which is only four miles from our Ranch homestead. Abandoned long ago, the mine is apart from the post office and adjacent house. The only evidence that there was a mine is the twenty-odd crumbling foundations interspersed with ant-heaps. Lonely indeed; wistful with Mopani trees and grass growing out of what was once a thriving community in the surrounding bushveld. Dad has bought the breed-herd with the Ranch and soon starts upgrading the largely Afrikaner cows by crossing with Brahmans to create his hybrids. There is a luscious field of lucerne, which is game-fenced to keep the kudu out - they prefer it to even the Mopani leaves in the dry season from August to November. October is known as suicide month in drought years because of the heat and dust storms before the guti - heavy mist and rain arrive to save us all.
We discover that there is an Adventist Church and Conference Office in Bulawayo, which means instant connections and friends, but it is too far to go to church very often. So, we still study the Sabbath School lesson every Sabbath. Now I enjoy bringing my insights and arguments to the table, and we have lively and heated debates. By mid-year, I start feeling lonely and a bit bored, so I apply to the School of Radiography in Bulawayo. The two-year course begins in July, and I attend an interview. After a pleasant exchange, the Head of the School informs me that commencing with the new intake, lectures will be conducted on Saturdays. The implications for me are study and work on Sabbaths. Why is this happening to me? In disappointment and sadness, I turn the offer down. Mum suggests that it is providential and there will be something better that is meant just for me.
A fire breaks out on our northern border. Dad is the first to detect the smoke. He calls the farmworkers to load the bakkie with a water tank, while he drags hessian sacks towards us,
“Drive as fast as you can!” he shouts to me as he jumps on the back,
“I’ll direct which roads to take”. Soon the flames are visible, and I feel the panic in myself and the others. We reach the fire which has penetrated Inunwa’s far camp, the mombies are restless and running. Dust combined with the smoke; the intensity of heat and poor visibility brings a madness of its own. The men unload the water tank and start beating at the flames with the wet sacks. It seems hopeless with the wind ripping. Dad and Paulus grab pliers from the tool kit and start to run. Dad yells that I must move the bakkie away from the fire and they disappear in the direction of the next fence to cut the barbed wire, so that the cattle are not trapped. I drive away and am now uncertain of how to proceed. I have no experience with fires and pray desperately,
“God, please, please help us. Change the direction of the wind - you did it on the sea of Galilee, I think it was, you stilled the wind and the waves. This time it’s the wind and the flames. It would be a good idea to change the direction of the wind, so it burns itself out; for your honour and glory”. I add the addendum,
“Please save Dad, the cattle and the people.” Time is up because I am suffocating, and I can’t see where the flames are. I call and walk for what seems like hours, then when it looks safe I climb back into the bakkie and retrace my treads, the burnt grass and trees are sickeningly black and eerie in the murky foglike smoke,
“Daddy! Paulus! Where are you?” I’m getting hoarse from shouting, and there is no reply. The sun is setting. I feel so panicky and exhausted that I am about to return home, when a bent and blackened figure comes staggering out of the bush. It’s Dad and then Paulus and the others. I run and embrace Dad and congratulate the weary warriors,
“The cattle got through OK!” says Dad. “But the veld is burned badly, and we are finished! Please drive home after we have had a drink.”
We pass the nearest cattle trough en route home, and everyone gulps down handfuls of water from the inlet pipe. We are all relieved but too dirty and weary to celebrate or even feel grateful until dinner time with Mum.
Towards the end of the year, I’m delighted that the only University to which I have applied for Physiotherapy accepts me, the University of Cape Town. By the way Mum and Dad congratulate me, I know that they are thrilled too. I work hard at preparing for the adventure; making new clothes and reading up about Cape Town University.
During the Christmas holiday, Rob travels up by train from East London to Bulawayo. I am so excited to see him again. We meet at the station and dally a while before joining Mum and Dad in the car. Rob has already met my parents on a previous occasion, but he has not stayed in our home. Mum, knowing that Rob has excellent carpentry skills, puts him to work making doors for the built-in cupboards for our huge kitchen. She says it is not suitable for us to have too much free time! She seems to be nervous that my career will be interrupted before it begins, but she doesn’t say so.
One evening Dad invites my brothers and their friends to a hunt; near a dip tank in one of the distant camps, a leopard was sighted by one of the workers. Dad puts the shotgun and a rifle onto the back of the bakkie and gets into the driver’s seat. The others clamber onto the back with shouts of,
“Goodbye. See you at suppertime!”
I am glad to be excluded; I have no stomach for shooting any animal, let alone a beautiful shiny leopard. When they return at sunset, Rob is shaking as he tells me about his very narrow escape,
“Shit. I nearly shot your father! We saw the leopard a couple of times. Each time someone would grab the rifle and aim, but by then it was out of sight. As the sun was setting your Dad was standing by the driver’s side, and he said, ‘We’ll have to pack it in for tonight guys!’ So I reached for the rifle to put it in its holder… Pow! There was a loud report. As I felt the kick I nearly dropped it. Your Dad was looking ashen, pale; the bullet had whistled right past his ear.”
Oh, shit, indeed! As he speaks I feel my tummy lurch, I think of what might have happened that night and how different our lives would be if Dad had died. At the same time I am relieved that the leopard lives. The event is never spoken of again, but I notice that when Dad prays, at worship that night, there is real meaning in his gratitude for life and health and strength. He seems to treat Rob more like a son after that experience and one to follow soon after.
“Quickly get the trochar, and canular,” Dad shouts as he runs down the hill to the Lucerne land. I detect his desperation and run to collect them in his office. The mombies have been in the lucerne land too long and are bloating. There are fifteen of them - prize steers ready for sale. We chase them into the crush, they are bellowing and soon start frothing at the mouth and gasping for breath. I feel so helpless as Dad punctures their bloating abdomens – gas hissing. One trochar is too slow, and with panic, fear and sadness, we witness four sink to their knees and slump rasping in death. Rob is very disturbed by this, and we cry together over the colossal loss.
Before Rob leaves, we stand in the kitchen after everyone else had gone to bed, our arms around each other. He asks about a private engagement. He is doing a Bachelor of Commerce by correspondence and at the same time is helping his father in the family business; a stone quarry near East London. I have three years ahead of me at Cape Town University. A private engagement he reasons will give us time and commitment to think about our future together. I am happy to know that he wants a permanent relationship. And although we are tempted to have a sexual relationship, he says that he values our friendship too much to spoil it before marriage - the picking of the rose! He leaves by train at the end of the holiday, amid tears and promises to write often, to which we stick like glue.
The train ride to Cape Town is a long three days, which will be repeated twice a year for the next three and a half years. The University is dauntingly new. It is the height of summer and every day I walk up the long hill past the Old Dutch Mill, over DeWaal Drive and a further slog up to the Physics or Chemistry Building on Upper Campus. I have lodgings at the Adventist Nurses Home, on the mountainside of the Mowbray Train Station. Twelve of us live in the double-storey house. Mrs Agnes Marais is a meticulous
