Shooting Butterflies (7 page)

Apache snorted, unsure of the black stranger. His ears cocked backwards, listening and waiting for a signal from his rider.

‘
Inkosazana
, tell no one I helped you.
Baas
Potgieter mustn't know I wasn't working. I will be killed if he finds out that I was out here.'

Tara looked at him standing next to her horse. His face wasn't ancient but he already had grey hairs on his head and with black people it was hard to tell how old they were. He was big and muscled, but not fat that would jiggle when he ran. And he was afraid of Mr Potgieter.

They had that in common.

The big German terrified her.

He was the only man she'd ever heard her dad say anything terrible about. This black man worked for Mr Potgieter, and she believed he told her the truth. If she ever said anything, he'd be what they used to call a
dead kaffir
, but now white people couldn't say things like that anymore. Not in the new Zimbabwe.

‘Promise,
inkosazana
?'

‘I promise,' she said, and she made a sign over her chest. ‘Cross my heart.'

He turned to the gate and opened it, pulling the wire quickly to one side to avoid the horses becoming tangled in the barbed fencing. As Apache walked through she heard Shilo say, ‘God speed,
Imbodla.
Be safe.'

He raised his hands in the air as if to attempt to hit Apache's rump or just hurry him along. Apache kicked out at him and then bolted, the other horses close behind. Tara turned her head to look back, but all she saw was that the gate was closed and Shilo had ghosted into the bush back from wherever he came.

The horses thundered up the road of Whispering Wind farm and didn't stop until they reached the stables, which were close to the house but outside the eight-foot security fence.

‘Mum! Mum!' Tara screamed even before Apache stopped, the dirt skipping up from his front hooves. ‘Dad's been shot!'

4

Carnations

Zimbabwe

1981

He was dead.

He lay in a fancy coffin with silver handles and so many flowers it looked like a florist's shop.

‘Yuck, that smell.' Dela put her finger under her nose.

‘There is no smell,' Tara said, ‘it's all in your stupid head.'

‘Girls, not now,' Maggie said, as she moved to stand between her children.

Tara stared at her dad. She reached into the coffin and laid her hand against his cheek. Someone who had always been so vibrant and alive was now cold to touch. He looked like he was sleeping, as though if she shook him hard enough he'd wake up and tell her he was only pretending.

But it was real. He wasn't coming back. Even she knew that there was no return from death.

‘Don't touch him,' Dela hissed at her.

‘Dela!' Maggie said. ‘Your sister can say goodbye however she wants.'

‘But Mum, she's touching a dead person.'

‘That person is your father. And it's perfectly fine to touch him and say goodbye.'

‘I'm not touching him.'

‘Suit yourself, Dela, but Tara and I are saying our farewell in our own way, and you will not spoil that for us. If you have finished your goodbyes, go outside and sit with your aunty Marie-Ann, she is waiting for you.'

‘Fine,' Dela said and stormed out of the viewing room, her new skirt swishing as she moved.

‘Come on, Tara. You know you can say goodbye to your dad, you're allowed to cry, honey.'

‘But there are no tears, Mum,' Tara said.

‘You're so much your father's daughter. He didn't cry easily either. They'll come one day, when you're ready. And when they do, you won't be able to stop them.'

‘Sure, Mum,' Tara said as she picked a red carnation off the floral spray that sat against the side of the coffin. She kissed it and placed it in the coffin next to her father's head.

‘I love you, Dad,' she said. She looked again at his face. Beneath the make-up, she could see the fine stitching where the big man had cut his throat, ear to ear, to finish him off. Ensuring he was dead. According to the policeman who had spoken to the family, the killer had also taken his pinkie finger. She shuddered to think that he was being buried with part of him missing.

The thought replayed in her mind of what might have happened if she'd stayed, of how she might have been able to run the killer down with Apache. He was trained for that. She might have saved her dad.

If her dad hadn't sent her away.

So many regrets swirled around her head, the fact that while he died, she'd been running away, and that she could tell no one a black man had helped her because he had sworn her to secrecy.

She wanted the big man in camo clothes caught.

She wanted him to pay with his life for her father's and uncle's deaths.

She wanted justice.

But deep inside, she was being torn apart by a promise she was finding it harder and harder to keep. She'd told the police about everything else that day – the ride, the shootings, the running away – but she'd said that she had been the one to open the gate. Not that she'd had help from Shilo.

She'd lied.

She knew that if the police had a good tracker, he might have seen Shilo's footprints in the sand.

If she told the police about Shilo, he might be able to help identify the killer. But then he would be dead, and his blood would be on her hands. She knew she'd be responsible for taking his life, and he'd saved hers. Having blood on one's hands was a reminder about the balance of life.

Tara remembered the moment the year before when she had shot a duiker, and it hadn't been a clean kill. The animal had cried like a human baby, a sound forever etched in her head. And as she'd slit its throat and it gurgled its last breath, the duiker's large amber eyes had looked into hers, pleading with her to stop the pain. Not knowing that she was the cause of that pain in the first place. Some people would say she was putting an animal out of its misery, but she couldn't come to terms with the fact that she'd been the cause of that misery in the first place.

She didn't want the blood of a human being on her conscience too.

Because even if she never pulled the knife across Shilo's throat herself, someone else would. He'd told her that, and she believed him. He'd made her promise. She wondered if, when he saved her life and extracted the promise, he knew she would then own his life? If she talked, he'd die, and as long as she was silent, he'd live. Being responsible for a human life was exceptionally harder than hunting and killing an animal.

She accepted that if she said nothing about Shilo helping her there was a chance her father's killer might not be caught.

He would go unpunished.

Until she was old enough to find Shilo alone, without the police tagging along, and speak to him. To follow up on what he'd said. One day soon, she'd go to Buffel's farm and find Shilo. It wasn't that justice would not be done, it just had to wait. She was sure her dad would understand.

Tormented, she put her hand on her dad's throat and traced the uneven skin. ‘I'm so, so sorry, Daddy.'

She turned away and walked out of the room, tugging at the skirt she'd worn after losing the argument with her mother that morning. Her father didn't care what she wore when he was alive, why would he care now when he was dead? She was told that the skirt and new shoes with a small heel on them were not for him, but for her mother. Tara had worn them for Maggie, because in the end arguing with her mother wasn't something she wanted to do, the day was for her father, and Uncle Jacob, for goodbyes.

Tara walked through the connecting door from the viewing room and into the main hall, and stopped. There was no solitude in the packed space of the crematorium's hall where the service was to be held. Hundreds of people were gathered and more still were arriving. The murder of the twins had been headline news. Everyone was there. A soft murmur of conversation could be heard but a voice broke through it.

‘Tara, come over here,' Aunty Marie-Ann said, beckoning Tara to sit in the front seat next to her.

She ignored her aunt and instead looked for a familiar face. A friendlier face. She searched for Gabe but he wasn't sitting in the front row, nor the second.

Her aunty got up and came and took her forcefully by the arm. ‘Your mother wants you to sit in the front row with us,' she said.

When they arrived at the bench, she pushed Tara down to sit next to Dela. ‘Talking of your mum, where is she?'

‘Still saying goodbye to Dad. We saw Uncle Jacob first,' Tara said. She shifted towards the aisle on the hard wooden bench, further away from her aunt.

She tried to shut out the fact that the police had said that the third shot she'd heard had been fired when her uncle had been crawling along the road. He'd been executed, shot in the back of the head. His closed coffin was proof of the execution. The mortician couldn't repair his face for the funeral. If he'd been dragged along further by Ziona, he might have come through the gate with her and survived.

She took a deep breath. She couldn't tell who helped her through the gate. Nothing could bring her uncle or her dad back, but another person didn't need to die because she couldn't keep a secret.

Aunty Marie-Ann tapped her on the arm. ‘We still have a few minutes before they start. Do you want anything? A tissue? A drink of water?'

‘Not unless you can bring Dad and Uncle Jacob back to life,' Tara said.

Aunty Marie-Ann reached for Tara and pulled her closer, sliding her back up the bench. ‘I can't do that, but I can give you a hug.'

Tara grimaced. As soon as she could, she moved away from her aunt.

She didn't want anyone to hold her and make her weak.

She had to be strong. For her dad, her uncle and for Shilo, who had saved her from the same fate.

‘You know for some people, learning to cry is harder than conquering Mount Everest,' Aunt Marie-Ann said.

Tara just stared ahead and ground her teeth. The minister entering the chapel saved her the daily lecture from her mother's sister about the body being a pressure cooker and the fluid needing to come out to release pressure. That crying was good for your soul. But Tara couldn't ask her aunt what was good for the body when one was withholding the truth.

The minister came out of the viewing room with her mum walking in front of him. The murmur grew louder, then settled into a strange quietness that wrapped Tara in a blanket of silence for the whole service. At the end, the minister gave each of the family members a single white carnation and a red ribbon from the flowers on her father's and uncle's coffins, then the coffins slid, one after
another, into the room behind the curtain, on their last journey together.

Tara could not comprehend or control the rage that ran through her body. They were going to burn her dad and her uncle, and the killer was still out there.

She shook with blind anger. She was born in Africa and she knew the traditional codes and those of the land far surpassed her understanding. There were factors at work she did not understand – yet. But one day she would know, and when that day came, she'd put this whole wrong right.

She followed her mother to stand outside the hall, in the courtyard area. Here white roses bloomed on tall bushes, and neat borders of fragrant flowers shared their space with low green shrubs. Tara stood next to her sister as people came up and hugged her mum and then them. Their lament of ‘they were
so
sorry' was like listening to a stuck record.

Tara began to get hot. There was no air and too many people. She swayed, staggered and then stood tall again.

‘How much longer?' she asked her mother.

‘A while, just keep moving your feet.'

But no matter how much she moved her feet, the darkness at the sides of her vision closed in on her.

‘Tara!' Gabe jumped to catch his young cousin before she fell on the hard cement. He picked her up in his arms as if she weighed nothing.

‘Please put her inside on one of the benches,' Maggie said.

‘You stay here, Maggie. I'll look after her,' Aunty Marie-Ann instructed.

‘
Imbodla
,' Gabe said as he put Tara on the bench at the back of the crematorium hall and smoothed her skirt down, covering her legs.

‘Hey Gabe,' Tara said, seeing his large familiar smile.

‘
Imbodla
, you okay?'

‘Why didn't you sit down before you fainted?' Aunty Marie-Ann interrupted. ‘What am I to do with you, Tara? You have caused your mother even more stress on a day she really didn't need it.'

‘I'm sorry,' Tara said automatically. Already she'd learnt that her mother's sister wasn't someone who suffered fools. She was strict, and she expected to be listened to, no arguments. Tara had only met her once before in her life, and she hadn't liked her then, and she sure as hell hated her aunt now for her unkind words.

Tara looked at Gabe. Gabriel, with his kind, gentle soul, had always been in her life. He was as close to a brother as she was ever going to get. He understood her. Always.

‘Marie-Ann, why don't you go grab Tara something cool to drink? I'll make sure she doesn't fall of this bench, it's quite narrow,' Gabe said.

‘Oh very well,' Aunty Marie-Ann said as she went off to get the beverage.

‘Stuck up old biddy. How her and your mum could be related amazes me,' Gabe said. ‘Come on, let's see if you can sit up.'

‘Gabriel,' Tara said, ‘what's going to happen now?'

‘We're going to munch our way through that spread of cakes and drink lots of cups of tea in the room over there, and then home.'

‘No, not now. I mean what's going to happen now that my dad and Uncle Jacob aren't there to run their businesses? Who's going to run Whispering Winds?'