'And Mr Vercueil,' I said: 'he must come to help with the car.'
She shook her head.
'Yes,' I insisted: 'he must come.'
The dog lay at Vercueil's side. It tapped its tail on the floor when I came in but did not get up.
'Mr Vercueil!' I said loudly. He opened his eyes; I held the light away. He broke wind, 'I have to take Florence to Guguletu. It is urgent, we have to leave at once. Will you come along?'
He made no reply, but curled up on his side. The dog rearranged itself.
'Mr Vercueil!' I said, pointing the light at him.
'Fuck off,' he mumbled.
'I can't wake him,' I reported to Florence. 'I have to have someone along to push the car.'
'I will push,' she said.
With the two children on the back seat warmly covered, Florence pushed. We set off. Peering through glass misted over with our breathing, I crawled over De Waal Drive, got lost for a while in the streets of Claremont, then found Lansdowne Road. The first buses of the day were abroad, brightly lit and empty. It was not yet five o'clock.
We passed the last houses, the last streetlights. Into a steady rain from the north-west we drove, following the faint yellow glow of our headlights.
'If people wave to you to stop, or if you see things in the road, you must not stop, you must drive on,' said Florence.
'I will certainly not,' I said. 'You should have warned me earlier. Let me make myself clear, Florence: at the first sign of trouble I am turning back.'
'I do not say it will happen, I am just telling you.'
Full of misgiving I drove on into the darkness. But no one barred the way, no one waved, there was nothing across the road. Trouble, it seemed, was still in bed; trouble was recuperating for the next engagement.: The roadside, along which, at this hour, thousands of men would ordinarily have been plodding to work, was empty. Swirls of mist floated toward us, embraced the car, floated away. Wraiths, spirits. Aornos this place: birdless. I shivered, met Florence 's gaze. 'How much further?' I asked.
'Not far.'
'What did they say on the telephone?'
'They were shooting again yesterday. They were giving guns to the witdoeke and the witdoeke were shooting.'
'Are they shooting in Guguletu?'
'No, they are shooting out in the bush.'
'At the first hint of trouble, Florence, I am turning back. We are fetching Bheki, that is all we are going to do, then: we are going home. You should never have let him leave.'
'Yes, but you must: turn here, you must turn left.'
I turned. A hundred metres further there was a barrier across the road with flashing lights, cars parked along the verges, police with guns. I stopped; a policeman came up.
'What is your business here?' he asked.
'I am taking my domestic home,' I said, surprised at how calmly I lied.
He peered at the children sleeping on the back seat. 'Where does she live?'
'Fifty-seven,' said Florence.
'You can drop her here, she can walk, it is not far.'
'It is raining, she has small children, I am not letting her walk alone,' I said firmly.
He hesitated, then, with his flashlight waved me through.
On the roof of one of the cars stood a young man in battle-dress, his gun at the ready, staring out into the darkness.
Now there was a smell of burning in the air, of wet ash, burning rubber. Slowly we drove down a broad unpaved street lined with matchbox-houses. A police van armoured in wire mesh cruised past us. 'Turn right here,' said Florence. 'Turn right again. Stop here. '
With the baby on her arm and the little girl, only half awake, stumbling behind, she splashed up the path to No. 219, knocked, was admitted. Hope and Beauty. It was like living in an allegory. Keeping the engine running, I waited.
The police van that had passed us drew up alongside. A light shone in my face. I held up a hand to shield my eyes. The van pulled away.
Florence re-emerged holding a plastic raincoat over herself and the baby, and got into the back seat. Dashing through, the rain behind her came not Bheki but a man in his thirties or forties, slight, dapper, with a moustache. He got in beside me. 'This Is Mr Thabane my cousin,' said Florence. 'He will show us the way. '
'Where is Hope?' I asked.
'I have left her with my sister.'
'And where is Bheki?'
There was silence.
'I am not sure,' said the man. His voice was surprisingly soft. 'He came in yesterday morning and put his things down and went out. After that we did not see him at all. He did not come home to sleep. But I know where his friends live. We can start looking there.'
'Is this what you want, Florence?' I asked.
'We must look for him,' said Florence: 'there is nothing else we can do.'
'If you would prefer me to drive I can drive,' said the man. 'It is anyhow better, you know. '
I got out and sat beside Florence In the back. The rain was coming down more heavily now; the car splashed through pools on the uneven' road. Left and right we turned under the sick orange of the streetlights, then stopped. 'Careful, don't switch off,' I said to Mr Thabane the cousin. He got out and knocked at a window. A long conversation followed, with someone I could not see. By the time he came back he was soaked and cold. With clumsy fingers he took out a pack of cigarettes and tried to light one. 'Please, not in the car,' I said. A look of exasperation passed between him and Florence.
We sat in silence. 'What are we waiting for?' I asked. 'They are sending someone to show us the way.' A little boy wearing a balaclava cap too large for him came trotting out of the house. With entire self-assurance, greeting us all with a smile, he got into the car and began to give directions. Ten years old at: most. A child of the times, at home in this landscape of violence. When I think back to my own childhood. I remember only long sun-struck afternoons, the smell, of dust under avenues of eucalyptus, the quiet rustle of water in roadside furrows, the lulling of doves. A childhood of sleep, prelude, to what: was meant to be a life without trouble and a smooth passage to Nirvana. Will we at least be allowed our Nirvana, we children, of that bygone age? I doubt it. If justice reigns at all, we will find ourselves barred at the first threshold of the underworld. White as grubs in our swaddling bands, we will be dispatched to join those infant souls whose eternal whining Aeneas mistook for weeping. White our colour, the colour of limbo: white sands, white rocks, a white light pouring down from all sides. Like an eternity of lying on the beach, an endless Sunday among thousands of our own kind, sluggish, half asleep, In earshot of the comfortable lap of the waves. In limine primo: on the threshold of death, the threshold of life. Creatures thrown up by the sea, stalled on the sands, undecided, indecisive, neither hot nor cold, neither fish nor fowl.
We had passed the last of the houses and were driving in grey early-morning light through a landscape of scorched 'earth, blackened trees. A pickup truck passed us with three men in the back sheltering under a tarpaulin. At the next road-block we caught up with them again. They gazed expressionlessly at us, eye to eye, as we waited to be inspected. A policeman waved them through, waved us through too.
We turned north, away from the mountain, then off the highway on to a dirt road that soon became sand. Mr Thabane stopped. 'We can't drive further, it is too dangerous,' he said. 'There is something wrong with your alternator,' he added, pointing to the red light glowing on the dashboard.
'I am letting things run down,' I said. I did not feel like explaining.
He switched off the engine. For a while we sat listening to the rain drumming on the roof. Then Florence got out, and the boy. Tied on her back, the baby slept peacefully.