Toloki opens his eyes. Boxing Day. One of those senseless holidays when we do not bury our dead. Like Christmas Day. Instead we go for what we call a joll. All it means is that we engage in an orgy of drinking, raping, and stabbing one another with knives and shooting one another with guns. And we call it a joll. We walk around the streets, pissing in our pants, and shouting, ‘Happee-ee-e!’ That’s what Christmas is all about. And Boxing Day is the day we go out to bars and she-beens to take off the hangover of yesterday. But by midday, the whole orgy has started all over again. Some of us, the better-off ones, go out to the beach to play volleyball and frisbees, and to piss and vomit on the golden sands as the day gets older. It was just sheer luck that there was a funeral yesterday: only because that stuck-up bitch Noria was sensible enough to insist that her son be buried on Christmas Day, and not on any other day. The street committee, or whoever is in charge of the lives of the squatter-camp dwellers, could have refused, but they acceded to her wish. It just shows how much power Noria still has – especially over men.
Today he must go and see her. Fortunately he is still wearing his professional costume, since he was too lazy to change into his home clothes when he came back from the funeral yesterday. He really must discipline himself to change, and not to sleep in his costume. Otherwise it will get finished, and God knows where he will get another one like it. It was not easy getting this one. One day, years ago, he was passing by one of the city shopping malls. At the paved square where there were flowers and small trimmed trees growing in giant concrete pots, and genteel people sitting at the small round tables eating all sorts of food, he saw a small shop that he had not noticed before. It was between the two restaurants where the pavement diners had ordered their food. Different types of costumes were displayed at the window, and he was struck by a particularly beautiful outfit all in black comprising a tall shiny top hat, lustrous tight-fitting pants, almost like the tights that the young women wear today, and a knee-length velvety black cape buckled with a hand-sized gold-coloured brooch with tassels of yellow, red and green. He fell in love with it. He knew immediately that it would be most suitable for his new vocation which he had decided on only the previous day after his disagreement with Nefolovhodwe.
Toloki walked inside the shop, and was welcomed with a firm handshake by the old man who owned the shop, and his son, who was being trained in the trade. The old man explained to him that his shop served the theatre world. Most of his outfits were period costumes that actors and producers came to rent for plays that were about worlds that did not exist anymore. But other costumes did not belong to any world that ever existed. These were strange and fantastic costumes that people rented for fancy dress balls, or for New Year carnivals, or to make people laugh. Toloki asked him about his favourite outfit in the window. ‘Oh, that one,’ said the old man. ‘I have only rented it out once before, to some Americans who wanted it for a Halloween party.’
‘Can I buy it?’
‘Buy it? Of course. Although God knows what you’ll be buying it for. People don’t normally buy these costumes. They rent them because they are things you use only once, and never again.’
‘I want to own it.’
But when he heard what the price was, he knew he could not afford it in a hundred years. It was expensive, he was told, because it was made of very expensive material: silk and velvet. He left with a very painful heart, for he really wanted that costume. He could see himself in it, an imposing (albeit stocky) figure in some of the greatest cemeteries of the world, practising his vocation which was slowly taking shape in his mind.
He went back to the shop every day, and sat outside that window looking longingly at the costume. Leaking from his open mouth were izincwe, the gob of desire. The owners of the two restaurants began to complain. ‘He is frightening our customers away,’ they said. ‘Who would want to eat our food while looking at the slimy saliva hanging out of his mouth?’ But Toloki refused to move away. It was a public place, wasn’t it? Didn’t he have a right to be where he wanted to be? At least if he couldn’t afford to buy the costume, he had all the right in the world to sit there for the rest of his life and admire it. ‘What can we do?’ the restaurant owners said resignedly. ‘Ever since these people began to know something about rights they have got out of hand. I tell you, politics has destroyed this country.’ So, day after day Toloki came to admire his costume, until one day the restaurant owners decided to buy it for him. ‘Promise us that if we buy you this costume you will never come back here again,’ they begged. He promised, and left happily with the nicely wrapped costume under his arm. He was never seen there again.
That was several years ago. Now the costume has seen better days. The colourful tassels are gone. The topper is crooked and crumpled. The velvet of the cape has developed a thick sheen of dirt, and the tights are held together by wires and safety pins. The black beauty has become almost grey. His pride in this venerable costume increases with age, though, like advocates of law who wear their old and tattered gowns with pride as symbols of their seniority in the bar. He will wear it, certainly, when he goes to see Noria, even though he is not on duty. It is a pity that Noria has never seen him in action. One day he would like to impress her with a flourishing display of his mournful expertise.
Maybe he should first go to the beach and take a shower. He has not washed himself for at least one week. Then he will go to Noria’s in the afternoon, when people are done with their household chores and are prepared to welcome visitors. On second thoughts, he will not go to the beach. It is Boxing Day and all the beaches are crowded with holidaymakers from the inland provinces who come especially to litter the lovely coastal city at this time of the year. People like to gawk when he showers. The smaller the crowd the better. Perhaps he will take a walk to the waterfront and entertain himself by watching the antics of the buskers and the ridiculous excitement of the tourists who visit the pubs, stores and theatres there. Or he might just as well sit here, watch ships come and go, and think of Noria.
Noria. The village. His memories have faded from the deep yellow-ochre of the landscape, with black beetles rolling black dung down the slopes, and colourful birds swooping down to feed on the hapless insects, to a dull canvas of distant and misty grey. Now, however, it is all coming back. Pale herdboys, with mucus hanging from the nostrils, looking after cattle whose ribs you could count, on barren hills with patches of sparse grass and shrubs. Streams that flowed reluctantly in summer and happily died in winter. Homesteads of three or four huts each, decorated outside with geometric patterns of red, yellow, blue and white. Or just white-washed all around. One hovel each for the poorest families. In addition to three huts, his homestead had a four-walled tin-roofed stone building with a big door that never closed properly. This was his father’s workshop.
His father, a towering handsome giant in gumboots and aging blue overalls, was a blacksmith, and his bellows and the sounds of beating iron filled the air with monotonous rhythms through the day. Jwara, for that was his father’s name, earned his bread by shoeing horses. But on some days – Toloki could not remember whether these were specially appointed days, or whether they were days when business was slack – he created figurines of iron and brass. On those days he got that stuck-up bitch, Noria, to sing while he shaped the red-hot iron and brass into images of strange people and animals that he had seen in his dreams. Noria was ten years old, but considered herself very special, for she sang for the spirits that gave Jwara the power to create the figurines. She had been doing it for quite a few years. Although her voice added to the monotony of the bellows and beating metal, we thought it was quite mellifluous. We came and gathered around the workshop, and solemnly listened to her never-changing song. Even the birds forgot about the beetles, and joined the bees hovering over the workshop, making buzzing and chirping sounds in harmony with Noria’s song.
The earliest reference to Noria as a stuck-up bitch was first heard some years back when Toloki’s mother was shouting at Jwara, her angry eyes green with jealousy, ‘You spend all your time with that stuck-up bitch, Noria, and you do not care for your family!’
Noria was seven at the time, and she and Jwara had spent a whole week in the workshop, without eating any food or drinking any water, while he shaped his figurines and she sang. We came and listened, and went back to our houses to eat and to sleep, and came back again to the workshop, and found them singing and shaping figurines. Even the birds and the bees got tired and went to sleep. When they came back the next day, Noria and Jwara were still at it.
Xesibe, Noria’s father, came to the workshop, stood pitifully at the door, and pleaded with Jwara, ‘Please, Jwara, release our child. She has to eat and sleep.’ But Jwara did not respond. Nor did Noria. It was as though they were possessed by the powerful spirits that made them create the figurines. Noria’s mother, the willowy dark beauty known to us only as That Mountain Woman, was very angry with Xesibe: ‘How dare you, Father of Noria, interfere with the process of creation! Who are you, Father of Noria, to think that a piece of rag like you can have the right to stop my child from doing what she was born to do?’ That Mountain Woman had razor blades in her tongue.
Toloki’s mother, on the other hand, was furious. There was no more food in the house, and no one could get Jwara to respond to their pleas that he should give them money to buy maize-meal at the general dealer’s store. He just went on hammering and hammering to the rhythm of Noria’s monotonous song. It was in these circumstances that Toloki’s mother, her stout matronly body shaking with anger, uttered the immortal words that gave Noria her stuck-up bitch title, which lived with her from that day onwards.
We know all these things, but Toloki does not remember them. He only knows that as far as his memory can take him, Noria was always referred to as a stuck-up bitch, and was proud of the title. How this came about, he does not know. Nor can he remember how Noria began to sing for his father. This is how it happened: he was eight and she five. They were playing the silly games that children play outside the workshop. Jwara had just finished shoeing the policemen’s horses, and was about to put off the fires, and to close the shop. He was looking forward to taking an early break, and joining his old friends, Xesibe and Nefolovhodwe, for a gourd of sorghum beer. Then Noria sang. Jwara found himself overwhelmed by a great creative urge. He took an idle piece of iron, and put it in the fire. When it was red hot, he began to shape it into a strange figure. He amazed himself, because in all his life he had never known that he had such great talent. But before he could finish the figurine, Noria stopped singing, and all of a sudden he could not continue to shape the figure. The great talent, and the urge to create, had left his body. He could not even remember what he was trying to do with that piece of iron. Then in the course of her game with Toloki, Noria sang her childish song again. The song had no meaning at all. But it had such great power in Jwara that he found himself creating the figurine again. From that day, whenever Jwara wanted to create his figurines, he would invite Noria over to the workshop, she would sing her meaningless song, and he would work for hours on end at the figurines. Sometimes new shapes would visit him in his dreams, and he would want to create them the next day. Jwara and Noria did not usually work every day though, and the time that they worked for the whole week was an exception and a record. It was because Jwara’s dreams had been particularly crowded the previous night, and he was unable to stop until he had reproduced all the strange creatures with which he had interacted in his sleep.
We were not surprised, really, that Noria had all this power to change mediocre artisans into artists of genius, and to make the birds and the bees pause in their business of living and pay audience to her. In fact, one thing that Toloki used to be jealous about even as a small boy, was that we all loved the stuck-up bitch, for she had such beautiful laughter. We would crowd around her and listen to her laughter. We would make up all sorts of funny things in order to make her laugh. She loved to laugh at funny faces, and some villagers gained great expertise in making them. A particular young man called Rubber Face Sehole knew how to pull all sorts of funny faces, and whenever he was around we knew that we would all be happily feasting on Noria’s laughter. So Noria received all the attention, and Toloki none.
It is rumoured that when Noria was a baby, she already had beautiful laughter. We say it is rumoured because it is one of the few things that we do not know for sure. When That Mountain Woman was pregnant she went to give birth in her village in the mountains, as was the custom with a first child. Since we never had anything to do with the mountain people, we only know about the events there from the stories that people told. They said that nursemaids and babysitters used to tickle Noria for the pleasure of hearing her laughter. This went on until her mother had to stop the whole practice after baby Noria developed sores under her armpits. After that, when she was tickled she did not laugh but cried instead, which seemed to spread a cloud of sadness, not only among those who heard her cry, but throughout the whole mountain village.
We felt that Toloki should not have been overly jealous of Noria. Although we always remarked, sometimes in his presence, that he was an ugly child, he was not completely without talent. He was good with crayons, and could draw such lovely pictures of flowers, mountains and huts. Sometimes he drew horses. But he never drew people. Once he was asked to draw a picture of a person, but his hand refused to move. When he went to school, he would just sit there and draw pictures while the teacher was teaching. Come to think of it, neither Toloki nor Noria paid much attention to school work from the very first day they were registered at the village primary school. But then they were not the only children who did not pay much attention to school work. Toloki drew his pictures not only in class during lessons, but also during break when other children were playing football with a tennis ball on the road near the school.
There was the time when a milling company sponsored a national art competition for primary school pupils. Those pictures that conquered the eyes of the judges won prizes of books. One of Toloki’s pictures, the only entry from the village, won a prize. The big man from the milling company drove all the way from town to the village primary school to award the prize of books to Toloki. The principal asked all the pupils to assemble in the big stone building that served as a classroom for Standards Three, Four and Five, and also as a church on Sundays, just as they did for the morning prayers, and the prize was awarded in front of everybody. Words were spoken that day that filled Toloki’s heart with pride, and for the first time in his life he felt more important than everyone else, including Noria. After school, filled with excitement, he ran home with his new books, and went straight to his father’s workshop.
‘Father, I have won a national art competition. I got all these books.’
‘Good.’ Jwara did not look at Toloki, nor at the books. There were no horses to shoe, no figurines to shape. He was just sitting there, staring at hundreds of figurines lined up on the shelves where they were fated to remain for the rest of everybody’s lives. And he did not even look at his son.
‘Father, I have a picture of a beautiful horse here. It is a dream horse, not like the horses you shoe. Why don’t you shape it into a figurine too?’
‘Get out of here, you stupid, ugly boy! Can’t you see that I am busy?’
Toloki walked out, with tears streaming down his cheeks. How he hated that stuck-up bitch Noria!
If Jwara ruled his household with a rod of iron, he was like clay in the hands of Noria. He bought her sweets from the general dealer’s store, and chocolate. Once, when the three friends, Nefolovhodwe, Xesibe and Jwara, were sitting under the big tree in front of Xesibe’s house, playing the morabaraba game with small pebbles called cattle, and drinking beer brewed by That Mountain Woman (who always had a good hand in all matters pertaining to sorghum), Xesibe complained, ‘You know, Jwara, I think you spoil that child. You pamper her too much with good things, and she is now so big-headed that she won’t even listen to me, her own father.’ Poor Xesibe, he was not aware that at that very moment That Mountain Woman was sitting on the stoep, not far from the three friends, sifting wheat flour that she was going to knead for bread. She heard her husband’s complaint, and she shouted, ‘Hey, you Father of Noria! You should be happy for your daughter. You are a pathetic excuse for a father. Or did you want Jwara to buy sweets and chocolate for a thing like you?’ She had razor blades in her tongue, That Mountain Woman. Xesibe was ashamed, and his friends were embarrassed for him. Since that day he never complained again, and Noria continued to receive gifts from Jwara. But so not to offend his dear old friend of many years he told her, ‘Don’t show these to your father. You can show them to your mother, but never to your father.’
It was not only the razor blades that made people wary of That Mountain Woman. It was also because she was different from us, and her customs were strange, since she was from the faraway mountain villages where most of us had never been. We wondered why Xesibe had to go all the way to the mountains to look for a wife, when our village was famous for its beautiful women. That Mountain Woman had no respect for our ways, and talked with men anyhow she liked. When she had just arrived in the village as a new bride, she was held in great awe and admiration for it was said that, way back in the mountains where she came from, she once walked on the rainbow. Of course no one had proof of that. We only had her word for it. But what we knew for sure was that she was good at identifying different curative herbs, and grinding and mixing them, and in boiling them to make potent medicines for all sorts of ailments. Those days she did not practise professionally as a medicine woman though, but helped members of her new family or their friends when they fell ill.
We told many stories about her, especially when women gathered at the river to wash clothes. She did not seem to be bothered. That Mountain Woman had no shame. The story we told every day, with colourful variations depending on who was telling it, originally happened when she was pregnant with Noria. During the later stages of her pregnancy, she went back to her home village in the mountains. It was the custom that she should give birth to her first child among her own people, and be nursed back to health, and be advised about baby care, by her own mother, and by other female relatives in her village. She went to the government clinic every month to be examined by the nurses, and to get the free powdered milk, cooking oil, and oatmeal that were given to pregnant women. Every time the story was told we exclaimed cynically, ‘Oh, they have clinics too in the mountain villages!’
During that period a group of health assistants came to the village, and stayed at the clinic. They were young men who were being trained to educate villagers about primary health care. Sometimes they helped the nurses to bandage the wounds of young men who had participated in stick fights, or in brawls that involved beer and women. During the few weeks that they stayed there, the health assistants accumulated quite a reputation in the villages around the clinic, for they went out drinking every night and did naughty things with the young women whose husbands were migrant workers in the mines.
One day That Mountain Woman noticed that the cooking oil and powdered milk were about to run out. The whole family used this food carelessly because they knew that she got it free from the clinic. Even though it was not her day to attend the clinic, she decided she would go all the same. The nurses would shout at her, and tell her that she was meant to come only when her time was due at the end of the month, but she was going to pretend that she had come because she had felt some pains that morning. An added incentive was that she had heard from some of the pregnant women in her village that there was a new type of food being rationed out at the clinic. These were powdered eggs that the villagers referred to as the eggs of a tortoise. They tasted like real hen eggs when you mixed them with water and fried them in cooking oil.
She rode on her father’s horse, since the clinic was located in a valley over the hills, which was quite some distance from her own village. It is said that she was eight months pregnant at the time. At the clinic, she joined the queue of pregnant women who were gossiping about the handsome young health assistants who had invaded the valley with a blaze of town sophistication and class. The young women of the valley were gaga about the health assistants, and the men were so angry that they were heard on occasion threatening to castrate the young upstarts who had the morals of pigs. There was a tinge of envy in the voices of the women in the queue, since nature had deprived them, at least for the time being, of the pleasure of enjoying the attentions of the handsome visitors.
The turn of That Mountain Woman came, and she went into the room where she was to be examined by a nurse. At that moment, there was no nurse in the room. She stripped naked, and lay belly upwards on the bed as was the practice, waiting for the nurse to come and palpate her. Instead, one of the health assistants entered the room. She was surprised and ashamed, and tried to cover her nakedness with her hands. But the young man said, ‘Don’t be afraid of me. I am a doctor.’ Then he began to palpate her, and within minutes, the crotch of his pants was on fire. She felt herself relaxing with him, and they introduced themselves to each other.
‘You are a beautiful woman. I think I have fallen in love with you.’
‘But I am heavy with child!’
‘You won’t be like that forever.’
That Mountain Woman felt flattered that even in her most shapeless moments, a whole doctor found her attractive. He told her that even though she was pregnant, there would be no problems if they were to decide to seal their newfound love with a bit of adult merriment. ‘And I should know, because I am a doctor,’ he added.
‘There is no way we can meet. I come from the village over the hills.’
‘I have a plan. This evening pretend that you are ill. Ask your people to send for me. Tell them that I am the doctor who examined you today, and I am the only one who understands your illness. Then I’ll come.’
The health assistant ran away quickly when he heard the footsteps of the nurse in the corridor. ‘Don’t tell her I was here,’ he said. ‘Otherwise she will spoil our thing.’
That evening, That Mountain Woman was attacked by strange pangs in her abdominal area. She moaned and wailed and asked for the doctor who had attended her that day. Old women of the village who knew everything about childbirth and all the complications that sometimes occurred in women, came and offered to help. But she cursed them out of the house, and demanded to see no one but the doctor who examined her that day. A horseman was sent to the clinic over the hills, and found the health assistant waiting for just that message. He said, ‘Yes, I am the doctor you are looking for. Go back and tell my patient that I’ll get the clinic Land Rover and come immediately.’ The horseman rode back with the message, and the health assistant went to ask for a Land Rover from the nurse-clinician in charge of the clinic.
‘Why do you want the Land Rover at this late hour?’
‘We are supposed to hold a meeting with the village health workers in the village over the hills. I need to go there and make arrangements with the chief.’
‘You are indeed a hard worker! You are always thinking of your work even after hours. I am surely going to recommend you for promotion when I write my report to the head-office.’
Unfortunately the Land Rover was being used by another nurse-clinician who had gone with some nurses to visit the outposts. What was he going to do, since he had already promised the desirable woman that he was coming? How would he placate the fire that raged in the crotch of his pants? Wearing a white coat, with a stethoscope stolen from the nurse-clinician’s office hanging around his neck, our health assistant went to the police station and asked the officers for their Land Rover. He told them that there was an emergency in the village over the hills. ‘Don’t worry, doctor, we’ll take you there ourselves.’ And two conscientious policemen drove him to the village over the hills.
He rushed into the rondavel where That Mountain Woman was lying on a mat on the floor, groaning in pain. Grandmothers were all around her, trying to persuade her to chew the herbs that would drive the pain away. He knelt down beside her, and began to palpate her belly. Then in a grave voice he said, ‘I don’t want to alarm you, grandmothers, but I think we are looking at something very serious here. I must remain alone with the patient. Please go out, and don’t let anyone disturb me.’
Soon a crowd had gathered around the hut. The grandmothers had spread it throughout the village that the woman was dying. The miracle doctor who, by the grace of God, happened to be at the clinic over the hills just at the time when his help was needed, was trying to save her life. Wasn’t it fortunate that the clinic which had never had a doctor stationed there before, but had always been staffed by nurses and nurse-clinicians, happened to have a doctor at that very moment? Indeed she was a fortunate woman. The crowd grew larger and larger, and at the same time festal chatter grew louder and louder. Soon the doctor would come out and announce what was ailing the poor woman. But minutes passed, and the doctor did not come out. Those people nearest the door thought they heard some delicate moans and heavy breathing leaking out of the door of the rondavel. The poor woman must be suffering so much!
An hour had passed, and everyone was beginning to get worried. Had something terrible happened to the poor woman? Or perhaps to the doctor? A naughty grandmother whose mind was full of dirty thoughts jokingly said, ‘Ha! Wasn’t it odd that she smiled when the doctor entered?’ Then all those who were in the hut when the doctor arrived suddenly remembered that, yes, she did smile.
These idle babblers planted a seed of suspicion in the mind of the woman’s father. Ignoring the advice of those around him, who said that if he angered the doctor his daughter might never be cured, he suddenly kicked the door down. He rushed into the hut, followed by those who were nearest the door. Inside the hut they were greeted by a scene that left them sweating with anger and disgust. Those who were outside the hut were amazed to hear screams. Then the doctor was flung through the door like a piece of rag. His pants flew after him, and fell in the midst of giggling schoolgirls. Men used their sticks on him, and he screamed, ‘You don’t understand, good people! I was using a new method of curing the pains on her!’
But the villagers did not believe in new-fangled remedies that involved nakedness. They would have killed him had it not been for the policemen, who took the disgraced doctor away to beat him up themselves. They were even angrier than the villagers, for they said the fake doctor had wasted their time. The young men of the village were not satisfied with the arrangement. ‘Why should the police have the monopoly on beating up this pig? We need our share too.’ But who could argue with the dogs of the government, as policemen were known throughout the villages? The last time the villagers saw the naked figure of the doctor, it was being frogmarched in front of the police Land Rover, in the glare of the headlights, and it was screaming, ‘Please forgive me, fathers! It was all a mistake! I will never do it again!’
We told the story over and over again, and we laughed, and we said, ‘That Mountain Woman has no shame.’ But one could detect a smack of envy in our voices when we said that. Those were adventures that would never be seen in our conservative village. Noria was born a month after this incident with the doctor. Six months later, when That Mountain Woman returned to our village with baby Noria on her back, we already knew everything about the scandal. We thought she would be hiding her head in shame, and would at last be a humble person, but no, she continued to be her old brash self. She even laughed when someone, who happened to be braver than the rest of us, asked her discreetly and in well-chosen words about the scandal. That Mountain Woman had no shame.
When Noria was born it was generally believed by the mountain people that her ears looked like those of the doctor. The story spread to our village as well. Though we had never seen him with our own eyes, we strongly believed until this day, that the doctor contributed Noria’s ears. The nurses at the clinic tried, to no avail, to explain that Noria could not have the doctor’s ears since That Mountain Woman was already eight months pregnant when she had merriment with him. Noria was already formed, with ears and all. But we refused to believe the nurses, who would obviously say anything to protect their colleague. We insisted that Noria’s ears were those of the doctor. We all marvelled, ‘Xesibe has no features. How did he manage to make such a beautiful girl?’ Indeed Noria’s father, a stubby man who wore a dirty brown blanket at all times and in all types of weather, had a permanently wry countenance.
It can be boring just to sit and watch ships come and go, especially on Boxing Day when there are not many ships moving in and out of the harbour. Some come, but they will only be unloaded tomorrow, after the holiday, unless they carry perishable food. But memories of his past fill Toloki’s time, so much so that the boisterous noise of the drunken sailors and their prostitutes does not disturb him at all, for he cannot hear it. His thoughts are of Noria and of the village and of the people of the village. When Noria left the village he never thought he would see her again. And later he also left. But now it would seem that his road, and that of Noria, were meant to cross from time to time in this journey of life. They grew up together as children. Come to think of it, at the very first funeral he ever attended back in the village, he was with Noria.
The first funeral. He was thirteen and Noria was ten. The first Nurse that he saw in his life was the principal of the village primary school where he was a pupil. A schoolgirl, who had been Noria’s friend during her life, had died a painful death of the gun. She was the first person that we knew of in our village to be shot dead, and it happened in the city. She had gone there, with other pupils who were in the school choir, to bury another pupil who came from the city to attend the village school where there were no disruptions, but who had unfortunately caught pneumonia and died.
The school principal hired the old bus that travelled between our village and the town. Toloki was among the boys who were sent to town to speak with the owner of the bus. It was his first trip to town, which was about two hours away from the village by bus. It was enchanting for him to walk on the gravel road, and to admire the three stores, the post office, the bank, the milling company, and the secondary school that comprised the town. It was a world that was a far cry from the huts of the village, and the rusty tin-roofed school that doubled as a church on Sundays.
The owner of the bus was quite happy to hire the bus out to the school, but he said, ‘The city is very far away. It takes one whole day and one whole night to get there. My bus is very old, but it will manage the journey. I must take it to the garage first so that they service it properly.’ This meant that those people who depended on the bus to go to town would not be able to go until the bus came back from the city. However, a lot of people went to town on horseback.
When Toloki got home he told his parents about the death of his schoolmate, and of how he was sent with boys who were much older than him to town to speak with the owner of the bus. The pupil who died was a member of the school choir, like both Toloki and Noria, and so the school choir was going to sing at the funeral. Would his parents allow him to go?
‘No, you can’t go.’
‘Please, father!’
‘You are too young.’
‘But Noria is going, and she is three years younger than me.’
‘Noria has more brains in her little finger than you have in your whole body.’
‘Father of Toloki, that was not a nice thing to say to your son. And it is wrong not to allow him to go when all the other children of the school are going.’
‘Who are you, Mother of Toloki, to teach me how to bring up my children?’
‘But, Father of Toloki . . .’
‘You know I don’t argue with women, Mother of Toloki. If you want to be the man of the house, take these pants and wear them. Can’t you see that this child of yours is so stupid that he will get lost in the city?’
At the end of it all, Toloki’s mother was crying, Jwara was staring blankly at the figurines in his workshop, and Toloki did not go to the city. Noria went though, and in addition to the provisions of a whole chicken and steamed bread that her mother prepared for her, Jwara bought her a quantity of sweets and chocolate. Toloki’s mother fumed, ‘You did not allow your own son to go, but you are not ashamed to spend all your money on that stuck-up bitch Noria!’
We got the whole story of what happened in the city from the Nurse. The choir from our village sang at the night vigil. The principal himself was the conductor. Under his baton, the choir had that very year won a trophy in the district school choir competitions. At the funeral of their schoolmate, the voices of those children in the tent where the vigil was held were even more dulcet than they were when they won the competition. Nobody knew of them, as they were from a faraway village no one had heard of. People of the city were asking, ‘Who are these children who sing like angels?’ After the song, a relative of the deceased made a speech and explained that these beautiful children, with such melodic voices and faded gymdresses with patches all over, came from a village where the mother of the deceased had been born. The poor child had been sent there to acquire better education because the children of the city did not want to learn, but preferred to run around the streets, sniffing glue and smoking dagga. But unfortunately God decided to call the poor child to his mansion, since a beautiful plate is never used for eating, but is only displayed to be admired. ‘In any case you will hear all the details of this child’s death from the Nurse at the funeral tomorrow,’ he added. ‘I merely wanted to tell you who these angels are.’
After this brief but much appreciated speech, a local choir took the stage and sang. But people did not seem to be interested in it. They wanted the village choir to come back and sing for them. In the meantime, Noria and her friend went outside the tent to get some fresh air.
‘You know, Noria, I fear something terrible is going to happen.’
‘Something terrible has already happened. We have come to bury our schoolmate.’
‘I feel we are going to be attacked. Some people don’t like our choir because it is doing well.’
‘How can you talk like that?’
‘There is nothing we can do about it, Noria. When one is called no one can prevent it. I am going to die laughing.’
While they were standing there laughing, for Noria took the whole thing as a joke, they heard an announcement from the tent that the village choir was going to take the stage again. They went inside the tent, joined the other choir members, and sang their hearts out. The people of the city were moved to tears. A man stood up and said, ‘I work for the radio station. I want to record this choir so that we can play its music in one of our choral music programmes. We shall surely go to the village to record this choir.’ It was at that moment that a man with a gun stood up and shouted, ‘You shall record them in their graves!’ People screamed and threw themselves on the floor. The man opened fire and Noria’s friend was hit in the chest. She died laughing.
It was at her funeral that Toloki came face to face for the first time with the ritual of the Nurse. When the Nurse related in detail how this our little sister died, and her premonitions, and the last words she uttered, and her final laugh, he was no longer the principal that Toloki knew. He was completely transformed, and his voice was not the voice he used at school, where he was always angry and did not hesitate to make the cane work on the buttocks of naughty boys and girls. When he explained how the bullet had pierced the heart of the innocent girl, we wailed, ‘People of the city killed our daughter only because she had a beautiful voice.’ He modulated his voice, and it blended well with our wails. For Toloki, who at that time did not have an inkling that his future calling would be in the cemeteries of the very city where they killed this our daughter, it was a magic moment. It was only marred by his parents. When the Nurse spoke about the cruel people of the city who had murdered our child, Jwara whispered aloud to his wife, ‘You see why I refused when Toloki wanted to go there, Mother of Toloki?’
‘But that stuck-up bitch Noria went there, and you bought her things.’
‘Noria is not stupid and ugly like Toloki. She is a child of the gods.’
‘If Toloki is stupid and ugly, it is because he has taken after you.’
They were shouting at each other. We stopped them, and told them what a disgrace they were. How could they bring the quarrels of their household to the funeral of an innocent child who had died such a painful death? During all this storm, the Nurse never lost his cool for a moment. Noria stood next to Toloki in stunned silence. Later we said it was good that she did not cry, both for her dead friend, and for her name that was being bandied about at a public funeral, for that would have cast an even heavier blanket of gloom over the village. Toloki was so embarrassed that he wished the ground could open and swallow him, especially when suppressed guffaws were heard from the direction of his schoolmates.
In the afternoon Toloki walks to the taxi rank, which is on the other side of the downtown area, or what is called the central business district. The streets are empty, as all the stores are closed. He struts like a king, for today the whole city belongs to him. He owns the wide tarmac roads, the skyscrapers, the traffic lights, and the flowers on the sidewalks. That is what he loves most about this city. It is a garden city, with flowers and well-tended shrubs and bushes growing at every conceivable place. In all seasons, blossoms fill the air. Sometimes when he goes to a funeral he picks a flower or two, as long as no one sees him, as you are not supposed to pick the flowers in the city parks, gardens and sidewalks. And that gives him a great idea: he might as well pick a few flowers for Noria. Just to make doubly sure, he looks around, then picks a few zinnias. He would have preferred roses, but he would have had to cross two streets in the opposite direction to get roses. So, zinnias will do. At least they are long-stemmed, and come in different colours.
Like the streets, the taxi rank is empty. Usually there are rows and rows of mini-bus taxis, and dirty urchins touting passengers for this or that taxi. And traders selling cheap jewellery and stolen watches. Or fruit and vegetables. This is where he buys his green onions when he comes back from funerals. Or sometimes, when he has had a good payday, a small packet of dried tarragon, which he likes to chew. And then he crosses the street to his favourite bakery to buy Swiss rolls.
An old kombi arrives and drops off a group of domestic workers and people wearing the blue and white uniforms of the Zion Church. That is the taxi to Noria’s squatter camp. He gets into the kombi and takes a back seat. The taxi will not go until it is full. People trickle in, but for some strange reason avoid the back seat. It takes up to thirty minutes to fill all the other seats, and those who come after that have no choice but to take the back seat. They sit facing the other way, trying very hard to give their backs to Toloki, and covering their mouths and noses with handkerchiefs or with their hands.
As the taxi drives out of the city through the winding highway on the hill, his heart pounds even faster with the anticipation of talking with Noria. He wonders what could have killed her son. A bullet from the police maybe? He has been to funerals of children who died from police bullets. Not long ago he mourned at a funeral of a five-year-old girl. The Nurse explained that a police bullet ricocheted off the wall and hit the child who was playing with her mudpies in the yard of her home. We have seen many such cases. Police bullets have a strange way of ricocheting off the walls of township houses, and when they do, there is bound to be a child about whom they never miss.
No, it can’t be police bullets. Remember that the graveyard quarrel started when the Nurse blamed our own people for killing the boy. Perhaps it was a death that was similar to that of a six-year-old boy he mourned last week. The Nurse told a gruesome story of how the mother and father were sitting in their living-room watching the news on television, when a picture of an unknown corpse flashed on the screen. It was their son who had been missing for the past two days. He had gone to school in the morning and never came back. The parents had asked his schoolmates about him, but they did not know where he was. Then they went to the police but were told, ‘Children go missing every day. There is nothing we can do about it.’
‘You mean you won’t even try to look?’
‘Look where? These children run away from their homes to join terrorists.’
‘But he is only six.’
‘It is the six-year-olds who throw stones and petrol bombs at us, woman. All we can say is that you people must learn to have more control over your children.’
The body of the little boy was discovered in the veld. He had been castrated, and the killer had also cut open his stomach, and had mutilated the flesh from his navel right down to his thighs. The police who were called to the scene said it was the work of a crazed muti killer who preyed on defenceless children in the townships. All his victims, whose ages ranged from two to six, were found without sex organs. The police knew exactly who he was, and had been working for three weeks around the clock trying to track him down. He was a thirty-year-old man from the same township, who had a young woman as his accomplice. Her role was to entice the children to lonely spots, where he butchered them and mutilated their bodies for vital parts that he used for making potent muti. The police turned and asked the onlookers if any of them knew who the dead boy was. But no one knew. They took the grisly corpse away, and it became an item on the evening news. The parents were obviously horrified when they saw their son on television. They went to the police to claim the body.
Since the crazed killer has not been arrested yet, the residents of the townships ask themselves who will die next. But if it was the crazed muti killer who murdered Noria’s son, why were people angry with the Nurse when he publicly displayed his anger with the killers? Why did they say that he was giving ammunition to the enemies of the people: the government and its vigilante groups and its police? Why did they not want reporters from the newspapers to get near Noria? No, it was not the muti killer. No one would have had reservations about condemning the muti killer, and about publicizing the fact that he had struck again. Well, perhaps Noria might tell him what really happened. He will not raise the subject, though. If Noria wants to tell him, she will volunteer the information.
He alights from the taxi at the rank in the middle of the squatter camp. He walks among the shacks of cardboard, plastic, pieces of canvas and corrugated iron. He does not know where Noria lives, but he will ask. Squatter people are a close-knit community. They know one another. And by the way, he must remember that they do not like to be called squatters. ‘How can we be squatters on our own land, in our own country?’ they often ask. ‘Squatters are those who came from across the seas and stole our land.’
The fact that he has become some kind of a spectacle does not bother him. It is his venerable costume, he knows, and is rather proud. Dirty children follow him. They dance in their tattered clothes and spontaneously compose a song about him, which they sing with derisive gusto. Mangy mongrels follow him, run alongside, sniff at him, and lead the way, while barking all the time. He ignores them all, and walks through a quagmire of dirty water and human ordure that runs through the streets of this informal settlement, as the place is politely called, looking for Noria.