Philida (31 page)

Perhaps you should first go and make yourself decent for visitors, her mother says.

It’s not visitors, Ma, says Maria. Ma can see it’s only Francois Brink.

He is not yet family, Maria. It’s not fit for you to appear naked in company.

It’s just my feet, Ma. She cheekily pulls up the yellow-brown dress almost to her knees. (Lovely calves, Francois notices. And yes, those delicate ankles. He thinks: Not such a bad idea indeed.)

Maria! Vrouw Berrangé says tartly. You will really make me grey.

Not just her ankles, indeed, decides Francois. He gazes unabashedly at her and takes in the deep blue of her eyes, the slight hint of moisture on her lips and the way her long dark hair is swept back from her forehead, and notices, too, the swelling of her breasts thrust against the striped dress from the inside and the graceful curve of her hips.

It feels as if he has never properly noticed her before.

To your room, says her indignant mother. She turns towards Francois, her face flushed. Please wait a moment. And Francois, please forgive what you have just seen. We’re not always like that.

A few difficult minutes creep past before Maria reappears in proper boots.

You can make us some coffee, orders Vrouw Magdalena Berrangé. Maria throws back her long hair. But she goes to the kitchen without another word of protest. In uneasy silence Francois and the mother of the house remain waiting until her daughter returns, followed by a slave woman with coffee cups, a bowl of aniseed rusks and a deep plate with wild-melon preserve on a large yellowwood tray. Afterwards the slave remains standing behind Tant Magdalena’s chair until such time as her services may again be required. A few of the other Berrangé children arrive to join them.

Francois has of course been here before. Before the Brinks moved away to Drakenstein, to Zandvliet, the children regularly came over to play and cavort in the loquat trees
or
in the barn or in the wide Oranje Street below the house. But since Francois’s father and mother have first come to discuss their son’s future with Maria’s parents the children have become more distant and more self-conscious and today is the first time in a long while that Francois has set foot in the house.

In wooden silence everybody eats and drinks. Beside the long low coffee table a naked slave boy stands with a fan of ostrich feathers on a long bamboo which he waves to keep away the flies. One can see that he is tired – he must have been chasing flies since early morning – but on his buttocks is a pattern of dark lines from a previous hiding which must be the reason why he goes on waving the feathered bamboo so energetically with his thin arms to keep the flies at bay, to and fro, to and fro, to and fro.

Only after the coffee ceremony does Vrouw Berrangé get up. I suppose you two still have something to discuss, she says to Maria, but without looking at Francois. Why don’t you go into the garden if it’s too stuffy inside? He knows that this is just because he is a familiar visitor; otherwise a few of the younger children would no doubt have been sent to accompany them.

The slave girl carries the tray back to the kitchen; the children silently disperse into the house; only the naked boy remains to wave and wave his large fan of plumes. Maria keeps watching him for a while, as if she hasn’t noticed him before. He seems to become conscious of her stare and moves his feet to turn his back. A slow smile tugs at Maria’s full mouth.

You may also go, Jantjie, she says to the boy.

He scurries out.

Maria moves her head to look at Francois. He self-consciously looks away.

Did you see? she asks deliberately.

Did I see what?

That slave boy is growing up fast. Soon he’ll be a handful.

I didn’t notice, says Francois gruffly.

Would you like to go into the garden?

If you want to. He gets up and lets her walk ahead of him, so that he can look at the graceful sweep of her long skirt.

It’s a long time since you’ve been here, she says when they come outside.

We’re kept busy at Zandvliet.

With what?

You should know. I got to help Pa on the farm.

And is that the only reason?

What else could it be?

I started thinking that you had somebody else in the eye.

He nearly misses a step. Like who?

She doesn’t answer. Instead, she asks in her disconcertingly direct way: What is it you want of me?

Francois thinks fast, then says: I want to ask you something. It’s an invitation.

And what is that?

You must come to visit us at Zandvliet again, he says. I’d like to show you the vineyards now that the summer grapes are beginning to swell. And I want you to see the bamboo copse. It is a beautiful and shady place in this hot weather.

Who says I want to see it? she says.

If you’ve seen it once you will know what I’m talking about. And then you’ll want to see it again.

I wonder to how many people you’ve already shown your bamboo copse, she says.

He feels flustered, but tries to pull himself together. To nobody, he says, trying urgently to believe his own
assurance.
You are the only one I’ve always waited to show it to.

I have something to tell you too, she says.

And what is that?

I heard about the slave Philida, Maria says very calmly.

There’s nothing to know about her.

They say you have children.

Maria! He indignantly pulls up his head, but the young woman does not look back at him.

If you have any plans with her, she says, flowing gracefully down the steps into the garden, you’d do well to stay away from me.

He feels his face glowing, but does his best to control it. This is the Caab, Maria! You know what things are like here.

You’re making as if that is something very common!

Well, it is. It happens on all the farms.

I don’t believe you, Frans.

Surely you cannot pretend to be shocked about it, Maria!

Of course I am. And if you think we can be married while you – We can’t have something like this standing between us.

Whatever you may think happened between me and that slave Philida has been over for a long time now.

You may just as well be honest with me, Frans. Or do you think it’s good for a husband and a wife to have silences between them?

You’re not supposed to know about such things, he protests.

I have a father, she says calmly. I have brothers. I don’t want my husband to be like them one day.

I won’t! he promises precipitously. I swear!

Swearing is against the Bible, she says. And she turns round to face him squarely. All I’m telling you, Francois Brink, if you want to marry me, then you will have to stay
with
me for the rest of your life. I won’t share my husband. Once we’re married I don’t want slave women in my bed.

If we get married, I shall stay with you. And with no one else.

And this Philida? And her children?

They are already gone. Into the interior.

You went to visit them in Worcester the other day.

How do you know that? he asks.

A woman knows these things. Her voice grows more vehement: My mother has fourteen children. That doesn’t mean that she doesn’t know.

Francois hangs his head. Maria, I promise you –

Don’t start promising me things. You’ll first have to
prove
to me that I can trust you.

I swear –

She presses a forefinger to his lips, so hard that it bruises them. Don’t swear to me, Frans! And after a silence she adds: All you need to do is to
prove
what you said. Once you’ve done that we can talk again. Otherwise you’ll stay at Zandvliet and I’ll stay right here.

How can I make you believe?

There’s no need ever to
make
me believe. Just make sure you don’t betray me. Because I shall know.

All I’m asking is for you to give me a chance.

I’ll give you enough of a chance. But I tell you before God: I shall know. And if I find out that you have lied to me, it will be better for you never to come here again.

You can believe me, Maria.

Have you seen what they do to a young bullock?

Involuntarily he presses his knees together.

You will miss your balls, Frans. But then it’ll be too late.

He doesn’t know why he should think of a thing like that now, but he says: You mustn’t think I didn’t notice!

Notice what?

It flusters him, but it also makes him angry: The way you looked at that slave boy in the
voorhuis
.

What are you talking about, Frans?

You’re not the only one who can look where your eyes don’t belong, he says.

Unflinching, she looks him straight in the face: That’s the only way I can find out about things. And that’s why I’m telling you to watch out. Because I shall know exactly what you’re doing or what you’re trying to do.

I tell you I won’t try anything.

That is something only you can decide. I already told you what will happen to you if you lie.

If you marry me –

If I marry you, your eyes and your thing will stay at home. I don’t want any Philidas in my home. And I don’t want to bring up another woman’s children like my mother did.

You can trust me, Maria.

Then it will be all right. You can go back to your Zandvliet now. Use the chance and think about it. And when you come back you can tell me.

I can come back tomorrow, Maria.

She gives a laugh. No, not tomorrow. That is too soon. I’ll give you a chance. I’ll give you a year. Then you can come and tell me. And then you will do as you said.

But a year?! Do you know how long a year is?

I know exactly. And I’m not a child any more. I am twenty-seven. I’ve been waiting long enough. But I refuse to be hurried.

After a long silence he pulls his breath in deeply and slowly. Then he says: All right, if that is how you want it.

I do. Because I have to make dead sure.

I give you my word.

I’m not all that eager to take a man’s word. But if you can wait for a year and I can see that you mean what you said, then I shall give you my answer.

But Maria!

I don’t want any But Maria, Frans. If you prefer, you can turn round right now and go home. I won’t blame you, because you’re a man. But if you come back in a year and give me your word once again, then I may believe you. She calmly looks him in the eyes. And Maria Berrangé says: Then you can do with me what you want, Francois Gerhard Jacob Brink. And then I may want to do it with you.

She turns away quickly, back to the house. But halfway up the garden path she looks back over her shoulder, drops both hands and picks up her dress by the seam of her skirt and briefly lifts it up to her knees. Just a moment, then she drops it back. Over her right shoulder her teasing eyes look back at him. Without knowing why, something in her gesture makes him feel unbearably sad.

When he gets onto his horse soon afterwards, what amazes him is that it is not Maria who keeps coming back into his head, not even her ankles. What does return to his mind, over and over, is a name. Philida. Just that: Philida.

But it is different from other times. The name carries a feeling, a sound, a weight. It is a name that belongs to the past. But not a past that is irrevocably behind him. It is a past which will never again, even if he tries to make it happen, let go of him.

Philida.

XXV

In which there is Talk of three Messages: one from the Past, one from the Dead and one from the Moon

THE NEWS OF
Frans’s visit to the Berrangés in the Caab travelled, like many other items of scandal, beyond the mountains to Worcester where it also reached Philida. This did not always happen quickly, because the route to the interior wasn’t easy, no matter which road one took. Some horsemen followed new and different short cuts, but that was mostly asking for trouble, if not death. And yet, when all was said and done, there was nothing that could stop news from travelling. Not that it upset Philida much to hear about Francois and Maria. Especially after Kleinkat had returned to her, life began to continue on its way at a tolerable pace. But there were some interruptions.

One of the first of these comes early on a winter’s day, when the frost turns the grass brittle and white, when Meester de la Bat and his wife and children leave on the Cape cart to visit friends, the Jouberts, on a farm just outside the village. Setting aside his work on a few new coffins, Labyn comes to tell Philida: I want you to come with me.

She looks up from where she sits knitting on the back steps of the house: nowadays she works more and more in an array of colours, which demands a lot of concentration. This day’s woman’s cardigan is in a rusty red, dark yellow and olive green. She asks: Where do you want to take me?