Читать книгу Heartfruit - Ingrid Wolfaardt - Страница 5

The gun stands at the back door, alongside a row of his father’s shoes.

A meerkat of a Raatjie sits polishing in the shade of the stoep, listening to Jim Reeves on the radio. The laces are washed and pegged in pairs on the line.

“Sies, you monkeys stink.” She pulls up her nose, waving them back, her dark eyes picking on them. “Ga! Get rid of the filth. Outside not inside!”

“Where’s Pa?” Isak asks her, stroking the barrel of the gun.

Raatjie nods impatiently towards the mountain behind the house. “The baas is stewing up there.” Frowning with concentration, she attacks the leather with a brush.

“And Kalbas?” Isak asks again as they wash their hands in the cement sink.

“All the dogs went along.’’

They hold out their hands for her inspection. “Just look at the two of you, your ma is going not only beat you up but me too.” She pushes the oversized spectacles back on her nose. “Off!”

Obediently, the two boys strip and hand her the bundle of clothes. Isak looks up at the mountain behind the leaves of the deltoidia. The brush swishes vigorously back and forth. She speaks in passing as the naked boys wrestle in the sun, “Raatjie’s bread is waiting.”

They whoop and make a dash for the back door, jostling with each other to be first. On the kitchen table is bread smeared with apricot jam. The canary watches them, chewing on its seeded stick. Danie feeds it a crumb and the little bird twists its head between the bars to peck at it.

Suddenly the radio’s volume is turned down.

His mother stands at the door, dressed in an overall, her dark hair swept up on the sides of her face, like the Spanish doll in Ouma’s cabinet, and the sinews of her neck are strained as she walks past them to the window. “Bedonnerdgeid,” is all she says before lighting a cigarette. She purses her lips and the smoke comes out in an even stream. “Have the volk finished with the slaughtering?”

“Ja, Mamma.” They answer in unison.

“Boeta, tell Outa he must send the head up to the house.” She struggles with the overall’s buttons, staring at him. “For God’s sake just put some clothes on first.”

“Ja, Mamma.”

He grabs at the pile of dirty clothes next to the radio. Raatjie swats wildly at him with the brush but he is too fast, hopping and pulling on his shorts as he runs down the hill to Outa.

The men are hosing down the cement and the door. They wear gumboots and are laughing loudly as Outa sprays the water and Piet sweeps.

“Outa Floors, Mamma wants the pig’s head.”

They stop laughing. The head lies on a tray of Ouma’s with a net over it. The net is covered in flies.

Piet protests. “It belongs to Outa.”

Isak shrugs. “It’s Mamma’s.”

Outa’s eyes narrow at the boy. “Ah, just take it then.”

He tries to lift the tray but the tray is too heavy. The men carry on cleaning, ignoring him. He tries again but he can’t.

“Outa must carry it.”

They stop a second time and Piet sucks in his breath.

Outa holds the hose for a while allowing the water to run into the ditch, then he switches it off and dries his hands. Silently, he picks up the tray and the flies lift briefly before settling down as he carries the tray up the hill.

Angrily, Piet lifts the broom. “Scoot!”

Isak chooses to walk home through the orchards, past the office and pack shed. The office door is open. Inside is Oupa’s glass-topped desk and leather couch. Under the glass are photos. Photos of his father at the borehole. Photos taken of Ouma and Oupa in the north on sand dunes. Photos of Oom Sakkie in Egypt in front of the pyramids. Photos of fruit trees with leaves and without. He wipes at the glass, smearing it with the fattiness still on his hands.

Then he senses that he is not alone in the room. Silver hair shows above the upright back of his father’s chair. Against the light he can see dust hanging in the air like a halo. He steps forward, reaching out to catch the floating pieces.

“Boeta.” His father swivels the chair around.

“Pappa.”

“It’s your birthday tomorrow.”

“Ja, Pappa.”

His father gets up from the chair and walks to the safe. “Come here.”

Dutifully, Isak walks over to the safe as his father unlocks it.

His father lifts it off the green felt, a pellet gun with a barrel of polished wood. “This was uncle Sakkie’s gun.”

Isak looks down at his warped face.

“Sakkie said I must give it to my eldest. Tomorrow you’re ten and I guess that’s a good time for a boy to have his own gun.”

His father holds out the gun to him and he steps forward, reaching up to kiss his father’s cheek, but his father pulls back.

“You’re a big boy, Sakkie. Kissing is for babies and moffies. From now on we greet like men.”

The fingers of his father’s hand grip his firmly and they shake hands like men do, then he takes his gun and it is light to hold.* * *

It is his birthday and it is raining. He can tell by the drumming on the roof and the light in the room. The birthday gun is in the safe behind his father’s suits and the house is empty but for him and Danie.

He rolls onto his back, feeling the strawberry mark on his neck. Raatjie calls it the mark of the devil, for something he did wrong before he was born. There are no sounds from the kitchen, just the twitting of the canary as Raatjie is stacking, drying trays, covered with halved fruit, for the rain.

He gets up and dresses quietly so as not to waken his brother. In front of the mirror he strikes a pose. The muscles in his arms scurry like mice. Then he inspects his armpits for hairs but there are none.

In the empty kitchen the canary sits forlornly on its swing. He whistles and the bird claws the side of the cage, pecking at the metal bars. The pig’s head of Outa lies on the kitchen table. He lifts the net to look, poking the flesh with his finger. Carefully he pulls back the lids, revealing the staring eyes, then covers the head quickly.

Kalbas waits at the door. He sits down and runs his hand hard over the sheepdog’s back and the dog smiles with pleasure. The mountain is covered in cloud.

All around the garden are cypresses planted by Ouma to keep the veld out.

Farming is in your blood, you are baptised into it from the day you are born. That is what Oupa will say to him today.

He calls the dog and they walk through the orchards. Pickers, flushed out by the rain, jest and shout at him from the tractor. Most of the men are strangers, moving from farm to farm, tumbleweeds scarcely touching the ground. They are difficult to discipline. Their ways are different to the farm people’s ways. He turns his head away as they eat of the fruit.

In the office, Oupa sits heavily on his father’s chair behind the desk while Dominee sits stiffly on the couch with ankles that snap like dogs at each other.

“Congratulations, Isak.” Dominee shakes his hand. “Rain on one’s birthday means many blessings.”

“Summer rain is a bloody curse, Dominee.” Oupa corrects him before turning his attention to Isak. “Farming is in your blood my boy, from the day you are born till the day you die.”

“Ja, Oupa.”

Oupa opens one of the desk’s drawers. “Want to play with the medals?”

“Please, Oupa.”

Dominee pages through the Bible on his lap, his suede shoes ruined by the rain while his Oupa sucks on the unlighted pipe. Isak opens the cigar box with the medals. A number are in the shape of a star, while others are wreathed, one has a springbuck head on it.

Behind Dominee is a photo of an old man with a goatee wearing lots of medals and behind the door is a calendar with a woman in a bikini, but Dominee can’t see the calendar because the door is open. The two men sit in silence. The humming noise of the grader can be heard behind the office wall and his mother’s strident voice in the pack shed. Isak unpacks the medals in rows. A row for Oupa and a row for Oom Sakkie.

Oupa thumbs tobacco that comes out of his mother’s farm shop. His oupa still has a set of keys even though he doesn’t live there any more. “In nineteen- eighteen, Ma and me returned from Bechuanaland after I lost the entire herd to the rinderpest.”

Dominee gives up on huisbesoek. He puts the Bible back into its leather bag.

Isak lifts two of the medals and makes noises like an aeroplane. He knows Oupa’s stories well. The old man lights up with a lot of sucking and coughing, while Dominee coughs politely from the smoke that Oupa blows in his direction.

“What was Oom doing there?”

“Followed the rush to the north,” he explains. “Thought I’d sell provisions to the mines and the diggers.” He leans back, settling into the swivel chair. “Fruit did badly after the Great War and I saw this as a chance to make money, lots of it. Ja ja, seduced by Mammon, Dominee.”

Danie stands at the door with a tear-stained face.

“Ja, ja, your boeta is here.” Oupa wags the pipe at him. “Has no one taught you to bloody well greet properly?”

Danie puts his head down and runs past Dominee to Isak.

“Why are you blubbing so much?” Isak asks crossly.

“The head.” Danie picks up one of the medals, his lashes wet. “The head looked at me.”

“It’s vrek, man, the pig can’t do anything to you.”

Isak dives the medal out of Danie’s hand. The smaller boy bursts into tears.

“Stop it!” Oupa reprimands him through the tobacco smoke. “Boys don’t cry.”

“Sissie,” Isak adds.

“Won’t play any more!” Danie drops the medal and runs out.

“Suit yourself, blubber boy.” Isak drops his voice.

The rain comes down on the tin roof and for a while Oupa’s story is drowned out. He takes out a penknife and begins to clean his nails.

Dominee concentrates on the leak in the ceiling. “So what did Oom do?”

“I took the Union Castle to England.” He pauses. “So wan with care, we find time for frightened peace to pant and breathe short-winded accents of new broils to be commenced in strands afar remote.”

His oupa likes to speak in a grand way. It comes from having to speak English at school long ago. It helps him win arguments at the farmers’ meetings because no one is exactly sure what he is saying. Isak wants to get up but he must wait until the story of Perron is finished.

“A month there and a month back, Dominee. When I docked in London I made directly for Covent Garden to A.C. Sanders, who had sold my fruit before the war. I had just five days and in five days I sold the entire harvest up front. They remembered the blue-and-red brand.” He digs a faded sticker out of one of the drawers, passing it on to Dominee. “They gave me my first cheque with gold embossed guarantees on it to take home.”

Dominee hands the paper back to him. “Must have been nerve-wracking, Oom.”

“The journey back took longer because of storms, so when we docked in the Cape, it happened to be the last day of my contract.”

Isak gathers the medals, careful not to disturb the old man or his temper.

“No one knew of my exact coming, and so old man Moore organised an auction of my things, in absentia. He gave Ma instructions to clear the house and the whole valley’s farmers were there in force to witness the fall of the Bloedsappe.”

Dominee looks at his watch and shifts to the edge of the seat, unzipping the leather bag.

“I took a taxi from the harbour with a spineless looking fellow who I paid upfront. He had this twitch in one eye and all I told him was, sit voet in die hoek, Boeta, today is my day.”

Outside the sun is shining and Isak can see parts of the mountain coming through the cloud.

“When we pulled up in the yard, they were busy auctioning off the last of the tractors and I showed him where to park the car, right under the auctioneer’s nose. They still had to make a way for us to get through, because of the crowd, so many people were there. I can remember the whole bunch, staring into the Ford to see who the bloody hell it was and everyone could see even the dim-witted bywoners, that it was me, Isak Johannes Minnaar, as plain as daylight.” Oupa swivels round, gesturing to the exact spot. “I paid the suffering soul a second time because he was white from me chasing him through the mountain pass and I took my time, climbing out slowly and oh, that face of old man Moore,” his oupa chuckles with delight, “and I took the cheque out of my top pocket, holding it high so all could see and then everyone knew the party was over.” He hits the desk excitedly, “Only then did I speak, in a loud voice and in English too, ‘Ma, put that stuff back in the house, we’re here to stay’.”

“One man’s gain is another man’s loss.” Dominee attempts to end the discussion, ready to move on to others in the district.

“Today, the Perron name means nothing.” Oupa spits on the floor. “You bloody Nats have come to change everything.” He tears at the sticker, dropping it in the rubbish bin. “We farmers are all now so one and the same.”

Isak holds out the box.

“Finished?”

He nods.

“Whose medals, Oom?” Dominee changes the subject inspecting the collection with interest. “Ag man, you won’t recognise any of them,” Oupa brushes him off, “you’re an Ossewabrandwag man.”

Dominee keeps quiet.

“Some are mine.” Oupa looks distracted, picking up the one with the springbok. “And others belong to my eldest son, given posthumously. His grave lies in Heliopolis, just outside Cairo.”

“His death?”

Oupa closes the cigar box lid. “Sakkie served under a bloody goat of an English officer in the desert, an officer because of his titles, not his damn backbone.” He takes the medal from Dominee. “The rain is over.”

This is the dominee’s cue to leave.

Oupa and Dominee walk out onto the stoep, leaving him at the desk.

* * *

Bored, he wanders inside the shed where his mother stands on a box surrounded by women, holding a box of peaches.

“You hold the fruit like this.” She cups the velvety fruit. “Its skin is thin like a child’s, press too hard and it breaks.” She squeezes the fruit and her wedding ring cuts into the skin, the juice dripping onto her wrist. “Now it means nothing to anyone, you might as well get rid of it.”

She throws the fruit over the heads into the drum.

They all turn to look and their faces are like stone.

Danie sits under the box on the cement floor drawing in chalk.

Between her brows are lines dividing her forehead in two. She scoops another fruit. “Remember,” she taps the side of her head, “the fruit must travel three weeks on the big waters. Do you understand?”

No one answers. No one understands. No one has seen the big waters the nooi is talking about. They all look out by the door as the lorry passes by. The men whistle but not the old man with blue eyes like a white person. He just stands, holding on to the railings. His mother tries again, swiping at the loose hair falling over her face. “What happens when you get a boil?” This time she doesn’t wait for a reply. “It gets infected, right?” She throws her head back, planting her feet wider on the box. “Fruit is just the same, almost like a person, once you’ve picked it off the tree it starts to die, slowly.”

The women are listening now.

“And when its gets bruised, then it rots even quicker. Only forty days, that’s all it has at its best.” Her voice drops. “If damaged, it’s even faster.”

Her lips and the women’s lips are the same to Isak, postbox slits that only allow a thin letter through.

The women chorus. “Ja, Nooi.”

His mother has a name amongst the women. He knows because he hears it spoken about in the farm barracks on weekends. Her name is Nooi Kwaaiwater because she can see from afar when a peach has been mollycoddled or not. Her shouting sits behind his belly button but her singing sits in his throat.

She gets off the box and the women line the sides of the band machine. Peaches roll past, hundreds and hundreds of them. The packers’ hands fly over the fruit so fast that Isak cannot see what they do in the air. When he sees again the peach is wrapped in tissue paper.

He spits the pip as far as he can. It hops over the floor onto Danie’s drawings. “Want to come to the river?”

Danie nods and drops the chalk. A row of stick figures without faces.

Down at the river the water comes past, sweeping along branches and fertilizer bags from upstream. The boys walk to the edge and call out.

Petrus sits hidden in the shade of an oleander, smoking. Twelve years old and finished with books and his angry schoolmaster who drinks communion wine from a thermos. They call his name again. Petrus creeps up and shoves Isak forward.

“Stop it.” Danie tries to stop them as they wrestle and kick in the mud.

“Shurrup, you just like a girl.” Isak dismisses him, getting off Petrus.

Sulking, Petrus retires under the bush, smaller and lighter in build from the liquor his mother, Raatjie, drank. He picks up the rolled cigarette and draws deeply.

“What are we playing?” Isak swaggers, hands on the hip.

“Look,” Danie points excitedly to the flock of summer swallows, “the sun has brought them.”

The birds twitter as they settle in the reeds.

“Let’s get the gun.” Isak throws stones into the reeds.

Petrus stops smoking. “What gun?” he asks suspiciously.

“Birthday gun,” Danie answers before Isak can reply. “Mamma doesn’t want him to shoot with it.”

“Pa says I’m big enough, so whê.” Isak sticks out his tongue.

“Where’s this gun of yours?” Petrus joins Isak in throwing stones into the reeds.

“At home in the safe,” Danie pipes in.

“Is it just another of your stories or are we going to see it?” Petrus challenges him.

“It’s my gun and I can do what I want with it,” Isak retorts proudly.

“Ag, I’ll only believe it when I see it with these two eyes.” Petrus stretches his eyes open like someone getting a fright.

Isak ignores him, instructing Danie, “Get the box in the office.”

Danie is still tiny enough to fit under the branches of the fruit trees. He runs as fast as he can, returning with the box of medals. On the lid is a drawing of a man with a twirled moustache and a gun slung over his shoulder.

“C … u … b … a … n,” he spells phonetically before presenting the box to Isak.

“Wait here,” Isak commands as he hands them each a medal. He keeps the one with the springbuck for himself.

He takes the short cut through the pear orchard. The trees are widely spaced and they are the oldest on the farm. He likes to walk this way as it is the closest place to a forest that he knows of. Above his head, pears hang in their thousands, still hard and green like bright jewels in the sun. He pauses and scratches around in the grass until he finds the nest. Some of the eggs have broken and the nest is abandoned but for a lone egg which he pockets.

The house on the hill is empty. The key lies in his father’s drawer amongst the socks packed in rows of colour. Isak opens the cupboard and there are suits in zippered bags smelling of naphthalene. Behind the suits is the safe. The hunting rifles dwarf his pellet gun. There’s a gun as tall as him with a large telescope and silver patterns on the barrel, almost the same as on Ouma’s teapot. He rests the stock on his shoulder and aims at the mirror.

“Peeow, peeow.” He pretends to shoot, finger on the trigger, stepping up to the mirror, his blurred reflection seen through the telescope. Carefully, he puts the rifle back, taking his own, as light as a twig. With the gun casually slung over his chest he takes his time down to the river, enjoying the feel of the leather strap and the knocking of the barrel against his thigh.

Petrus and Danie sit high up in the wild pear tree, chucking down fruit. Numerous times he lifts the barrel, then drops it without firing.

“Boetie can’t shoot,” Danie sings from out of the tree.

“Basie is scared of the nooi, Basie is a scaredy-pants,” Petrus joins him.

Isak aims into the reeds and pulls the trigger. There are shrieks as the birds respond in fright. A few hover above the river, then settle down in the plumes.

“Drop it.” Petrus jumps out of the tree, openly admiring the gun.

“Help!” Danie cries from above.

“Help yourself,” the bigger boys answer as one.

They walk in single file along the edge of the river.

“Can I carry it?” Petrus asks politely.

“Only carry.” Isak hands over the gun.

Ahead are wild ducks, disturbed by the flooding waters. The brown birds slop in the mud.

“Here.” Isak gestures with his hand behind his back.

Reluctantly, Petrus hands back the gun.

Isak drops on his haunches as the ducks wet their beaks. He aims, squinting with concentration. There is a large male in the group with bolder feathers and head. He shoots at it but the bird only flaps it wings. They watch as it splashes water over its body, waiting for it to fall but nothing happens. He shoots again and again at the same bird.

“The bird’s skin is too thick.” Petrus suggests.

“Shurrup!” Isak swings the gun wildly and shoots into the sky.

Petrus yawns.

“Come and stand here.” Isak orders him. “I want to see if I can shoot through your sleeve. Lift your arms like this.” He demonstrates.

The other boy leans against a tree opening his arms to the side.

“Open your arms more.”

Petrus flings them wide open. “Hell, now I’m just like liewe Jesus.”

There’s a black cross in the sight. He shifts the gun from side to side until the sleeve is perfectly centered. Then he pulls the trigger. The pellet makes no sound. Through the sight he sees Petrus falling in slow motion, his mouth wide open.

The ducks hiss. A red spot appears on his shirt at the shoulder, spreading like ink on blotting paper. Isak tries to run but his mind runs faster than his legs.

“O Heretjie, I’m going to vrek.” Petrus writhes in the mud and the ducks arch their necks.

Isak pulls at the shirt to see the mark. “Just don’t go and sqeal at Outa, do you hear? You keep quiet or I’ll donner you.”

Petrus doesn’t answer. He closes his eyes, moaning.

“Did you hear, poeskop? If you split on me, I’ll moer you.”

“Won’t.” With a crooked arm Petrus limps through the trees to the barracks.

“Remember!” Isak shouts at him, picking up the birthday gun with its mud-spattered barrel.

* * *

He stays at the river until the sun sets and the ducks lift off to roost in the eucalyptus grove.

At home, the table is set for supper and the tray with the Johnny Walker jug and soda machine stands in the lounge. The gun is wiped and put away next to the hunting rifles. The key positioned exactly right amongst the socks.

He is alone in the house.

Leisurely, he fills the bath, stripping off his clothes, standing on the bath’s edge to see himself in the mirror. He aims. “Peeow peeow.” He sees how Petrus falls.

Outside the dogs bark. He runs for his room, closing the shutters and climbing into bed, lying quite still.

“Sakkie?” his mother calls for him from the front door.

“Still playing at the barracks,” his father suggests.

“Isak!” His mother calls down the passage. She opens the bedroom door. “Are you awake?”

He slows down his breathing and she listens.

“The passage is wet,” she says, closing the door, walking quickly to the lounge where his father is pumping soda from the machine. “He’s sleeping,” is all she says.

The dogs begin to bark hysterically and there is a knock on the back door.

“Is there no rest for a man?” His father goes to the door.

Isak sits up.

“Evening, Baas, sorry to bother Baas.”

There’s another’s voice too, higher pitched and softer.

“Speak up, Grootman.”

He hears how the voices move into the kitchen.

“Outa bought flour at the shop, Baas, and the klong had to carry the bag home, but the klong couldn’t carry it, Baas, even when he tried to carry the flour bag, Baas, he couldn’t because his arms were too weak, Baas.”

“Why was he too weak, Outa?”

“Basie of Baas shot the klong, here in the arm with the gun, Baas, the gun that Baas gave Basie for his birthday, deceased Baas Sakkie’s gun, Baas.”

“Wife!” His father shouts down the passage to his mother in the lounge.

Isak sinks back in the bed, pulling the covers over his face and pulling on his pyjamas.

This time she switches on the light. “Pappa is calling you, in the kitchen …” she hesitates as though she wants to say something to him, but then all she says is, “hurry.”

He wears his flannel pyjamas with red motorcars printed all over it. In the kitchen his father stands at the stove, heating brandy in a pot and Petrus sits at the table, clutching his injured arm. Outa Floors holds his hat between his hands and there is an albino feather stuck in the strap of his veld hat and a pained expression on his face.

“Stand closer,” his father instructs.

Both boys move closer to the stove. Danie shifts closer too.

His father unbuttons Petrus’s shirt. The shoulder is bruised and swollen around the red mark. Isak stares angrily but the other boy avoids his eyes.

“Wife, the blades.”

His mother is busy with the pig’s head at the basin. She rinses her hands, covered in pink jelly, before extracting a blade from the orange packet.

Meticulously, his father goes to work, dipping the cotton wool in warmed brandy, cleaning the wound. With the new blade he scrapes around the mark, cutting the skin open over the lodged pellet. He presses on either side of the pellet and Petrus grimaces with pain. The pellet pops out, landing on the table, a tiny piece of lead that has caused all the trouble.

“Give the boy some bread.”

The bread is meant for Petrus. Isak watches his mother smearing the slices, then Petrus, consumed with self-pity, gripping the sandwich in his limp hand.

“Thank you, Baas.” Outa is satisfied with the outcome.

Petrus leaves with his grandfather and Isak’s mother calls Danie to the dining room for supper.

“Sit.” His father points to the kitchen chair.

It is only the two of them with the insignificant pellet and the pig head in the basin. Kalbas lies under the table and Isak rests his feet on the dog.

“The gun?” His father’s nostrils flare.

“It’s in the safe, Pa.”

His father picks up the pellet. “You can choose. It’s quite simple. Either the gun or a hiding.”

He cannot live without the gun. “The hiding, Pa.”

“Fetch.”

On the back stoep is a pair of his mother’s takkies. His hand fits into it. His father takes it from him and for a moment it looks like he has changed his mind.

“Down.”

Obediently, he drops over the chair. The red cars are pulled off his bottom, Isak clenches his teeth. At first nothing happens. The dog comes closer and licks his face. Then the takkie comes down and it is a thrashing like no other. The sheep dog retires under the table, whimpering.

It stops but he keeps his head down. Tears stream out of eyes. He bites on his lip, not making a sound. Eventually, the heavy tread of the man moves out of the kitchen down the passage, past the entrance hall to the lounge.

The soda machine gushes. Silence, then piano chords softly played fill the house with notes that ripple like water. The dog paws the boy’s arm. With effort he gets up, his skin burning and broken. Hobbling to the bathroom, he climbs up on the bath’s edge, turning his bottom to the mirror and the word Bata is written over and over in reverse.

He finds his way in the dark back to his bedroom. The piano becomes louder and louder like rain on a roof, on and on until it stops abruptly. The humming of the generator is cut off too as the last light is switched off.

Danie climbs out of the bed and opens the shutter. Light streams in from the sliced moon, a sliver of yellow melon hanging there amongst the stars.

“Boetie,” Danie peers over Isak, “did you have a nice birthday?”

Isak doesn’t answer.

The little boy digs something out from under his pillow, holding it out. A piece of meat, covered in cold gravy. He wolfs it down as the little boy watches with approval.

The moon settles on the mountain top. Together they lie in the brightness. Danie scratches his back with blunt fingers, while down at the river, the ducks honk, him still not knowing what the gun can do.