by Lewis Desoto
In the living room Märit pours herself a glass of gin with trembling hands, adds a spray of soda water, then takes a big swallow. The taste is vile and she pours in a few drops of lime cordial and stirs the liquid with her finger. Her hand is trembling, she notices, and her whole body is coiled tightly like a bale of wire.
With her drink in hand she stands at the window and lights a cigarette.
When Ben gets back, she will demand that he do something about this. He is too casual with the workers as it is, and now they think they can treat her as a familiar. They have to learn to respect her. But what can he do? He will think she is overreacting. And she can’t explain to him that she thought for an instant that he was in the bedroom too. It is her own fault for letting Tembi have the run of the house.
Where is Ben? He should have been back by now.
She paces back and forth as she smokes, sipping occasionally at her gin, and slowly calms down as the alcohol uncoils the tightness within her.
She finishes her drink and goes to the cabinet to make another one, then stands sipping it at the window. Shadows from the eucalyptus trees are beginning to stretch across the lawn. Where is Ben? She wonders if she should telephone the van Staden farm and ask if they have seen him. As she turns away from the window her eyes fall upon Tembi’s housecoat, still lying across the couch.
Suddenly a great sadness descends upon Märit, as if the long shadows have come into the room and enveloped her, like a cloak of sorrow. Why is everything so wrong? When she looks out the window at the farm it is a meaningless place—what does it have to do with her? If she were to leave tomorrow, who would care, who would remember? Even Ben, how long would he care? After a while he would find himself a real wife, who could bear him children, who could work next to him on the land.
She hears again the sound of her palm slapping Tembi’s face, what an ugly sound, flesh striking flesh, and she knows that she was wrong in what she did. But she had been confused, everything mixed up in her mind.
It was an overreaction, from the surprise and the shock, from the fear that Ben was in the house, had been in the bed, and the revulsion that thought had given her. And the fear. She sinks down on the couch and bows her head, covering her face as the tears come.
At last she rises and goes through to the bedroom, where she rummages around amongst her jewelry until she finds a bracelet made of blue stone beads—the same color as her dress, another purchase from her honeymoon in Durban—a gift from Ben, bought one afternoon at the Victoria Street Market.
Clutching the bracelet in her fist Märit leaves the house and follows the path that leads to the kraal. The sun is high but the shadows under the trees are thick. A smell of wood smoke fills the air. At the edge of the kraal she pauses, hearing voices. A group of women are standing over the communal fire pit, tending to the big cast-iron cooking pot, one of them stirring the contents with a long wooden spoon. A few chickens peck in the dust near the huts. To one side, outside the washhouse, a man bends over a tap, shirtless, with his head thrust under the gushing water. There is no sign of Tembi.
The women notice her presence and turn towards her, expectantly, ceasing their talk. The man at the tap raises his head, also turning to her with the same air of expectation. A small child wanders over towards Märit, half timid, half curious, his eyes fixed on the blue bracelet dangling from her fingers. Just a little boy, with a smear of mud across his cheek and a patched sweater that is too small for his frame.
“Do you know Tembi?” Märit asks.
The boy nods his head.
“Is she here?”
He shakes his head, his big round eyes held by the gleam of the blue stones in her hand.
Across the clearing the women watch her. The man at the tap has turned and stands with his hands resting on his hips. The beads of moisture glisten on his shoulders in the sun. He returns her gaze without embarrassment, curious, alert to her presence. His skin is wet, smooth, and silky. Just like Dollar, she thinks, the thought rising to her awareness unbidden.
There is no welcome in the faces that watch her, only curiosity, only wariness. She is unable to go forward towards the huts, to cross an unmarked line in the dust.
Märit shakes her head and looks down at the boy. “Give this to Tembi,” she says, thrusting the bracelet towards him. Then she turns and walks back to the house, overcome with a sense of being outside of the life in the kraal, of not being welcome there. She walks back to the safety of the house, a sense of shame upon her.
23
A FAINT PLUME of yellow dust appears above the road that runs past the farm called Kudufontein, a familiar sight to those who live in this district, a signal of the passage of a vehicle between the farms that lie along these sandy roads in the back country near the border.
From the window of the house Märit watches the column of dust as it approaches, fast-moving, thick, perhaps more than one vehicle, someone in a hurry to be somewhere. Is it Ben? she wonders. For some reason she remembers a line from a Sunday school Bible lesson: “By day in a pillar of cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire.”
Two cars come slowly up the drive towards the house—the old blue Mercedes of her neighbors, the van Stadens, and behind it a white Land Rover with dark-tinted windows. There is no third vehicle, no red pickup truck, no Ben.
Märit draws back slightly from the window, her eyes fixed on the Land Rover, on the sinister dark windows.
The cars come to a halt on the driveway in front of the house with a loud crunching of tires on gravel. For a moment nobody alights from the vehicles, nobody reveals himself, while beyond the two cars the plume of yellow dust slowly revolves in the still air, then settles back towards the road.
It is Connie van Staden who first appears, easing herself from the Mercedes, patting away the wrinkles in her dress: a middle-aged woman in dark clothes, dressed formally, dressed in the way one would on a Sunday visit to church, not in the more casual manner of a visit to a neighbor. Her husband, Koos, appears next, unfamiliar to Märit in his suit, but still wearing his ever-present slouch hat. Connie says a word to him across the roof of the car and he takes off his hat. They both peer at the house for a moment, then turn their attention to the white Land Rover.
The driver’s door swings open and a policeman in a gray uniform steps out, settling his cap on his head and flexing his knees to free the cloth of his trousers from his crotch. Märit recognizes him—the sergeant from the police station in Klipspring, a big, boyish man with a soft face. Sergeant Jonker—no, Joubert. He looks at the house before nodding to the van Stadens, and all three turn to look at the Land Rover expectantly.
The man who gets out from the passenger side is a stranger to Märit. A stranger in mirrored sunglasses and civilian clothes: a light-colored safari suit, knee socks, tan desert boots—the uniform favored by government officials during the summer months.
Märit draws back from the window as the man looks up at the house. She notices the posture of deference the sergeant takes with this stranger, and the way that Koos and Connie van Staden look to him, waiting for him to take the first action. Märit keeps her eyes on this man in his safari suit, with his eyes obscured behind the reflective sunglasses. He seems sinister, ominous, foreboding creating an aura around his body. She knows he brings bad news.
As he mounts the steps Märit moves even farther back into the room. She does not want to meet this stranger at her door, she does not want to admit him to her house—if she does not let him enter, he will go away with his news untold, and whatever has happened will not have happened.
The stranger lifts the brass knocker on the door, the knocker in the shape of an ox head, and lets it fall three times, summoning her.
Märit stands paralyzed, staring at the door.
The knocking sounds again, this time made by a hand, bare knuckles on the wood, and she knows it is the stranger who knocks, summoning her.
Her footsteps take her to the door, each step weighted w
ith dread.
As she opens the door the stranger steps back, his hand raised to knock again, his hand lifted as if in a fist against her. Startled, he lowers his arm and steps away from Märit. It is Connie van Staden who steps forward now, her mouth squeezed into a grim line.
“Oh, Märit, Märit.” She lifts her arms to Märit, opening them to embrace. “Oh, Märit, I’m so sorry to come like this.”
The fear and the pity in Connie’s eyes cause Märit to retreat, away from Connie’s reach—she does not want to be embraced by this fear and this pity.
Her throat is tight but she forces the words out. “What has happened? It’s Ben, isn’t it? Tell me what’s happened.”
Connie wrings her hands together. “Oh, Märit, it’s terrible! I don’t know what to say.”
Her husband clears his throat and looks down at his shoes and puts his hands behind his back and avoids Märit’s eyes.
She turns to the stranger. “Is it about Ben? What’s happened to him?”
The policeman steps forward, removing his cap. “Mevrou Laurens, I’m Sergeant Joubert. We met before, you remember, in town, with your husband, when you came to the police station…” He does not finish his sentence.
Now the stranger removes his sunglasses, and Märit sees his eyes, which have no fear, which have no pity or concern, but which are watchful light blue eyes, regarding her with curiosity.
“Our news is not good, I am afraid, Mevrou. Perhaps we had better go inside, where you can sit down.”
He speaks English to her, but with a thick Afrikaans accent, the words clipped and guttural.
“It’s Ben, isn’t it? I know it is. Tell me what has happened to him.” She puts a hand on the door frame to steady herself against the sudden weakness in her legs.
Connie takes Märit by the elbow. “Come, it’s better that we go inside,” she says, and Märit allows herself to be led to a chair.
The others sit, except the stranger. Märit looks up at him, waiting.
“There was an explosion earlier today at the radio tower outside Klipspring. I regret to tell you, Mevrou Laurens, that your husband was killed in that explosion.”
The air goes out of Märit’s lungs, as if this man has punched her in the chest.
So there it is—Death. She knew it was Death the moment she saw this stranger get out of the Land Rover. He has the air of Death around him. He is someone used to talking about Death.
Märit tilts her head back and tries to breathe. The meaning of the words sinks in. Then she grasps—at hope. “By the radio tower? But Ben wasn’t at the radio tower. He went to the station. Why should he be at the radio tower? That’s in the other direction. There must be a mistake.” She swings her head from face to face, searching for confirmation.
Sergeant Joubert takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry, but there is no mistake, Mevrou. I knew your husband. I recognized him.”
The reference to Ben in the past tense is like a door slamming shut on hope.
The stranger sits down now and crosses one leg over the other and looks at her with his watchful, curious expression, without visible sympathy in his pale blue eyes.
“Who are you?” Märit demands angrily, turning on him, because who else is there to blame except this man who comes with Death. “What is your name?”
“Forgive me, I did not introduce myself.” He slips a laminated card from his breast pocket and places it on the polished surface of the coffee table. “Gideon Schoon. Security Branch—Defense Forces.” Märit ignores the card, and after a moment he retrieves it and buttons it into his pocket again.
“What is this to do with you?” Märit says. “Ben wasn’t at the radio tower. He went to the station to fetch a load of seedlings.” She shakes her head, trying to grasp everything that has been said. “What explosion?”
“A bomb was planted at the tower, sometime last night we believe. A terrorist action. It appears that the terrorists also buried a land mine on the road near the tower. Your husband was in his truck, on that road. Evidently his vehicle triggered the land mine, killing him in the resulting explosion.”
She can’t form an image to go with his words. “Killing him…?” she mutters. Then she looks at Connie and Koos van Staden, and at the sergeant. “Where is Ben?” she appeals to them. “I want to see him. I don’t believe any of this. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“First it is necessary for me to ask you some questions, Mevrou,” Schoon says. “Then we can take you to see your husband.”
“Are you sure it’s Ben?” Märit asks the sergeant, ignoring the other man. “How do you know for sure?”
“It was his truck, Mevrou, the red pickup.”
“There are other trucks like that.”
“I’m sorry, but it was him. I recognized him…the body.” He looks down at his hands, shaking his head.
Connie van Staden rises to her feet and puts a reassuring hand on Märit’s shoulder. “Can’t these questions wait, Captain Schoon? It’s not the right time now.”
“Time is of the essence,” he replies. “I intend to apprehend these criminals.” He leans forward to Märit. “Now, the road your husband was on, Mevrou Laurens, it does not lead to this farm. There is a fork outside of Klipspring that branches away towards the radio tower and the border. Can you tell me why your husband would be on that road, traveling in the opposite direction from his home?”
“He went to the station, to fetch seedlings that he had ordered. He wants to plant almond trees. He would have come straight home.”
“Do you have acquaintances over there?” Schoon asks. “Maybe he was going to visit someone? Does he go that way often?”
“No,” she says slowly, shaking her head.
“No? Let me ask you this, Mevrou. Do you or your husband have contact with any persons across the border? Did he ever travel there? Did you go with him?”
“Where? I don’t know what you are talking about.”
Schoon studies Märit a moment without speaking.
“Did your husband get on well with the kaffirs who work here?”
“That is not a word Ben uses. Neither do I!”
“Very well,” Schoon comments with a shrug. “Let me put it this way—what was your husband’s relation with his workers? Did he discuss the political situation with them?”
“Ben treats the workers well. Fairly. With respect.”
“And you, Mevrou? Do you socialize with the blacks? Do you have them into the house?”
Märit does not answer. She looks at Schoon’s hands, which are small and thick, with strands of fine dark hair growing on the back of his fingers, and the sight of his hands fills her with revulsion, almost a sexual revulsion against his maleness. There is an over-sweet smell of hair oil around him. He seems to her not a man, but some kind of animal, compact and thick-bodied, in his safari suit and his knee socks, and with his small hyena-like eyes.
She wants to stand up from her chair and order him from the house, this announcer of Death, this scavenger. But her limbs feel heavy, leaden. And what is the use, what will change? Märit stares past him, through him. It doesn’t matter—nothing matters. What is this man to her? Nothing.
“How would you describe your husband’s political sympathies, Mevrou Laurens?”
“Ben is a farmer.” She cannot bring herself to use the past tense. Nothing of this is quite real to her. Ben will come back. This strange interrogation is only a dream, outside of reality.
Schoon waits for her to continue, and when she does not, he jerks his head with a small gesture of irritation. “Ja, we know that, but did he favor the present way of life here, did he want change, did he work with anybody from outside? Have there been strangers visiting him? Does he know about explosives?”
Märit turns on him angrily. “Why are you asking me all these questions? Where is my husband?”
“I need to know these things, Mevrou Laurens,” Schoon answers, unperturbed.
The faces look at Märit expectantly, as if some
revelation on her part will explain away everything.
“Ben is a farmer, that’s all,” Märit says.
Then Koos van Staden clears his throat apologetically and says, “If you don’t mind me saying this, Captain Schoon, I knew Ben Laurens, and I think you are barking up the wrong tree here, so to speak.”
Schoon runs a finger across each side of his mustache. He turns his head to look at Koos, then at the sergeant, who sits gazing down at his hands sheepishly. Schoon focuses his attention on Märit again. He takes a deep breath and softens his voice as he speaks. “We are all on the same side here. These terrorists, these criminals who come into our country at night like cowards and plant their bombs, killing innocent people, they are the enemy. Innocent people, Mevrou, like your husband. I don’t have to tell you that we are all in danger—anyone who lives on an isolated farm is in danger. You might not like me, because I have to bring the bad news and ask the questions, and I accept that—but I have to ask them.”
Schoon looks around the room again. “With your permission, Mevrou, I will have to bring a team in here and question your workers.”
And if I refuse, she wants to say, but does not because she sees the utter disregard for her opinion in his eyes.
She feels very tired and heavy, and she feels old, so very old and so very far away from these three strangers in her house. None of this makes sense to her. Yet at the same time a terrible, final certainty has descended on her.
“I don’t care what you do,” Märit mutters.
Ben is gone. Ben is dead. Without him the farm means nothing to her. She suddenly feels an intense loneliness. If only her mother were here, to hold her, to tell her that everything will be all right. But she is alone in all the world now.
