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Story postcard – sifting through the shadows (3)

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Rudd speaks cautiously, aware of the tension in Jacobus, his arms still rigid against the wall, his head dropped between his shoulders. “The vehicles closest to the gomo didn’t stand a chance. Some of those rocks are huge. I’m not sure where you parked your truck.”

“It was there. That side. Up against the fence.” Jacobus drops the words like stones to the floor. “My truck! Jeessus man!”

Rudd takes half a step towards him and then stops, as Jacobus pushes himself upright.

“I never saw your truck for sure,” Rudd says.

Jacobus turns to face him. “Maybe it won’t be mine. But that truck. You’ve no idea. I need it for everything,” he says, his voice low and bitter.

 “Sorry, sorry,” says Tonderai.  

Jacobus sucks in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “Agh … it’s only a truck man. Hey Tonderai? It’s only a truck.”

“Yes, but …”

“A truck,” Jacobus repeats, his voice flat. He sits down heavily, shoulders slumped. “You know how long it took us to get that through customs? How many bribes we had to pay? I don’t even want to think about it.”

“I love your truck, Jacobus,” Marybelle calls. “I’ll say a prayer for it.”

“Ha! Go for it Marybelle. I need it for everything, hey. All our vegetable deliveries. No truck, no business. Only vehicle we’ve got man.”

“May still be okay,” Rudd says, as he goes back to his spot on the bench.

“I’m not so sure, Rudd,” Tim calls. “When I went outside, all I saw up that end of the fence were buried vehicles. Some of them may be okay, if we can clear them. Just have to wait until the rain stops.”

“Ja. Let’s hope it’s not as bad as it looks. I reckon the kopje slipped because of all the clearing they’ve been doing round there for planting, and firewood.”

“Like building in a bloody swamp,” says Jacobus, as the rain begins another assault on the roof. “And I don’t just mean this storm. We’re so used to taking risks, hey Rudd? Jen said she’d heard something about a cyclone, and I told her she’d gone mad. And now look. I’ve spent so long scratching the lion’s balls with a short stick. Now …”

But Jacobus never finishes. Rain slams down and cuts him off. It pounds over them, the downpour so heavy that it seems to hammer up from the floor itself. For long minutes it drowns the space to talk, then at last it patters away.

Father Norman is the first to shout into the quiet. “Any sign of the mission truck, Rudd?”

“Not that I saw. Tim?”

 “The only vehicle I saw for sure was Fred’s, and that won’t be going anywhere any time soon.”

“Maybe I can fix it,” says Bernard.

Fred’s hand shakes up into the torchlight, lifting his creaking voice with it.

“Bernard will fix it. He’ll get us going.”

“Huh!” Bernard dips his head towards his friend. “Maybe you are right, old man. Maybe you are right.”

 “Of course he is,” Marybelle calls brightly. “Just got to keep our hopes up.”

“That’s all we live off,” says Jacobus.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

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Story postcard – sifting through the shadows (2)

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Rudd sits still, pleased to be in the shadows. Outside the storm picks up again, rattling at the door then shrieking off around the building, shaking the windows. It pushes, and shoves. It throws over tables, and kicks them into walls. Furious. Banging. Crashing. Slapping. Then slowly, slowly, like a child bored of a game, it steadies, sulking into corners.

Jacobus’ voice reaches out through the bluster. “Tonderai, this cyclone thing is new hey. None of us are ready. But this rain – all this rain that never stops. And the wind. Something’s wrong, hey? Let’s just hope the Nyahonde doesn’t get out of hand.”

Tonderai nods his head slowly. He speaks slowly. “But I am the one. The senior one. I tried to tell them. But some … they would not listen.”

“Agh, don’t worry about that man. If anyone had told us to leave, I would have told them to voetsek.”

“Tonderai …” Fred’s voice is shaky. He tries to raise it louder, clearing his throat. “They never listen to me …”

“Ha!” laughs Bernard. “That is whites for you. They do not respect their elders.”

“Not true,” said Jacobus. “We do, but they’re not the only ones telling us what to do.”

Tonderai’s eyes stay on the fire. “I am the clever one in my family. I went to the mission school. My mother worked every day to pay for school fees. But then what? Fighting. Independence. Working here. Busy, busy. But now there are no tourists. And this … ” he swings a mackintoshed arm out towards the storm.

Bernard clicks his tongue loud and hard against the back of his teeth, repeating the sound as he shakes his head.

“We didn’t know it would be this bad,” Rudd says.

“We saw the warning,” Tonderai replies his voice insistent.

“But the Government said nothing.”

“The Government?” Jacobus almost chokes on the word. “Really? This Government? C’mon man. Who are you kidding? As if they’d do anything.”

A bash of wind swallows Rudd’s reply, then Marybelle steps in.

 “Jacobus,” she shouts, voiced determined, “this is the only government Rudd knows. We’re old hey? We remember how things used to work. He …”

Rudd leans closer to try to catch what Marybelle is saying, but he cannot hear, for the wind has started its din again, battering the door against the old stove, faster and faster. But the cast iron block does not budge, and again the wind retreats, leaving just the rain galloping over the roof.

 “Tonderai, I’ll take you to your village when this is over. I’ve got my truck,” Jacobus calls out.

“Ah Jacobus…” Rudd hesitates, his voice shrinking, “the carpark …”

“What?”

 “That landslide out the front. Remember?”

“Ja,” says Jacobus. “Speak up man, I can’t hear you.”

“Okay. Looks like the whole kopje has come down. Car park is buried. And some of the cars… ”

“Some of the cars what?”

“Totalled.”

“What? No way!” Jacobus surges to his feet. “My truck?”

“I can’t say for sure.” Rudd stands slowly, anxious at the rage building in the bigger man. “But it doesn’t look good.”

“What? No!” Jacobus’ voice is taut.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

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Story postcard – sifting through the shadows (1)

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 “You okay Rudd?” Marybelle shouts.

“Fine. And you two?”

“Oh, we’re great.” Marybelle’s voice lifts on the wind.

“Appreciate the singing. Helped with the wait for the tea. That water took forever to boil.”

Rudd leans forward on the bench, enjoying the occasional feathers of warmth that drift down from the fire. He looks around the room. There are deep shadows in some corners, with others held bright by torches. Jacobus’ torch is balanced on the billiard table, its beam angled towards the bench where Tim is persuading Fred and Bernard to take sip after sip of hot, sugared tea. Just beyond them, caught in the edge of the light, is Jambee, hands warming around a mug.

Over his other shoulder Rudd sees Jacobus, his body a dark square by the door. Rudd can’t see his face, but he can imagine it, and the big hands that helped to shift the old cast iron stove out from its corner, to act as door jam. Remembering the weight of the wet metal he folds his arms, and pushes his palms deep into his armpits, trying to smother the lingering pain. As he does so Tim’s torch does a quick circle of the room, checking faces. It finds the priest smoothing down his hair, beside Jambee.

Eish. So lucky to spot the priest. What did he say? Searching round by the bar? If he hadn’t come round that corner.

Then Tonderai emerges from the shadows to throw more wood on the fire. Rudd watches the sputter of sparks, and the way the smoke lingers now the door is closed. It hangs suspended, light as tissue, until fingers of wind squeeze in through the whistling cracks, and chase it out.

“Hey Tonderai. Any news on your family?” Jacobus shouts.

“I have none, but I am worried.”

“Where are they?” Jacobus asks, his voice loud in a sudden lull of wind.

“Chimanimani.”

“By the Nyahonde?” asks Bernard.

“Yes.”

 “Oh dear,” says Marybelle.

“What’s the Nyahonde?” Simi asks.

“A river,” Rudd answers.

“Are your family on high ground?” Jacobus asks.

“No. We’re in the valley. We have a new house, a brick house … but not strong like this. Plus, they are cutting the trees on the hills above us.”

 “Are your family there now?” asks Marybelle.

“No. My wife Miriam, wife number two, she took my girls – Precious, 12 years, and Kudzai, five years – to stay with her mother in Mutare. My first wife, Beatrice, she has passed.”

Rudd smiles at the memory of Beatrice – large, kind. His nanny before they left.

“Are there still people in your village?” Jacobus asks.

“My sister is there. Her husband would not leave. She is wife number three. Four children. I am very worried for her.”

“Oh Tonderai, I hope they are okay,” says Marybelle, her voice stricken.

Tonderai looks at her. “Yes. They do not know cyclones. But the chief is worried.” Tonderai pulls his shoulders back, firelight slipping over the contours in his face. “But what can I do? I must work. They need my salary. Stopping is for rich people.”

Rudd looks down at the wet glisten on the floor, his palms burning.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023