Whitethorn (43 page)

Tinker and me, we'd have these long talks when she'd sit on my lap under a tree by the creek or down at the library rock, and I'd try to explain to her what was going to happen and assure her that she'd be all right. I'd tell her about how I had to get an education and this was an opportunity not to be missed, and that I'd come down every school holiday to be with her. She'd prick up her sharp little ears and then sometimes lick my face, but if you looked into her eyes you could see that she was just as concerned as I was. Leaving somebody you love that much is a very hard thing for anyone to do.

You begin to realise that in life nothing stays still, just when you not looking, everything changes and not always for the better. Not that I can say this next change that happened was bad because it wasn't. But I'd be lying if I didn't say that I had in my mind decided when I grew up to marry Marie. I knew she was older than I was, but eleven years was the same as Mevrou Booysens and the doctor. So, if they could do it, why not us? But, of course, all my hopes were smashed to smithereens by the scene that had taken place in the moonlit parlour. I couldn't get the picture of the soft light on her shoulder and the gold of her hair, like a halo, out of my mind. Marie had drawn back from Sergeant Van Niekerk at the same moment I passed the parlour door and the moonlight also showed the curve of her breasts. I don't know what it was, but I knew it was very beautiful. Also, that something inside me had changed forever.

Now that Mevrou Booysens wasn't herself any more and had turned into Mevrou Van Heerden, the Impala Café was up for sale. To everybody's surprise, it was bought by Mr Patel, of Patel & Sons, for one of his sons who was coming back from Bombay with a brand-new wife. They were going to change the place into an Indian restaurant. Mr Patel said they were going to call it the Impala Curry House. ‘We are keeping old tradition and having new one as well, mixed grills we are having any time you want, but also very, very jolly good curry,' he'd announced. This didn't go down too well with the town and here are some of the things the
volk
were saying all over the place. ‘What does an Indian know about mixed grills? Next thing you know you getting curry chops, man! Nobody is going to eat that Charra food. It is a well-known fact that Indians are always looking for ways to cheat a person. Take, for instance, old meat that's not so fresh, put a bit of curry on it and you can't taste that it should be given to the dogs. Curry is little pieces of meat that burns your mouth so much that drinking water doesn't help. That's step one. Step two is that you have to drink lots of beer and eat lots of rice so they make a bigger profit all-round. Can't you see how clever that is? But if Patel's son thinks he can trick a
boer
then he and his new wife, who doesn't even speak Afrikaans, have another think coming, we not stupid, you hear? The
boere
won't go to eat there after church on Sunday because it's a heathen place, and it's the Lord's day also, so they go back to their farms drunk from all the beer and with their mouths still burning all over the place.'

Those were the things people were saying. I must say I was a bit surprised at Mr Patel doing a stupid thing like this, even if it was for his son. One thing was certain, he was not a stupid man. If cheating was his main business, as everyone said, answer me this. He was not the only shop in town that white people and blacks could go into to buy stuff. The other shops were all owned by good Afrikaners, so why was Mr Patel the only person in Duiwelskrans that drove a brand-new Buick straight eight? People don't go twice into a shop where cheating is going on unless they are the stupid ones.

When I asked Sergeant Van Niekerk about this, he said, ‘
Ag
, Tom, it's simple, Patel gives credit. You can put it in the book and pay at the end of the month.'

‘Don't the other shops give credit?'

‘
Ja
, but only to white people.'

‘Why don't they also give credit to
kaffirs
?'

‘Because they think
kaffirs
won't pay at the end of the month,' he laughed. ‘That's where Patel's clever. Black people
always
pay. It's the whites who sometimes don't. I'm always going around and knocking on white doors and saying, “Pay up, or else”.'

See what I mean? But you learn in life that the same people can be very clever in some things and very stupid in others. Clever giving credit to
kaffirs
and stupid opening up an Indian restaurant in a town like Duiwelskrans. So Marie said, ‘I'm going to cook you your last mixed grill before the Impala closes and becomes an Indian restaurant that my mum told them isn't going to work, but they don't want to listen, what can you do, hey? At least we had the decency to warn them that this isn't a curry-type town
.
'

I don't know where that ‘your
last
mixed grill' came from, because Gawie had had a mixed grill the time I burned my hand, but I hadn't had one yet. But I didn't say anything. A mixed grill doesn't come along every day and having the last one that was really only the first, but wasn't ever going to be cooked again was a big honour, I can tell you. Now, I suppose you're wondering how come I'm suddenly eating the last mixed grill at the Impala Café after church on Sunday and not eating stale bread sandwiches at The Boys Farm. How did I get permission to do this?

Well, you've got to give credit where credit is due. It was Meneer Prinsloo's one and only brilliant idea called Government Permission Monthly Outing. He got the
Dominee
to say it in church. Anyone who wanted to invite a boy to lunch on Sunday could, and the boy only had to be back at The Boys Farm by five o'clock in the afternoon. A boy was allowed to go only once a month because, remember, we had to work in the vegetable gardens and water the fruit trees on a Sunday. So that was why I could go to the Impala Café and have the last mixed grill in history.

Let me tell you, it turned out to be a mixed grill and a half! Here's what was in it: sausages two, piece of liver, bacon rashers two, chops two, piece of steak (not small), fried egg one, chips (lots), tomato sauce. You could have cold slaw also, but I didn't. You could get cold slaw at The Boys Farm when the cabbages were in the vegetable garden and they had too many, so why eat it now. I couldn't finish it all because I had to leave room for a one-legged bowl of ice-cream. Tinker got her football stomach with what was left over, and we could hardly walk back to The Boys Farm we were so full. At one stage on the way home, Tinker did this little vomit and it was tomato sauce. I don't think dogs like it.

After the mixed grill Marie said, ‘Come into the house, Tom, I want to talk to you.' She'd gone and brushed her hair and put on the same bright-red lipstick she'd had on at the wedding, and she'd taken off her apron. So we went into the parlour and sat on the same settee where you-know-what happened in the moonlight. ‘Tom, you know I love you, so I want you to be the first to hear the good news, after my mum, of course.'

I tried to smile because I was pretty sure I knew what the good news was going to be. But my mouth, all of a sudden, went sort of all squiffy. ‘Is it Sergeant Van Niekerk?' I stammered.

‘Clever boy!' she exclaimed, clapping her hands. ‘
Magtig
, there are no flies on you, Tom Fitzsaxby. How did you guess?' Her eyes were shining and I could see she was very happy.

‘I'm good at guessing things,' I said.

‘We're going to be married before you go to that posh boarding school in Johannesburg, just so you can be there. You're going to be best boy, you hear? It's something you can have in weddings.'

‘I don't think I'm allowed, Marie,' I said, thinking it best to warn her right off. ‘Mevrou is very against weddings. I have to get permission from Meneer Prinsloo, otherwise it's called “tippy-toeing around people's backs”. You also have to wear your dirty clothes unless you've got the high-up inspector from Pretoria's permission because Mevrou won't give it.' It all came out at one time, like speaking vomit. This was because I didn't know what to say and I was angry that she was going to marry before I could grow up and be the lucky husband. Not that I didn't think Sergeant Van Niekerk wasn't a very good choice. He was the best there was, you couldn't get better. It was just that everything a person loved was now changing.

‘Don't you worry about the clothes, you hear? And guess what? You're
also
getting a wedding present from Doctor Van Heerden and my mum.'

‘But I'm not getting married!' I said, surprised. ‘You the one who gets the presents.'

‘
Ja
, that's true, but you're like our little
boetie
now. You'll see, you'll like it.' Then she took me in her arms and gave me a long kiss on the mouth. ‘Oh, I do love you, Tom,' she said. She smelled of roses, and the lipstick had this sort of greasy taste. She drew back and looked directly into my eyes, her hands gripping my shoulders. ‘There's also a big, big secret, but you've got to swear on a stack of Bibles you won't tell, hey?'

I didn't think it would be polite to remind Marie that I wasn't the one to swear on stacks of Bibles and then go and tell people all over the place. ‘I promise on my word of honour,' I said solemnly.

‘Tom, the sergeant and me, we also going to have a little baby!'

C
HAPTER
E
LEVE
N

The Love That Can't Wait for Weddings

NOW KEEPING A SECRET is one thing, but growing fat in the front is quite another. Either Marie was eating too much and putting on weight in only one place or the secret was well and truly out for all to see. People were giggling behind their hands and saying, ‘Shotgun wedding, hey!' I wasn't quite sure why it's called that, and I couldn't find out because my main-asking people were all involved. I mean, I knew it was because Marie had got the baby in her stomach before the wedding, which is, it seemed, a sort of a sin, but one that happens quite a lot in our part of the country. But why shotgun?

Anyway, when the
Dominee
said in church,
‘
If anyone should know any just cause or reason why this man and this woman should not be joined in holy matrimony, let them declare it now or forever hold their peace,' you could hear the start of a giggle or two around the place. He has to do this for three Sundays, and on the last one when there were a few too many giggles coming from the congregation, the
Dominee
glared down at us and thumped the pulpit with his fist. ‘Marriage is a serious business, you hear? Let me tell you something, this kind of marriage has a long tradition among the
volk.
In the olden days when the Great Trek was not long over, people were scattered far and wide and could only come into a
dorp
for
Nagmaal
once a year. That was the time for the young people to take a look and see what was available for a nice wife or a good husband. You think only church and communion takes place at
Nagmaal
, hey? You are quite wrong. These, you must understand, are
regte
Boere
with red blood in their bones, and the young men and women have got natural urges!' He chuckled suddenly. ‘I can assure you many a young girl must get married long before the next Easter comes around, and some after the offspring have sprung off!' He paused as this got a good laugh from the congregation. ‘God is a practical man who likes to take shortcuts. For example, six days only to create everything, and then a nice day of rest. The Lord does not see this example of natural urges as a deep sin, but only as a God-given opportunity to defeat the tyranny of distance. So, I will not tolerate this sniggering in my church when an essential God-sanctioned tradition is taking place. Can you even imagine a better combination than a policeman and a nurse? To keep the law and to heal the sick and then, together, to bring forth the fruit of the womb. Hallelujah!'

That stopped the giggling quick smart.

As for Marie, she said to me, ‘
Ag
, Tom, who cares what people say. I love Jan van Niekerk and I want more than anything in the world to have this baby, and anyway he asked me to marry him long before I didn't have my time of month.'

‘What time is that?' I asked.

Marie laughed. ‘I keep forgetting you still little and don't know these things, it's called my menstrual cycle and it happens to a woman.'

If that was supposed to inform me, let me tell you something for nothing, it didn't. But when later I got out from under the bed my Meneer Van Niekerk's
Shorter Oxford English Dictionary
I was in for an even deeper mystery. I looked up
menstrual cycle
. This is what it said: ‘The process of ovulation and menstruation in female primates.' So I looked up menstruation and what a shock I got: ‘The process of discharging blood from the uterus.' That definitely couldn't be it, if a person was discharging blood all over the place there would have to be something seriously wrong with them, and Marie was a very healthy person. So I looked up ovulation.

Ovulate
to produce ova or ovules, to discharge them from the ovary.

So now I've got to find what is an ovary and ovules discharging
?
Back to the dictionary, but now there's two explanations, the first one is:

Ovary
(1) each of the female reproductive organs in which ova are produced.