There is still the Byron project. Of the books he brought from Cape Town, only two volumes of the letters are left – the rest were in the trunk of the stolen car. The public library in Grahamstown can offer nothing but selections from the poems. But does he need to go on reading? What more does he need to know of how Byron and his acquaintance passed their time in old Ravenna? Can he not, by now, invent a Byron who is true to Byron, and a Teresa too?
He has, if the truth be told, been putting it off for months: the moment when he must face the blank page, strike the first note, see what he is worth. Snatches are already imprinted on his mind of the lovers in duet, the vocal lines, soprano and tenor, coiling wordlessly around and past each other like serpents. Melody without climax; the whisper of reptile scales on marble staircases; and, throbbing in the background, the baritone of the humiliated husband. Will this be where the dark trio are at last brought to life: not in Cape Town but in old Kaffraria?
FIFTEEN
THE TWO YOUNG sheep are tethered all day beside the stable on a bare patch of ground. Their bleating, steady and monotonous, has begun to annoy him. He strolls over to Petrus, who has his bicycle upside down and is working on it. ‘Those sheep,’ he says – ‘don’t you think we could tie them where they can graze?’
‘They are for the party,’ says Petrus. ‘On Saturday I will slaughter them for the party. You and Lucy must come.’ He wipes his hands clean. ‘I invite you and Lucy to the party.’
‘On Saturday?’
‘Yes, I am giving a party on Saturday. A big party.’
‘Thank you. But even if the sheep are for the party, don’t you think they could graze?’
An hour later the sheep are still tethered, still bleating dolefully. Petrus is nowhere to be seen. Exasperated, he unties them and tugs them over to the damside, where there is abundant grass.
The sheep drink at length, then leisurely begin to graze. They are black-faced Persians, alike in size, in markings, even in their movements. Twins, in all likelihood, destined since birth for the butcher’s knife. Well, nothing remarkable in that. When did a sheep last die of old age? Sheep do not own themselves, do not own their lives. They exist to be used, every last ounce of them, their flesh to be eaten, their bones to be crushed and fed to poultry. Nothing escapes, except perhaps the gall bladder, which no one will eat. Descartes should have thought of that. The soul, suspended in the dark, bitter gall, hiding.
‘Petrus has invited us to a party,’ he tells Lucy. ‘Why is he throwing a party?’
‘Because of the land transfer, I would guess. It goes through officially on the first of next month. It’s a big day for him. We should at least put in an appearance, take them a present.’
‘He is going to slaughter the two sheep. I wouldn’t have thought two sheep would go very far.’
‘Petrus is a pennypincher. In the old days it would have been an ox.’
‘I’m not sure I like the way he does things – bringing the slaughter-beasts home to acquaint them with the people who are going to eat them.’
‘What would you prefer? That the slaughtering be done in an abattoir, so that you needn’t think about it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Wake up, David. This is the country. This is Africa.’
There is a snappishness to Lucy nowadays that he sees no justification for. His usual response is to withdraw into silence. There are spells when the two of them are like strangers in the same house.
He tells himself that he must be patient, that Lucy is still living in the shadow of the attack, that time needs to pass before she will be herself. But what if he is wrong? What if, after an attack like that, one is never oneself again? What if an attack like that turns one into a different and darker person altogether?
There is an even more sinister explanation for Lucy’s moodiness, one that he cannot put from his mind. ‘Lucy,’ he asks the same day, out of the blue, ‘you aren’t hiding something from me, are you? You didn’t pick up something from those men?’
She is sitting on the sofa in pyjamas and dressing-gown, playing with the cat. It is past noon. The cat is young, alert, skittish. Lucy dangles the belt of the gown before it. The cat slaps at the belt, quick, light paw-blows, one-two-three-four.
‘Men?’ she says. ‘Which men?’ She flicks the belt to one side; the cat dives after it.
Which men? His heart stops. Has she gone mad? Is she refusing to remember?
But, it would appear, she is only teasing him. ‘David, I am not a child any more. I have seen a doctor, I have had tests, I have done everything one can reasonably do. Now I can only wait.’
‘I see. And by wait you mean wait for what I think you mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘How long will that take?’
She shrugs. ‘A month. Three months. Longer. Science has not yet put a limit on how long one has to wait. For ever, maybe.’
The cat makes a quick pounce at the belt, but the game is over now.
He sits down beside his daughter; the cat jumps off the sofa, stalks away. He takes her hand. Now that he is close to her, a faint smell of staleness, unwashedness, reaches him. ‘At least it won’t be for ever, my dearest,’ he says. ‘At least you will be spared that.’
The sheep spend the rest of the day near the dam where he has tethered them. The next morning they are back on the barren patch beside the stable.
Presumably they have until Saturday morning, two days. It seems a miserable way to spend the last two days of one’s life. Country ways – that is what Lucy calls this kind of thing. He has other words: indifference, hardheartedness. If the country can pass judgment on the city, then the city can pass judgment on the country too.
He has thought of buying the sheep from Petrus. But what will that accomplish? Petrus will only use the money to buy new slaughter-animals, and pocket the difference. And what will he do with the sheep anyway, once he has bought them out of slavery? Set them free on the public road? Pen them up in the dog-cages and feed them hay?
A bond seems to have come into existence between himself and the two Persians, he does not know how. The bond is not one of affection. It is not even a bond with these two in particular, whom he could not pick out from a mob in a field. Nevertheless, suddenly and without reason, their lot has become important to him.
He stands before them, under the sun, waiting for the buzz in his mind to settle, waiting for a sign.
There is a fly trying to creep into the ear of one of them. The ear twitches. The fly takes off, circles, returns, settles. The ear twitches again.
He takes a step forward. The sheep backs away uneasily to the limit of its chain.
He remembers Bev Shaw nuzzling the old billy-goat with the ravaged testicles, stroking him, comforting him, entering into his life. How does she get it right, this communion with animals? Some trick he does not have. One has to be a certain kind of person, perhaps, with fewer complications.
The sun beats on his face in all its springtime radiance. Do I have to change, he thinks? Do I have to become like Bev Shaw?
He speaks to Lucy. ‘I have been thinking about this party of Petrus’s. On the whole, I would prefer not to go. Is that possible without being rude?’
‘Anything to do with his slaughter-sheep?’
‘Yes. No. I haven’t changed my ideas, if that is what you mean. I still don’t believe that animals have properly individual lives. Which among them get to live, which get to die, is not, as far as I am concerned, worth agonizing over. Nevertheless . . .’
‘Nevertheless?’
‘Nevertheless, in this case I am disturbed. I can’t say why.’
‘Well, Petrus and his guests are certainly not going to give up their mutton chops out of deference to you and your sensibilities.’
‘I’m not asking for that. I would just prefer not to be one of the party, not this time. I’m sorry. I never imagined I would end up talking this way.’
‘God moves in mysterious ways, David.’
&nbs
p; ‘Don’t mock me.’
Saturday is looming, market day. ‘Should we run the stall?’ he asks Lucy. She shrugs. ‘You decide,’ she says. He does not run the stall.
He does not query her decision; in fact he is relieved.
Preparations for Petrus’s festivities begin at noon on Saturday with the arrival of a band of women half a dozen strong, wearing what looks to him like churchgoing finery. Behind the stable they get a fire going. Soon there comes on the wind the stench of boiling offal, from which he infers that the deed has been done, the double deed, that it is all over.
Should he mourn? Is it proper to mourn the death of beings who do not practise mourning among themselves? Looking into his heart, he can find only a vague sadness.
Too close, he thinks: we live too close to Petrus. It is like sharing a house with strangers, sharing noises, sharing smells.
He knocks at Lucy’s door. ‘Do you want to go for a walk?’ he asks.
‘Thanks, but no. Take Katy.’
He takes the bulldog, but she is so slow and sulky that he grows irritated, chases her back to the farm, and sets off alone on an eight-kilometre loop, walking fast, trying to tire himself out.
At five o’clock the guests start arriving, by car, by taxi, on foot. He watches from behind the kitchen curtain. Most are of their host’s generation, staid, solid. There is one old woman over whom a particular fuss is made: wearing his blue suit and a garish pink shirt, Petrus comes all the way down the path to welcome her.
It is dark before the younger folk make an appearance. On the breeze comes a murmur of talk, laughter and music, music that he associates with the Johannesburg of his own youth. Quite tolerable, he thinks to himself – quite jolly, even.
‘It’s time,’ says Lucy. ‘Are you coming?’
Unusually, she is wearing a knee-length dress and high heels, with a necklace of painted wooden beads and matching earrings. He is not sure he likes the effect.
‘All right, I’ll come. I’m ready.’
‘Haven’t you got a suit here?’
‘No.’
‘Then at least put on a tie.’
‘I thought we were in the country.’
‘All the more reason to dress up. This is a big day in Petrus’s life.’
She carries a tiny flashlight. They walk up the track to Petrus’s house, father and daughter arm in arm, she lighting the way, he bearing their offering.
At the open door they pause, smiling. Petrus is nowhere to be seen, but a little girl in a party dress comes up and leads them in.
The old stable has no ceiling and no proper floor, but at least it is spacious and at least it has electricity. Shaded lamps and pictures on the walls (Van Gogh’s sunflowers, a Tretchikoff lady in blue, Jane Fonda in her Barbarella outfit, Doctor Khumalo scoring a goal) soften the bleakness.
They are the only whites. There is dancing going on, to the old-fashioned African jazz he had heard. Curious glances are cast at the two of them, or perhaps only at his skullcap.
Lucy knows some of the women. She commences introductions. Then Petrus appears at their side. He does not play the eager host, does not offer them a drink, but does say, ‘No more dogs. I am not any more the dog-man,’ which Lucy chooses to accept as a joke; so all, it appears, is well.
‘We have brought you something,’ says Lucy; ‘but perhaps we should give it to your wife. It is for the house.’
From the kitchen area, if that is what they are to call it, Petrus summons his wife. It is the first time he has seen her from close by. She is young – younger than Lucy – pleasant-faced rather than pretty, shy, clearly pregnant. She takes Lucy’s hand but does not take his, nor does she meet his eyes.
Lucy speaks a few words in Xhosa and presents her with the package. There are by now half a dozen onlookers around them.
‘She must unwrap it,’ says Petrus.
‘Yes, you must unwrap it,’ says Lucy.
Carefully, at pains not to tear the festive paper with its mandolins and sprigs of laurel, the young wife opens the package. It is a cloth in a rather attractive Ashanti design. ‘Thank you,’ she whispers in English.
‘It’s a bedspread,’ Lucy explains to Petrus.
‘Lucy is our benefactor,’ says Petrus; and then, to Lucy: ‘You are our benefactor.’
A distasteful word, it seems to him, double-edged, souring the moment. Yet can Petrus be blamed? The language he draws on with such aplomb is, if he only knew it, tired, friable, eaten from the inside as if by termites. Only the monosyllables can still be relied on, and not even all of them.
What is to be done? Nothing that he, the one-time teacher of communications, can see. Nothing short of starting all over again with the ABC. By the time the big words come back reconstructed, purified, fit to be trusted once more, he will be long dead.
He shivers, as if a goose has trodden on his grave.
‘The baby – when are you expecting the baby?’ he asks Petrus’s wife.
She looks at him uncomprehendingly.
‘In October,’ Petrus intervenes. ‘The baby is coming in October. We hope he will be a boy.’
‘Oh. What have you got against girls?’
‘We are praying for a boy,’ says Petrus. ‘Always it is best if the first one is a boy. Then he can show his sisters – show them how to behave. Yes.’ He pauses. ‘A girl is very expensive.’ He rubs thumb and forefinger together. ‘Always money, money, money.’
A long time since he last saw that gesture. Used of Jews, in the old days: money-money-money, with the same meaningful cock of the head. But presumably Petrus is innocent of that snippet of European tradition.
‘Boys can be expensive too,’ he remarks, doing his bit for the conversation.
‘You must buy them this, you must buy them that,’ continues Petrus, getting into his stride, no longer listening. ‘Now, today, the man does not pay for the woman. I pay.’ He floats a hand above his wife’s head; modestly she drops her eyes. ‘I pay. But that is old fashion. Clothes, nice things, it is all the same: pay, pay, pay.’ He repeats the finger-rubbing. ‘No, a boy is better. Except your daughter. Your daughter is different. Your daughter is as good as a boy. Almost!’ He laughs at his sally. ‘Hey, Lucy!’
Lucy smiles, but he knows she is embarrassed. ‘I’m going to dance,’ she murmurs, and moves away.
On the floor she dances by herself in the solipsistic way that now seems to be the mode. Soon she is joined by a young man, tall, loose-limbed, nattily dressed. He dances opposite her, snapping his fingers, flashing her smiles, courting her.
Women are beginning to come in from outside, carrying trays of grilled meat. The air is full of appetizing smells. A new contingent of guests floods in, young, noisy, lively, not old fashion at all. The party is getting into its swing.
A plate of food finds its way into his hands. He passes it on to Petrus. ‘No,’ says Petrus – ‘is for you. Otherwise we are passing plates all night.’
Petrus and his wife are spending a lot of time with him, making him feel at home. Kind people, he thinks. Country people.
He glances across at Lucy. The young man is dancing only inches from her now, lifting his legs high and thumping them down, pumping his arms, enjoying himself.
The plate he is holding contains two mutton chops, a baked potato, a ladle of rice swimming in gravy, a slice of pumpkin. He finds a chair to perch on, sharing it with a skinny old man with rheumy eyes. I am going to eat this, he says to himself. I am going to eat it and ask forgiveness afterwards.
Then Lucy is at his side, breathing fast, her face tense. ‘Can we leave?’ she says. ‘They are here.’
‘Who is here?’
‘I saw one of them out at the back. David, I don’t want to kick up a fuss, but can we leave at once?’
‘Hold this.’ He passes her the plate, goes out at the back door.
There are almost as many guests outside as inside, clustered around the fire, talking, drinking, laughing. From the far side of the fire someone
is staring at him. At once things fall into place. He knows that face, knows it intimately. He thrusts his way past the bodies. I am going to be kicking up a fuss, he thinks. A pity, on this of all days. But some things will not wait.
In front of the boy he plants himself. It is the third of them, the dull-faced apprentice, the running-dog. ‘I know you,’ he says grimly.
The boy does not appear to be startled. On the contrary, the boy appears to have been waiting for this moment, storing himself up for it. The voice that issues from his throat is thick with rage. ‘Who are you?’ he says, but the words mean something else: By what right are you here? His whole body radiates violence.
Then Petrus is with them, talking fast in Xhosa.
He lays a hand on Petrus’s sleeve. Petrus breaks off, gives him an impatient glare. ‘Do you know who this is?’ he asks Petrus.
‘No, I do not know what this is,’ says Petrus angrily. ‘I do not know what is the trouble. What is the trouble?’
‘He – this thug – was here before, with his pals. He is one of them. But let him tell you what it is about. Let him tell you why he is wanted by the police.’
‘It is not true!’ shouts the boy. Again he speaks to Petrus, a stream of angry words. Music continues to unfurl into the night air, but no one is dancing any longer: Petrus’s guests are clustering around them, pushing, jostling, interjecting. The atmosphere is not good.
Petrus speaks. ‘He says he does not know what you are talking about.’
‘He is lying. He knows perfectly well. Lucy will confirm.’
But of course Lucy will not confirm. How can he expect Lucy to come out before these strangers, face the boy, point a finger, say, Yes, he is one of them. He was one of those who did the deed?
‘I am going to telephone the police,’ he says.
There is a disapproving murmur from the onlookers.