21

BLACKMAIL

VIGILANCE LOITERED BY THE TICKEY BOX WITH his back to the nun inside, trying to make out what she was saying. If this was a trunk call, it must be costing a fortune – but the Catholics had plenty of money. They walked around Crocodile Flats in darned cassocks and humble grey dresses to underline their vows of poverty, but he had seen photographs of the Great Place where the Pope lived, crammed with treasures that would feed the world’s hungry. Vigilance bet that when they went on what they called ‘retreat’ once a year, it was to some smart hotel where they ate like rich people and lay around in foam baths to soak off the settlement dust.

‘Mother Esmé, we believe this girl,’ the nun pleaded. ‘Please come …’

It was something to do with a lady and a burnt-out hut, he gathered. Then he caught a name: Sweetness Moloi. Philomena’s daughter, she of the golden looks and sturdy limbs. Had the girl done something wrong? Fallen pregnant? But in that case, surely the nun wouldn’t be talking and laughing at the same time.

‘What are you doing here?’

The officious voice stabbing into his back was Luxolo’s: the young postmaster foisted on the village in place of Ouma Klopper, who had reigned behind the post office counter since 1958. In keeping with her tight blue perm, uncompromising stays and immaculate frilly blouses, she was strict but fair. In the days when there were different doors for blacks and whites, Ouma Klopper served everyone in order: first come, first served, never mind which side they were on. She rewarded patient kids in the queues with pastel motto sweets that read ‘Ek het jou lief’ and ‘Kiss me quick’, and withered unruly kids with a glare that could melt shoes to the linoleum.

In defiance of regulations about indoor greenery, she nurtured a wandering Jew cutting in a sawn-off light bulb topped up every day with water until it had wandered all over the brass bars above the counter, up one wall to the cornice, right round the room (supported by thumbtacks), then down to the safe where the stamps and postal orders were kept. She brought out chairs for pensioners to sit on. She fetched glasses of water for thirsty people who had walked a long way, and didn’t wipe the rim afterwards. She called people by their names.

‘I’m a bloedsap,’ she’d emphasise. ‘We don’t hold with nonsense regulations. What’s right is right. Finish and klaar.’

When people said, ‘But Ouma, the bloedsappe went out with the ark,’ she’d snap, ‘Never mind. Nobody gets away with claptrap in my post office.’

When the new regime in Pretoria discovered that she was seventy-five, she was replaced by a fussy despot, Simon Luxolo, who looked down his long nose at everyone. The first thing he did was snip off the wandering Jew at its base, unwind it from the brass bars and throw it in the bin; the second was to go through the receipt books and compile a damning report about unprofessional account-keeping. Having no children to support her, Ouma Klopper was reduced to a state old-age home where, it was said, she started another wandering Jew in a light bulb tied to the bars on the window.

Everyone missed her. The new postmaster was officious. One day Queenie shouted ‘blackmail!’ at him in an argument and the name took. Luxolo could not comprehend why everyone who came into the post office wore a mocking smile.

Now hearing his self-important ‘What are you doing here?’, Vigilance swung round with the same disrespectful expression. ‘Just standing.’

Luxolo snapped, ‘You’re listening outside a public telephone. That’s an offence. Go back to your sewing machine.’

‘It’s a free country now, meneer Postman.’ The double insult was unmistakable. ‘I can stand where I want.’

‘Not in front of my post office, loitering. Vuma!’

Vigilance was shoved in the chest, sending him stumbling into the pathway. The attack was so sudden that he lost his balance and fell, scraping one side of his face as it slid along the gravel. The shock made his head spin. In a daze, he heard the tickey box door bang and the nun shout, ‘You can’t do that to an old man!’

Luxolo’s reply was suave. ‘He was eavesdropping on you, Madam. I sent him away. Regulations stipulate that—’

‘Sent him? That’s a lie. I witnessed your attack. He could be badly hurt.’

Vigilance felt the nun swoop down on him and struggled to sit up. ‘I’m all right, Sister. Just a bit dizzy.’

A hand smelling of Lifebuoy soap went under his chin as she assessed the damage. ‘You’re not all right. You’re bleeding. Come, I’ll take you to Sister Dineo and we’ll get that graze cleaned up.’

As she helped him to his feet, Luxolo raised his voice. ‘I will not allow such flagrant transgressions in or near my post office—’

‘And I’ll bloody well have you up for assault if you do anything like this again,’ Sister Hilary barked over her shoulder as she looped her arm round Vigilance’s waist. Shaken and sore as he was, he couldn’t help a chuckle.

‘And why are you laughing?’

‘I didn’t know nuns used such language.’

‘When needs be,’ she said. ‘Were you eavesdropping?’

‘Yebo. I’m one who cannot tell a lie. Sorry, Sister.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I want to know what’s going on.’ He shambled to a stop and turned to her. ‘You were smiling and laughing in there. Please tell me why?’

Sister Hilary was so caught up by her wonderful tidings for Mother Esmé that she couldn’t help them overflowing again. She bent towards his ear and whispered, ‘It’s Sweetness Moloi, but don’t tell anyone. She believes she saw a vision of Our Lady yesterday. Father Liam has telephoned the diocese in Johannesburg and they’re sending someone down. The head of our order, Mother Esmé, will probably come too. This could be a miracle.’ Her gasp of joy was hot on his cheek.

Vigilance roared, ‘Ma-Jesu, in this place? Never.’

The astonished denial was the same when everyone heard. Nothing of even minor importance ever happened in Crocodile Flats.