Out of Shadows (20 page)

Bully was a fresh-air freak who insisted on opening all the windows for class so we had to sit shivering. If that wasn't bad enough, his lessons were a mountain of boring. He didn't do anything, just made us read while he sat and stared out the window. When the bell eventually rang, Fairford or Rhys-Maitland or someone had to break his trance and ask for dismissal because it was like he hadn't heard and would keep us in there forever.

One day Osterberg finally dared to ask Bully if he was
going to start giving us prep. We hadn't written an essay since Mr. van Hout, the academic year was passing and O levels were at the end of next term in November, and that was less than four months away.

Bully winced like he'd been stung.

“What's the bloody point?” he said, and then perhaps realizing he was speaking out loud: “Yes, prep. Read chapters fourteen and fifteen. Make some notes or something. There won't be a test.”

“Are you sure, sir?” Osterberg was apprehensive.

“I was once.” It was a hollow voice. “Today, I can't be sure of anything.”

He worked out a deep breath. “Boys, you need to know I won't be headmaster of this school for much longer. I think the time for me to retire has come. I always said when I went it would be on my own terms, and I intend to keep it that way.”

A hush blanketed the classroom.

Someone's pen clattered to the floor and it sounded like crashing rocks. It was Ivan's. He bent down to retrieve it, his eyes unusually open and skittish. I could see he was thinking fast and yet not really thinking at all. To me he looked like someone who was in a strange, panicky place and desperately looking for a way out.

When lessons were over he didn't come back with us to the house. Instead, and without a word of explanation, he headed straight for the Admin Block and up the stairs to Bully's office.

“Bully's decided to stay after all. But there are going to be a few changes,” he told us when he returned to the house. “Changes for the good, in the long run, you have to remember that.”

“What have you said to him
this
time?” we asked in wonder,
but he wouldn't be drawn on what any of the changes would be.

“Come. I need some air.” He was already walking up the corridor, wrapping on his scarf. He meant only Pittman, Klompie, and myself, of course, no one else. We followed close behind.

“Let's go to the Cliffs,” said Klompie.

“
No!
” Ivan snapped. Then more quietly: “No. Not the Cliffs. We're always going there. Somewhere else.”

The cold air tugged sharply that afternoon, but there was something about the day that made us believe summer could return. Ivan led us around the squash courts and onto the path that led to the workers' village. As we got close, some piccanins who'd been playing with toy cars made from wire and Coke bottle tops started running around us, the younger ones laughing hysterically as the older ones showed off and braved it to within a couple of meters before scampering away again.

“Herro, sah. Herro, baas,” they trilled. “How do you do?”

We went under the cover of the pines and Ivan took out some gwaais. When we'd all lit up, using the glow of tobacco to try and warm our hands, he started to tell us more.

“They're going to be watching us like hawks now,” he said.

Klompie and I both nodded, understanding. It was Pitters who spoke out.

“Who?” He looked suspicious.

“The government, of course. Who do you think? First Kasanka, then Mr. van Hout. Now Nelson. It's too much. They don't like us private schools as it is; we remind them of the past. Too many whites in one place, and they have too little control.”

“So what? Let them watch. What the fuck can they do?”

“They can close us down,” Ivan said, eyeing Pitters levelly. “Or give us a government-appointed teacher to keep
an eye on what we're doing. I've told Bully he needs to get someone in to replace Mr. van Hout quickly. A black teacher. One who's managed to climb his way out of the township or whichever mud hut he came from and made something of himself. A living example of independence. A white one wouldn't work.”

Pitters stabbed a tree with his smoke.

“Jeez, man, students
and
teachers? We already have Mr. Mafiti. Whatever happened to standards? What are you trying to do to our school, Hascott? It'll be more wanked than ever.”

Ivan threw his own butt at him. Pitters' eyes flashed angrily.

“It's about
integrity
,” Ivan told him. Told us all. “All I want is to uphold the integrity of the school, and to ensure it remains open. It
has
to stay open, we
mustn't
let them close it. This is the best school in the country. If we have to make a few sacrifices to keep the government happy then so be it.”

“We should be kicking more blacks out, not letting them in.”

“Don't you see? It's the only way.”

“Only way for what?”

“To stop them closing us down, or taking us over. Because of what's happened.”

“They can't do that—it's not theirs.”

“They can do anything that bloody pleases them,” Ivan said, “and if it's not the law now they'll
make
it the law. They mustn't close the school. Not until after we've left.”

Pitters had already come forward, but as Ivan spoke he'd backed off again, hands in pockets. “Why do you care so much, Hascott? Why the hell do you care when you want to leave at the end of the year anyway?”

Ivan twitched a smile.

“That's the other bit of news. I'm not leaving, either, I'm
going to sort it with my folks and get my A levels here. I plan on staying right to the end.”

He glared.

Klompie tried to break the tension with a high giggle. “We'll be surrounded by them,” he laughed. “I never realized you liked Kaffirs so much, Ivan.”

Ivan grabbed Klompie by the shirt, holding him firm. Their noses almost touched.

“Don't you ever,
ever
say that again. You hear me?” His eyes, his cheeks . . . his whole face was a storm. He punched Klompie and dropped him. “I hate them. They took my country, they took my home. We lost Sir because of one of them. You will never say that about me again. I . . . hate . . . 
them
. Got that?”

Klompie mumbled. “Sorry, Ivan.”

“Got that?” He turned on me.

His intensity had rooted me, I lifted my hands and surrendered. It was that easy.

He started hunting for stones. The piccanins were still in sight, playing up by the corner. Ivan launched his missiles in quick succession and the kids squealed with delight, dodging and enjoying the game.

“Cheeky bloody . . .” Ivan snatched more stones up, bigger ones this time. “They're laughing at us. Are you just going to sit there and let them take the piss? Look, they think we're a joke.”

He dropped the stones at our feet.

The children howled with glee.

“Well? Or are you bunch of gays going to stand there and let them do what they like? We wouldn't have let them get away with it in the Old Days.”

It was enough. Klompie and Pittman took a handful and started hurling. Ivan clapped approval, and then all three turned and stared at me not joining in, as though I wasn't one
of them. As though I didn't understand what it was like to be them.

I snatched a stone from Ivan's hand and chucked it hard. It hit one of the little piccanins right in the head. He stopped dead and covered his eyes and screamed while the others scattered. All at once the game was over. For them, at least; for us it had just begun as we chased them through the trees, throwing and cheering and howling like a bunch of fucking animals.

When I woke
, the sun was full on and shooting straight into the backs of my eyes. The sound of U2 gently messed up the inside of my head, tormenting me with images of angels and devils and a burning cross of shame.

Grimacing, I twisted my head and wiped heat from my chest. The combined effects of weed and beer, which had seemed such a good idea at the time, had worn off but left me with a serious
babbelas
. My head throbbed, my tongue was dry and swollen and scraped across the roof of my mouth like a slab of biltong. Inside, I was screaming for relief. Outside, the body refused to move and attempted to cling on to sleep, but behind the veil was the faint aftertaste of a nightmare I didn't want to go back to.

With a surge of effort I hauled myself upright.

The sun pounded, ricocheting off pale slabs. A few feet away the cool blue of the pool beckoned but any other movement was too much, so I just stayed like that until I was ready, feeling the jarring rhythm of my hangover beat in time with the music.

All the other sun loungers were empty now, a couple of
discarded towels the only sign that anyone had been here. The pool was calm and flat. For a brief second I wondered if I'd slept through to the next day then dismissed the idea. No, it was still the same.

Everything was the same.

Still hiding out at the hotel pool. Still under a hot spring, September sky. Still wasting my holidays when I should have been at home revising for final exams. Home, however, wasn't a place I liked to spend much time in case Ivan rang again, wondering why I wasn't with the gang, questioning why I wasn't there to go out on one of their “walks.” The truth was I didn't like their “walks.” I never had. Not that first chase through the pines after the piccanins over two years ago, and definitely not when they suddenly started getting worse. But I didn't see how Ivan would ever accept the truth so it was far easier to stay away and hide.

I pushed my feet and clipped an empty bottle, sending it bouncing and spinning across the stone. I waited for it to break, but amazingly it didn't. I retrieved it and placed it on the table, still in one piece. I turned off my cassette player and began the walk back home.

I was almost at the front door when I caught the sound of an engine. Something about it made me stop.

I turned, and beyond our drive I saw a dirt-white pickup leading a trail of red dust as it came near. I urged it to carry on past, for it to be just any old pickup, but already I knew it wouldn't. Sure enough, it turned in.

Ivan had come to find me.

“Shit.”

I didn't have time to think. I ran around to the side of the house. Straightaway my old man looked up from his newspaper.

“What's happened?” he startled.

“Dad. Hi,” I said, feigning calm words very badly. “Where's Matilda?”

“What?”

“Matilda,” I urged. “Where the bloody hell is she?”

“Now look, Robert, there's no need to be like that. I thought we'd got through all your issues about your stepmother.”

“We have. I like Matilda. But this has nothing to do with her.”

Although that wasn't completely true. It did really.

Out at the front of the house, Ivan's brakes squealed to a halt.

“Never mind, it's too late. Just stay here, okay?”

“Why?” he tried to crane forward. “Who is it?”

“Please, stay here. And Matilda. Trust me on this.”

And I ran back around in time to stop Ivan getting out from behind the wheel.

“Howzit,” I said, all cheerful.

Ivan looked out and took a long swig from the Coke bottle he held between his knees.

“So this is what your house looks like,” he said at last. “And you're not dead after all. I'm disappointed, because that can only mean you've been
choosing
not to see us.”

I laughed. Ivan didn't.

“I've been revising,” I explained.

“That's what you always say.” Another slow swig. “What's your problem, Jacko? You've stopped seeing us in the holidays and at school you haven't been out with us in bloody months. You're missing all the fun.”

“I don't have a problem.”

“So why don't you join in anymore . . . you know . . . with the games?”

Games
, I thought.
Is that what the past two years have been to you?

I shrugged. Out of the corner of my eye I saw my old man standing on the grass, looking at us. Then he turned and said something to someone out of sight. It could only have been to Matilda.

“Okay, I'll come now,” I told Ivan hurriedly.

He seemed pleased by that.

“Really?”

“
Ja
. It'll be fun.”

“Well about bloody time. Go get your stuff.”

Relieved that he didn't even try to move from the car, I darted back toward the house.

“And hurry the hell up,” he called after me. “Five minutes and I'm coming to get you.”

I was out in four.

Most of the boys
from school came from rich families but you never really thought about it, it just was. Klompie's aunt and uncle were slightly different because you couldn't help notice they were
seriously
rich.

Their house was in Borrowdale for a start, and it was one of the best. Two stories sitting contentedly in a massive garden on the gentle undulations of the capital's most desirable suburb, with tennis court, swimming pool, and sauna, and the main gate was an electric one you could control from the car—you didn't have to wait for the houseboy each time. The garage doors, all four of them, were automatic as well, although they were closed and locked most of the time; you rarely got a glimpse of the dazzling BMW, Range Rover, and Mercedes paintwork, and even Klompie was only allowed near one of the two VW Golfs parked in the drive.

This was a white man's paradise, and everything my father had ever pointed an accusatory finger at. It was lavish and exclusive, out of reach for the majority, yet I'd always had the
feeling the ten-foot wall right around the perimeter was as much to keep us in as it was to keep people out.