Yet, most important of all, he saw the expressions on the faces of the two Youth Leaguers. It was the look of men who had found a new star to follow.
'Since when have you conceived such a burning interest in archaeological anthropology?" Shasa Courtney asked as he shook out the pages of the Cape Times, and turned from the financial section to the sports pages at the rear.
'It was one of my majors,' Tara pointed out reasonably. 'May I pour you another cup of coffee?" 'Thank you, my dear." He sipped the coffee before he spoke again.
'How long do you intend being away?" 'Professor Dart will be giving a series of four lectures on successive evenings, covering all the excavations from his original discovery of the Taung skull, right up to the present time. He has been able to correlate the whole mass of material with one of these new electronic computers." Behind his newspaper Shasa smiled reflectively as he remembered Marylee from MIT and her IBM 701. He wouldn't mind another visit to Johannesburg himself in the near future.
'It's absolutely riveting stuff,' Tara was saying, 'and it all fits in with the new discoveries at Sterkfontein and Makapansgat. It really does seem that southern Africa was the true cradle of mankind, and that Australopithecus is our direct ancestor." 'So you will be away for at least four days?" Shasa interrupted.
'What about the children?" 'I have spoken to your mother. She will be happy to come across and stay at Weltevreden while I am away." 'I won't be able to join you,' Shasa pointed out. 'The third reading of the new Criminal Law Amendment Bill is coming up, and all hands are needed in the House. I could have flown you up in the Mosquito - now you'll have to take the commercial flight on the Viscount." 'What a pity,' Tara sighed. 'You would have enjoyed it. Professor Dart is a fascinating speaker." x 'You'll stay at the Carlton suite, of course. It's standing empty." 'Molly has arranged for me to stay with a friend of hers at Rivonia." 'One of her Bolshies, I presume." Shasa frowned slightly. 'Try not to get yourself arrested again." He had been waiting for an opportunity to talk about her political activities and he lowered the newspaper and looked at her thoughtfully, then realized it was not the correct moment and merely nodded. 'Your grass orphans and your widower will try to bumble along without you for a few days." 'With your mother and sixteen servants at hand, I have no doubt you will survive,' she told him crisply, letting her irritation show through for an instant.
Marcus Archer met her at the airport. He was affable and amusing and while they listened to a Mozart programme on the car radio as they drove out to Rivonia, Marcus discussed the composer's life and works. He knew much more about music than she did, but although she listened to his dissertation with pleasure and attention, she was nevertheless aware of his enmity. It was well concealed, but flashed out in a barbed remark or a spiced glance. He never mentioned Moses Gama's name, and nor did she. Molly had said he was a homosexual, the first she had ever encountered to her certain knowledge, and she wondered if they all hated women.
Puck's Hill was a delight, with its shaggy thatch and unkempt grounds, so different from Weltevreden's carefully manicured splendour.
'You'll find him at the end of the front stoep,' Marcus said, as he parked under one of the bluegums at the rear of the house. It was the first time he had referred to Moses, but even then he did not use his name. He wandered away and left her standing.
She had not known how to dress, though she imagined that he would not approve of slacks. So she had chosen a long loose skirt made of cheap but colourful trade print that she had purchased in Swaziland, and with it wore a simple green cotton blouse with sandals on her feet.
Again, she had not been sure whether she should wear make-up, and she had compromised with a pale pink lipstick and just a touch of mascara. She thought she looked well enough in the mirror of the women's room at the airport as she combed her dense chestnut curls, but was suddenly stricken by the thought that he would find her pale skin insipid and unattractive.
Now standing alone in the sunshine, she was once again attacked by doubts and that terrible sense of inadequacy. If Marcus had been there, she would have begged him to drive her back to the airport, but he had disappeared and so she summoned up all her courage and walked slowly around the side of the whitewashed house.
She paused at the corner and looked down the long covered verandah. Moses Gama was sitting at a table at the far end with his back to her. The table was piled with books and writing materials.
He was wearing a casual white shirt with open neck that contrasted with the marvelous anthracite of his skin. His head was bowed and he was writing rapidly on a block of notepaper.
Timidly she stepped up on to the verandah and although her approach was noiseless, he sensed her presence and turned abruptly when she was half-way down the verandah. He did not smile, but she thought she saw pleasure inhis gaze as he stood up and came to meet her. He did not attempt to embrace her, or kiss her, and she was pleased, for it confirmed his differentness. Instead he led her to the second chair placed beside his table, and seated her in it.
'Are you well?" he asked. 'Are your children well?" The innate African courtesy, always the enquiry and then the offer of refreshment, 'Let me give you a cup of tea." He poured from the tray already set on his cluttered desk, and she sipped with pleasure.
'Thank you for coming,' he said.
'I came as soon as I received your message from Molly, as I promised I would." 'Will you always keep your promises to me?" 'Always,' she answered with simple sincerity, and he studied her face.
'Yes,' he nodded. 'I think you will." She could hold his gaze no longer, for it seemed to sear her soul and lay it bare. She looked down at the table top, at the closely written sheets of his handwriting.
'A manifesto,' he said, following her gaze. 'A blueprint for the future." He selected half a dozen sheets and handed them to her. She set aside her tea cup and took them from his hand, shivering slightly as their fingers touched. His skin was cool - that was one of the things that she remembered.
She read the sheets, her attention becoming fastened upon them more firmly the more she read, and when she finished them, she lifted her eyes to his face again.
'You have a poetry in your choice of words that makes the truth shine more luminously,' she whispered.
They sat on the cool verandah, while outside the brilliant highveld sun threw shadows black and crisp as paper cut-outs beneath the trees and the noonday swooned in the heat, and they talked.
There were no trivialities in their discussion, everything he said was thrilling and cogent, and he seemed to inspire her for her replies and' her own observations she knew were measured and lucid and she saw she had aroused and held his interest. She no longer was aware of her small vanities of dress and cosmetics, all that mattered now were the words that they exchanged and the cocoon they wove out of them. With a start she realized that the day had slipped away unnoticed and the short African twilight was upon them. Marcus came to fetch her and show her to her sparsely furnished bedroom.
'We will leave for the museum in twenty minutes,' he told her.
In the lecture theatre of the Transvaal museum the three of them sat near the back. There were half a dozen other blacks in the crowded audience, but Marcus sat between the two of them. A black man beside a white woman would have excited interest, and certain hostility. Tara found it difficult to concentrate on the eminent pro lessor's address, and though she glanced in his direction only once or twice, it was Moses Gama who occupied all her thoughts.