When the Ground Is Hard

by Malla Nunn

  “You’re in it together. You took the necklace to spite us, because you’re jealous.” Delia is certain that what she says is true, and in her righteous fury, she’s forgotten that Lottie can move faster and hit harder than she’ll ever be able to.

  The girls in the semicircle ooh and aah, because Lottie has to pay Delia back for the insult immediately. Defending your honor is part of the school code, and the only way to do that is to fight. The strange thing is, I haven’t thought about Sandi Cardoza in the four days since the underwear theft, or tried to scheme my way back into the group, but in Delia’s mind everyone wants to be her. She’s too vain to notice how little I care anymore.

  Lottie grabs Delia by the hair. She twists, and the audience gasps. That was fast. Delia didn’t see it coming. Lottie turns Delia’s head so she can look right into her face. “Call us thieves again,” Lottie says with cold-eyed calm. “I dare you.”

  Sandi Cardoza steps back and bumps into Natalie and Peaches, who are also suddenly nervous. I love their fear. It’s a guilty thrill. I know violence doesn’t solve problems—except it does.

  “Girls!” Mrs. Thomas’s voice breaks the semicircle that shields us and everyone melts back into a straight line. “What’s going on?”

  Lottie and I take our original position behind Claire Naidoo and keep our mouths shut. If Delia wants to accuse us of stealing, she can do it herself.

  “Well?” Mrs. Thomas goes straight to Sandi Cardoza, with her stick-up hair and puffy eyes. She’s obviously involved. “Tell me what happened.”

  Sandi sniffles. Delia darts us a savage glance and says, “Lottie Diamond and Adele Joubert stole Sandi’s silver necklace while the rest of us were at the fire.”

  Mrs. Thomas sighs. Girls and their problems, she must be thinking. She’d rather be with Etta James than standing in a concrete hallway with vain little creatures who make it impossible to figure out who’s lying and who’s telling the truth.

  “Now”—Mrs. Thomas turns on Lottie and me—“tell the truth, and shame the devil: Did one or both of you steal the necklace?”

  “No, Mrs. Thomas,” I say in a firm voice that carries the length of the hallway. “Lottie Diamond and I did not steal Sandi Cardoza’s necklace.”

  “She’s lying. They did it!” Delia’s voice makes Mrs. Thomas flinch. Her fragile mood makes her sensitive to sharp sounds and bright lights.

  Mrs. Thomas raises her hand for quiet. Delia’s father pays full fees and Sandi Cardoza’s father donated a new generator to the school, so she has to make an effort to investigate. She asks the bathroom line, “Did anyone see Adele and Lottie steal the necklace?”

  Silence.

  “Does anyone know where the necklace is now?”

  The line remains stubbornly quiet. If a girl steps forward to say that, yes, they saw Lottie and me with the necklace, they’ll be rewarded by Delia and Sandi, but how sweet will that chocolate bar taste after Lottie’s given them a cut lip and a black eye for lying about us?

  “Check our room,” Lottie says. “We’ve got nothing to hide.”

  Moments later, Mrs. Thomas strides into Dead Lorraine’s room and pulls open our drawers. She checks the pockets of the clothing hanging in our wardrobe and strips our beds to find what might be hidden under the sheets. Then she hauls my suitcase from under my cot and rifles though the contents. Heat stings my face. The bounty of cans and unopened biscuits is embarrassing but no longer shameful. I shared with Lottie last night, and together we’ll make quick work of eating what’s left. The cans and boxes prove that I have no reason to steal.

  “All clear.” Mrs. Thomas’s mouth softens into a smile. She’s relieved that we’re innocent and still eligible for the Golden Sun Award. Her happiness is selfish. Stealing in the dorm casts a shadow over her reputation. If we’re good girls, then by extension, so is she.

  “They stole the necklace and hid it,” Delia huffs. “They knew you’d search the room.”

  Mrs. Thomas blinks and her jaw clenches, and for a moment it appears that her soft mood has evaporated and, with it, any shred of patience or kindness. Delia steps back, expecting a lashing.

  “Now, now,” Mrs. Thomas coos. “You’ve got no proof that Adele and Lottie are the thieves, so my hands are tied. I’ll list the item in the lost-property book, and if it doesn’t turn up in a week, I’ll make a report to Mr. Vincent.”

  Delia bites her tongue. Mrs. Thomas won’t make the report this week or next week or the week after, because she’s afraid to admit her failures to a white man. She’ll write the items into the lost-property book, knowing full well that what’s lost at Keziah is never found.

  “Get washed and dressed for chapel and take your mind off earthly things,” Mrs. Thomas says. “We have much to be thankful for this morning.”

  She drifts out of the dorm and back to her house, where she’ll take the plastic rollers from her hair and style it into the elaborate victory rolls that were popular during WWII, but are way out of style in 1965.

  Delia sucks air through her teeth to let us know what she thinks of Mrs. Thomas’s handling of the situation, and I shut the door to Dead Lorraine’s room in her face. It’s no use talking. In Delia’s mind, Lottie and I are liars and thieves. She’s got the wrong girls.

  Somebody stole Sandi’s necklace. Not us.

  19

  Praise Be

  After breakfast, we march from the dining hall to the chapel for a special Monday morning “give thanks” service. Boys sit on the right side of the aisle, and girls on the left. Senior teachers take the row closest to the pulpit, and junior teachers sit at the end of the student rows to make sure we behave. Mrs. Thomas, the Elephant, and Mr. Moses, the dorm master, sit in the very back row, where they get a good view of who passes notes and who whispers through the sermon.

  Mr. Vincent takes the pulpit. “Let us pray,” he says, and we bow our heads and thank the Lord for the branches that beat the flames and the water that doused the embers. We thank Him for our salvation. We thank Him for our lives.

  Then Mr. Vincent says, “We are God’s instruments, and last night God worked a miracle through Adele Joubert and Lottie Diamond, two girls who embody the fighting spirt of Keziah Christian Academy. Together, they faced the fire and, with the Lord at their side, saved the school shop from burning down.”

  Heads turn in our direction, fingers point, and voices whisper, “That one’s Adele, and that one’s Lottie.”

  We are the center of attention, and I’ve imagined this moment a hundred times in my daydreams: me with windblown hair and glowing skin, every detail of my face made beautiful by the heat of envious glances. Instead, my heart lurches in my chest. I feel exposed. One of Mother’s favorite expressions is “The higher a monkey climbs up the tree, the more you can see of its bum.” I am that monkey. The more the others stare, the more I’m certain they can read my thoughts and see the sins of envy and greed written across my forehead.

  Our rapid elevation to top girls is breathtaking and confusing. I’ve been high and fallen low, and, strangely enough, being low isn’t so bad.

  Mr. Vincent continues. “To acknowledge their bravery and courage, Lottie and Adele will receive a Golden Sun Award at a ceremony next Friday, and well deserved. Following the Golden Sun Awards, there’ll be a special dinner to thank you all for the hard work that each of you did in keeping Keziah safe from the flames.”

  Excited voices break the silence. Golden Sun Awards are scarce, but nothing compared to a special dinner of roast beef with gravy and slices of corn bread smothered in butter. One of the younger boys claps his hands and says, “I want second helpings!” Everyone laughs . . . a rare sound in the chapel, where we usually try to maintain silence and holiness. Mr. Vincent and the senior teachers let the chatter die down on its own. After the fire, we have all earned the right to make a little noise, and two hours of rest and contemplation before lunch.
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  We sing the final hymn, “To God Be the Glory,” and Lottie and I leave the chapel with little girls gathered around us like bridesmaids. It’s sweet. We have pets, and it didn’t cost me one piece of impago. Boys stare at us, and final-year girls, who are usually standoffish, acknowledge our existence with quick nods. If there’s a place above the top students, then that’s where Lottie and I now sit. Delia, Peaches, Natalie, and Sandi Cardoza smile stiff smiles and pretend they love us, too, but I see right through them.

  “Sour grapes,” Lottie says of them, and I understand their resentment. It’s hard to fall all the way down to ordinary. It feels like failure: a small death that wipes out the old you and replaces her with a cheaper version. I can’t find it in me to care, though. Despite our temporary status, Delia and the others still have pocket money and rich parents and pretty faces. I was pushed off the top shelf and forced to share Dead Lorraine’s room with lower-shelf Lottie Diamond. I survived. Delia and her girls will recover soon enough.

  * * *

  • • •

  Lottie and I find a pool of shade under an indoni tree with a distant view of the river. I open a bag of toffee chews and crack open Jane Eyre to where we left off reading in the early hours of this morning. I give the book to Lottie. She’ll read too fast, as usual, but she saved my life last night, so it seems like giving her the first turn is the least I can do.

  She clears her voice to start. “I both wished and feared to see Mr. Rochester on the day which followed this sleepless night: I wanted to hear his voice again, yet feared to meet his eye. During the early part of the morning, I momentarily expected his coming; he was not in the frequent habit of entering the schoolroom, but he did step in for a few minutes sometimes, and I had the impression that he . . .”

  “Hey. Hey, Adele . . .” A voice interrupts Lottie’s reading, and I look up in frustration. Surely, Rochester will come and see Jane soon—especially after she saved him from that mad servant with the mad laugh.

  Beatrice and the other girl, Ramona, stand side by side in the circle of shade. I’m certain Delia has warned them against talking to us, and I’m curious to know why they are taking the risk anyway.

  “Is it true?” Beatrice asks.

  “Is what true?” I say.

  “That you and Lottie started the fire behind the school shop.”

  Lottie and I exchange glances.

  “Who told you that?” My shoulders go tight, and Lottie’s fingers grip Jane Eyre so hard that I’m afraid she’ll rip a page.

  “No one.” Beatrice bites her thumbnail. “It’s just . . . it’s just we heard that no way could the fire have spread from the bush near the sports field to the bush behind the classrooms. Unless . . .”

  “The two of you started it by yourselves,” Ramona says, finishing for Beatrice. “That’s what we heard.”

  “From Delia?” Lottie demands, and the pets flush red.

  I’m angry, too, but it’s bad manners to ask Beatrice and Ramona to name names. Lottie is all fists. She doesn’t know that this situation calls for soft words.

  “Why did we start the fire?” I ask in the sweet voice I use when Father comes to visit and I’m the loveliest daughter in all of southern Africa. The girls hesitate, and I say, “Tell me what you heard. No hard feelings, hey.”

  “Well . . .” Beatrice looks over her shoulder, nervous at being caught talking to the enemy. “You’ve got nothing that makes you special, so you started the fire to get attention . . .”

  “Plus,” Ramona pipes in, “both your mothers are squint-eyed sluts who got no class and—”

  “Shut up.” Beatrice slaps Ramona’s arm.

  “It’s all right.” My smile does not waver. Inside, though, I am ashamed that I said similar things about Lottie’s mother once. We gossiped about the dirty hut she lived in, the endless parade of men, and the irony that she, of all people, had a fair-skinned daughter who could pass for white. We also used to say that Lottie was more native than mixed-race, and wasn’t that a shame? Joining in the gossip made me feel a part of the group; an almost diamond. I could, and often did, secretly list all the things that made me a top-shelf girl. Mother is unmarried but she has one man, not many. She lives in a nice house with carpets on the floor instead of a mud hut. She has paper money in her pocket instead of loose coins. In my mind, my mother was better than Lottie’s mother and, therefore, I was better than Lottie and all the other illegitimate students. I shudder now to remember the poison that came out of my mouth.

  “How did we start the fire?” I shift the conversation to safer ground. “With a box of matches, or by rubbing sticks together to make a spark?”

  Ramona and Beatrice shrug, and Beatrice says, “We didn’t hear about that part.”

  I grab a handful of dried leaves and a stick from the ground near me and offer them to the girls. “Here,” I say. “Start a fire with these. Go on. Try.”

  They stare at the leaves and the stick.

  “What do we do?” Ramona asks.

  “How do I know?” I say. “Do I look like a bushman?”

  They giggle, and I push the leaves closer. “Go on. Take these to whoever told you that we started the fire and ask them to show you how we did it. And then you can show us.”

  The girls grab the fire starters and run in the direction of the senior dorm. I laugh to imagine Natalie—and, hand to Bible, it will be Natalie—sweating over the fire stick with her cheeks puffed as she tries to get a spark.

  Lottie glares at me. She thinks we should retaliate against the girls for lying about us and our mothers, but she doesn’t realize that we just struck a blow against them without raising a finger.

  * * *

  • • •

  For one minute, we were lost in Jane’s story, and now we’re back in Swaziland and standing under the branches of a tree that Jane Eyre would find extraordinary and mysterious. Maybe it’s just as well. My blisters sting, and I want to be all here when Jane and Rochester meet again.

  “Let’s go to the river,” Lottie says, and we walk down a steep slope that leads to the sandy shore. I hold my blistered arm to my chest, the way a child holds an injured bird. I’m terrified that if I fall, the blisters will burst and fill with sand, and Mrs. McDonald, who keeps the school first-aid kit between the brown sugar and the allspice on her kitchen shelf, will give me an aspirin for the pain and a smelly homemade poultice, donated by one of the poor parents, to fight an infection.

  “Does it hurt bad?” Lottie asks, and I’m embarrassed that she sees my weakness, but last night’s aspirin has worn off, and Mrs. Thomas is stingy with her medicine. She hates to waste it on whining girls who are yet to make the acquaintance of true and deep pain.

  “Not too bad.” I stare across the river to the fields of wild grass, but no amount of soothing scenery can distract me from the pain.

  “Put your arm in the water and keep it under for a while.” Lottie snaps a leaf off an aloe plant and squeezes drops of pale juice to the surface.

  I hold my arm in the powerful current, and the cold water numbs my skin and makes me shiver. When I’ve air-dried, Lottie rubs the cut aloe leaf over my blisters, and they shine in the sun. The aloe juice soothes the pain, and we walk along the bank of the river as swallows skim the water’s surface. It’s peaceful, and but for the charred leaves and ash speckling the rough sand, the fire might have happened a hundred years ago.

  We walk for twenty minutes, hardly talking, till we reach a wide stretch of water with bulrushes growing along both sides. Hundreds of woven nests cling to the bulrush stalks and bend them closer to the water. Noisy weaverbirds come and go from their colony, and the air seems decorated with the song they sing.

  “See that rock?” Lottie points farther downstream.

  “I see it.” The rock is flat and slender, and cuts the river almost in two. Rusted red streaks make a pattern on the sur
face. It’s almost wide enough to lie on.

  “Never go past that rock,” Lottie says. “No matter what.”

  “Why?” I notice the unfamiliar hills and the strange trees around me. “Wait . . .” A thought jolts me from my walking daydream. “Are we out of bounds?”

  “Not yet,” Lottie says. “This side of the rock is Keziah, and the other side is Bosman’s farm. Don’t go there. Bosman and his sons have guns, and they hate mixed-race people . . . especially anyone from school.”

  “How do you know?”

  Lottie sighs. “Take my word for it, Adele. Past that rock is trouble.”

  The land on the other side of the rock is serene and beautiful, and that’s the problem, Mother says. One moment, it’s sunshine and beauty and happy songs, and the next moment, you are in inescapable danger, hurt and scared. When God made Africa, she says, he cut his thumb by accident and bled all over the land, every hill and valley soaked. Now the earth is stained with blood. Now violence and beauty live together forever in Swaziland, she says. It can’t be helped. It’s how things are.

  “You mentioned Bosman before.” I suddenly remember when. “You think he’s the one who gave Darnell the black eye.”

  “Ja, Bosman is the kind of mean that makes animals and children run for cover,” Lottie says. “Me and Mama Khumalo have warned Darnell away from Bosman’s farm, but Darnell doesn’t listen to anyone. You saw him at the river, how impetuous he is.”

  Impetuous. Another Lottie word, meaning “acting or doing quickly and without thought or care.”

  “You think Darnell is in trouble,” I say.

  “Yes, I really do,” Lottie sighs. “Darnell runs away and his daddy has him back at school in two or three days. He’s never been gone this long. Ever. Something is wrong, Adele. I can feel it. That’s why you have to steer clear of the rock and Bosman’s farm. One missing person is enough.”