“You people never know when to stop,” she would observe. “You must ask your husband to take you to the hospital to close you up.”
She obviously had forgotten that this was only going to be Niki’s second child.
Madam Cornelia’s greatest concern was for Tjaart. Who was going to look after Tjaart when the time came for Niki to give birth? And after that, how was she going to look after a new baby and Tjaart at the same time?
PULE HAD NOT returned to Excelsior for almost a year. When he came back, he found a coloured baby in his house. In Welkom, he had heard rumours of his wife’s pregnancy. He had written to Niki, trying to find out the truth of the persistent stories. But she had not responded. He had then stopped sending her money, after warning her that if she did not come up with a reasonable explanation concerning her alleged condition, he would stop wasting his hard-earned cash on her. The money that was enabling her to gallivant around was dripping with his sweat, he added. He was indeed true to his word. Hence Niki’s willingness to act as Tjaart’s nanny, even when she was very heavy with child. She needed the cash.
The fact that there were other families in the location who had coloured children did not lessen the grief that Pule felt to the marrow of his bones.
“Who is the father of this child?” he wanted to know.
Niki dared not reveal Stephanus Cronje’s name, in case Pule did something silly. Like going to confront him at his Excelsior Slaghuis, where the man would be sure to gun Pule down. Stephanus Cronje was well known for drawing his gun at the slightest provocation. Like when a customer from Mahlatswetsa Location was foolish enough to complain that a piece of meat just purchased had a distinct stink of putrefaction. Madam Cornelia would say she had already rung the money in the till. There was no way of getting the money out once it was already in the till. If the customer insisted that he wanted a refund, Stephanus Cronje would whip out his gun and ask the customer to disappear from his sight. Sane customers never argued with guns.
Niki wondered how Stephanus Cronje was going to receive the news of Popi’s birth. She had not seen him since the day she told him of her missed periods, her morning sickness and her cravings for damp soil and sunflower seeds. It was very clear to Niki that he was avoiding her.
“I have asked you a question,” said Pule calmly.
“I have already sinned, Father of Viliki,” wept Niki. “I will understand if you never want to have anything to do with me again.”
WE SAW Pule exiling himself into a world of silence. Those who worked with him in the mines of Welkom said the silence continued even there. So did the heavy drinking. We pointed fingers at Niki. How could she do this to a man who had shown so much responsibility towards his family? Other women could make excuses that their husbands had deserted their families after falling for the wily women of the big cities of gold — Welkom and Johannesburg. But Pule was well known throughout Mahlatswetsa for his devotion to his wife and son. We knew that even when he spent long periods without coming home, he never forgot to send Niki and Viliki money and beautiful clothes.
Mmampe, who was carrying a load in her womb herself as a result of the barn escapades, had an answer.
“What can we do?” she asked resignedly, “White men have always loved us. They say we are more beautiful than their own wives. We are more devastating in the blankets.”
Oh, the burden of being loved! Of being devastating!
The news of Popi’s arrival reached Johannes Smit, who bitterly boasted to Stephanus Cronje, “Even if you scored a bull’s-eye, I had Niki first. Before any other man.”
But Stephanus Cronje was in no mood to rejoice over any bull’s-eye. Or to engage in puerile contests. He was busy plotting ways to stop the news from reaching Cornelia’s ears.
12. A TRULY COLOURED BABY
HIS PURPLE SHOES look like a ballerina’s dance slippers. The broad brim of his purple hat covers his eyes. His face is downcast, as if he is contemplating the burnt sienna ground. His khaki pants are bulging at the pockets. One hand is in his pocket and another is holding a white umbrella. He is using the closed umbrella as a walking stick. His shoulders are raised high. His elbow-length purple sleeves hang loosely from his khaki waistcoat. The ground has streaks of green. White cosmos surround him.
The Man with the Umbrella walked hesitandy towards Niki’s shack. Black piglets grunting around the corrugated-iron shack and speckled hens pecking at unseen morsels scattered in different directions at his approach. He used his umbrella to knock at the open corrugated-iron door.
Niki in a white doek, yellow blouse and black skirt sat on the bed, Popi nestling in her arms, a pacifier in her mouth. Although it was very hot under the low corrugated-iron roof, the baby’s head was in a woollen cap. Only her round face could be seen.
“I thought I should warn you,” said the Man with the Umbrella, “they are searching all over the district. From house to house. They follow every rumour.”
He was talking of the police. They had uncovered twelve light-skinned children who they claimed had mixed blood. They were already in jail with their black-skinned mothers. There was a doctor too. All the way from Bloemfontein. His work was to take blood tests and to confirm that the blood was indeed mixed.
Niki wondered how it was possible for the doctor to tell if the blood was mixed or not. Mixed with what? Was it not all red?
“They will come for you too,” said the Man with the Umbrella. “Take your baby away. Go hide in Thaba Nchu. Or better still, in Lesotho. I have heard that in Lesotho they don’t mind when the child’s blood is mixed. They are ruled by a black prime minister there. You must have relatives in Lesotho.”
It was difficult for Niki to take this whole matter seriously. Especially as the news came from a stranger with a white umbrella and funny shoes.
Thaba Nchu would give her no succour. The arm of the law was long enough to reach there. She would not exile herself to Lesotho either. She had never been there in her life. She knew that, like most Mahlatswetsa Location people, she had distant relatives in that country. But surely she could not just pack up and go. In any case, the one who had been wronged by her actions had forgiven her. Pule had said so in his letter: he had forgiven her because it was not for him to judge. Yes, he had not come back to Excelsior for eight months — not since he left the day after Niki’s refusal to name the father of her coloured child. But after a few months’ silence, which he spent digesting what had befallen him, he had explicitly written that he forgave her. He had become a mzalwane — a born-again Christian. We observed with mirth that Niki’s infidelity had had a commendable by-product. It had driven him into the comforting arms of salvation.
If the one who had been wronged had forgiven her, what business was it of the police? Why would the government not forgive her as well?
She was still not totally convinced of any imminent danger when the Man with the Umbrella pointed his funny shoes towards the door and left to warn others.
Niki carried Popi on her back, wrapped in a red and blue tartan shawl, and briskly walked to Mmampe’s shack three streets away. Mmampe’s ageing mother sat forlornly on the mud stoep in front of the door. She expressed her surprise at seeing Niki walking the free earth of Mahlatswetsa. Her own daughter and her lightskinned granddaughter were in jail. The police had come for them in the middle of the night. Three police vans in all. Each with five heavily-armed Afrikaner policemen. They kicked the door down and shone torches in the eyes of a startled Mmampe and her mother. Mercifully, they gave Mmampe the opportunity to put a dress on over her nightie, before they frogmarched her into the street with the bawling baby in her arms. They bundled Mmampe and the baby into the back of a van, ignoring the old lady’s pleas that they leave the baby with her. There were already other women and babies in the van. They drove away in a triumphal convoy.