Philida (22 page)

In the end Labyn survived, but he was no longer what he’d been before, and in the end his Baas sold him upcountry, and that was how he came to Bernabé de la Bat, far from the Caab, far from Lavinia, and all he had left was his
carpentry,
and his coffins remained much sought after. What also drew people to him was his storytelling. Which, more than anything else, was what caught Philida’s interest. And of course the fact that the two children, even the baby, so soon became infatuated with him while he became an oupa for them. Stories she’d known since childhood were retold by him, the one about the Water Women, the one about the snake with the shiny stone on his forehead, the one about the woman who had an eye on her big toe, the one about the Ouman with fire in his arsehole; and also a whole bagful of others. Some he’d brought from Batavia, others he’d picked up on the ship during the sea voyage. Still others the wind had blown to him in this Colony. A number of them he’d probably made up. His stories were put together the way he made furniture from wood, furniture to which he became so attached that he found it almost unbearable to sell it, and even then it would be only when there was really no other way out.

One night just a short while after Philida arrived in the village, Meester Bernabé de la Bat comes to the room of the women slaves to tell them they have to get up very early the next morning, he is taking Philida to the Bokkeveld. For what? He has to visit one of the farms and wants to use the opportunity to show her something important.

For a moment she feels annoyed. Meester de la Bat may not be a Brink, but they are both white and neither of them ever says anything he doesn’t want to say. She can feel her lips twitching, but says nothing.

And what about the children? she asks after a while.

They can come along, he says.

But when she discusses it with Delphina later, the woman says, Don’t worry, it’s easier for the children to stay behind. She has an idea of what is coming. It’s something he does
with
all his slaves. She, Delphina, will look after the little ones. It will be better for them to be here, rather than go all the way to the Bokkeveld. So early the next morning Philida goes off with Labyn and Meester de la Bat.

It is a terribly long way, and on the Cape cart it is a rough ride, but Labyn is a capable driver. They have to go past many places. The Sand River and the Wabooms River and Romans River. Then Vaalvlei and De Liefde and Waveren and Vredeoes and Skoonvlei and Welgemeend, then past Welkom and Visgat and Bokveldskloof and Vaalbult and Kolen River, afterwards Groenfontein and De Hoek and Wadrif, to Op-die-Berg and Remhoogte and Wyekloof; apart from all the fountains: Merriesfontein and Koperfontein and Gansfontein and Kleinfontein and Doornfontein.

By the time the day starts to draw its ears up into its neck as the sun grows red with weariness and shame, Meester de la Bat at long last orders Labyn to rein in the horses at a farm where he has to deliver some court papers, and there they are invited to stay for the night – the Meester in the house with the farmer and his family, Labyn and Philida in an empty stable outside in the yard. Without Willempie, Philida’s breasts are painful but there happens to be a slave woman who has twin babies and can do with some milk, so Philida can provide some relief.

Very early the next morning they set out again, and on the way back, just where the road narrows to leave the Bokkeveld, they stop at a strange thing which they’d passed the previous afternoon when everybody was too tired to pay attention. But this time they stop to have a proper inspection. At first Philida thinks it must be a scarecrow, like the thing they used to put up in the vineyards at Zandvliet to scare off the flocks of birds that fed on the bunches of grapes in the early summer.

Except this is not a scarecrow.

The three of them get off to follow the Meester for a closer look. It is a long iron pole, painted red, with something stuck on top.

Only when they come right up to it Philida can make out what it is: a human skull, dirty and dilapidated, with very little of it left. A tuft of hair here and there on the bare white bone. Two hollows of eye sockets staring into nothingness.

And this? asks Philida, when it looks as if no one else is going to speak.

This, says Meester de la Bat, this is the Galant some people in the Bokkeveld still have nightmares about.

I think I hear about him from Ouma Nella, says Philida.

That is possible, says the Meester. Galant was a slave here. He did terrible things.

Is this the Galant that make a rebellion against the farmers of the Bokkeveld?

He was a very famous man, says old Labyn quietly, almost reverentially. Everybody in this Colony knows about him.

Meester de la Bat clears his throat. Today most people have forgotten about him, he says sternly. And well they should. But about seven years ago he conducted a reign of terror in these parts.

What’s he doing here? asks Philida. And what are
we
doing here?

I wanted you to come and see. As I just said, this Galant led a slave rebellion against the white people some years back. He and his followers killed three of them. Then they were caught and taken to the Caab to appear in court, and brought back here to be executed. Two were hanged, and their heads were stuck on poles here in the Bokkeveld, for all to see what happens when slaves try to rise up against
their
lawful masters. They were left here – one in this place, the other one at the far end of the Bokkeveld, to be consumed by time and the birds of heaven.

Is this really necessary? asks Philida.

Is what necessary?

Everything. The hanging. Putting the heads on the poles. And travelling all day yesterday and today just so that we can come and look at this thing.

This one, says Meester de la Bat, this one was the gang leader, Galant. And as you can see, he is still here.

Again Labyn speaks: Is this so that the people can see or to make them angry?

Labyn, says Meester de la Bat.

I’m just asking, Baas, says Labyn.

Meester de la Bat gathers up the long flaps of his black coat and struts off with his stiff secretary-bird steps, back to the cart.

What about the others? asks Philida behind him.

The white man stops to look back. Which others?

The ones that wasn’t hanged. You say there was others.

Yes, there were others that were also punished. I told you there was another one that was put up at the top corner of the Bokkeveld. And a third one who was hanged but his head wasn’t put up on a pole. And then five more. They were tied to the gallows when the three leaders were hanged. Afterwards they were taken to a stake where they were flogged and branded. And then they were locked up in the jail behind the Drostdy in Worcester for hard labour, three for life, and two others – their names were Achilles and Ontong – for fifteen years.

So they must still be there, says Philida.

They must be there, says the Meester. And I’m sure they’ll be there for a long time still.

He suddenly seems to be in a hurry. Come, he says. It is time to go back.

Wrapped in her own thoughts, Philida wonders: Those five. Perhaps they were the ones who cleaned up the Drostdy square on the day of the auction, and swept up the cowpats and the turds. But if you really think about it, nothing has been cleared up at all.

The sun is sinking. Against the blood red of the scarecrow pole one can see the dirty white skull, looking out across the empty world with its empty eyes. As if he is anxious to take everything in. From here, for all one can tell, all the way to the Caab. To the sea, to the other side of the sea. To all the places in the world where there are still slaves and people who know about slaves. Those eye hollows, Philida thinks, they miss nothing, they won’t ever miss anything, they’re too big, too empty. Eye hollows that stare through day and night. Eye holes that
know
and that will never stop knowing.

Thank you that Meester came to show me again, Labyn says demurely next to her. This truly was a great man, I heard a lot about him and I’m glad every time I can see him. To Philida he says: Maybe we can look up the other five in the Drostdy sometime. He turns back to the scarecrow and makes a small bow in his direction. Good day, Galant.

Philida sits unmoving in her corner of the cart. What she thinks is: How little remains of a man. A sliver of bone. Two hollows for eyes. But as long as they still can look, perhaps nothing has been in vain. This man Galant was here, and now we came all this way, a whole day, to get here to him. Perhaps, in a way, it was worthwhile after all. It’s too early to be sure. But will we ever know?

And without meaning to, she can hear her own voice
speaking
quietly into the wind, a wind which after the oven-hot day suddenly comes blowing ice cold against her face. Good day, Galant, she says. And deep inside her head, without knowing exactly what it is she is thinking, conscious only of Labyn’s comforting arm around her, she murmurs: Yes, it was good to see you.

But the day is far from over. Somewhere along the road they have to outspan and spend the night in the veld before they can drive on the next day, all the way through the long emptiness, back to Worcester, back to home.

XIX

In which Labyn reveals himself as a Storyteller of Note and introduces Philida to a holy Man who will be with her for the rest of her Life

AFTER THAT RIDE
to the Bokkeveld Philida starts spending more and more of her free time with Labyn. There are often only the two of them, usually at his workshop where the wood smells settle in one’s nose. But the children loved being there too. For Lena there is always some little wooden thing to play with, while Willempie is usually happy to lie on the floor on a
kaross
, playing with his toes, or otherwise in an
abbadoek
on Labyn’s back. Many times Kleinkat comes to play with small cut-offs or tools, with a mouse or a butterfly she has caught outside, or with the fantasy friends she finds everywhere. To Labyn’s great pleasure she is particularly partial to olive wood, and can spend hours in his workroom, playing in wood shavings, or rubbing herself luxuriously against newly sawn olive boards. Otherwise, she simply sits and cleans or preens herself, one hind leg stretched out past her head, or with her pink nose under her tail to reach her little arsehole. That is to say, until the day she disappears.

The great sadness comes soon after they went to the Bokkeveld, and nobody can find out why or how. It takes days before they realise what has happened, because at first Philida thinks she has just hidden somewhere in the house or in the yard, there are so many hiding places or spots to
play
in. But after Labyn has once asked, What’s become of that little cat? Philida starts getting worried. Everybody is questioned, but no one has seen her. Not even Meester de la Bat, and everyone knows that his writing desk is the spot where Kleinkat prefers to nest among the papers.

Apart from her children it is about the only thing Philida still has with her that came from Zandvliet. If she wasn’t so busy she might have tried to ask permission to walk back along the road to look for Kleinkat. But even though it is midsummer, Nooi Anna has decided that she has to start her knitting for the winter early, because in these parts the cold comes with a vengeance and it comes early. So Philida has to swallow her sadness. Which isn’t easy, and many times, especially at night when the children are asleep, it creeps up on her like a searing pain inside, as if the skin has been chafed away to expose the tender flesh underneath.

All that helps to ease the hurt, is to keep herself busy with her knitting. Or to spend more time with Labyn. And one hot day Philida once again sits knitting on the bench near the door of the carpentry shop where he works. Lena is playing with small cut-off blocks on the floor. To one side Willempie lies fast asleep. The workroom smells of fresh sawdust.

Labyn is talking non-stop as he usually does when she is around. All the shit we got in this Colony, he tells her, comes from the Christian people. He is planing a long yellowwood plank for a table. Every now and then he stops for a while to lift it up and aim with one eye along the side to make sure it is completely straight.

You and me sitting here, working and working all the time, while the white people are sitting on their backsides in the sun or in the shade as the case may be, he says, it
all
comes from that Jesus of theirs. It is his fault. So I think it’s time for you to come over to the Slamse like me.

But I don’t understand about the Slamse, says Philida. At Zandvliet the Ounooi always say one must stay away from them, with that lot you’ll go straight to hell.

Did that Ounooi of yours ever say anything you could believe?

No, you’re right, Labyn. But what can I do? That’s how I was brought up.

Brought up for the fire that will burn you one day. My Slamse people are not like that. With us there is no baas or slave. We’re all the same. Just people. And it goes very far back, hundreds of years, to a man called Muhammad where it all began.

I don’t know him, says Philida. What must I do so that he can help me?

This is where it begins: with the stories. Labyn tells her about the Year of the Elephant, when a man called Abdallah went into a woman, Amina. And when she fell pregnant, there came a voice, saying, You’re expecting a child that will be the Lord of all his people, and when he is born, you must call him Muhammad.