing about which he had some choice.

  'I think I shall stay. I have finished with city life.' He glanced up from his bowl. Kiza concentrated upon the intricate key-pattern on her skirt, tracing the lines with her thumbnail.

  'Grandfather. What food did you eat in the city?'

  'Mealies. But not good mealie-pap like this.'

  Kiza looked at the boy, disappointment showed in his face. Was it so long since Ngubeni had been with children that he had forgotten that small boys do not necessarily want to hear true things? Mtolo wanted the, second-hand flavour of city life. He wanted the advertisements he saw in dog-eared magazines at the native store to come to life in the mouth of his grandfather from the city.

  'My overseas Madam once gave me a whole Christmas cake to myself. It came from England. In a jet aircraft — from overseas.'

  'With white sugar on it?' Mtolo asked, 'and little people, and trees and birds and snow-houses?'

  'Yes, like that. Somewhere I believe I still have one of the people.'

  Eagerly Mtolo said, 'Can I see it?'

  'You may have it to keep.'

  The boy looked pleased. 'Thank you, Grandfather. Have you seen snow?'

  'One time in winter they made snow statues in the gardens.'

  'And was it...'

  Kiza motioned to the boy to be quiet, and watched the old man who was her husband and whom she scarcely knew. He finished his porridge and then some strong tea, and bread, then sat back and rolled up a cigarette.

  Suddenly the boy said, 'Did you find my father?'

  Kiza saw that her husband was nonplussed by the question, coming as it did when he was beginning to relax, and coming as it did from the boy. He concentrated on shreds of tobacco.

  'Is your father lost then? Did he drop down a crack in the road?'

  Kiza shook her head at him. 'He knows that you have been trying to find his father. He is ten years. Old enough.'

  Ten years. It was both a long and a short time ago. Ten years since the riots. Ten years since the armoured police vehicle had ploughed into the chanting crowd in the Township killing the boy's mother. Ten years since their son had disappeared into the city. Ten years that she had lived with the boy in this bare land.

  The old man nodded to himself.

  'I thought the boy was younger.'

  'He is old enough.'

  Old enough? To know what? To understand what? About truth, honour, loyalty to one's tribe. Her husband's head kept up its nodding.

  Kiza wondered if this was the beginning of some affliction of age, the shaking that came to some people.

  The old man ran the tip of his tongue along the cigarette paper, rolled it and pinched off the ends, then lighted the tobacco and rested his back against the hut wall.

  Again Kiza started tracing the key pattern, and pulling at odd frayed threads...

  The old awkwardness between them.

  They had been married for thirty years, made children, yet there had not been many days in total that they had spent together. There was always this period of readjustment, a strangeness between them, a tension. It was the same for other women who for most of their lives worked in the cities as servants until their joints grew too stiff to kneel to polish and scrub; who lived separate lives from their men; who were heads of their families — until the men returned, and they had to step down.

  'How are the
bones?'

  Kiza looked up at him, puzzled, not understanding how his thoughts had got from talk of the boy's age to 'how are the bones?'.

  'The arthritis bones ... do they hurt you still?'

  'It is a drier air in this place ... they get no worse.' She kneaded her knuckles, wondering if she had in any way shown her resentment at his intrusion into her life with the boy.

  Now she waited quietly for him to answer the question that the boy had asked. He would speak when he was ready.

  She had known for several years that their son, the fine handsome son who had been her husband's pride, had not disappeared into the city, had not, distraught with grief, gone to take revenge upon the driver of the police vehicle who had driven into Mtolo's mother as she suckled the baby and watched the protest gathering of schoolchildren. This was what Kiza had told the boy when he had needed something to boast of.

  'When they killed my mother in the riots, my father went out to kill the ones who did it. When he has done the revenge he will come and I will live with him,' he could say.

  There was no reason to tell him that his father had gone to join his city wife who also suckled his children. No point in saying that he had joined the city police, or to say that she had once seen him. He had been in uniform, armed and carrying a sjambok. He was the native guard of prisoners in leg-chains, men of their own tribe. No reason to say that his father worked in that prison where people jump from high windows because of the things that are done to them.

  But men are different. They thought it womanish to hide from truth. Kiza knew that the old man, before finally leaving the city, had gone looking for their son. If she had her way she would have left matters where they were. What good would it do the boy to know? He had little enough to give him pride as it was, being brought up by such a poor shred as herself, in this place that the white baas law had said must be their home.

  'The boy is very like him.' His face was turned to the boy, but his words were for her. 'I searched the city for many days.'