‘Check the Benades’ assembly line!’ he said.
‘We’re assembling the new republic,’ Pop said. He was very excited about his idea.
‘We’re assembling it and it’s going to pay! What will we charge apiece?’ That was Treppie, of course. Then he held up one of the completed corsages, stood up and pinned it to his shirt, pushing out his chest and prancing around like a child of the devil.
‘We mustn’t charge too much,’ Pop said. ‘It’s for a cause, remember.’
At that point, Treppie told her it was time to fetch the brandy and Coke, with glasses and ice, ’cause now they needed to talk about this ‘cause’. Every cause had its price, he said.
Even today, if they talk about money, he wants to drink.
‘Now, let’s see. How much did you spend, you two? Spending’s what you’re both so good at, isn’t it?’ Treppie was looking for trouble. She could see it coming.
‘Twenty-five rand,’ Pop said, but it was actually thirty-five rand with all the extras. They were still thinking in pounds and pennies and shillings those days, anyhow.
‘Hmmm,’ said Treppie, ‘and what per cent profit would you say a person should make out of a new-born republic?’
‘Well, um, surely not more than about five per cent,’ said Pop. ‘Like I said, it’s for a cause.’
‘Are you crazy! I’d say one hundred or two hundred per cent! Or double that. Four hundred per cent. I’ll tell you what,’ said Treppie, in that high, devil’s voice of his, ‘we’ll lie to those buggers. Let’s tell them it’s for a hospital. The HF Verwoerd Hospital. We’ll take clean paper and write neatly on top: Republic Flower Fund. The HF Verwoerd, er, Institute, that’s grander, for the Mentally Retarded.’ Then Treppie smoothed down his voice and talked like the man who reads the news on the radio: ‘With a column for your signature, sir, and a column for your donation, madam. We’ll tell them the price is forty-four cents. Then you’ll see how we milk their sympathies. They’ll search their pockets for change and hand over the first half-crown they can find. But who, on a day like that, will sign next to a donation of only six cents? So they’ll fumble for more change and pull out a shilling or two, or three. Or more, much more! On a day like that people will want to show off. They’ll dig deep into their back pockets. On a day like that they’ll want to sign for a cause, in hard cash!’
She and Pop just sat there, stunned. Treppie’s eyes were glittering. It was just too bladdy far-fetched for words. They just sat there with their mouths hanging open.
‘And the cherry on the cake,’ Treppie said, putting on that high little voice of his, ‘the cherry on the cake is our mascot.’ Then he turned his head slowly and looked at Lambert. Like the devil himself, he looked Lambert up and down. Christ, she thought, I can see trouble coming.
‘Lambert,’ said Treppie, ‘come here to your, er, uncle.’ Lambert went over to him and Treppie began telling him what to do. ‘Lambert, let your mouth hang open,’ he said. ‘No, not like that, pull your bottom lip this way. Yes, like that. Now, turn your eyes to the inside, towards each other, and now up, yes, like that, but not too much, just about half-mast. That’s it. Now, stare out in front of you, about two yards, at knee-height. That’s it, yes. That’s perfect, just perfect. And now watch carefully what your uncle Treppie’s going to do.’
Then Treppie walked back a few steps into the dark, out of the light, and he waited for a while, and they also waited, her and Pop, and Lambert too, with his open mouth and his crooked eyes, like he’d been hypnotised or something, and then Treppie came out from the dark. Hell, he looked just like that Gadarene madman. He waggled into the light, with one leg dragging in the dust behind him, and one arm flopping from a twitching shoulder, slobbering from the mouth.
And those eyes! That was the worst. She’ll never forget his eyes. Turned up so all you could see was the whites, his eyelids flickering like an old bulb about to blow.
‘Come on, Lambert, my boy,’ Treppie said with a thick tongue. ‘Come on, come let your uncle show you how we’re going to win over those mothers of the nation tomorrow. Every now and again you must smile through the spit, and then shake your head a little, like this. Don’t worry, it’s crooked enough as it is.’
And there they went, walking round in circles in the dust of the yard as Treppie showed Lambert how to act crazy. It was very queer, but they couldn’t help laughing. Pop too. When Treppie and Lambert came and stood in front of him, swaying on their legs, with drool running down their chins, and Treppie sang, ‘Ringing out from our blue heavens, from our deep seas breaking round’, Pop just couldn’t help laughing. Then Pop also made a funny face, rolling his eyes and acting crazy. After a while they were all pretending to be mad; even she kicked one leg out in front of her, slobbering with her tongue. Pop pushed his bum out and pulled his body into a hump, just like a hen. They had a lot of fun that night, there in that bare backyard.
‘Ne’er would your children, who are free, have to ask,’ Treppie shouted, spraying spit all over the place.
‘Granpa rode a big fat porker in the pouring rain,’ said Pop.
‘The rain in Spain,’ said Lambert, ‘so he fell off, bang! and then he climbed on to its back again.’
And she climbed on top of the washing machine and sang: ‘Whiter than snow, yes whiter than snow, o wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.’
Whenever she gets to this part of the story, they’re all on the floor, laughing. Then she can’t carry on. Which is maybe for the best, ’cause it began to get a bit rough that night, a bit too rough. Lambert says he doesn’t know, he says it must be the drink Treppie threw down his throat, but he can’t remember a thing about that night, or the next day.
For everyone’s sake, she just tells the story of the next day, the day they went to Pretoria. In the little Austin, with all the corsages, and how they made so much money, she says. For everyone’s sake, she tells the story, but especially for Lambert. She tells how they made bags of money at the Voortrekker monument. She can still see it before her eyes, she says; the people stood there with stiff eyes, listening to the speeches, and they pulled out paper money from their pockets to buy the little corsages.
Almost six hundred rand. Five hundred and forty nine rands and twentynine cents.
When she gets to this part, Pop drops his head, and Treppie says ‘Fuck!’ as he walks out the front door. And Lambert says, the rain in Spain, sitting there in the lounge with his brandy. When she tries to go to the kitchen, he stops her: ‘Ma, tell us more, tell about the speeches, and how the people pulled ten-rand notes out of their pockets when they saw me.’ Then she tells him the story. She tells him what he wants to hear. Poor Lambert. That poor cockeyed child of hers. And then Pop lifts up his head and he helps her. He recites bits of Verwoerd’s speech for Lambert, just as if he’d been there himself.
‘And I say to you today, my people, the Commonwealth of Nations will bring us no gain. Not a single cent. I say to you here today, we’re better off on our own. No one has any business meddling in our affairs. No one needs to stick their noses into our affairs. We’ll work out our own salvation here on the southern tip of Africa, by the light we have, and with the help of the Almighty.’
Then Treppie comes in with a fat grin on his face. Now that sounds just right, he says. That sounds like good business. No one must come here and mess with them. Not with the volk and not with their brothers in the volk either.