Roeloff felt his heart pick up a beat.
‘I thought you all had the same colouring and eyes.’
‘Not all white people look the same, Kudu, so how can we? We are different colours of the sun. The morning sun which is light, the afternoon sun which is deep. And our eyes, depending on whether we’re from up there or over there where the sun gets up in the morning, would determine the thickness of the skin over them.’
‘You’re saying something serious, Twa.’
Twa looked at him. ‘I asked Zokho about her mother. Her mother was not from the tribe she was living with. She had run away from the people who had captured her years ago, and met up with them. She became the wife of one of the hunters.’
‘Are you saying that she …’
‘Zokho’s mother was Shy Little Tortoise.’
Roeloff sat very still.
‘Do you know what that means? It means that you’re Zokho’s uncle. My son, Harman …’ He left the sentence unfinished. If Twa was telling the truth, then his father and Jan Joubert had killed Harman’s grandmother the day they raided the camp and captured Zokho. ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’
‘I never even told Zokho. She doesn’t know her mother and my sister were one.’ He took a deep drag on his pipe. ‘We must keep this secret, Kudu. I only told you because I thought if you knew, you would understand things about yourself and your son.’
Roeloff gave a small laugh.
‘I understand many things, Twa. The world’s not as pure as we think.’
‘You will tell him about his mother and his crippled old grandfather?’
‘Harman will know his history when he’s grown.’
They sat in silence for a long time, watching the first light come over the rant.
‘My time is nearing, Eyes of the Sky. I’ve brought you home, you are safe. When the big sleep comes, you must bring me here, to the rante. The second cave, near the eye.’
Roeloff felt a pain in his heart. Twa had told him once that a Sonqua could tell from the ache in his bones when he was coming to the end of his journey. Had Twa come to Kloot’s Nek to die? He couldn’t bear the thought.
‘You’re not going anywhere. Who’ll teach Harman to use the bow and arrow?’
Twa’s face puckered into a mischievous smile.
‘Twa’s wild blood’s in him, he’ll teach himself. He will not be like your other children, Kudu, and you’ll have many. Be careful with him.’
‘He’ll grow up like his father.’
‘His father?’ Twa chuckled. ‘Who’s his father? His father’s white, but his heart’s the heart of the little hunter.’
When Neeltje saw the house and trees in the distance, her heart picked up a beat. The road leading up to it was long, edged with kareebome and jagged rock formations, the friction as the wagon rolled slowly over the dry clay whipping up pockets of orange powder. She could imagine her children playing on the grass below the rant on their left. On their right was a large stone kraal, dusty and dry, in disrepair, and further along, stables and buitekamers leading up to the thatched- roof house on the rise. In front of the house, and at the side, there were four wagons.
‘All these wagons and horses. It doesn’t look good. Twa?’ Roeloff called to the hunter in the back of the wagon. ‘We’re here. We’re at Kloot’s Nek. Come and sit here with us in the front.’
Pietie Retief was on the stoep with Joubert and a few others when Hennie pointed to the dust.
‘The kommando?’
‘It’s a wagon. It looks like, it looks like …’
‘Who does it look like, man?’ Retief dug his elbow into his grandson.
‘I can’t see.’
‘It looks like Roeloff,’ Joubert said. ‘All that hair.’
‘Roeloff? I can’t believe it. Did you say Roeloff?’
‘Inheritance will bring back the devil.’
The old man looked at him askance.
‘Nonsense! His father sent the kommando. They found him. I’m surprised he’s come, though. After the way he was kicked out, I wouldn’t have blamed him if he stayed away. Always said there was good in that boy.’ He stretched his legs and walked to the end of the stoep. ‘And it would stand everyone in good stead to remember it’s his land we’re standing on now.’
Joubert took out his pipe and filled it.
‘What do you mean? There’s Drieka.’
‘He’s the son.’
‘A wife takes precedence.’
‘Not a second wife. Not over children. Kloot’s Nek is Roeloff’s and Vinkie’s.’
‘Well, Willem’s still with us. We shouldn’t be talking about that.’
