When Katjie and the girls caught up to Esther they were out of breath.
“Nee, man, Esther, if we sit through two hours of church we should at least eat the biscuits afterwards,” Katjie said.
“Ag, Katjie, I wasn’t in the mood for the susters looking down their noses today. My heart feels too broken for skindering.”
Neville was up when Esther and Katjie arrived home, sitting on the wooden stool in the sun, smoking, with a glass of cooldrink next to him.
“How is Jesus?” he asked.
“He misses you,” said Esther.
“Tell Him I send my regards,” said Neville with a big smile and a raised glass.
Esther thought that to cheer herself up, and to make the place feel like home, she should hang the new green curtains Liedjie had been given by the Bless Me Jesus pastor’s wife. A person couldn’t stay feeling heartbroken all day and they had been in this house long enough now for it to start to feel like it was theirs. She peeped into Liedjie and Jaco’s room and saw Titty sleeping. Jaco was there, pushing clean clothes into a Shoprite packet.
“Hey, Ma,” he said. “Thanks for the washing. I am going to sleep by Charlie. See you later.”
Esther wished he would say, “Hey, Mammie, what are you doing? Can Jaco help Mammie?” and then they could hang the new green curtains in their new home together. But she didn’t say anything. Liedjie had told her Jaco needed to be left alone, or else he would go and be gone forever.
She fetched an empty paint tin that the builders had left and stepped up on it to start hooking the curtain into the rings on a pole above the sink. The room changed colour with the curtain in the window and Esther wanted to get the next one up quickly so that she could admire the effect. As she was about to step down and move the tin over to hang the second curtain, a bakkie pulled up outside.
Neville shot inside with his cooldrink and cigarette, ducking behind Esther, who could see out of the door from her perch. Two men in church suits got out, slamming the doors. Esther could see a Bible on the dashboard and both men had white ties, which meant they were elders in one of the churches. She studied their faces, but she didn’t recognise them. One had a clipboard with papers under his arm and he walked to the open door.
“Morning,” said Esther. “Kan ek julle help?”
“Morning,” the man with the clipboard said, his voice formal. When he saw Esther wasn’t stepping down, he said, “There is a problem.”
Esther did not speak or move.
“You are illegal occupants of this house,” he said, staring at her.
Esther’s mouth went dry, but she stayed on the paint tin, with the green curtain in her hand. She felt Neville move behind her.
“You have occupied my house,” the man said. “I am here to tell you, you must get out or there will be trouble.” He held up the clipboard. “These papers here say that this house has been allocated to me by the municipality.”
Esther reached out and the man passed her the clipboard. A letter typed on a municipal letterhead listed an address that belonged to a Mr A. Cupido. Esther felt disorientated. She hadn’t thought that the house could belong to someone. It had been empty, with a donkey, a cow and sheep, not someone’s home with a number and the name of a street. Animals don’t live at a street address.
“You must get out today or we will throw you out,” said the man. The second man leaned against the bakkie blowing smoke circles as he dragged on a cigarette.
The bakkie had attracted attention and some of the occupiers appeared in their doorways and others moved closer and stood at the front corners of Esther’s house. She saw uncertainty flicker in the man’s eyes as the crowd grew. Word was spreading and people left their food and their beds, put out their cigarettes, and came out of the shebeen, some running, to see what was happening.
“What you want, hey?” a toothless old woman screeched.
“This house, huh?” another said.
“If you want it, take it, but then you must know what will happen to you,” the old crone said and the crowd laughed.
“Ja, you want this house, but we don’t want you.” People were shouting now and still Esther stood on the paint tin holding the curtain.
The man with the clipboard started to speak but when the old woman took the cigarette from between her lips and came at him with it, he stumbled backwards and climbed into the bakkie, rolling up the window as he started the engine.
“You must get out!” he shouted at Esther as the crowd swarmed around the vehicle, boys hitting the bonnet and roof with their flat hands. He revved the engine and the crowd parted as the bakkie roared off, bumping down the track to the tar road.
Esther stood on her paint tin, holding the green curtain in her hands and wondering who they were.
“That man is married to one of the teachers at my school,” said a boy, “and they live in a nice house in Bridgton.”
“What do they want with me?” Esther said.
“They are shacklords,” said a woman.
“They want the occupied houses so the teacher can claim them and rent them out.”
“These people threaten a person like that just so they can occupy an occupier’s house?” Esther asked.
“That teacher who owns that bakkie has a lot of houses,” said the boy. “Renting out these houses is good and easy money.”
Esther thought of Oom Krisjan and all his houses and yards and she wondered, as she often had, how he came to control them and be the one in charge and the one who collected the rent. There had always been something about Oom Krisjan that hadn’t felt right, but Esther and all his other tenants just accepted that that was the way it was. And these men were just the same. The occupiers had nothing but still there were those who saw them as easy to rob.
As the occupiers went back to their cold plates and crumpled beds, Esther stepped off the paint tin and looked up the road to where the bakkie was turning towards town.
Behind her Neville appeared.
“Those blerrie people must come here and take my house,” he shouted to the departing crowd. “I will sort them out.”
“And where were you now?” Esther laughed. “You are a man not a mouse. Why were you hiding behind my skirts?”
“I was right here, supporting you,” Neville said indignantly.
For the next hour he stood in the street shouting and swearing and waving his arms in the direction of the road so that eventually one of the other occupiers shouted, “Shuddup!”
Esther went outside and said, “Neville, it’s no good making a noise. They are gone. Come inside and eat. I have made samp and beans.”
Neville flung his arms into the air and shouted, “I am the baas of this house!” then turned and, in a quiet voice, said to Esther, “Stamp en stoot?”
“Ja,” laughed Esther, “stamp en stoot.” Neville smacked Esther’s backside as she walked past and she grabbed at his ear but he ducked and they fell against each other laughing.