‘You want a bosjesman? Is that it? Go sleep outside and take your food with them, then, and don’t come back into this house! And you,’ Willem turned to Zokho, ‘you will not work in this kitchen again, you’ll work with the others outside!’ And he took them both by the neck and pushed them out through the door.
Roeloff stood in the rain, watching the door close in his face. Zokho’s dress was still on the kitchen floor, and she ran naked into the darkness. He looked about him. What was he to do now? Barefooted, cold, the rain drumming down on his head? Oupa Harman wouldn’t have allowed his father to do this but he hadn’t even woken up with the commotion. And how would Roeloff face him? The others? What would he say? Tomorrow everyone would know his sin. A chuckle behind him made him turn.
‘Ttt, ttt, ttt,’ Twa sniggered from his doorway where he squatted, warming his hands over the fire. ‘What did you do now?’
Roeloff looked at the Bushman laughing at him. He walked over.
‘Nothing.’
‘Nothing? Come, sit with me at my fire.’
‘My father just threw me out in the rain. Your fire won’t make me forget.’
‘You don’t know that. I have tabak, that makes you forget anything. And many stories. I haven’t told you yet about the day the men came on their horses to our camp. I saved that for when you’re big.’
‘I don’t feel very big.’
Twa looked at him slyly over his foul-smelling pipe. ‘What you did in there with Zokho, that is big.’
‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘I can see that,’ Twa laughed, his eyes moving down to Roeloff’s groin. ‘But you were going to.’
‘What’s the matter with my father?’
‘You’re reminding him he’s getting old.’
Roeloff squatted at the small fire, rubbing his hands in front of him.
‘I don’t know what happened in there. It just happened.’
‘It’s like that the first time. I was younger than you when the fever came over me. I remember the girl. She was from the Ein-qua, the people of the river. Your feelings run off with you, you think with your stick. But it’s good, hai?’ he cackled.
‘Tell me the story.’
‘Not tonight. Go in there, Kudu, and sleep. You are tired. I’ll stay here by the fire.’
Zokho’s fate was much worse. Embarrassed by the girl’s behaviour although she knew sexual play was not uncommon among the Koi-na children, Sanna took a stick to Zokho when Willem Kloot told her what had happened, and forbade her to speak to Roeloff. Not only had she left behind her dress and caused trouble with the grootbaas, she had fancied herself the kleinbaas’ equal, and shamed all of them.
‘You’re so bad, Zokho,’ Sanna’s breasts heaved with her guilt at beating the girl, ‘I don’t know what to do with you. You want to be kicked off the farm? Don’t you have food in your belly, you stupid girl? Is the grootbaas not looking after you that you have to go sniffing after his son?’
Sanna didn’t have to worry about Roeloff. Torn between feelings he didn’t understand and what he’d done, Roeloff felt he’d committed a terrible sin. He’d set himself upon a girl, and one not like himself. He vowed to God that he would never do it again. The next day he went out at dawn with the sheep to avoid running into the family in the yard, and stayed out with Twa until dark. When he returned, he saw Zokho with the Koi-na near the stream. They had made a fire and were dancing around it. Was it full moon already? His father allowed them the big fire for that. He walked the other way to reach Twa’s hut, thankful that no one was there.
The following morning he came out of Twa’s hut, surprised to see his grandfather waiting outside.
‘Oupa …’
‘Here,’ Harman Kloot handed him a chunk of warm bread just out of the oven. ‘You staying with Twa?’
‘Yes.’
His grandfather looked around the yard, still empty of people at this early hour, and reached for his pipe in his jacket pocket.
Lighting the pipe was almost a ritual. His grandfather wouldn’t talk until he had tamped down the tobacco, lit the pipe, and inhaled. Roeloff felt the need to say something.
‘I didn’t mean to do anything bad with Zokho.’
Harman Kloot brushed aside the explanation.
‘It’s done. You can’t undo it.’
‘I just … touched her.’
Harman Kloot sucked on his pipe, letting out small bursts of smoke. There was a look of amusement in his eyes.
‘You just touched her?’
‘Yes. I … she … I didn’t do anything wrong.’
‘Not yet.’
Roeloff felt the heat rise to his face.
‘I wouldn’t do such a thing, Oupa.’
Harman Kloot smiled.
‘You can make a river run backwards? Don’t make too much of it. These things happen when you’re young. Even when you’re older. Don’t put yourself in the way of it.’
