Little Suns (25 page)

He gave Xokindini as a gift to young Charles who took the horse back with him to eKra when his father finally demanded he should return home to look after his own animals and start school like his uncle and namesake who went to Shawbury in the land of amaMpondomise.

‘
Hela Malakane, Hela Malakane!
’ the girls who were singing
lipina-tsa-mokopu
changed their tune when they passed Malangana’s house and saw him sitting on the stoep. They were now bored with the big round moon and were going to their various homes to perform whatever chores were still undone and then to sleep. But before that they were giving Malangana a taste of their mischief.

It was the habit of the village children to make fun of the twisted man. It got worse when they discovered he neighed like a horse when he got agitated.

‘
Malakane nnka Malakane, Malakane khali khali Malakane!
’ At this the girls lifted their
thethana
grass and beaded skirts and exposed their bare bottoms.
Malakane
was the Sesotho corruption of his name, and they were inviting him to take what his heart desired.

He just sat there with a distant look in his eyes. He had mastered the art of ignoring all those who teased and insulted him. They moved on with disappointed giggles because they couldn’t provoke one of his famous neighs. He was proud that he had not neighed. He had no control over the neighs. They just came unexpectedly.

Just as he thought he had got away with it one long and melancholic neigh came as if from the hollow of his body. The girls who were now few in number, for most of them had gradually branched off to their homes, heard it, stood and listened, and then clapped their hands and cheered.

Malangana sighed and cursed his lot.

His lot had started gradually with a sore heart and the longing for Mthwakazi. The
mokhele
also became less fashionable as fewer military people were buying them. In any event he had become less enthusiastic about travelling long distances. His wealth in the form of animals was gradually becoming depleted, though he continued to hoard hundreds of pound notes since his needs were few.

Gcazimbane was ageing as the years went by. It was in their fifteenth or sixteenth year in Lesotho – he couldn’t remember – when he woke up one morning, went to the stable and found Gcazimbane dead.

He wailed as if a human being had passed on. The horse had changed drastically since participating in the War of Hope from the carefree spirit that used to enjoy playing hide-and-seek with his groom to a brooding beast that carried out orders without joy, and that even once allowed itself to be abducted by amaBhaca enemies. But Malangana remembered only the wonderful times. Why, he was with Gcazimbane when he first spoke with Mthwakazi and argued about the sun. Gcazimbane was even present when he and Mthwakazi did adult things by the river. More than any human being, Gcazimbane was the keeper of his deepest secret.

At this thought he wailed once more.

People came to console him for they thought he had lost a relative. When they found that it was only a horse they offered to get rid of the carcass for him. He was grateful for he did not know who was going to assist him in burying Gcazimbane with all his kin so far away at Qoboshane or on the mountains of Mants’onyane, for they had even spread that far away herding their sheep and goats.

The next day he was grateful for the kindness of the neighbours as they brought him meat. Some of it was cooked tripe and it was very good to eat with sorghum bread. There were chunks of raw meat that he roasted on the open fire. Neighbours became generous like that when they had slaughtered an ox or when one of their animals was dead, so he did not ask questions. When he still had lots of goats and one was injured he would take it out of its misery. He would share most of the meat with the neighbours or else it would rot. There would have been no point in hoarding meat for oneself. Two weeks later another neighbour had brought him sun-dried meat known as
lihoapa
. This was particularly good and he kept some for when he would go to visit Mhlontlo.

It happened one day that in casual conversation a neighbour mentioned that Gcazimbane was not only a beautiful horse but he was very delicious despite his age. Delicious? Did these people eat his horse? He remembered vaguely that Basotho people used to be teased as horse-eaters but he had thought it was only a joke. He screamed to the heavens when he learned that not only did his neighbour eat his horse but he himself partook in gormandising chunks of prime portions of the beast.

He imagined the horse living in his stomach, gnawing his intestines. He tried to vomit it out. He felt it kicking in him. He thought he somehow needed to exorcise the cannibal in him but he did not know how. He came to believe that Gcazimbane was really living inside him. That’s when he started to neigh like a horse, uncontrollably, at any moment.

Everyone had gone but Malangana sat on the stoep and watched the moon. He would sit until it set. No one could believe this was the same Malangana who had the sheep and the goats and who used to ride fat horses selling
mokhele
ostrich feathers and fraternising with princes and being the envy of everyone. Over the years he had become almost skeletal with knees and elbows jutting out like knobkerries. It was not because of ageing. It was because of the longing of the heart. It had taken its toll on him. These were its physical manifestations. When the heart was longing it ate the body bit by bit. It started with the fatty areas, and then chewed the muscles and even gnawed parts of the bones, making them brittle. Longing made his body convoluted, twisted and grotesque.

He had not been to see Mhlontlo for more than a year now. Two months before Cesane came with the news that shocked him and he felt that it was Mhlontlo’s final betrayal. First, Mhlontlo had tried to commit suicide. Secondly, he had now become
igqobhoka
– a convert – of the Roman Catholic Church.

The way Cesane put it was like this: Mhlontlo, or ’Mamalo as the Basotho liked to call him, had gone to white Catholic priests at Holy Cross Mission, and had told them that he was so depressed that he went to the mountain and covered his eyes with a
qhiya
headscarf. Then he ran with all his strength towards a cliff with the intention of killing himself. But he heard a voice saying, ‘Hey, you stop that right now!’ That stopped him in his tracks right at the edge of the cliff. He took off the blindfold and looked around but there was nobody there. Then he blindfolded himself again for a second attempt at suicide. But he felt someone grabbing his arm and heard a voice saying, ‘Go and find a church service and offer yourself to God.’ That was how ’Mamalo went to the Catholic Fathers and became a man of the Church.

‘Today he prays and he goes to Holy Mass every Sunday,’ said Cesane. ‘He carries a rosary with him all the time.’

Malangana was happy about only one thing: Mhlontlo was not alone. Charles, his son, was there at Phiring with him, although he travelled back and forth to Qumbu.

The moon sat on the mountain. The silly mongrel thought now for sure it was going to lick the moon. It jumped up with its tongue hanging and licked the air. It fell to the ground and rolled once. A jackal howled. Malangana laughed. His body rattled.

iPaseka
, which included Good Friday and Easter Monday, had intervened and the acolyte said she could not introduce Malangana to the owner of the drum. She did come to the general dealer the next day, but without the drum and without the owner. She refused to say who the owner was. She could only say the owner of the drum was also her owner, and as
igqobhoka
she was not available during
iPaseka
because Jesus Christ, the one who was a baby on Christmas, died and was nailed on a cross and
amagqobhoka
mourn his death on Friday, even though they know that he will wake up again on Sunday and walk to heaven after some forty days. It was not the first time Malangana had heard this tale. These were the kinds of stories the tree-planting young men should be making fun of, not his war stories.

For a number of days after that the acolyte kept coming with excuses: her owner was sick or her owner had travelled. Malangana on the other hand kept showing her the money which she would be paid only after introducing him to the owner of the drum. The acolyte had finally to confess she could take Malangana to the owner only when both the man of the house and his wife were away at the same time, which didn’t happen often because the owner of the drum, who happened to be the man’s aged mother, lived a secret life that involved the drums.

Throughout April, the month amaMpondomise call
uTshaz’iimpuzi
, the month of the withering pumpkin, Malangana went to the general dealer’s store and sat on the stoep waiting for the acolyte. She came quite faithfully, for money has a powerful magnetic pull when the eyes have seen it. Sometimes she brought some victuals, which he nibbled just a little bit. She thought he was fussy for an emaciated man. She did not know he was wary of looking too well-fed. His body had to be a true reflection of his years of anguish.

The tree planters have long dismantled their camp and left to civilise other landscapes. On that slope on the site of their camp Malangana has constructed his own shelter with grass and leaves and branches of bushes without even asking permission from the headman who he is certain is some interloper imposed by Government. The headman and the village council, on the other hand, just let him be because they think he is mad.

Today the acolyte comes. She is excited. Today is the day. The man of the house will be away for the whole week. He has gone to Umtata to consult with Government. He is a very important person of Government. His wife has gone to Qumbu for the day to visit her own relatives and to buy a few things at the shops. The acolyte knows that she may even return the next day since the husband is away.

Malangana is taken aback when he realises that the path leads to the site formerly occupied by Mhlontlo’s Great Place. He can hardly recognise it though, with all the tall pine trees instead of the
umsintsi
that used to surround the place.

It is an expansive homestead of whitewashed rondavels and four-walled
ixande
houses. The acolyte tells him it is the homestead of Rhudulu who is the only Mpondomise of substance remaining in Sulenkama. Malangana remembers him. Like him, he was an ordinary soldier in Mhlontlo’s army. But he does not remember him in the War of Hope. He wonders how he became so wealthy.

The acolyte takes Malangana to one of the houses where an old woman is lying on a mattress eating roasted pumpkin seeds from a bowl. Even though she has greatly shrunk and years have furrowed her face he can recognise her. She was one of the diviners who nursed the queen when she was sick. She was robust and matronly then but
nguye lo
.
She is the one.

‘I have a visitor for you,
makhulu
,’ says the acolyte, addressing her as grandmother.

‘Who are you, my child? Even though my eyes are weak you look like you need some healing and a lot of feeding too. You bring me visitors, you know that Rhudulu does not allow me the work of the ancestors any more, you silly girl,’ says the old woman.

‘I am Malangana,
makhulu
. You will not know me. But I remember you.’

‘I don’t divine any more, my child. Ever since my son found Christ he separated me from heathen things even though the spirits of my ancestors still move me.’

The acolyte is eager to conduct business and get it over with. This opportunity may not avail itself again.

‘He wants to buy one of your drums,
makhulu
,’ says the acolyte.

‘How does he know about my drums?’

‘I told him about them. He is a good man, he won’t talk about them. His ancestors led him to one of your drums in his dreams and he told me about it when I met him at the
intlombe
.’

The old woman gets panicky. No one must know about the drums. When the spirits of the ancestors possess her the acolyte and a few friends assemble secretly in her room and beat the drums and
bavumise bacamagwise
– perform the sacred rituals of diviners – until the spirits calm down. This means that whether her son likes it or not she is still a diviner; the spirits of her ancestors are refusing to leave her alone and hand her over to her son’s religion. She can don the red-and-white uniforms of the Methodists on Sundays and struggle on with her
dondolo
walking stick to church, but when the spirits call the drums must sound.

‘Bring the drum,’ says Malangana.

The acolyte dashes out.

‘I remember you from the days of Mhlontlo.’

The old woman becomes agitated. ‘Don’t even mention that name. It’s a good thing he is where he is now. I hope he rots there. I hope they kill him dead.’

Malangana is shocked to hear this from an elderly woman of the amaMpondomise people who used to be a traditional doctor at the king’s court.

‘My child,
azange abenobuntu laMhlontlo
,’ adds the old woman.
That Mhlontlo never had any humanity
. ‘After killing poor Hope he left his body to be eaten by wild animals. It was my son, Rhudulu, who broke ranks with his army and rode all the way to Maclear to warn Government of Mhlontlo’s treachery. It was too late. Poor Hope was killed. After the war it was also my son who helped that white man – I think his name was Leary – find the skeletons of the poor white men and bury them right here at Sulenkama.’