‘Compressor burn-out,’ said Treppie, walking slowly around Lambert with the bottle in one hand and the book held tightly to his chest. Shame, he looked that poor Lambert up and down the way someone would inspect a broken engine in a scrapyard.
‘Sour oil,’ he said, fanning his nose.
He plucked at the sleeves of Lambert’s T-shirt. ‘Blown-out windings,’ he said.
Then he cupped his hand behind his ear and put his head to Lambert’s stomach, as if he was listening to the sound of his insides. Lambert just stood there, dead still, with those mad eyes of his.
‘Rattles and hums and harmonic vibrations,’ Treppie said.
Then Treppie knocked himself a shot on the head with the bottle and rolled his eyes. He looked very strange, like he was on stage and he wanted to start crying or something.
‘Not a muffler in sight,’ he said. ‘Not on the intake stroke, nor on the exhaust. No gas, no pressure, bugger-all.’ And he looked at her and Pop as if they were mechanics who knew exactly what he was talking about.
‘How do you save a fridge,’ Treppie asked, ‘with a condenser that won’t condense and an ice-box without ice? God’s own evaporator. One big heavenly leak.’
But, he said, there was always hope.
‘There’s still hope, Lambert, there’s still hope,’ he said, tapping his book with his fingers.
Lambert just stood there, saying nothing. He went completely dumb when he saw that book. He’d heard a lot about it, but he’d never been allowed anywhere near it.
He even stuck out his hand, the one that was shaking, as if he wanted to touch it.
But Treppie turned away, pressing the book even closer to his chest.
‘Uh-uh,’ he said, ‘first wash handies. Handies and footies, and while you’re about it you can wash the rest of you too. Then you must put on some clean clothes.’
Treppie stopped talking and looked around him to see if everyone was listening.
That’s when she allowed herself to take another breath, ’cause she saw Treppie was about to make one of his speeches again. And when Treppie starts making speeches, you know he’s okay.
‘This here is the family Bible. This is where you’ll find the writings of the prophets and the law, and everything else you need to inherit the earth, be blessed and live in eternal glory with your Fuchs and your Tedelex. But for that you must first do your catechism, my boy, before you can be accepted into the bosom of the congregation. The congregation of Triumph Electrical Appliances. Without the knowledge of pressure and gas, and without an insight into the temperatures of the high side and the low side, you’re not worth a straw. The holy Electrolux be my witness!’
He held the book in front of his face and blew on to it, and then he put it down on the sideboard and wiped his hand over its hard, shiny cover.
He’d give Lambert a week, he said, after which he’d conduct an examination. If Lambert studied properly, to his satisfaction, he’d have a look at those two antiques of Lambert’s. ‘Then we’ll fix them,’ he said, ‘you and me. So help me God!’
Ag shame, the next thing Lambert’s mouth began twitching into a smile, right through those spots of oil, like he wanted to start crying or something. And that smile just got bigger and bigger. He smiled at her and Pop, and then they smiled much better back at him.
Only then did she come out from behind the chair. And Pop shifted the toolbox back under his seat.
‘Go wash yourself now,’ Pop said to Lambert.
Yes, go take a bath, she also said, not that it worried her whether Lambert bathed or not, but this was a different story.
Treppie suddenly got all concerned about Lambert. No, he said, they must immediately go buy some ointment for those burns of his. It was too late for Prep. They must tell the chemist it was burn-out oil from a fridge. He’d know what ointment to give them. And something for his eyes too, Treppie said. She thought, hell, this was too good to be true, Treppie must be joking. But he saw what she was thinking and he said: ‘Honestly, it’s no joke. It’s chemistry, this.’
And that’s how Lambert came to be treated for his sores. He even got dressings on the worst of the burns. She picked up his dirty clothes outside the bathroom and threw them on to the rubbish heap, just like that. Then she nagged Pop and Treppie until they went to Pep Stores in Ontdekkers to buy him a new T-shirt and a pair of shorts. The only pair they could find were Extra Large, with little black blocks on it.
‘This is an expensive round,’ Pop still said, ‘it’s no use buying him shorts if he won’t wear them.’
‘He will,’ said Treppie, ‘he’ll even chew fucken ladybirds now if you ask him to.’
JESUS’ BLOOD NEVER FAILED ME YET 
In those days of Lambert’s studying, Treppie had a funny look on his face. She couldn’t make out if he was sad or what it was. It was like he knew what was coming, but he didn’t know when. And he knew it was bad, but now it must just come and be done with.
He began to drink even more than usual and by early evening he’d already be singing such sad songs. Hallelujah songs like ‘Pass me not, oh gentle Saviour’ and others like ‘Red River Valley’.
Until one night, when he went into his room and scratched around for the keys to the sideboard’s top drawer. He opened the drawer, took out Pop’s mouth organ and tried it out, with a hum on the high notes and a hum on the low notes. But the first hum sounded like a pain in the gut, and the second like a pain somewhere lower down. That’s what she said to him, but he just gave her one of his looks. He passed the mouth organ over to Pop and asked him to play something. Play what? Pop said, but Treppie wiped his hand over his face and said, anything, anything would do, thanks.
How Pop got on to it was a mystery, but he chose an old tune that the Salvation Army used to play in the streets of Vrededorp. By the time Pop had played the tune three times over, each time more smoothly with more and more notes in their proper places, Treppie began to remember the words and started singing along:
‘Jesus’ blood never failed me yet
never failed me yet.
Jesus’ blood never failed me yet
there is one thing I know
for He loves me so.’
They played that song and sang those words over and over again. The more Treppie remembered the tune and the words, the more trills Pop began coaxing out of the mouth organ. He played low notes like cellos and high notes like trumpets. After a while he played exactly like a harp in an orchestra. It was like the tune of a completely different psalm, but to the same words and the same song that Treppie stuck to. After a while it began to sound like some kind of a classic or something.
That Pop should have so much breath, and so much music left in him, and that Treppie should suddenly sing so much Jesus-stuff took them all by surprise, Pop too. What surprised them even more was that the music was so good, even though lots of Klipdrift had passed through their gills that night, and the mouth organ was so old, with missing notes here and there. After a while Pop and Treppie’s eyes began twinkling from making so much music together. Each time the song swung to a new verse they’d look at each other and wink. And then Treppie would raise his part of the tune by half a note, and Pop would catch that half-note clean out of the air, and there they’d go again.