The Housemaid's Daughter (40 page)

‘Cathleen lived with faith. Throughout her life she stood fast through joy and tragedy, and finally through flood.’

I felt the congregation nod its approval. Mrs Cath had indeed been brave. She’d ventured out to help others when the waters had been at their highest. The minister was right to praise her, he was right to focus on courage shown in this way. It was safer to contemplate this than the conviction she’d brought to other, more unsettling, crises.

‘Let us pray for Cathleen,’ he bent his head, ‘dedicated mother, dear friend and faithful servant.’

‘Amen,’ murmured the congregation.

‘Grant peace to Rosemary and Helen, and bestow upon them Your everlasting Grace.’

‘Amen.’

And for my child, I prayed, clasping my hands hard in my lap. For my wild, beautiful child …

‘And upon Ada and Dawn,’ my head snapped up, ‘whom Cathleen wished to be mentioned here.’

The congregation froze. There it was, shockingly out in the open – what they’d shied from for so many years: Mrs Cath’s willingness to forgive my sin, her embrace of Dawn and me as family, her resolve in the face of the law.

Two small voices at the back said, ‘Amen.’

I felt the stiffening of Miss Rose’s body within her tight black suit, even from where she sat on the other side of Helen. Miss Rose would be outraged. This time there would be no Mrs Cath to save me. This time, surely, Miss Rose would do whatever it took to be rid of me. The organ began a quiet
Panis Angelicus.
Tension slowly ebbed, pews creaked. Over the muted chords burst the honking cries of hadedas on their way to their afternoon roosts. I once feared they knew my sin, I once feared they would carry news of it across the Groot Vis, and drop it with a triumphant cry on to Cradock House, and my shame would be exposed …

Beside me, Helen twisted her hands in her lap.

I looked at my own fingers, not young any more, not as supple as they once were, and I thought of Mrs Cath’s fingers, and the pleasure they brought to all who heard her play. Scales rushing down the garden and into the
kaia,
marches for my dear Phil, sly Debussy melodies that echoed in the head for days afterwards.

I will carry on with the Chopin nocturnes that have been my gift to her. I will play the last few into the silence of Cradock House. I hope there will be time to do so before Miss Rose forces me out.

Chapter 54

‘
T
he lawyers want to see you, too.’ Miss Rose smoothed her red dress – no black for Miss Rose – and picked up her handbag. ‘I can’t think why. I’ll be in the car.’

I rushed into my best skirt and blouse, and my shoes with heels, and sat in the back of the car as Miss Rose drove – at the sort of speed that must be acceptable in Jo’burg – to the lawyer’s office on Adderley Street. My arm was stiff from an afternoon of tea-pouring and cake-slicing and much washing-up. Helen had helped, while Miss Rose held court in the lounge and waited to be served.

The lawyer’s office was on the second floor of a building overlooking the Dutch Reformed Church on Market Square, which had escaped the floodwaters.

‘Good morning, Miss Harrington. Please accept my deepest condolences. Miss Mabuse,’ the lawyer shook my hand as well. ‘Please sit down, both of you.’

He settled himself behind his desk. There was a picture of him on the wall behind, like the Superintendent had at the town hall. It seems strange to me that people who are already important still need to reinforce their importance by displaying photographs to prove it.

‘As you know, we have handled the family’s legal affairs since the time Mr Harrington arrived from Ireland many years ago. It falls to me to present Mrs Harrington’s will, of which you are both beneficiaries.’

I heard the intake of breath beside me, and felt Miss Rose’s renewed anger. Apart from catering instructions, she had said nothing to me since the funeral.

‘What do you mean, sir?’ I forced my head to concentrate. I had not come across the word beneficiary before.

‘It means, Miss Mabuse,’ he looked at me over his glasses, ‘that you have inherited something from Mrs Harrington.’

Inheritance. The mixing of black and white skins that would always give rise to a brown child. The mixing of parental blood that carries only some traits from one generation to the next, but not all. Inheritance is a fickle thing. It made Dawn’s colour inevitable, yet it refused to pass on Mrs Cath’s capacity for warmth to her daughter.

‘How much?’ Miss Rose’s words were abrupt. For her, this was about money.

‘Let me give you the overall picture.’ He glanced down at the papers on his desk.

‘Miss Harrington, you inherit the bulk of your mother’s liquid assets, apart from three thousand rand that goes to Miss Mabuse, and five thousand rand to her daughter Dawn.’

I stared at him in astonishment. Together, that was far more than what rested in my bank book! With such money Dawn could pay for private lessons to finish her studies! With such money she could buy a new brick house for herself!

‘In terms of property, Miss Helen inherits Cradock House and its contents, to be held in a trust for her until she turns twenty-five.’

‘But—’ Miss Rose half left her seat.

‘All rental income shall accrue to the trust as well.’

‘But the house should be sold, Helen doesn’t need it—’

The lawyer held up his hand. ‘One moment, please. Mrs Harrington states that Miss Mabuse’, he inclined his bald head towards me, ‘may remain as occupant of the
kaia
at Cradock House and, if required, act as caretaker until that time, under the current financial arrangements.’

‘We can’t sell the house now?’ Miss Rose hovered on the edge of her chair, gripping the arms with white knuckles.

‘I’m afraid not.’ The lawyer gave a tight smile. ‘That will be Miss Helen’s decision when she is twenty-five. She may dispose of the house if she so wishes at that time.’

There was a pause. Dimly – for my head was aching – I began to grasp how skilfully Mrs Cath had dealt with those she was leaving behind: her decision to name Dawn and me during the funeral service not just out of love but as an enduring challenge to those who would dismiss us; her deftness in removing Cradock House from Rosemary’s grasp and saving it for Helen, so securing her heritage; and finally, the gift to me of the
kaia
beneath the bony thorn tree, for as long as Helen kept Cradock House as her own.

‘I can stay,’ I found myself murmuring. ‘Is that true, sir?’

‘Yes, it’s true,’ snapped Miss Rose. ‘You’ve been angling for that from the very beginning.’

Her words pierced the air between us, like the bullets I’d heard in the township. A series of cracks, a pulse of wind if you were close enough. Phil knew such sounds …

The lawyer took off his glasses and began to polish them on his tie.

‘Miss Harrington, it is unwise to begin a disposition such as this in an adversarial manner.’

Miss Rose yanked open her handbag, pulled out a compact mirror and examined her face briefly before thrusting it away. She tilted her chin.

‘Did my mother change her will recently?’

‘No, this has been her intention for some years.’

‘Then there’s nothing more to be said.’ She gathered her handbag and cast me a furious glance. ‘You have all my banking details. And I presume you will make the necessary arrangements to rent out Cradock House.’

She stood up. I remained seated. The lawyer stood too, and offered his hand to Miss Rose. ‘It will be handled with extreme care. And we will set up the trust in your daughter’s name. I presume you will inform her?’

‘Of course. Are you coming, Ada?’

‘I will walk back, thank you, Miss Rose. I need to understand what Mrs Cath wants me to do.’

Miss Rose extended her hand to the lawyer and swept out of the room. The lawyer looked at me for a moment, then closed the door behind Miss Rose.

‘I believe you have been with the family for many years, Miss Mabuse.’

‘I was born in Cradock House, sir. I have lived there for all but a few years of my life.’

‘Your English is very good. Now,’ he laid his hands flat on the table, ‘we shall not rush into this. As soon as Miss Harrington and her daughter have returned to Johannesburg, we will begin an inventory of the house.’ Seeing my blank expression, he explained. ‘We need to make a list of all the furniture and possessions because these will belong to Miss Helen from now on. Do you understand, Miss Mabuse?’

‘Yes. They have never been mine, sir. I will care for them for Miss Helen.’

‘Quite so. Only once that is complete will we seek tenants to take the house furnished. You will remain in the
kaia.
I believe you’re a teacher in the township?’

‘Yes, sir. I teach piano.’

‘Ah,’ he nodded. ‘I’ve heard you’re very talented.’

‘Mrs Harrington taught me all I know.’

‘Indeed. And you will need to give us your bank account number and identity details – and that of your daughter – so we can deposit the funds that Mrs Harrington has specified.’

‘Thank you, sir. I will write them down for you.’

My head was clearing and I was becoming aware of outside things. The palms on Market Square, untouched by the floods, swaying in the window.

‘There is one further matter in the will, which pertains to yourself only.’ He stopped and searched for easier words. ‘It’s only for you to know about.’

I waited. I could not imagine what he meant. He reached into an envelope and drew out the red diary. ‘This is for you. Mrs Harrington wished you to have it.’

I took the book from him with shaking hands. It was the first diary. I lifted it to my cheek and felt the downy velvet. The satin ribbon fell from its pages. This diary had long since been replaced, and I hadn’t seen it for many years. I’d lately read from the brown leather one.

‘There is a separate letter that accompanies it.’

He handed over a loose leaf of paper with Mrs Cath’s familiar script, the slender upstrokes, the heavy downstrokes, the particular flourish of the capital letter that began each entry.

He stood up.

‘If you need any further help, we are always here.’ He hesitated, then held out his hand once more. Few white men shake the hand of a black woman. ‘Your faithful service has been justly rewarded, Miss Mabuse.’

Chapter 55

My dear Ada,

This is the first time that I am writing to you formally, although we have been communicating like this for many years through my diaries. I have tried to be honest but there are some things that I have never written down, or spoken of, and which should now be recorded, on paper, so that you may always know them.

I was blessed by your mother’s friendship when I first arrived in Africa, but it has been
our
lifelong partnership – daughter, friend, confidante – that has been the most influential, and precious, of my life.

You were also the beloved of my dearest Phil – I’m sure you know this, now. I knew it, before you realised it yourself. You were so young, Ada! And so beautiful …

I have carried with me all my life the regret that I never acted in time to help you find a way to be together, although it would have meant leaving South Africa and all you had ever known.

I wonder if you realise that most countries in the world now believe apartheid to be morally wrong. It may take a while for it to pass from this country, but one day there will be equality. It did not happen in time for you and Phil, but it may happen in time for our glorious Dawn. Please hold on.

And finally, the music. There are not enough words to say what it has meant to watch you and listen to you. Please play for me every day. I will hear it.

Cathleen

I
t was the winter after Mrs Cath’s funeral when Dawn came back to Cradock.

‘Child!’ I gasped at the beautiful young woman who stepped off the train from Johannesburg, her hair straight and far lighter than when she’d left, her feet encased in high heels that Miss Rose would have been proud of, her dress a swirl of animal spots. Men getting off the train stared at her. I stared at her because her hair was the colour of Phil’s, light and flopping over his forehead as he looked up at me in the garden by the washing line where I was hanging wet clothes …

‘Mama!’ Dawn bent down to hug me and I felt her tears against my cheek. ‘You look so well, Mama!’ She was being kind, of course. ‘I’m sorry it’s been so long. I tried to get back for Mrs Cath—’

‘I know,’ I said, slipping my arm through hers, trying to find my breath. ‘She would have understood.’

The Groot Vis was low on the day Dawn arrived, just a narrow channel glinting between washing rocks. Nowhere in Johannesburg, she told me gaily as we walked across the bridge, was there a river that matched ours for laziness one day and tumult the next. Her good humour was infectious, she smiled at strangers, she slipped off her heels and carried them in one hand. People turned to look at her, or whistled at her from passing cars.

Dawn stayed with us for one luminous week, a week that was divided between my
kaia
and Lindiwe’s house. A week of embracing old friends who’d survived so far, a week of hiding her exotic face from notice by the police. A week that said nothing about where she lived or if she had a proper job in Johannsburg. A week devoted to laughter and love and to dance, as I played for her once more. Gershwin,
Rhapsody in Blue,
her body twining and folding about the opening glissando like water curving around rock …

‘What of the future? When the dancing is over?’ This from me, finally, in the quiet of the
kaia
on the night before she left, with the thorn tree scraping on the roof and a candle throwing shadows against the wall. She was lying on the bed Mrs Cath had bought her, wearing the dressing gown that had hung on the back of the door waiting for her to return.

‘Don’t worry, Mama,’ she whispered into the flickering gloom. ‘I earn enough through dancing. And Mrs Cath’s money is safe.’

‘Do you dance for whites?’

She sat up, eyes gleaming with the defiance of old. ‘They like me. They don’t think of me as coloured!’