‘Jesus’ blood never failed me yet.’
The next verse they’d take in a minor, and the one after that in a major, and so on, with all kinds of trills and frills as they went along. They’d play the song like a waltz and then faster again, and then like chapel music, and then jolly again.
‘… there is one thing I know
for He loves me so.’
They were playing Lambert through his catechism, she thought, they were playing sharp and clear air back into his head, so he could study well. For the fridges. They were singing and playing ’cause the family Bible had changed hands.
That was the fourth night of Lambert’s studying.
TICKEY 
It’s exactly a week tonight since Lambert began his studying. And here he comes now, out of his den and down the passage. All three of them have been waiting here in the lounge. She’s told Pop three times already she wants to go sleep, but each time he says, no, she must wait, and Treppie also says she must wait, they’re still going to make history here tonight. She doesn’t want to miss out on history, so she thought she’d better sit and wait. She’s making all her buttonholes smaller, even though there’s only one button left. And here he is, at last, standing in the doorway with the fridge book under his arm. It doesn’t look like history to her, it looks more like trouble. She gets up and puts on her housecoat.
‘Now I’m fully swotted up,’ says Lambert. His voice sounds like it’s coming from a hole somewhere. He’s standing there with his legs slightly apart, swaying a little, like he’s leaning into a strong wind. He looks thin in the face and pale and wan, with dark rings under his eyes. She can see scabs and sores all over his body from the acid. He doesn’t look so good. But he’s acting tough and he’s smiling. She smiles a little smile back at him.
‘Hell, Lambert, if you’d studied like this at school you’d have gotten far by now, my boy!’ Treppie says. Give with the one hand and take with the other.
But she can see nothing will put Lambert off tonight. He made a deal in front of witnesses, and now those witnesses had better stick up for him. She’ll do her part, she’ll bear witness. He doesn’t have to remind her. She buttons up her housecoat in the middle with the new, small button.
‘Stick to the point, Treppie,’ Pop says in a straight voice here next to her.
‘Ja, I agree,’ she says. ‘A promise is a promise, let him have his exam now and be done with it, so he can get his fridges fixed.’
‘Fridges that work are another chapter altogether. You two mustn’t expect miracles.’
Now Treppie’s talking like a preacher. She can see he’s about to take off again.
‘The only thing I’m glad about,’ he says, ‘is that for once I’m seeing some real commitment from a Benade. ’Cause that’s the one ingredient we’ve been missing all our lives.’
She nudges Pop. Pop must be strict with Treppie now, before he really gets going.
‘Don’t start talking rubbish,’ Pop says. ‘All our lives we’ve been doing our best with what we were given.’ She hears him take a deep breath before carrying on.
‘Or with what we think we’ve got,’ he says, ‘’cause you don’t always know what your own possibilities are, and your eyes are not always open to your own talents. Anyone can look right past that kind of thing. It’s no one’s fault. It’s just the way things are.’
Pop looks Treppie up and down. She also looks at him. Up and down.
‘And you, of all people, should know what I’m talking about.’ Pop looks around to see if he’s got everyone’s attention.
Dear Lord, Pop mustn’t go and overdo it now.
‘You, for example, missed the fact that you should’ve been a clown. Yes, a clown at Boswell Wilkie circus.’
Pop holds up his finger to show he’s not yet finished. He must be careful with that finger. He knows what comes of it.
‘And don’t get me wrong, I mean it as a compliment. I don’t mean it in an ugly or funny way.’
Now she must help Pop a bit here. Now he’s taking big chances.
‘Tickey,’ says Mol. ‘Not Treppie, Tickey.’ They always laugh when she says something. They think she doesn’t know how to be funny. Well, she doesn’t know much about history, but she knows how to play the fool.
‘With a red nose,’ says Lambert. His voice sounds a bit better now.
‘Yes,’ says Pop, ‘a clown who laughs and cries at the same thing, so people can never make up their minds. And that’s a good thing, ’cause the last thing this world needs are people who keep making up their minds about bugger-all. You have to be patient and take each thing as it comes, good or bad. And, Treppie, my brother—’
She gives him a little kick under the chair. Pop’s brain is soft. He does it more and more these days. He forgets his perspective. He mustn’t go and lose his perspective now.
‘And, Treppie, my man …’ Pop says. He acts like it was nothing. But she saw Lambert’s eyes shifting uneasily when Pop said ‘my brother’. It’s her end, the idea that Lambert still hasn’t realised anything.
‘… let me just tell you one thing, and this is a piece of wisdom I picked up from you. You taught me this, and it’s not the kind of thing a person usually picks up from fridge mechanics.’
Pop’s looking at Treppie so hard that Treppie doesn’t say a word. There’s a sort of shy smile on his face. If you want Treppie in your pocket, just praise him. Ai, old Pop, he’s so smart tonight. In his own way.
‘It’s never too late,’ Pop says, ‘to recognise the talent you missed and to do something about it.’
Treppie gets up, with his shy smile and all. He tiptoes to his room, holding up his finger to show they must be quiet and wait a bit, he’s coming now. As soon as he’s closed his door, Pop tells Lambert to sit down. Now she can go and make him a nice mug of sweet coffee and a sandwich, ’cause a person can’t do exams on an empty stomach. She says nothing. The air’s full of surprises tonight, never mind history.
Mol sits on the stoep in front. She looks at the sparrows pecking the car’s hubcaps. They think it’s other sparrows, but it’s just themselves they see there. They go on and on, peck, peck, peck. After a while they’re just about falling over, but still they carry on. Then she says to Toby: ‘Fetch!’ and he chases the birds away. But they come back again.
There’s peace and quiet in the house now that Treppie’s helping Lambert with his fridges. It’s been more than a week already, thank God. Even Pop’s like a new man. He gets up with her in the mornings and they make sandwiches together in the kitchen. Pop takes Lambert and Treppie’s sandwiches through to the den, and then he comes and sits quietly here on the stoep with her. They drink coffee and look at the sparrows. And then they laugh all over again about the exam that Treppie gave Lambert.
Not that it was all fun and games. There was almost trouble, quite a few times, but in the end it all went off very well. It’s ’cause she and Pop kept their heads. Especially Pop. Pop was really on top form that night. Lambert too. Shame, she’s never seen him try so hard.
Lambert had hardly finished his sandwich that evening when Treppie came out of the room in one of Pop’s floppy old hats, striped pyjama pants, a vest full of cigarette holes, and red socks that were so old his toes and heels stuck out. He’d smeared his face white with Brylcreem, except for a wide space around his crooked mouth, which made it look much bigger than usual. On his nose was a plastic bubble they’d got for nothing at the Shell garage after Red Nose Day, when there were too many noses and not enough people with money for charity.
Treppie stood next to that box of red noses and said he wanted to take one for just in case, a person never knew. Charity was a house with many mansions.