“Will you slow, Gareth?” Nan asked. “I can’t hear them.”
Gareth said nothing.
The faces did look Oriental, except for the hair. The mother got up. The whole group began to trot alongside.
Nan opened the window fully and put her head out. Tess pulled at her.
“Can we not slow, Gareth?” Nan asked urgently.
“They’re trading,” Gareth answered.
“No,” Nan said. “They’re saying ‘metse.’ That’s it. We must stop, Gare. I have it clear.”
Tess said, “What on earth is metse? I don’t have any.”
“Water, Tess. They want water. I have never heard of this. They don’t do this. Look, they’re keeping up. This is too desperate. We must stop. We have the outer tank. It’s full of water. We must stop. Gare, I am pleading! I am faint. You must stop. Stop this. We have the external tank. You must attend. They are all running. One of the girls, Gare — a scab condition. They are smiling at us, begging. Gare, if you love me, please stop!”
“They can run for miles, they say,” Tess said.
“That is the men, Tess — when they hunt.”
“Right. They blow poison darts, and that weakens the animal or rhino or what all, and then they just run after it until it drops. Days, sometimes, it takes. They can run.”
“Tess, be still. Look at them.”
The Basarwa were reaching to touch or catch hold of the vehicle.
“Gare,” Nan said. “What do you say? Please, my heart, we must stop!” She put her hands on his shoulders. He tensed and bucked violently to reject her touch.
Gareth said, “There is no chance. We are in sand, Nan. We could be all night. No!” He was increasing speed.
“Then, Gare,” she said, “if we stick, all right, we could put brush down — I would help. I would help. Please, Gare. The mother is running. Their mother is running. We won’t stick. Help can turn up. They are skin and bone!” She appealed to Tess. “They are skin and bone. We are making them run.”
Again Nan put her head out the window. The Land-Rover was drawing away. Nan could hear the dire breathing of the runners.
“No stopping, I say,” Tom said.
Nan ducked back in. “Tom, this is our vehicle!” she said, shouting.
“You shall be civil to Tom,” Gareth said, in his most menacing voice.
Nan saw one of the girls drop to the ground, spent.
“One of the girls has fallen.”
“Nan, we are picking up dust. You will close up. Close the window.”
Gareth was right. There was dust in the air. “Hear, hear!” Tess said. She had taken out a bandanna and was holding it bunched near her mouth.
Nan closed the window and sat back, making herself look forward, her face agonized.
“They are still at the side, Gareth,” Nan said. “Gare, at the window you can see them, two of them. Gare, please look. Oh, help!”
Nan opened the window again. She looked back. The second girl had fallen. Only the mother, still carrying the baby, was still pursuing, her face wild. She would soon fall.
“The mother is still running, Gareth. She is straining, with that baby. I wish you would look. You are destroying me. We must stop!”
The mother was heaving with effort. It was too much. She threw her arms up and fell on her back, protecting the infant she was carrying.
The Land-Rover ground onward. Nan looked to the rear. The women were lost. She covered her face with her hands. Then she lowered her hands and seized the water bottle from Tess, who was holding it. She shoved her window open and hurled the bottle out onto the bank. She lunged toward the front, grasping for anything else she could find to throw out of the vehicle. The men shouted. Tom grappled with her. Tess shrank into her corner. Tom turned and got on his knees in his seat and seized Nan by the shoulders. He pressed her back. He held her. Gareth was trembling with fury.
“She has pitched out the water bottle, Gareth,” Tom said.
With a roaring cry that frightened them all, Gareth drove his foot down on the brake. The Rover slewed and stopped. The engine died. Tom released Nan.
They sat in silence, tilted, mastering themselves. Nan was the first to speak. “Why have we stopped, Gareth?” she whispered.
Gareth was contained. “One of us must collect the bottle. Simple enough.”
For a moment they were in darkness, enclosed in the dust of their passage as the wind came up sharply behind them. Nothing could be done until it was clear again. They waited.
Tom moved to get out. But Gareth caught Tom’s wrist and pulled him roughly back. “One of us must collect the bottle,” Gareth said again.
THIEVING
As from 1978, God chose me for a thief. Could I, a boy, withstand Him? If God marks you, you must fall, always.
Why must God choose out one Mokgalagadi who is poor and who in all times past loved all things of God and B.V.M.? I was very much in churches. I was foremost in singing of hymns, praising God most highly. My name of Paul is found in Scripture. To me, God hates all thieves. And if Lord Jesus may forgive a thief at times, always it is just because this thief is vowing he shall steal no more. What book is my greatest treasure, if not St. Joseph Daily Missal?
As well, I am Mokgalagadi, of a tribe that in all ages of time is misfortunate and despised in Botswana and always made to be enslaved and mocked, and having any treasures taken from it, never taking them from others. Only Basarwa are less than we to the prideful Bamangwato and Bakwena, our masters. At Tsane I never took items from my mother as children do. Always I was truthful. I only sought to prosper with good English-speaking. My tutor was Sister Honoria at St. Boniface Mission, godsent to me. But she was taken out from Tsane to aid others.
I came to my fate by an egg, at Lobatse, at Boiteko School. A cooked egg came to be found in my bed. At Boiteko, we few Bakgalagadi were ill treated by Bamalete and Coloured boys at times, myself the most. It was because I am tall, and fast in my English. I was first in Geography by far. To this day I state Headmaster Sebina and the bursar Chibaya made a crime ring, with hiding of sports fees and claiming of a cashbox stolen, with, then, Sebina found as owner of a new van for hire. They feared inspectors coming. So that if some boys could be shown out as thieves for taking food and cooked eggs from the kitchen, those boys could be given all blame, and so forward with more crimes! They said Here is Paul Ojang who is late on fees and with no relations to aid him in the Board of Trust, and he is a boarder from far-distant Tsane, from where he cannot be heard again. So a miracle passed and an egg was found to walk. Still today I can cry at this wrong done to me.
The cur Sebina said I was only telling falsehoods — he, the master liar. When that cashbox was taken, keen boys were sleeping two hands from the office, yet they heard no sounds when doors were broken through. Miracles were all about. I said to him If at all I am a thief, why am I known to say to some chaps who are stealing in shops in Lobatse it is wrong? But he said I must pack and go. He said I was known to name him as Headmonster. He knew it only from spies. Who set that egg into my bed? It was boys or the crime ring, or God’s hand.