Excerpt
SUBSTITUTES
by Frank Swales
A novel, approx. 90,000 words
Setting: South Africa, 1970s.
End of Excerpt
© Frank Swales
(In the club.)
‘Ever had a black girl, Ed?’
Bar talk.
I laughed. ‘Sure, Rob, I’m gonna admit it, and blow my chances with our own women. Not to mention the cops — some bugger would shop me for sure.’ The words came out slurred; I was too far gone to care.
‘There are ways round it. You just gotta be careful.’
That from my mate, Acker — all mouth and beer gut. ‘Anyway, we’re not living in the fifties. Things are changing.’
‘Not so as you’d notice,’ said Rob. ‘You still get jailed for poking a black girl. Christ, what a place.’
‘Look,’ I insisted, ‘we may not agree with apartheid, but we have to live with it, or get the hell out of South Africa. I’ll stick with my own kind. It’s safer.’ And the thought stabbed through my booze-soaked brain: God, you’re a hypocrite, Ed. Be a man — tell them!
*
(Ed and Elaine hire a servant.)
Anna had waited patiently for our return. She bobbed a curtsy, holding out her pass book in open palms for my inspection. I took the slim volume and flicked through its pages, skimming over the details. Tribe: Zulu; residence: Nongoma, Natal; Date of —. The only thing I wanted to see was the little stamp, correctly dated, which told me that this girl was allowed to be here in Witbank. And there it was. So far so good.
I gave her the casual once-over: short tightly-curled hair, wide nostrils set in a handsome negroid face, and full lips. Tall, I noticed; her eyes would be almost level with mine if she ever raised them from the floor. No gleaming body oil, so thankfully the infamous kaffir smell was absent. The oil was a beauty aid for the girls, but a definite turnoff for Europeans; just another difference between cultures. Plainly dressed in lemon blouse and coarse brown skirt, Anna was barefoot and shapely, with an impression of strength...and an aura of shyness. She didn’t know where to put her hands: one moment they’d be dangling at her sides, then an arm would snake round behind her back to grab the other elbow, forcing her bosom out and up in an unconsciously erotic pose. And still her eyes found comfort among the floor tiles.
I launched into the interview without preamble. ‘How old are you?’
‘Master, I have seventeen years.’
‘Any children?’
She shook her head.
‘Boyfriend?’
‘Baas?’
‘Do you have a man?’
She mumbled, ‘Ek is ’n goed meisie, baas.’
‘I’m sure you are a good girl, Anna.’ I wasn’t qualified for this interviewing lark. It was getting too personal for my liking. But the questions had to be asked; this girl would be part of my household. I moved on.
‘Do you have references? From your last madam?’
Anna poked around inside her blouse and produced a folded envelope from her bra. She handed it to me. It was warm, and moist. The letter was handwritten in Afrikaans. I scanned the flowing script, understanding maybe one word in ten.
‘That’s fine, Anna. Very good.’
She smiled broadly, showing just the hint of overbite in a mouth full of dazzling teeth. So that was that. Time to wrap it up.
‘The madam will pay you twenty-five rand at the end of this month,’ I said.
Anna curtsied her premature thanks to Elaine.
‘If you work well, and behave yourself, no men in the khaya,’ I paused for emphasis, ‘the madam will pay you thirty rand at the end of next month, and every month after.’ The terms had to be stated clearly, to avoid tears later.
‘Baie dankie, master.’ That curtsy again. And another to the madam. ‘Baie dankie, missus.’
‘One more thing, Anna,’ I said. ‘This is an English household. Save the Afrikaans for the neighbours, and your Zulu for your chummies in the khaya. Inside the house it is English only. Can you manage that?’
Anna smiled. ‘Ja, baas. I have good English.’
*
(Ed reaches out to Anna.)
‘Goodnight, master.’
‘G’night.’
She turned to go, saying, ‘Happy New year, master.’
I stirred myself. ‘Anna, don’t go yet. You haven’t had a drink with me. For New Year.’
‘It is very late, master. I am tired.’
‘That champagne in the fridge. I saved it for tonight, but I can’t drink it all myself. You like champagne, Anna?’
Anna smiled. ‘Ja, baas.’
Half an hour later, the champagne had gone. So had our inhibitions. A pleasant glow permeated our senses as we slow-danced, barefooted in the gloom, to the muted refrain from the stereo. The curtains were drawn, all windows shut. Anna’s head rested on my shoulder as we moved, and I occasionally brushed a soft kiss along her exposed neck, flowing with the mood.
‘Hot, Anna?’
‘Ja, baas.’
‘Well, take off your blouse.’ I just had to be drunk to try that corny ploy.
She giggled. ‘Nee, baas. My bra is by the khaya.’
‘I know.’
Her unbound nipples pressed hard against my chest, and I crushed the yielding flesh of her breasts to me as we moved slowly with the music. Only the thin cotton of her white blouse separated us, proving no barrier to the sensations passing between us.
‘Anna. Mina thanda wena.’
‘Nee, baas. Nee.’
‘Ja, Anna. I do love you.’
Was that a nervous smile on her lips? I was anxious enough for both of us. But I was trapped. The alcohol, the hot clammy night, the haunting music, and mostly the overbearing nearness of this young, firm body; everything was woven into a web of entrapment. A delicious mesh which my willpower couldn’t break.
‘Sit down.’ I guided her to the sofa.
Kneeling beside her, I snuggled down into Anna’s neck, nibbled her collar bone, and started down towards her cleavage.
‘Baas,’ she murmured, breaking away and struggling to her feet.
Damn, I’d blown it.
Anna stood at arm’s length, swaying to the music; a little unsteady on her feet, obviously not used to drink.
‘Too hot,’ she said, dragging her blouse over her head without a thought for the buttons….
Anna was no longer the servant who kept house for me, who cooked my meals and washed my clothes. Nor was she the girl who looked after my son, who played games with him and fed him bowls of mielie pap in her khaya. Who, by simply being here, made it possible for me to leave Eddie and go to work. This wasn’t the maid who smiled shyly and bobbed a curtsy with a ‘Baie dankie, master’ as I handed over her wages at the month’s end; who was a silent witness to the break-up of my marriage. This was the woman who inhabited the fringes of my more outlandish dreams, the ethereal form which tripped through my unconscious just out of reach of reasoning; a mist which evaporated whenever I faced it head on.
And she was the lay that could get me a prison sentence, deportation and disgrace….
I’m here, take me.
If you must.
If you dare!
I awoke alone. Anna in the kitchen, Eddie playing in the yard. She brought me coffee in bed. She had left me before dawn, to creep back to her khaya for a shower and change of clothes. I tried to talk about the previous night, but Anna wasn’t having any of it.
‘You were drunk, master.’ Then she left the bedroom.
So, that was it? No mention of us sharing the most intimate, most intense act possible between a man and woman. Had I imagined the hot, panting couple entwined on the carpet, straining and groaning, and gasping out words of love in three languages? White flesh weighing down black, black riding white? And the husky whisper, ‘Kom by die slaapkamer, master’, which got us off the lounge floor and into my double bed for a second, and much longer, bout of love?
I called Anna back into the bedroom.
‘Sit down, Anna. On the bed. We must talk.’
She stayed by the door. ‘It is day, master.’
‘Of course...you’re right. I’m sorry.’
I searched desperately for the right words. Anna’s eyes wandered the room, letting her gaze rest here and there, anywhere but on the figure of her baas propped up naked in bed under a single sheet. The same sheet that she had helped crumple and stain only hours before.
‘It happened, Anna.’
Her eyes found the floor. ‘Ja, master,’ she mumbled.
‘I’m glad it happened,’ I said.
No response.
‘Are you glad, Anna?’
‘It is not allowed.’
‘Fuck apartheid,’ I spat out, ‘I’m English!’
She looked up, startled.
Softly, I asked, ‘Did you like it? As I did?’
‘Ja, master.’
*
(Childhood memories.)
‘Oh, come on, Chrissie...you said you would.’
‘No, Ed — I said I might. I don’t feel like it now.’ She took her hand away. ‘Yuck! You’re leaking.’
Chrissie rubbed her hand against my school blazer and stood up, leaving me dishevelled and exposed on the old mattress laid among the jumble in our garden shed. ‘I’d better go. We’ve got netball first period after lunch.’
She buttoned up her white cotton blouse, drawing a veil over her budding breasts; my palms still tingled with the memory.
‘Chrissie,’ I whined, ‘I bought you a cod-and-six-penn’orth. You promised...tits-and-tug.’
‘I did tug! It’s big, isn’t it?’
‘You didn’t finish.’
‘I’m not having it spit at me. Finish it yourself.’
I jumped to my feet. ‘You done it for Mossie. He told me.’
‘I never did!’
‘For nowt, he said.’ I grabbed her hand and pulled it down to my groin. ‘Just hold it, please. You don’t have to do anything — I’ll move.’
She struggled as I slid my arm round her waist and drew her close.
‘Bugger off! You’ll mess on my skirt.’ Her nails found my face and left bloody scratches down my cheek.
I yelped in pain, backing off, striking out as I retreated; my fist connected with her eye.
‘Shit!’ she screamed. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’ And she flung open the shed door. ‘Just you wait, Ed Stranton.’
I waited in mortal dread. For the exposure, for the retribution. I didn’t dare go back to school; I took a long walk among the sand dunes by the golf links, gazing out to sea but failing to find my salvation there.
After tea Mossie called at my house. ‘Hey, what you done to Chrissie-no-knicks?’
‘Nowt. What’d she say?’
‘She’s got a shiner! She told old Miss Bouncy-bouncy she got it fighting with you, over some sweets.’
‘Sweets?’
‘Yeah. You were in big trouble, but Chrissie said it was okay because she already gave you a good hiding.’
So I was off the hook, my tough-guy image sacrificed to protect our secret. The next time Chrissie got me alone her hand failed to perform its magic; I just could not respond. She laughed and never tried again.
*
(Acker Versus Jan.)
But we had serious discussions too. Today’s subject was illicit sex, and had been brought up by Acker because...well, because he was a stirrer; Knight of the Order of the Wooden Spoon. And his chosen target — Jan. Acker was probing the underbelly of the Afrikaner culture, searching for a soft spot. He found it.
‘So you people maintain’, Acker was saying, ‘that a black woman is different from a white...inferior?’
‘Ja, man,’ said Jan.
‘In what way?’
‘In every way. Their whole body is different. Jesus, just check the size of their backsides.’
‘I do, and right sexy they are, some of ’em.’
‘Ag, man.’
‘And the knockers on them! You know, Jan...sometimes I park out in the bundu, and just sit there watching the farm girls go bouncing by.’ He winked at me. ‘You know, the old-fashioned blacks, Jan — nothing on top, letting it all hang out. And I’m thinking, Come over here, girls. Let me tune you in. Man, I could really twiddle those knobs!’
‘You’re sick, man,’ said Jan.
‘Far from it, mate. Tell me this...how is it I can see a black girl’s nipples — out there on the farms, or in books sold openly in any cafe — but a white woman isn’t allowed to sunbathe topless in her own garden, and all the juicy bits in my mags are censured with stars?’
‘It’s not the same.’
‘A tit’s a tit, you tit!’
‘Will you listen, rooinek! A kaffir girl’s breasts are like a cow’s udder, just part of nature. But a white woman’s bosom must always be covered, in case it excites a black man to rape.’
‘Bloody hell, Jan. And you call me sick! Look, mate. What colour is a black woman — inside?’
‘Black meat is black meat.’
‘Inside?’
‘Black — all the way.’
‘Wrong! She’s the most delicious pink, exactly like your missus.’
‘Voetsak!’
‘True. Ask Ed. Or ask some of your boeties — the real Boers, on the farms. Plenty of them have tasted brown sugar.’
‘A real Boer wouldn’t touch a black woman,’ Jan said.
‘No? Then where do the little brown piccaninnies come from? Bugger me, you’ve got a whole race of coloureds down in the Cape.’
‘They’re the basters of English sailors.’
‘All of them? Don’t talk shit. What about that tribe down there...the black van der Merwes, isn’t it? A good old English name, eh?’
‘Okay,’ Jan conceded, ‘in the old days, maybe.’
‘And today,’ Acker insisted. ‘Check out the Sunday Times. Seems to me there’s hardly a month goes by without some old farmer getting caught in a field on top of a fifteen-year-old native girl. Next thing you know, he’s chewing on his shotgun barrel and blowing his brains out, or swinging from a tree. Why? Because his family have disowned him. Never mind how many years he’s struggled to bring them up, feed and clothe them...one dip in a black honey pot and he’s on his own — disgraced and headed for jail. Over what? Christ, it’s only sex. Bollocks to the colour. There’s only one colour where it matters. Pink, mate...pink.’
*
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SUBSTITUTES
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