spoken to him about it and told him that no good could come out of writing verses – unless they were hymns. But even then it was foolish. Because in the hymn-book there were more hymns than people could use.
Instead of starting to work for himself and finding some girl to whom he could get married, Paulus, as I have said, just loafed about. Yet he was not bad-looking and there were many girls who could have favoured him if he looked at them first. And from them he could have chosen a woman for himself. Only Paulus took no notice of girls and seemed shy in their company.
One afternoon I went over to Hendrik Oberholzer’s farm to fetch back a saw that I had bought from him. But Hendrik and Paulus had gone to Zeerust with a load of mealies, so that when I got to the house only Hendrik’s wife Lettie was there. I sat down and talked to her for a little while. By and by, after she had poured out the coffee, she started talking about Paulus. She was very grieved about him and I could see that she was not far off crying. Therefore I went and sat next to her on the riempiesbank, and did my best to comfort her.
“Poor woman. Poor woman,” I said and patted her hand. But I couldn’t comfort her much, because all the time I had to keep an eye on the door in case Hendrik came in suddenly.
Then Lettie showed me a few bits of paper that she had found under Paulus’s pillow. It was the same kind of verses that he had been writing for a long time, all about mimosa trees and clouds and veld flowers and that sort of nonsense. When I read those things I felt sorry that I didn’t hit him harder with the sjambok that day he kicked me on the shin.
“He does not work even as much as a piccanin,” Hendrik’s wife Lettie said. “All day he writes on these bits of paper. I can’t understand what is wrong with him.”
“A man who writes things like that will come to no good,” I said to her. “And I am sorry for you. It is not good the way Paulus is treating you.”
Immediately Lettie turned on me like one of those yellow-haired wild-cats, and told me I had no right to talk about her son. She said I ought to be ashamed of myself and that, no matter what Paulus was like, he was always a much better man than any impudent Dopper who dared to talk about him. She said a lot of other things besides, and I was pleased when Hendrik returned. But I saw then how much Lettie loved Paulus. Also, it just shows you that you never know where you are with a woman.
Then one day Paulus went away. He just left home without saying a word to anybody.
Hendrik Oberholzer was very much troubled. He rode about to all the farms around here and asked if anyone had seen his son. He also went to Zeerust and told the police, but the police did not do much. All they ever did was to get our people fined for bringing scraggy kaffir cattle across the line. The sergeant at the station was a raw Hollander who listened to everything Hendrik said, and then at the end told Hendrik, after he had written something in a book, that perhaps what had happened was that Paulus had gone away.
Of course, Hendrik came to me, and I did what I could to help him. I went up to the Marico River right to where it flows into the Limpopo, and from there I came back along the Bechuanaland Protectorate border. Everywhere I enquired for Paulus. I was many days away from the farm.
I had hardly got back home when Hendrik called for news. From his lands he had seen me come through the poort and he had hastened over to see me.
We sat down in the voorkamer and filled our pipes.
“Well, Lourens,” Hendrik said, and his eyes were on the floor, “have you heard anything about Paulus?”
It was early afternoon, with the sun shining in through the window, and in Hendrik’s brown beard were white hairs that I had not noticed before.
I saw how Hendrik looked at the floor when he asked about his son. So I told him the truth, for I could see then that he already knew.
“The Lord will make all things right,” I said.
“Yes, God knows what is best,” Hendrik Oberholzer answered. “I heard about ––––. They told me yesterday.”
Hendrik could not bring himself to say that which we both knew about his son.
For, on my way back along the Bechuanaland border, I had come across Paulus. It was in some Mtosa huts outside Ramoutsa. There were about a dozen huts of red clay standing in a circle amongst the bushes. In front of each hut a kaffir lay stretched out in the sun with a blanket over him. All day long these kaffirs lie there in the sun, smoking dagga and drinking beer. Their wives and children sow the kaffir-corn and the mealies and look after the cattle. And with no clothes on, but just a blanket over him, Paulus also lay amongst those kaffirs. I looked at him only once and turned away, without knowing whether he had seen me.
Next to him a kaffir woman sat stringing white beads on to a piece of copper wire.
That was what I told Hendrik Oberholzer.
“It would be much better if he was dead,” Hendrik said to me. “To think that a son of mine should turn kaffir.”
That was very terrible. Hendrik Oberholzer was right when he said it would be better if Paulus was dead.
I had known before of low-class Uitlanders going to live in a kraal and marrying kaffir women and spending the rest of their lives sleeping in the sun and drinking bujali. But that was the first time I had heard of that being done by a decent Boer son.
Shortly afterwards Hendrik left. He said no more about Paulus, except to let me know that he no longer had a son. After that I didn’t speak about Paulus either.
In a little while all the farmers in the Groot Marico knew what had happened, and they talked much of the shame that had come to Hendrik Oberholzer’s family. But Hendrik went on just the same as always, except that he looked a great deal older.
Things continued in that way for about six months. Or perhaps it was a little longer. I am not sure of the date, although I know that it was shortly after the second time that I had to pay ten pounds for cattle-smuggling.
One morning I was in the lands talking to Hendrik about putting some more wires on the fence, so that we wouldn’t need herds for our sheep, when a young kaffir on a donkey came up to us with a note. He said that Baas Paulus had given him that note the night before, and had told him to bring it over in the morning. He also told us that Baas Paulus was dead.
Hendrik read the note. Then he tore it up. I never got to learn what Paulus had written to him.
“Will you come with me, Lourens?” he asked.
I went with him. He got the kaffirs to inspan the mule-cart, and also to put in a shovel and a pick-axe. All the way to the Mtosa huts Hendrik did not speak. It was a fresh, pleasant morning in spring. The grass everywhere was long and green, and when we got to the higher ground, where the road twists round the krantz, there was still a light mist hanging over the trees. The mules trotted steadily, so that it was a good while before midday when we reached the clump of withaaks that, with their tall, white trunks, stood high above the other thorn-trees. Hendrik stopped the cart. He jumped off and threw the reins to the kaffir in the back seat.
We left the road and followed one of the cow-paths through the bush. After we had gone a few yards we could see the red of the clay huts. But we also saw, on a branch overhanging the footpath, a length of ox-riem, the end of which had been cut. The ox-riem swayed in the wind, and at once, when I saw Hendrik Oberholzer’s face, I knew what had happened. After writing the letter to his father Paulus
