LITMIR.BIZ

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gain independence in a few months’ time, and once again thousands of refugees were fleeing to the last white outpost in Africa.

      Our government, of course, had promised to protect its citizens from the Communist threat represented by the new rulers of both these countries.

      ‘But I don’t understand it.’ Simon stared at the beer bottle in his hand. ‘I thought the blacks would throw a helluva party because the white bosses had eventually gone. Isn’t that what they wanted? Now it seems as if they want to murder one another.’

      ‘That’s politics, pal,’ Pierre said. ‘You hardly expect all of them to think alike just because they’re black?’

      ‘No, of course not, but … aren’t they tired of fighting? They’re like a bunch of kids who’ve been given a cake as a present. Instead of dividing it equally, they fight over it until there’s nothing left of the cake.’

      ‘I don’t think you should see independence as a gift.’ Pierre smiled, but only one corner of his mouth lifted. ‘Or blacks as a bunch of children.’

      ‘OK, OK, you old liberal!’ my brother laughed. ‘You know what I mean.’

      ‘You must remember that the whites in Africa have always followed a policy of divide and rule. Jomo Kenyatta says the whites really pray for the blacks to keep on fighting so that the whites can remain the rulers.’

      ‘You mean …’ Simon absently swallowed another mouthful of beer. ‘The whites leave but the divide and rule remains?’

      ‘Something like that. But I think our government is going to do more than pray.’ Pierre’s slightly husky voice had developed an ominous note. ‘Our guys have always been better at fighting than praying.’

      Simon frowned at him, his mouth open as though he wanted to ask something but didn’t have the courage to do so.

      ‘I think they’re going to send in the army,’ Pierre said without looking at Simon, his black eyes on his bottle of beer.

      ‘Into Angola?’ Simon’s face was a study in disbelief, his voice soaring in astonishment. ‘Never!’

      ‘Why not? The army is already on the border. They merely have to cross it. The soldiers, the weaponry, it’s all there. Do you think they’ll be able to resist the temptation?’

      ‘But …’ Simon laughed nervously. ‘How will we know which side to choose?’

      ‘Does it matter?’ Pierre shrugged his shoulders and laughed with my brother. ‘Divide and rule?’

      Simon whistled softly through his teeth. He no longer looked so disbelieving. I was suddenly enormously irritated. When I sighed – far more loudly than I’d intended – Pierre looked up in surprise as though he had only just realised that there was another person in the room with them.

      ‘You’re bored with our army talk.’ It was a statement, not a question.

      ‘Well …’ I was suddenly grateful for the room’s darkness because I could feel that I was blushing again. ‘I’m glad I don’t have to go to the army …’

      ‘What would you like to talk about?’

      Was he making fun of me?

      ‘You can always discuss books with her,’ my brother said. ‘She reads far more than I do.’

      ‘But not nearly as much as you do,’ I hastily parried and gestured towards the crowded bookshelves.

      ‘Many of those books belong to my mother and father.’ He finished the last of his beer. ‘All those old-fashioned numbers. I prefer modern authors. And you?’

      ‘No … I don’t know … as long as the book reads well …’

      Now I sounded exactly as I’d feared I would. Like an idiot in standard three. My mind changed into a car with a flat battery. I pumped the mental accelerator up and down, as I had seen Ma doing, desperate to utter a sound. But there was nothing except a deathly silence between my ears. Pierre smiled, this time with both corners of his mouth, but the one side was still higher than the other.

      ‘Do you feel like a flick tonight?’ my brother asked, saving me from further humiliation. ‘Pierre knows the owner of the café next to the Plaza. He can let us have a special home movie.’

      ‘Special?’ I asked carefully.

      ‘Uncensored,’ Pierre said.

      ‘I don’t know …’ He couldn’t possibly mean one of the dirty movies we’d discussed in the car earlier in the afternoon. ‘What kind of flick?’

      ‘Don’t worry,’ Pierre said. ‘We won’t get anything that’ll make a schoolgirl blush.’

      And I blushed again.

      ‘Can I invite Dalena?’ I asked on the spur of the moment.

      ‘How will she get here?’ my brother asked.

      ‘She’ll manage.’ Even if she had to steal her father’s car and drive herself here, Dalena wouldn’t let an opportunity like this slip through her fingers. She wasn’t as cowardly as I was. ‘She can sleep over at the farm and we can take her back tomorrow.’

      ‘Who’s Dalena?’ Pierre wanted to know.

      ‘Mart’s roommate,’ Simon said. ‘Apparently she’s a sex bomb.’

      ‘I never said that!’

      ‘Well, you said she’s sexy.’

      ‘Tell her she’s welcome.’ This time Pierre’s smile was as twisted as Grandpa Fishpond’s after he’d survived his first stroke. ‘Tell her she’s very welcome.’

      ‘Why didn’t you tell me your brother is such a dish?’ Dalena wanted to know the moment I opened my eyes.

      She lay on her stomach on the other bed in my room, chin in hand, as though she had been waiting for hours for me to wake up.

      Immediately I closed my eyes again. The light was too bright and her voice too deep. Usually I liked Dalena’s boy’s voice but this morning I wished she were a hi-fi so I could turn down the bass. I had gone to bed too late after drinking too much beer, trying to impress Simon and Pierre. There was a constant throbbing in my head and my hair smelt of smoke.

      ‘Hey, you can’t go back to sleep,’ she whispered urgently.

      ‘Why not?’ I moaned softly with closed eyes.

      ‘I have an important subject to discuss with you.’

      I felt a pillow hitting my head. Playfully, but hard enough to make me open my eyes. I knew when I’d lost.

      ‘What is it, Dalena?’

      ‘Tell me more about your brother.’

      I threw the pillow back at her head.

      ‘He’s dangerous. He smokes and he drinks and he breaks girls’ hearts by the score. What more do you want to know?’

      ‘Sounds irresistible.’ Dalena smiled her shamelessly wide smile.

      ‘Did you like the movie?’

      ‘I can’t remember a thing about it,’ she said. ‘It was impossible to concentrate with your brother sitting so close to me.’

      ‘Good morning!’ My mother stuck her head round the bedroom door. ‘I’ve brought you coffee and rusks.’

      Ma was wearing her Japanese dressing gown, the one she called a kimono. One day she would see the East, she always said. (And Russia and Egypt.) She didn’t bring me coffee in bed as a rule but she liked to impress my friends. She didn’t wear the kimono every day, either.

      ‘Thank you, tannie, that’ll be delicious!’ Dalena said in her sweetest voice and jumped up to take the tray with its crocheted cloth,

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