You! I know your filthy mug! Now watch what happens to a runaway Hotnot!
He grabs the Hottentot and hits him. He turns to Maynier, who is still standing stock-still gazing at this lot.
And what are you looking at, you prickless scumbag? This is not your house any longer. Scat!
He charges onto the stoep and flings the landdrost from his last platform. The dishevelled dandy gets up slowly and dusts himself and makes his way between us with lowered head. It’s dead quiet, all you hear is the flapping of his torn silk jacket. As soon as he’s passed through the throng, the farmers erupt and clap hands and guffaw and gob and bellow.
I’m one of a small group of Christians staying behind after the show is over. In front of us stand the Hottentots who came to complain of us to Maynier for maltreatment. We take the Hottentots behind the buildings and belabour them with fists and whips and sticks until we’ve had enough. Meanwhile Hannes is standing to one side regarding the Hottentot who used to work for him. After the rest of us have had our revenge on our labourers, he speaks softly to me and his brother Coenraad. The three of us tie the Hottentot down and fling him over a donkey and ride out of town with him. In the hills, from where you can see the town basking in apparent tranquillity, and see the inhabitants tracing their usual routes like ants as if the Company’s rule hadn’t just been overthrown, we kick the Hottentot to death and dig a shallow grave and cover him up and level the soil.
The next day the whole town knows that Maynier and his family have left for the Cape from fear for their lives and that he departed with his wagon and his convictions and nothing else. We also kick out the officials who supported Maynier’s peace negotiations with the Caffres. I’m one of those who kick hardest. Reports reach the town that a member of the Political Council, one De Wet, a true man of The Law if his name is to be believed, has been sent to visit Graaffe Rijnet and report back to the government. My pals and I sit in front of the drostdy and watch the wagons creaking by. After a few days there are not very many people left in the town. The few who stay, stay indoors. Now and again you see a curtain or a screen briefly lifting and the white of an eye peeping through.
The men occupying the town and dubbing themselves Patriots, we farmers who are now squatting in the drostdy or camping in the town, rouse one another to a raging carousal. The freedom so suddenly dropping into our hands and the terror at what may follow, that of which no man dare speak, drive us to a mighty swilling. For more than a week my friends and I hit and howl and drink and laugh and frequently pass out. Van Jaarsveld and the youngest of the Triegard brothers punch each other to a pulp in the street until neither one can stand up straight any more. With a last blow from Van Jaarsveld Triegard stays down. The Redcaptain squats down astride him and brushes his lovely hair from his face and starts punching afresh until a few Patriots drag him off. Triegard’s jaw is broken and he’s bitten off the tip of his tongue. He looks for it and picks it up and then collapses again.
When the Patriots sober up, most of them realise that they’ve signed nothing and have no inkling as to what is actually written in the Te Samenstemming. The men drink a little water and lots of coffee and when the headaches have subsided the Patriots collect two hundred and seventy-six signatures on a petition charging Maynier as a tyrant and his wife as a wanton. Believe me, I, Coenraad de Buys, and my fellow Caffre-copulating Patriots, accuse the officials of indecencies with Heathens. Etcetera the rebellion.
I stay in and around Graaffe Rijnet, sometimes sleep on the floor of the drostdy, sometimes in the veldt. Now and again I stay over on the farms of friends. The ground is hard. In the mornings it’s more of an effort to get up than when I was minding Smut-face Senekal’s cattle. I don’t go home. I no longer have a home. I have too much of a home. After two months De Wet comes riding into Graaffe Rijnet. His retinue – an officer, a secretary and a penman – pitch their tents in front of the drostdy. Olof Godlieb de Wet looks older than his fifty-six years. He questions the burghers politely and is shocked at the crudity of the bush and veldt and farmers. Rumours abound that there’s a government commando on its way to come and murder all the white farmers. I take up position in the street and raise my voice and proclaim:
France stands by all nations that overthrow their rulers!
Here on the frontier you can holler what you like. Stories and rumours wipe one another out. The only facts are the bushes and anthills and bullets and blades.
In June word reaches us of another rebellion; in Swellendam there are apparently also Patriots. Then the news of nine British men-of-war that have anchored in the Cape. A month later word reaches us that Swellendam has already surrendered again.
De Wet quarrels with a farmer about his way of dealing with his Hottentot; on the 16th of June we kick him out of town as well. I stop the Patriots who want to tackle old De Wet. But when they get stuck into his retinue, I participate. My knuckles bleed, skulls crack. Everything blurs, it’s just me, here, now, and the body in front of me.
On the 6th of July Willem Prinsloo and six other farmers proclaim a Citizen’s Government and hoist the revolutionary flag of France. The white and blue remain and the orange turns red and the rebel leaders elect the Representaten des Volks, the representatives of the people, on behalf of De Volkstem, the voice of the people. They refuse to pay taxes to the Company, and to the devil with its laws! They call their government the National Convention. The Patriots, in a spirit of civic goodwill, suggest that Van der Poel, the new landdrost appointed by De Wet, should also, like Maynier, pack his bags and relocate to the Cape. They appoint Jan Booysen in his stead, and in August a local man, David Gerotz, takes over. He is the landdrost and he is the Head of the National Convention and the people are starting to refer to the Republic of Graaffe Rijnet, even though there is no authority whatsoever in charge. Everybody wants to rule and nobody wants to follow and the whole lot has been bankrupted by the Caffres and the drought. They request that the Reverend Manger should stay on to marry people. He tarries a while; then, one fine day, our Lord’s spokesman also vanishes without a trace.
On 16 September 1795 the English officially assume command from the goddam VOC and Viscount Macartney becomes the first British governor at the Cape.
Exactly a year after the uprising our latest landdrost – who’s keeping tally? – turns up at the drostdy: Frans Reinhardt Bresler. The Reverend Manger greets us gawkily. The Cape has smacked him on the wrist and summarily sent him back with Bresler. Despite our threats, seventeen burghers, so help me God, welcome the new landdrost. Gerotz checks the street up and down to see whether my gang is anywhere to be seen, then hastily escorts the landdrost into the drostdy. During the monthly meeting of the National Convention – verily, revolutions end up making bureaucrats of the most hardened rebels! – we summons Bresler to come and explain his presence to us. Bresler sends word that he will speak to us at two o’clock. By that time he’s already hoisted the British flag and rung the drostdy bell. He tries to persuade us to take the oath of allegiance to the British. Not a soul stirs. Through the window I see a young man scrambling up the flagpole. His two friends are egging him on from below. He yanks down the flag and they run away with it. Bresler stops talking when the whole crowd jump to their feet and come to stand at the window and laugh and cheer on the young bucks running down the street with the flag. I get up and walk out and nobody stops me.