Tandia

by Bryce Courtenay

  There was a burst of disbelieving laughter from the court and Dreyer was forced to use his gavel and call for silence. Tandia smiled at Bronkhorst. 'I am not a mechanical person, sergeant. The choke? The petrol? What is the connection ?'

  'Ja, okay, I will explain.' Bronkhorst, not in the least phased by the laughter, seemed to be enjoying himself. 'When it's cold, in the winter, you know in the mornings, and you want to start an engine you got to give it more petrol, you have to open the valve to the distributor more, so you've got what is called a choke. It's usually on the dashboard just under the steering wheel so you can pull it out, it's just a button on the end, a little lever, and you pull it out and when you start the engine you pump the accelerator a couple of times to pump more petrol which goes in the distributor and the engine starts and won't stall because it's getting extra petrol. That's why you call it the petrol because, you see, what you doing is feeding the engine more petrol. When I said, "Petrol. Push the petrol down," I meant for the driver to push in the choke.'

  'I see, and why should he do that?' Tandia asked.

  'Well kaffir drivers, I mean Bantu drivers, they leave the choke out and forget to push it back and it races the engine and wastes a helluva lot of petrol. It's just something you do automatically, when you get in a lorry with a Bantu driver, you look at the choke and if it's out, you make him push it in.' He paused, looking around the court, and then added, 'The government tells us all the time we mustn't waste petrol. If the Arabs want they can cut off our petrol any time they like. We making our own at Sa sol, outside Vereeniging, out of coal, but it's not yet enough. Petrol must not be wasted!' He offered this gratuitous advice seemingly to all the court and appeared to be very pleased with himself.

  'Let me see now, sergeant. You are about to leave, there is a lot of shouting, confusion and panic, yet you calmly give the driver an instruction to push in the choke?'

  'Who's panicking?' Bronkhorst asked, pulling his head back and raising his eyebrows. 'Maybe them, but not me. As far as I am concerned it was a routine job.'

  'Yet a moment ago you said, people usually co-operate?'

  'Ja, with EOs, but I'm a plain-clothes officer, panic and shouting you come across all the time, man.'

  'You said a choke is needed in the cold weather, in the mornings in winter, but it was half past three in the afternoon on 5 December last year, not exactly winter? Why would you instruct the driver to push in the petrol, the…er, choke?'

  Bronkhorst grinned. 'That's the whole point I'm trying to make, man! You see, the black people, when they drive they just use the choke any time, summer, winter, any time they get in a lorry, when they start an engine they use the choke, then they leave it on, sticking out full throttle. It wastes a helluva lot of petrol. Sometimes they miles down the road when they remember to push it in again. Sometimes they don't even remember.'

  Tandia noted the look of relief on Geldenhuis's face. He'd seen what was coming and was relieved. Bronkhorst had been smart enough not to fall into Tandia's trap. 'Thank you, Sergeant Bronkhorst, you have been very patient. Perhaps you will help me a little more to understand?' Tandia used one of her long pauses and the police sergeant dropped his answer neatly into her deliberate silence.'

  'Certainly'.

  'Thank you. You are in the cabin of the lorry now, moving forward, and you tell the driver in a calm voice to push the choke in. What were your words again?'

  'Petrol. Push the petrol down.' Bronkhorst said, grinning.

  'And you didn't see Mrs Katie Kembeni standing in front of the truck screaming up at you?'

  'Ja, that's right, man, I didn't see her.'

  'And hear, you didn't hear her screaming?'

  'I was looking at the driver, concentrating on the choke, there was lots of noise, lots of women screaming and shouting, I didn't take any notice.'

  'But with all the noise going on, all the confusion, you were still able to say to the driver in a quiet voice, "Petrol. Push the petrol down"?'

  The court was hushed as Tandia waited for Bronkhorst's answer, but again the policeman didn't panic. 'The windows were closed in the lorry, we do that in case somebody throws something inside. I was looking down at the choke, my eyes were not on the road in front. What happened was all in a couple of seconds, I was pointing to the choke and then I looked at the driver and said, "Petrol. Push the petrol down.'"

  And he didn't understand you and put his foot on the petrol, I mean, of course, the accelerator. No doubt he was looking at you and not at the road either?' Tandia said.

  'Ja, that's perfickly true.' Bronkhorst said, feigning surprise. 'You can ask him yourself if you like. He was looking straight at me when he put his foot down, I can testify to that fact.'

  Tandia smiled brightly at Bronkhorst. 'I'm sure you will, Sergeant. You spoke. to him in a quiet, reasoning voice and he panicked and slammed his foot down hard on the petrol, the accelerator?'

  'Ja, I dunno why he did that, maybe he was panicking a little from the crowd, you know, the noise and all the onlookers.'

  'Was this the noise he couldn't hear because the cabin windows were closed and the onlookers he couldn't see because he was looking directly at you?'

  Bronkhorst drew his head back impatiently. The noise had been going on a long time, he knew it was there outside, his eyes were on me only a matter of a few seconds while I talked, it must have been then when the woman, Mrs Kembeni, escaped from custody of the Black Jack and came to the front of the lorry.'

  Tandia swung away from the witness box, her black advocate's gown swirling around with her movement to reveal a smart tailored black suit underneath. With her black high-heel shoes she looked perfectly stunning. Thank you, Sergeant Bronkhorst.' She turned to Magistrate Dreyer. 'I have no further need for Sergeant Bronkhorsf, your honour. Now I would like to call Thomas Motlana to the stand.'

  Dreyer used his gavel again. 'The accused may stand down, call Thomas Motlana,' he said, getting the black man's name right on this occasion.

  Tandia was quick with Motlana, simply starting at the point where the police sergeant had spoken to him, asking the black driver what he had heard. Predictably the black man repeated the words, sotto voce, in a similar vein to the sergeant. As Sergeant Bronkhorst had said, his attention was drawn from the front of the truck to the policeman's face and he had reacted automatically, thinking the sergeant meant the accelerator. He'd put his foot down on the petrol and the truck shot forward, killing Katie Kembeni. Tandia then asked Motlana if he drove the same lorry all the time, to which he replied that he didn't, but used anyone of five lorries; he'd been given the Dodge GG 1728 for this particular job.

  After the driver Thomas Motlana had been excused from the witness stand Tandia returned to the bench and retrieved a file. With the file under her arms she walked over to the bench and, opening it, she withdrew two sheets of paper. 'Your honour, I submit for the scrutiny of this court three documents. The first is a government bulletin dated 10 August 1964, directing that during the summer months until I May, all government vehicles over a one-ton limit must have their choke cable removed to conserve petrol!'

  A murmur rose from the court. 'This second document is an affidavit from the government garage in Randfontein. It stipulates that all GG vehicles over three tons on the road this summer comply with this instruction. And furthermore,' Tandia removed a small receipt from the file. 'I have here the mechanic's time sheet which shows that GG 1728, a blue Dodge three-ton vehicle, the property of Bantu Administration and Development, had its choke cable removed by government mechanic D. Du Plooy on 28 November 1964, one week before the incident.

  'Your honour, I submit that both the accused could not have acted as they have claimed and that Sergeant Bronkhorst did instruct driver Thomas Motlana in a voice intended to be instantly obeyed, with the words, "Petrol! Push the petrol down!" meaning to place his foot hard down on the accelerator in order to run ov
er Mrs Katie Kembeni, and that doing this he is directly responsible for having committed a deliberate act of premeditated murder!'

  In his summing up Magistrate Dreyer admitted that due care had not been taken by the driver of the truck due to the noise and urgency of the situation at the time, that Sergeant Bronkhorst may have mistaken anyone of several round buttons on the dashboard for the choke. He added that Captain Geldenhuis, counsel for both the accused, had demonstrated this by pointing out that the sergeant was not familiar with the layout of a Dodge three-ton truck, that the driver had indeed misinterpreted the police sergeant's instructions and while his attention was momentarily diverted he'd reacted somewhat in panic by placing his foot down hard on the accelerator.

  He declared Bronkhorst not guilty and Motlana guilty of manslaughter but with mitigating circumstances. The driver was given a six-month suspended sentence and fined ten pounds. Two weeks after the trial Alfred Kembeni was endorsed out and sent back to the Transkei.

  Both Peekay and Tandia began to despair. They were fighting cases in which the evidence had patently been tampered with by the police or witnesses had been intimidated, tortured or murdered, but more and more even the best argued defence was simply being ignored in court. Magistrates such as Dreyer were commonplace and patently sympathetic to the activity of the Special Branch; it was becoming increasingly difficult to prepare a case with precision and care when the court lists showed one of these men presiding.

  Every time they lost one of the old guard, men such as Magistrate Coetzee, he was replaced by someone who soon showed his Broederbond background and responded to the honour the government had bestowed on him in appointing him to the bench with bigotry and blatantly racially motivated decisions.

  When, despite all the forces ranged against them, Red successfully challenged the meaning of a law and won an important case, within a few weeks of the victory the law would be changed, thus eliminating the legal precedent involved.

  Finally Peekay and Tandia lost Magistrate Coetzee, or to put it more correctly Magistrate Coetzee retired to his beloved farm on a bend of the Crocodile River, near Barberton, in the Eastern Transvaal. The South African Bar Association held a reception for him and gave him silver plate, the ubiquitous tray with the EPNS stamp on the back and the usual fatuous dedication on the front:

  J. H. Coetzee

  In grateful appreciation for thirty-five years on the bench.

  The girls at Bluey Jay sent him a case of his favourite Cape brandy and a poem penned by Sarah which read:

  Magistrate Coetzee

  We love you so

  We hear it's time

  for you to go

  From now on it's free

  if you feel randy…

  But if you don't,

  enjoy the brandy!

  Mama Tequila also sent him the Boer Mauser, the old rifle that had been such an important part of his dalliance with Sarah.

  The people of Soweto collected enough money to purchase a blue Fordson tractor and a red disc plough. A brass plate fitted to the side of the engine read:

  For the Induna Coetzee

  Who ploughed the land for the seeds of freedom for all the people.

  From the citizens of Soweto.

  The Special Branch heard about this proposed gift and reported it to Pretoria who 'suggested' to Magistrate Coetzee that the gift was unacceptable and that it should be turned down. Magistrate Coetzee, however, accepted the gift with humility and with a speech which was widely quoted, calling for understanding and compassion from the legal system.

  Alas, the small blue tractor never reached it destination; it was sent by rail and offloaded onto a railway siding near Magistrate Coetzee's small farm. When he came to collect it someone had taken a ten-pound hammer to both it and the disc plough, destroying them beyond repair. Scrawled on the ground beside the battered little tractor were the two words, kaffir boetie.

  Though the small brass plate had received more than one direct hit, the words on it were. still legible and Magistrate Coetzee unbolted it, straightened it out in his workshop, polished it with Brasso and screwed it to the front door of his small farmhouse. He polished it himself every week, not allowing the black woman who looked after the house and cooked for him to touch it.

  Two weeks after the incident with the tractor and plough, and six weeks after his retirement, the old magistrate was placed under house arrest. The government had simply waited for his talk to the people of Soweto to grow cold before they placed a restraint order on him forbidding him to communicate with the press and confining him to his farm and a once-a-week visit into Barberton to do his shopping, where he was not allowed to be in the presence of more than one person at a time.

  When Tandia heard of the detention notice, with Johnny Tambourine at the wheel of her Volkswagen she drove down to Magistgrate Coetzee's farm called Eendrag, which means unity and harmony, in the sense of all the people being together of one accord.

  Tandia and Johnny Tambourine left Johannesburg after lunch and arrived at the farm just on sunset. The old man was sitting on the stoep with a decanter of brandy and he stood to welcome Tandia, formally shaking her by the hand. When Tandia introduced Johnny Tambourine he did the same. Magistrate Coetzee's grip was firm and his smile was welcoming.

  'I must apologize, but I am under house arrest. As you probably know I may not see more than one person at a time.'

  Johnny looked around him expecting to see someone, a security man, posted to watch the old man.

  Magistrate Coetzee laughed. 'No, no, there is no one here. Only us and my servant at the back. You must indulge an old man, after thirty-five years as a man of the law I tell myself this is stupid, but then again another part of me says, "Coetzee, the law is still the law!" and this other part of me always wins. I have asked the old woman who looks after me to give you a nice supper and there is a clean room with a new mattress and blankets on the bed in the servants' quarters for you to stay tonight.'

  Johnny Tambourine grinned. He didn't know quite what to make of the craggy old man with the bulbous nose as red as a turkey's crop. 'It's okay, man, I'm a guy who can look after myself.'

  Magistrate Coetzee grinned back. He'd probably never been spoken to in such a familiar way in his entire life. 'Two months ago in my court, talk like that would have earned you the sjambok. You're a cheeky bloody kaffir, Johnny Tambourine, but I'm glad you're here to look after Miss Tandy as well!'

  Johnny Tambourine laughed. The honours were even, the old man hadn't tried to patronize him. He gave Magistrate Coetzee an informal salute and wandered off to the back of the house with Tandia's overnight bag. This place was so quiet. He'd become aware of the silence the moment he'd turned off the high whine of the VW's air-cooled engine. He could feel it, it was a distinctly spooky sort of quiet, a nothing-is-happening-in-this-place sort of silence. No engine noises, bicycle bells, car engines, the sudden cry of a child, the sharp bounce of a tennis ball as the kids played soccer in the street, the laughter of people, the sudden roar of a bus passing, the coal man rattling along in his donkey cart, the repetitive notes of a mine worker strumming his guitar and the call of the woman mealie vendor with her golden cobs of roast corn carried in a white enamel dish on her head. Already he was missing Soweto.

  The only noises Johnny Tambourine heard now were from the birds and insects. Christ, there must be a hundred things around here to bite a person! Like snakes! He'd heard how snakes like the cool and came into people's houses in the country and sometimes even got into your bed.

  Johnny Tambourine was so busy scanning the bush beyond the yard that he didn't notice a large black hen pecking away in his path. The hen, alarmed at his sudden approach, jumped into the air with a 'Schwark!', its feathers flapping. Johnny Tambourine's feet also left the ground and Tandia's bag went flying; he seemed to peddle the air for a moment, like a Tom and Jerry cartoon, before he realiz
ed it was only an old black hen.

  That was it! That was the trouble with coming into the bush, all of a sudden a guy has to live like a fucking peasant! Looking out for things he doesn't even know about. Sounds don't make sense any more. You couldn't even trust a hen to sound right. No wonder all the guys from the country wanted to come into the city. It was definitely dangerous out here, the most dangerous place he'd ever been.

  Johnny Tambourine retrieved Tandia's bag and opened the screen door leading into the kitchen at the back of the house.

  'I see you, Mother,' he said politely to the old woman bent over a scrubbed pine table kneading a large lump of dough, her quick black hands disappearing into the white dough and then out again.

  The old woman didn't look up at his entrance. 'Tell me, my son,' she asked, 'where you come from, are the people afraid of hens?'

  Tandia sat on the stoep with Magistrate Coetzee. It was like being back at Bluey Jay on a Sunday morning when everyone slept. So quiet and peaceful. You could see the riverbank and then the cool glint of the setting sun on water beyond.

  A flock of guinea fowl appeared at the water's edge. It was too far to see them clearly but she'd seen them often enough when she'd been on walks with Juicey Fruit Mambo into the hills around Bluey Jay. The guinea fowl was a pretty bird, the size of a smallish hen with a bright grey-purple head and a hornlike cockscombe sweeping back from its small beak. It possessed sharp little beady eyes, a lot more suspicious than a hen's. Grey feathers, patterned with minute white dots, swept back smoothly into a beetlebacked body to gave it the appearance of a church elder, which was further characterized by the way it walked. Guinea fowl seemed to rock slightly as they walked on their short blue legs, always on the move, never pausing, busy as anything.