Whitethorn

by Bryce Courtenay

  I accepted the small single sheet of paper and, brushing away my tears for the second time in several minutes, glanced at it. The handwriting was elegant and the note read: I am Frikkie Botha and you are Voetsek. I can’t speak.

  It was written in Afrikaans, of course, as Frikkie couldn’t speak English, the elegant hand came from Duiwelskrans school where he too had been educated, mostly with a steel-edged ruler across his knuckles, until the slant and formation of the letters were perfect. I was dumbstruck and it took me several moments to recover from this second shock.

  ‘Can you hear me, Frikkie?’ I asked at last.

  He nodded his head. I was suddenly lost for words. Where was I to begin? How could I ask him questions that simply required a nod in reply? So much water under the bridge. The Frikkie of the dairy, cows, vegetable patch and orange orchard. The Frikkie who’d allowed Tinker to live on the condition that I stayed stom over Fonnie du Preez and Pissy Vermaak. The Frikkie who’d beaten Mattress to a pulp in the boxing ring and, in turn, received a broken jaw. The Frikkie who referred to Tinker as ‘my little rat trap’, and would brag about her prowess to everyone. The Frikkie who’d knocked me into the ground because I’d tried to cover up the fight over Miss Phillips’ pound residing in Gawie’s bum and confessed that the reason we were scrapping was that I’d stupidly said the Union Jack was prettier than the vierkleur, the hallowed flag of the Transvaal Republic. The Frikkie in his Stormjaer uniform, giving us ill-informed lectures on the latest German triumph while we watered the orchards or worked in the veggie garden. The Frikkie of the disastrously bungled railway bridge explosion and the cowardly Van Schalkwyk brothers. Then the Frikkie that followed the explosion as the notorious Faceless Man whose identity the newspapers had speculated over for three weeks. And now, finally, Frikkie the broken, the hooded beggar. The Frikkie who now sat before me, one hand reduced to a stump, and his little dog, who pathetically derived his name from my own beloved Tinker.

  ‘Howzit going, Frikkie?’ I asked. ‘Fancy meeting you here. What a surprise, man.’ I spoke in Afrikaans, of course, trying to sound cheerful.

  Frikkie nodded his head.

  ‘You have a little dog and you’ve called him Tinker?’

  Another stiff nod. I wasn’t getting very far and an awkward silence ensued. Frikkie had a spiral notepad resting in his lap and now he started to write. He was a left-hander and it was the only means of communication left to him. He now wrote: I saw you with a lady a long time ago.

  ‘I’m sorry, man. If I’d known it was you I would have stopped to talk,’ I said.

  He wrote again, tearing off the page: What are you doing here?

  ‘I’m going to school. I won a scholarship,’ I replied.

  It’s nice to see you, Tom.

  ‘Ja, you too, Frikkie.’

  We go back a long way.

  ‘Ja, since I was just a small brat.’

  A series of glottal stops followed from Frikkie, these I took for laughter or, more likely, a chuckle.

  Where you staying?

  There seemed no point in lying to him. ‘Ag, as a matter of fact, right now, I don’t know. It’s the school holidays and, well, you see I’m broke. I thought that maybe I could find a place to sleep in the station here.’

  He shook his head furiously, scribbled rapidly and ripped the page from the notepad. No, man, the railway police, they arrest you.

  ‘Maybe you know a place I can go, Frikkie? I’ve got a job, starting tomorrow. Perhaps somewhere that will let me pay them back in a week, a boarding house or something?’

  He scribbled again. Not that it was really a scribble, like I said, he had a beautiful hand. Come and stay with us, it costs nothing.

  I had no idea who the ‘us’ was meant to be. Himself and the surrogate Tinker still at my side nuzzling me, or were there other people involved?

  ‘Ja, I’d be most grateful, thank you,’ I said, accepting his generous offer.

  He wrote again and handed me the note. Tom, come back at half past five. I have to wait here for the rush hour. Today is payday and it’s worth at least a quid to me. I forgot to say that his spelling in Afrikaans wasn’t all that good, but I’ve translated it here correctly into English.

  I was a bit hungry, but it wasn’t too bad, though I knew for certain that tomorrow I’d have to lower my dignity and ask Smelly Jelly for an advance or I was going to starve to death. I’d not had the opportunity to explore Johannesburg other than the time Miss Phillips took me to John Orr to get underpants and then the art gallery and the lunch where I tasted roast chicken. So I had a good time exploring around this big skyscraper place. All in all, it had been a wonderful day, I’d got myself a job and now I had somewhere to sleep, as for the food department, well, I wasn’t that hungry, yet. But that’s the problem with life, just when you not looking something bad happens, something you never going to forget in your whole life.

  I haven’t explained to you that for a few months now I’d been thinking a lot about girls and waking up in the morning and not being able to go to the showers until it went down, which sometimes took ages. I was trying not to do ‘you know what’ too much just in case Meneer Prinsloo was right about going blind from overuse, which I doubted, but a person shouldn’t get too cocky. So part of my exploring the city was to keep my eye out for pretty girls.

  So, now it’s rush hour and I’m making my way back to Frikkie Botha and walking along Rissik Street, which is packed with people going towards the railway station, when I see this beautiful girl. She’s grown up already, but even I know how beautiful she is. Long, blonde hair and a nice body and she is swinging her hips in her summer dress. I really had to worry about what was going on in the front of my grey flannel shorts, and had to put one hand in my trouser pocket to keep things looking normal. I worked my way through the crowd until I was right behind her. We stopped at this robot and waited for the light to turn green. Then, just as the light changed, she stepped off the pavement and, all of a sudden, her bloomers fell down around her ankles. Only they were not like Mevrou’s bloomers, but a little light thing that’s black and has red roses embroidered on it. So she steps out of them with her high heels and keeps walking. I am so shocked that I don’t think and I bend down and snatch up the bloomers and go running after her. ‘Miss! Miss! Stop! You’ve dropped your bloomers!’ I shout. There’s lots of people who hear, and the girl just keeps walking, and everyone is laughing, and I panic and catch up with her and tap her on the shoulder.

  ‘Go away!’ she hisses.

  So I’m standing holding the bloomers. I don’t know what to do. So I put them in my trouser pocket and start to run in the opposite direction bumping into people. Now my perfect day has become far from perfect because the Poet of Salvation in Translation is just a stupid young boy idiot!

  When I eventually regain my composure and double- back to reach Central Station, Frikkie is waiting. He’s stowed the box and the display board with the coloured man in the magazine kiosk. Now we’re walking along with Tinky on a lead, which is what I’ve decided to call his little dog, because I can’t say Tinker without wanting to cry. It’s pretty slow going because Frikkie is bent almost double, and isn’t exactly the prancing boxer of the past. He walks with a stick, and his arm with the missing hand almost scrapes the pavement. He is still wearing his hood and I haven’t yet seen what he looks like underneath. The eyehole keeps slipping away from his one eye, so I don’t know how he can see. But then I realise that Tinky has worked this out long ago and he’s taking his master home. Only not directly, as the little dog leads him into a small Indian curry place. Not so much a restaurant, but a sort of a hole in the wall with two tables and a curry smell coming from it.

  ‘We are very, very happy to see you, Meneer Botha. You are looking very, very well and absolutely blooming also. Mrs Naidoo has made a very, very excellent curry for you,’ the Indian guy, who I take to be Mr Naidoo, says, welcoming Frikkie. How he can possibly know Frikkie is looking well with the hood ov
er his head is a mystery. Maybe Frikkie was walking a bit better. ‘For Tinker we have a lovely, lovely and very nice meaty bone,’ Mr Naidoo adds. ‘Now you are please introducing me to your friend?’ he says, smiling and extending his hand over the counter. ‘Naidoo, Bombay University, B.A. failed,’ he announces by way of introduction.

  ‘Tom Fitzsaxby, how do you do?’ I reply, taking his hand.

  ‘Very excellent, top notch and jolly, jolly good,’ he replies, and turning to Frikkie, says, ‘The usual you are having?’

  Frikkie nodded and pointed to me, raising two fingers.

  ‘You are wanting for your friend, Mr Tom too?’

  Frikkie nodded again.

  I couldn’t believe Frikkie was going to buy me dinner, then I immediately thought he might expect me to pay.

  ‘I’m not hungry, Frikkie,’ I said hurriedly.

  ‘For Mrs Naidoo’s curry a boy is always very, very hungry, it is something very, very delicious, Bombay chicken!’ Mr Naidoo protested.

  ‘I haven’t got any money, Sir,’ I whispered urgently to the Indian proprietor.

  ‘We have rice and pappadam also, no charge tonight, we are having Hindu sacred feast, everything is free.’ He looked at me and smiled. ‘You are coming please?’ Whereupon he turned and led us through a door at the back into what was no more than a passageway with a lone small table set for one. ‘We are getting you a chair at once, Mr Tom,’ he said. Frikkie sat down and Tinky collapsed at his feet with his nose on his master’s boot.

  Then, to my horror, Frikkie removed the dirty hood.

  I’m ashamed to say my mouth fell open and I visibly pulled back in shock. Frikkie’s face was as flat as a plate and the colour of beetroot with white scars running every which way, like well-grained beef. Two holes served as his nostrils, which pumped in and out, popping mucous bubbles. The hole directly under was without lips, and looked more like an anus than a mouth. His left eye was completely missing and was simply a pinkish purple dent in his head while his right eye was completely normal, though without an eyebrow. One ear was perfect and the other was sheared cleanly from the side of his head.

  ‘Jesus!’ I heard myself exclaim.

  Frikkie had the notepad out and wrote hurriedly, then handed the pad to me. You owe me a shilling! Ha! Ha!

  I’d never tasted curry before but I took to it right away. The meal was simply delicious and was washed down with a big enamel jug of orange cordial that Frikkie had to sip through a straw. Mr Naidoo came to the table as we completed the meal. ‘I have some very, very nice ganja,’ he said to Frikkie.

  Frikkie nodded and produced two half-crowns from his purse, and the Indian returned shortly with a cellophane packet containing some sort of crumpled brown leaf. I looked at Frikkie curiously and he wrote on his pad, dagga. I had never seen marijuana before and it certainly didn’t look like a whole five bob’s worth of anything to me.

  ‘Very, very good, Durban Gold,’ Mr Naidoo said, then turning to me, ‘For Mr Botha’s pain,’ he explained. Then he added, ‘You are please not touching, Mr Tom, this dagga, it is very, very bad for boys, but also good muti for Mr Botha.’

  We left soon after and went a few doors down to a Solly Kramer’s bottle store, and Frikkie purchased a bottle of brandy. The bottle store was opposite Joubert Park, where Miss Phillips had taken me to visit the art gallery and it came as some surprise when Frikkie and Tinky crossed the road and we entered the park, heading directly for the art gallery.

  When we arrived I saw that the steps and the veranda with its huge Gothic columns was now a place where a dozen or so men were sitting smoking and taking in the mild evening air or lying, covered by grey army blankets, despite the mild weather. Most of them nursed bottles wrapped in brown paper or newspaper, and one or two of them greeted Frikkie, who pointed at me and gave the thumbs-up sign, which seemed to be all that was needed to introduce me. One very tall and exceedingly thin derelict called out in Afrikaans, ‘What’s your name, son?’

  ‘Tom,’ I answered, not adding my surname.

  ‘Lofty . . . Lofty van der Merwe,’ he replied. ‘Welcome, Tom.’

  ‘Dankie, Meneer van der Merwe,’ I said, thanking him.

  ‘Ag, man, we not all hoity-toity here, Tom,’ he replied. ‘Just call me Lofty, hey?’

  Nothing lasts forever, and towards the end of my fourth year at school Smelly Jelly was working back catching up on a bit of printing on the Gospel-gobbling Goose. I must say we had become a formidable team, and for some time now had been sending tracts to America. Talk about hot gospel! Some of our efforts practically burned your fingers! Smelly Jelly would read a new tract I’d written and say, ‘Congratulations, Tom, this one is positively proselytising pyrotechnics, you have lit a bonfire for Jesus!’ I had become an international tract-writing success, with one of my tracts, ‘When Jesus Came to Dinner’, a truly big-time hit. The Gospel-gobbling Goose was burning the midnight oil, pumping blue fluorescent light into the dark arcade below.

  So this was the reason Jellicoe Smellie was working back one late November night. He finally packed up and prepared to set off for home, a flat he shared with a ginger cat in Hillbrow. The cat didn’t have a name and was simply referred to as ‘the cat that pisses’. On this night, like many others recently, Smelly Jelly was the only one left in the arcade. Although nobody actually witnessed what happened next, the conclusion seemed obvious. Jellicoe took the one step too many in the accident waiting to happen. Under the weight of that terminal tread the stairway crashed down into the darkness below. The following morning they discovered his lifeless body buried under four cedar steps and a length of moulded banister.

  While I missed working with Smelly Jelly it wasn’t the financial disaster that it might at first have seemed. I’d saved twenty pounds from my tract writing and this was more than enough to get me through my final year at school, as well as pay for my clothes.

  Now here’s a funny thing. After the first year of working for the Born-again Christian Missionary Society and dossing down each night with Frikkie’s friends on the art gallery veranda, I suppose I could have afforded some sort of cheap boarding house or even the YMCA, but I continued to stay with this brotherhood of drunkards in what was referred to as the Starlight Hotel.

  In the winter we’d move over to the back of Johannesburg Central, or Park Station, as it was commonly called. We’d camp among the huge steam pipes pumping heating into the railway station. With two army blankets, even though the Johannesburg temperature often dropped to below freezing on some winter nights, we were snug enough among those big old heated steel pipes. Of course, it was pretty noisy with the trains coming and going all night and the constant shunting in the goods yard, but drunks sleep through anything, and boys quickly grow accustomed to noise.

  Most of the alcoholics were ex-miners who’d worked underground and had been the victims of accidents and were on a small fortnightly pension from the mining group who’d employed them. My contribution for being allowed to stay with them unharmed was to write letters to the various mining companies, Goldfields Limited, Consolidated Mining, Anglo American and the like. I’d try to solicit extra payments for wives long-since deserted or sick and dying children whose names they often had trouble recalling. I grew quite skilled at penning these pathetic pleas for help. While they were not always successful, I managed over the years to extract several hundred pounds in ex gratia payments with a letter that must have, once in a while, touched the heart of someone in the head office of a giant mining company. Solly Kramer’s bottle store was where the cheques were usually cashed, the payment always being returned in excellent spirits.

  My tract-writing career was an ideal apprenticeship. A good tract requires a mixture of guilt, persuasion, remorse, reward and compassion, as well as a tincture of dire consequence. A soliciting letter isn’t all that different in nature. After a while my facility with the pen assumed a mystical quality among the drunks who used Joubert Park and Park Station as their home.

 
; Lofty van der Merwe had once been a mine captain underground, which was one rank up from shift boss, and, apart from the fact that he could hold his brandy better than all of them, his previously exalted station made him the undisputed leader when occasionally one was required. Alcoholics listen to a lone voice inside their heads and they’re not apt to follow anyone as the demon drink is the only shift boss they know. But the company of regularly inebriated men is seldom held together without occasional violence, and Lofty understood this and earned their respect by ending many a fight with a straight left that had a fellow drunk sitting in the gravel wiping the blood from his nose.

  These were men who hailed from the bottom of the social barrel, even when they’d once lived sober lives. In the landscape of a large city they were referred to in the popular vernacular as Poor Whites. Where I came from in the deep north there was nothing unusual about them, they were farm hands, timber cutters, railway workers, road gangers or worked in the saw mills, mostly gainfully employed and always drunk on a Saturday night. They beat their wives and children as a matter of course and then went to church on Sunday. I knew them intimately and understood how to act in their company. After all, The Boys Farm was a factory that set out to produce men for precisely such rural activity. Completely accepted in a backwoods community, they became social detritus in the City of Gold where their only usefulness lay 2000 feet under the towering skyscrapers as underground miners.

  Lofty must have been a bit of an exception, and well beyond the sober aspirations of his peers at the Starlight Hotel. During the soft summer evenings on the high veld I would act as Lofty’s shift boss, writing letters, running a book on the Turfontein races and even, after a while, dispensing advice and keeping an eye on the health of the brotherhood.

  Drunks usually ignore even the most serious medical problems by masking the pain with drink. In the first few days of the school holidays I became a familiar sight at the Emergency Department of Johannesburg General Hospital. On the first evening out of school, Lofty would line the boys up for inspection and then, next morning, I’d bring the sick and the lame into Emergency and complete the necessary paperwork and see to it that they received treatment.