A Change of Climate: A Novel (21 page)

She knew the answer: the colonel will decide. But this is what prison life must be, she thought: a series of endless requests, some great, some small, repeated and repeated, until one day—in the face of all expectation—one of them, great or small, is granted. Can you arrange for me to send a message to my husband? Can I have a bowl of hot water, I cannot get the fingerprint ink from under my nails? Can I have a newspaper, can I have a mirror? Can you assure me that God loves me and that I am his child?

The next day, after the mealie-porridge but before the broth, another wardress came in. “You want to comb your hair, Mrs. Eldred? The colonel is waiting to see you in his office.”

She jumped up from her bed. “Never mind my hair.”

The woman stood back to let her pass out of the cell. To her surprise, two more wardresses were stationed outside the door, and they trod a pace behind her along the corridor. They treat me as if I’m dangerous, she thought. Perhaps I am.

The colonel was a man of fifty, with pepper-and-salt hair shorn above his ears. The regulation belly strained at his uniform belt, but the rest of him was hard and fit looking. He motioned her to a chair. A ceiling fan creaked over her head; she lifted her face to it. Round and round it churned, the same stagnant air.

“I must apologize for not seeing you sooner, Mrs. Eldred. There were some incidents in the men’s prison that have been taking up my time.”

“What incidents?”

“Nothing that should bother you.”

“Is my husband in there, in the men’s prison?”

“You’ll have news of Mr. Eldred very soon—in fact, you’ll be seeing him soon, all we want is that you talk to us a little bit.” The colonel sat down opposite her. “You’ve been to political meetings, Mrs. Eldred?”

“No. Never.”

“You’ve been to protest meetings? About the bus boycott, for example?”

“Yes.”

“So, isn’t that the same thing?”

“I didn’t think so, at the time.”

“We have photographs of you at these meetings. We know you have held political meetings at your house.”

“Never.”

“You have had people from the ANC at your house. Agitators.”

“It’s not illegal to have visitors.”

“So what were you doing, Mrs. Eldred, if you weren’t having a political meeting? Just having tea and cake, were you? Perhaps reading the Bible together?”

Anna didn’t answer.

“We have the names of everyone who has visited you.”

“Yes. I know you have your spies everywhere.”

“It’s necessary,” the colonel said. “Believe me, Mrs. Eldred. We have to keep control.”

Anna pushed her hair back, smoothing it with her hand. It felt lank and greasy; the cell was an oven by midmorning, and she was not given enough water to wash properly. “Can I ask you a question, Colonel? Just one? All I want to know is if any of the mission staff are on your payroll. Has anyone been informing against us?”

“If you were innocent, Mrs. Eldred, you wouldn’t have to ask me that question.”

“Oh, I’m innocent, Colonel.” She felt color rise in her face. She was not afraid. Since they had brought her to the prison she had felt every emotion, but not fear. “I am perfectly innocent, and so is my husband, and I am quite sure that the mission society who sent us out here have been informed of what has happened, and that they will be making representations to your government on our behalf.”

“I’m sure that is so,” the colonel said, “and I am sure their representations will be listened to with the greatest of respect.” He ran a hand over his bristly head. “But you must understand, Mrs. Eldred, that my government takes exception to people such as yourself coming out here to tell us how to run our country, coming out here in the guise of mission workers and then turning political and interfering in affairs that you don’t understand.”

“I do understand,” Anna said. “You can’t expect that line to succeed with me. I’ve seen everything, with my own eyes.”

“With respect, Mrs. Eldred, you have seen nothing and you know nothing. When you’ve been here twenty, thirty years, tell me then.” The colonel looked up at the ceiling, as if self-control reposed there. When he spoke again it was in a flat voice, with his former quite meaningless courtesy. “Can I offer you a cigarette, Mrs. Eldred?”

“No, thank you.”

“You don’t mind if I smoke myself?”

“Feel free.”

“Do you have any complaints, Mrs. Eldred?”

She looked at him wonderingly. “If I began on my complaints …”

“About your treatment, I mean.”

“Could I be allowed some fresh air?”

“I’m afraid there is nowhere suitable for you to take exercise.”

“I can hear other women outside. I can hear their voices.” And laughter. Songs.

“That will be from the courtyard. The blacks go out there to do their washing.”

“I expect I shall need to do washing.”

“It will be done for you, Mrs. Eldred.”

“I should like a change of clothes from home, and some books. Is that possible?”

“I will send someone to see about your clothes.”

Relief washed over her; she had not thought about it until now, but for the first time it occurred to her that they might put her into a prison dress. “And the books?”

“You can have a Bible for now. Will that do?”

“Thank you.”

He inclined his head. “You’re a well-mannered woman, Mrs. Eldred. I’d like to see you keep it that way.”

“I hope I can, Colonel.” Whatever you say, she thought, I shall have the last word. “Could I have the light on for longer, so that I can read? I couldn’t sleep last night. I never can sleep much before midnight.”

The colonel hesitated. “For one hour, perhaps. Till nine o’clock.”

She had gained a piece of information. She had a sense of petty triumph.

“Can I have my watch back?”

“Yes, that is possible. I didn’t know it had been taken away.”

“And this bucket, this so-called sanitary bucket—it’s disgusting. When they brought me down the corridor I saw some buckets standing in a corner, a kind with lids. Can I have one of those?”

The colonel looked stricken. He flung himself from his chair, and chopped the wardress to pieces in blunt Afrikaans. The wardress shrugged, talked back; then became abject. “Mrs. Eldred,” he said, turning to her, “we owe you an apology. I do not know how this can have happened. You’ve been given a native-type bucket. All colored and white prisoners are automatically allocated buckets with lids, that is the rule. Your bucket will be changed immediately.”

Anna stared at him. The colonel had the last word after all.

That night, her legs began to ache; sleep was fitful, but before dawn she plunged into a dreamless stupor. When she woke she was shivering, and her scalp was sore: a vast headache lay behind it. She felt it was difficult to breathe, let alone eat. She had wrapped herself in her blanket, but it didn’t help.

They came for her at nine.

“The colonel again?”

“Ag, Mrs. Eldred, he must be in love with you.”

He was pacing his office; stopped pacing when he saw her. “Good morning, Mrs. Eldred, please sit down.” He looked at her closely. “So it’s a hunger strike?”

“No, it’s not a hunger strike. I just prefer not to eat.”

“You don’t like the food you are given?”

“How could anyone like it? It’s not fit for pigs.”

“So if we were to supplement your diet, you would eat?”

Anna didn’t answer. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction; didn’t want to allow herself the temptation. Since that first time, there had been no apple. The skin on the back of her hands seemed grayish, as if the color of her blood had altered.

“Come, Mrs. Eldred,” the colonel said. “What would you like? Some fruit?”

She didn’t speak. The headache had gone now, but its ghost remained, and the back of her neck was stiff.

“I’d like to go home,” she said in a low voice. “I’d like to see my husband. I’d like to know why you are keeping me here.”

“In good time,” the colonel said. “You must understand that whatever you decide, we have to send in the prison rations. That’s the rule.”

She nodded, head bowing painfully on the stem of her neck. He seemed to have made up his mind that she was on a hunger strike, even though she had denied it. Well, let him think so. Let it be so. The black woman who scrubbed the corridor, who would supplement her diet? She imagined her own body: saw herself fading, growing meeker, thinner, thinner … For the first time fear touched her. I am not made for this, she thought. Emma, now … Emma could bear it. Bear it? It would be an ornament to Emma. And yet, the fear was almost a relief to her. So I am human, she thought. If I had been in prison, and not afraid, how would I have lived the rest of my life? How could I be allowed the luxury of everyday, ordinary fears, if I were not afraid now? She said, “Colonel, for pity’s sake, tell me what you have done with my husband. All I want is to know that he is safe.”

“We should be able to arrange for you to see him.”

“When? Today?”

The colonel exhaled gustily. “Have patience, Mrs. Eldred.” She saw him struggle to quell his exasperation with her. “Look, Mrs. Eldred, I’m sorry if you think you’ve been treated badly, but the fact is that we are not used to prisoners like you. This situation is unprecedented for me. And for the staff, it is unprecedented for them. That is why we had the mistake about the buckets, and maybe—maybe we have committed other mistakes. No one wants to keep you here for any longer than necessary.”

“But why are you keeping me at all? You’ve hardly asked me any questions.”

“No one wants to harass you, Mrs. Eldred. What you’ve done, you’ve done.”

“Are you asking my husband questions?”

The colonel shook his head. “Not in the way you mean, Mrs. Eldred. Why should you think such things? No one has hurt you, have they?”

“No.”

“Just so—no one has hurt your husband either.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“What can I do then? Except to assure you that you are here as much for your own protection as anything else?”

“Protection from whom?”

The colonel looked weary. “From yourself.”

“You haven’t brought any charge. I don’t think there’s any charge you can bring. Why don’t you let me go?”

“That is not possible, I’m afraid.”

“Why isn’t it?”

Keep asking questions, questions: just once you might get an answer.

“I am waiting on a higher authority, Mrs. Eldred.”

“Are you, Colonel? Waiting for your God to speak?”

“No.” He half smiled. “A telephone call from Pretoria will do for me.”

“And when do you expect that?”

He shifted in his chair, ground out his cigarette in the ashtray. “I no longer
expect,
Mrs. Eldred. I’ve learned patience. May I commend it to you?”

She looked up into his face. “We might grow old together, Colonel, you and I.”

That evening, unprecedentedly, they brought her a bowl of hot water and a clean dry towel. Until now she had been allowed to wash only once a day. They brought some fruit and a bar of chocolate. “Not all at once or you’ll be ill,” the wardress said. Her face showed her disapproval of this special treatment.

Anna unwrapped the chocolate and inhaled its fragrance, its deep cheap sweetness: sugar and oil. She despised herself. The colonel saw through me, she thought, he knew I was weak. The emulsion slid over her tongue, into her bloodstream. Her heart raced. She sat back on her bed, drawing up her feet. I shall always hate myself, she thought, I shall never forgive myself for this, I shall suffer for it hereafter. She flicked her tongue around her teeth, like a cat cleaning its whiskers: collecting the last taste. Took her pulse, one thumb fitted into the fine skin of her wrist. Its speed alarmed her. But I am alive, she thought.

Then she thought, but perhaps this is only a trick. Perhaps tomorrow they will bring back the porridge and the encrusted spoon, and the native bucket. And I shall not be able to bear it.

Next day they told her that she had a visitor. “A kaffir,” the wardress said, turning down the corners of her mouth. “The colonel has given permission.”

Lucy Moyo was seated in the room where the fingerprints were taken. Her handbag rested on her vast knees. She wore one of her ensembles: a plum-colored dress, a pink petal hat to tone with it. Her handkerchief was folded and secured under the band of her wristwatch. She smelled of lily of the valley.

Anna flew toward her, her arms outstretched. But Lucy Moyo took her by the shoulders and held her off, in a brutal grip. “Brace up, brace up now, Mrs. Eldred.” Her voice was fierce. “Do not let these people see you cry.”

Tears flooded Anna’s face. Letting go of her for a moment, Lucy twitched her handkerchief from under her watch strap. She took Anna by one shoulder and began to dab and scrub at her face, just as if she were one of the nursery children who had taken a tumble into the dust. Anna’s tears continued to flow, and Lucy to wipe them away, all the time talking to her in the same tone, brisk and firm and no-nonsense, as if she knew that sympathy and tenderness would break her spirit.

“Mrs. Eldred, listen to me. Everything is in hand, everyone has been informed. We have telegraphed to London—Father Alfred has done it, that man is not such a fool as he sometimes appears. The High Commissioner is sending someone from Cape Town. Everyone is praying, Mrs. Eldred. Do you hear me?”

“Yes, yes, I understand—Lucy, have you seen my husband? Is there any news?”

“Father Alfred has seen him. He is well and in good spirits and saying not to worry. At the mission we are all well, we are all in good spirits, the monthly accounts are done, the wages are paid, you must have no fear, everything is in good order.”

“Five minutes,” the wardress said. Her face was set into a grimace of distaste. She held out her arm, showing her watch, as if Lucy might not understand.

Lucy looked at her hard. “Are you a Christian woman?” she asked. She let Anna go. She fell against the table, limp as a rag doll. Lucy opened her handbag. “They said one book, no more. I have brought you this. I know this book is dear to you because you have brought it from your home in England, and as you once told me, given to you by your mother.” Lucy put into Anna’s hand her copy of
The Sun-Drenched Veld.
She kissed Anna on both cheeks, shook off the wardress’s arm, and sailed from the room, her bag over her wrist. She left her perfume behind her, lying heavy on the air.