Burger's Daughter

by Nadine Gordimer

  Her crinkly Indian cotton dress looked wrung-out round her, limp; to him a statement that the visit was not something for which she had prepared herself in any way. There was no indication of what impression she wanted to make, this girl; but that was, in fact, the impression he had formed the few times, since she was an adolescent, he had encountered her and even from photographs in the papers: she was either so vulnerably open that her presence in the world made an impossible claim, or so inviolable that her openness was an arrogant assumption—which amounted to the same thing. She didn’t understand the shame of the need to please, as royalty never carries money. The coolie-pink (he had an affection for these old descriptive terms, so innocently, artlessly insulting)—the purplish pink of the dress made her skin an attractive contrast, almost painterly: greeny-bronze lights slipping over her sallow collar bones and the quiet-breathing dip at the drawstring neckline where the breasts began. The dress was merely uninteresting, not unconventional in the striking way he liked loose clothes on the tall bodies of the Afrikaans state theatre actresses and art school lecturers who were the women he kept around him. It was in spite of her clothes that potent physical appeal remained; unpainted, softly-quilted full lips at rest after a strong polite smile, the water-drop clarity of the eyes and glossy accent of eyebrows in the smokiness of her face. Vitality was suggested by the dark curly head, not tilted in coquetry when she spoke or listened, calmly upright above the chairs when he left her to fetch refreshments.

  On one of the walls of this house an oil of heroic proportions: the visitor’s eye matched to it a number of others in the room. All were composed radially from figures which seemed flung down in the centre of the canvas from a height, spread like a suicide on a pavement, or backed against a wall, seen from the sights of the firing-squad. Brandt Vermeulen was evidently a patron of the painter. There was also a Kandinsky drawing and a Georgia O’Keeffe lithograph she did not recognize until her host explained his tastes and preferences, much later, because she was rather ignorant of movements in art; a Picasso satyr that was unmistakable even to her, and a group of small, intensely atmospheric Cape and Karoo landscapes that must be Pierneefs. A print from one of the African herbalists’ shops, showing the Royal Zulu line from Shaka to the contemporary King Goodwill Zwelithini grouped in cameo portraits round a beehive hut, and framed in pink-striped plastic exactly as it would be in some servant’s backyard room, represented quaintly the local naive tradition, in line (she was later to learn from her host) with Rousseau or Grandma Moses. Standing on an antique Cape yellow-wood kist beside the visitor’s chair was a presence, once alone, she became aware of, a life-size plastic female torso, divided down the middle into a blue and a red side, with its vaginal labia placed horizontally across the outside of its pubis, like the lips of a mouth. The tip of a clitoris poked a tongue. The nipples were perspex, suggesting at once the hardness of tumescence and the ice of frigidity.

  Brandt Vermeulen carried in orange juice. She was asked to move the roses and he put down the tray among fallen petals. There was a warm loaf-shaped cake—You have to try at least half a slice, my Mina’s gingerbread is an experience, and she gets offended—It was delicious, the real thing, he took pleasure in their mutual experience of the pure natural juice and the tender spiciness, helping himself to more cake and gesturing his guest to do so.—It’s an old family recipe from my grandmother Mina learnt when she was a piccanin helping out in the kitchen—so she says, but my mother says she got it from her mother herself, and taught Mina—maybe your mother had it handed down, too ?—

  There might be some distant family connection between Brandt Vermeulen and Rosa Burger. It was not on record in Bureau of State Security files. Her mother had been vague about it. Brandt Vermeulen’s mother and Rosa’s mother could have been third or fourth cousins on the maternal side; he had no need to acknowledge the possibility, nor would Rosa have much ground to claim kinship in the collateral of Afrikanerdom where, if you went back three hundred years, every Cloete and Smit and van Heerden would turn out to have blood-ties with everyone else.—No, she had never tasted such good gingerbread before.

  And did she also like pickled pumpkin? Did she know what pickled pumpkin was? He thought not! He was playfully boastful about his sensible vegetable patch out there near the swimming-pool; people simply didn’t realize how beautiful vegetables were, he must show her his mahogany-coloured brinjals and scarlet chillies, and pumpkins like those plump fancy sofa cushions with a button in the middle. His garden, his paintings, this sort of mad venture—he blew rose petals off the jacket proofs—now he was about to lose his boots publishing a book of woodcuts and poetry that was actually erotic but wouldn’t run into trouble with the tannies2 because the woodcuts were too abstract and the poems too esoteric for one to expect to sell any copies...

  He could have gone on quite easily entertaining her with his enthusiasms and ability not to take himself seriously, she could have got up to leave at the end of an hour without having revealed any purpose in coming. Those magnificent pumpkins—Mina pickled them sweet-and-sour, he would give her a jar to take home. —Do you still live in the house—your father’s house ?—he laughed, he wasn’t prying—I don’t know, are you married or anything ?—

  She told him she had lived in various places; now in a small flat.

  —So you gave up that house...of course. I was there once when I was about fifteen years old—I don’t think you were even born—

  She smiled, closing her eyes momentarily in an unconscious effort of recall or denial.—Oh yes I was.—

  —Well, too young to have been much in evidence...I messed up a knee at rugby and the uncle who kept an eye on me while I was away from home at school wanted your father’s opinion before he’d take the responsibility for the usual cartilage operation. He swore by the skill of Lionel Burger—may be a red but he’s the best doctor in the country! So my father had to give in...—He made the transition to Afrikaans, for them, without noticing it—I was a bit nervous, I didn’t know what a red would be like, some sort of Antichrist, Frankenstein we kids used to see in the bioscope, but your father was marvellous, we talked rugby—of course he’d been a first team fullback in his medical school days—I decided, what did they mean about this red business!—

  —I sold the house, I’ve given up my old hospital job. Over a year, now.—She was speaking in Afrikaans, too.

  His beaming, sun-and-chlorine-scoured face composed itself to consider what perhaps his visitor had given up more than a house, a job. Wit and frivolity sank, like kites gracefully grounded.

  —I’ve been working for one of the big investment advisers. The Barry Eckhard organization.—

  —I see.—And he was looking, looking at her for what there was to be revealed.

  She showed no signs of nerves or embarrassment, yet neither did she have the defensiveness he was used to meeting if someone were to be pressing him. She was mistress of her own silences; as if he were the one waiting for her to speak instead of she herself looking for an opportunity. He folded his arms, workman-like.

  She spoke in the tone and cadence she had used to say her mother had not, so far as she knew, been handed down a recipe for gingerbread. —It’s not very interesting. In fact, so much less than I thought.—

  His bristly blond eyelashes flicked towards the preoccupation on the table.—Ways of losing money are more amusing, unfortunately. —

  —I could hardly say I’m tired of it—already. Rather that I don’t seem to have made...how shall I say...contact with it.—

  He was drawn into a leading question.—It’s not what you need... ?—

  She let his question become a conclusion. Then she spoke not in reflection but directly to him, a quiet statement coming up on him and surrounding him.

  —I want to go somewhere else.—

  He took time:—Another job ?—

  —I’d like to see Europe.—

  Put like that it seemed so reasonable; he had been back and forth so often; t
here she was, a girl like any other, a girl in her twenties, of an intelligence, education and class that took experience of the outside world for granted, was it not perfectly reasonable that she was aware of the possibility of other people’s pleasures existing for her, too ? He could not be less than serious and sympathetic.—Well why shouldn’t you! I mean why shouldn’t you want to ?—

  —But I never have.—

  —Not as a child ?—The telephone had started ringing.

  —I’ve never been able to.—Rosa Burger did not appear to grant tacit permission for him to answer it.

  —I thought that once or twice your father—The telephone continued to press its electrical impulses upon them, compressing the isolation of their talk towards a complicity. He got up, shedding that.—Damn it, no one will go.—Old retainers have the disadvantage of being deaf.

  From some other room his voice came, lively, cajoling, laughing; when he returned all died quickly from his face.

  —Sorry about that.—In a monkeyish gesture his hand darted of itself and tossed a piece of the cake into his mouth.

  —My mother and father went several times to the Soviet Union, but before I was born. The last time my father was abroad was in 1950, I was two, he went to England and Czechoslovakia as well. All over—not to America, the Americans wouldn’t let him in. It was the last time he or my mother was allowed out. And when I grew up this automatically applied to me, too.—

  It sounded like something merely handed down; another family recipe.—Have you never tried ?—

  —Once.—She smiled at him.—But not very seriously. That is, not in a way that makes any sense. I just went along and filled in a form at the passport office... But that was when my mother was alive, and my father.—

  —And now ?—For the first time, his voice took her on.

  She seemed to reiterate, simply:—I want to know somewhere else.—But following the reference to Lionel Burger and his wife, he saw that the statement was different; besides, he heard ‘know’ instead of ‘go’: I want to know somewhere else. The mother, the father; their destination, here or anywhere, did not have to be hers. He took the soothing, encouraging tone of one who can agree warmly with a move that has nothing to do with him.—Well, why not—naturally—of course.—

  —D’you think you can help me ?—

  He did not evade her gaze; his grin deepened and the skin at the side of his left eye was tweaked by some nerve; he got up suddenly and stood as if he had forgotten what for. He wrestled with pleasantries that wouldn’t do, for her; he did not know how to get back onto the plane of soothing empathy without responsibility. She hadn’t even given him the conditional ‘could’; it was as good as stated: you can help me. More, coming from her: I’m ready to let you.

  He scratched both hands up through his short hair, stretched the fingers wide and let his hands fall. Staringly smiled at her, as he kept his good temper, his charm—almost English-gentleman stuff, to faze the English liberals themselves in debate. When he spoke he addressed her with a diminutive in their language, to show—she understood ?—he did not repudiate ties that had no need of consanguinity. She and her father and mother belonged with him even though they disowned the volk—nothing could change that, Lionel Burger who died an unrepentant Communist jail-bird also died an Afrikaner. Brandt Vermeulen did not need to tell her her father could have been prime minister if he had not been a traitor. It had been said many times. For the Afrikaner people, Lionel Burger was a tragedy rather than an outcast; that way, he still was theirs. They could not allow the earth of the fatherland to be profaned by his body; yet, that way, they were themselves absolved from his destruction.

  —Kleintjie, you are not an easy problem...—he grinned at her sweetly—ay? It’s not just a matter of who will help...you know that...I don’t have to tell you...the best will in the world—

  —I’m prepared to try. I ask you because no one could ever doubt you—I mean, I can’t do you any harm.—

  —Look—but you mustn’t overestimate what I am...my position. I don’t just whisper in the Prime Minister’s ear...and if I did, if I could...he is a man of principle, nobody...not his enemies deny that. If you mean what you say—you look as if you always mean what you say ?—

  —I want to go out.—

  —Believe me, I understand—don’t question it, good god, I’ve been away, lived abroad myself. It’s necessary, it tells you where your home is, it convinces you—you’ll see.—

  —I hope I’ll get a chance to.—They laughed, the tempo quickened between them, in spite of him.

  —You’ll see—I hope. What we are doing here may frighten the world, but what is bold and marvellous is always a little terrible to some. Your father had the same reaction to his ideas, nè... ? Of course—we who are most diametrically opposed understand each other best! If things had been different—well... If your father had lived longer, I think he would have overcome his despair—you see, I think his living as a Communist was an expression of despair. He didn’t believe his people could solve the problem of their historical situation. So he turned to the notion of the historically immutable solution...yes, he didn’t trust us: his own people; himself...that’s how I see it. But if he had lived a bit longer—I honestly believe a man of his quality—a great man—

  Brandt Vermeulen placed the pause for their mutual consideration.

  —a man like Lionel Burger, he would have had to have been prepared to acknowledge a discovery: we’ve gone further... I’m convinced. I’ve often thought—I’ve wanted to talk to you about this, but I didn’t really know you. The dynamic of the Afrikaner—it is not expended, as the social dynamic is in Europe and possibly even America. It’s taken many forms since the era of crude conquest, many. Your father’s was one. I hear someone’s writing a book about him... I’ve often thought I’m the one to...I’d like to develop this idea of his having been deflected from his destiny, and why.—

  She kept the considering face of one who respects a scholarly approach. Of course, sentiment was too shallow an emotion for someone of her background.

  —It’s terrible...he died much too soon. But in another sense (he found a way to phrase it without sounding callous) you see, it’s not long enough ago. You follow? Though to you—He held a deep breath, leaning forward.

  —Another life.—She didn’t explain; she was putting the context of her father aside from herself, or in a way so direct Brandt Vermeulen couldn’t credit it, made the demand for this: I want to know somewhere else.

  —Oh yes...one doesn’t live in the past—the present is too exciting—well, I mean, alarming, but still!—he did not need to spell out Angola, Moçambique, Rhodesia, Namibia, the border wars their country was fighting, in which he and she might not be on the same side—And that’s what makes the whole thing—his hand circled her attention, her face, existence, in the air with the gesture of his red ball-point singling out paragraphs of newsprint.—You simply want to go away? On a holiday ?—

  —People do every day.—

  —On a holiday.—

  —Yes.—

  —Like anyone else—

  He punctuated with nods and smiles, as if she were a little girl giving the right answers.

  —If you are just like anyone else...just supposing one were to manage some sort of representations on your behalf, just suppose—where to begin—it’s quite a thing to expect you to be regarded like anyone else ?—

  —I realize that.—

  —You do.—Fingernails very clean, from swimming; he felt with them along the grainy line that crevassed the rosy cushion of his chin.—You do.—

  She did not shy away.

  He protected himself, for the time being, flattering himself by including her in the bond of not taking oneself too seriously, suddenly flippant.—You’ll have to be satisfied with a jar of Mina’s pickled pumpkin—I don’t know what I can do, if anything—if anything—

  —Whatever you offer.—

  —It’s not what I offer—it’s w
hat’ll be asked, my girl ?—He laughed, they laughed, his hand steadied her shoulder.

  No doubt she was reinvestigated, if that was what was meant. At least Brandt Vermeulen got as far as getting his close friend at the Ministry of the Interior to consent to considering an investigation, instead of dismissing the whole possibility out-of-hand. That was an achievement in itself; she gathered it had been accomplished, on subsequent visits to his secluded and charming house whose existence one would not have dreamt of when one knew only the way to court and to prison. He was always apparently pleased to see her; or maintained, in his way, a tradition of hospitality that would be upheld whatever the circumstances.—Nothing encouraging to tell you —I must say at the outset—you’ll have to be patience on a monument! —(They continued to speak in Afrikaans together, but the tag came in English.) They never discussed anything over the telephone, each for his own reasons observing the cautions of their country. She came in March and April to hear this advice in his presence; it was possible, even likely, that somewhere in the room—behind one of the pictures in his collection, or in the great jars of ‘arrangements’ his garden provided—was another arrangement that recorded the conversation as part of the investigation. She would have expected this; out of fairness to him, to safeguard his position. Not only did he use her name often, she also used his, calling him Brandt, naming easily and openly, for any monitoring presence, the power she was addressing herself to. He told her the amusing story of how he had come to acquire the plastic torso with the anatomical novelties—as he termed them, again resorting to English—and he returned again and again to the subject of her father’s biography. She told him about the young man who was writing it, or at least going about collecting material for it, and what the approach was. They agreed the result wasn’t likely to be up to much; an Englishman—Brandt Vermeulen summed up—how could an Englishman expect to fathom Lionel Burger. She never remembered to bring her swimming-costume, although late in April it was still warm enough on one occasion for her (let in at the front door and led to the garden by Mina) to find him in the pool, throwing a ball to a tiny excited black boy paddling around in an old tyre-tube.—Ag, no—you haven’t seen my little kaffertjie yet ?—Come out to greet her, he spoke affectionately, the child splashing and shouting too much to overhear. It was his Mina’s grandson, spending the school holidays pampered in the yard.