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?”