Tonderai opens his arms wide, and staggers as though they are full of planes. Rudd laughs. Tonderai does not. Instead he spins around with a splash, to face Simi.

“Suddenly there is Snake.” His voice whistles on the wind, pitched now with fear. “Snake twists towards the piles of aeroplanes, and beside him Wife of Snake shouts at the Workers to get their brushes and sweep the papers away. But the Workers cannot, for there are too many papers. They try harder. They sweep and sweep, but it is no good. There are fallen aeroplanes everywhere. They lie in heaps on the ground, so many of them that even Snake does not know what to do. Besides, he cannot raise his head high enough to see where these paper planes come from, and his Wife shouts so loudly that he cannot think. She too is going mad, mad with her sjambok. She whips the Women and the Workers, and shouts and screams that they must clear the papers away – faster, faster. She yells again and again, and Snake slithers, and slithers, and he hisses and hisses … but they can do nothing.”

Tonderai’s voice drops away. He turns and sits down beside Bernard, and his eyes lock on to the red remains of the fire. Rudd cannot see Bernard, but he can see Simi. She sits now with the blanket dropped from her shoulders, and one hand holding the other up against her chest. Her whole body looks tense to him, stiff from the listening, the absorbing of the story.

Tonderai’s next words are careful and deliberate. “Girl is happy now. She feels stronger, for the messages tell her that she is seen. That the People are seen. That the world waits for them to be free. Her arms full, she turns to the window, and smiles at the faces she sees there. They smile back, and start to wave – first one, then two, then three, then too many for Girl to count.”

Tonderai pauses briefly, then starts again, his voice accelerating into a loud roar of rage. As the sound punches like a fist into the wind, the room gasps, and some jump. Tonderai smiles slightly, and continues. “This roar – it is Grandpa. He is angry for a plane has landed in his feast. Then two more land in his drink, and he roars again.” Tonderai thumps his voice upwards once more. “Grandpa pounds his fist and yells. Even the Favourites are frightened now. The youngest jump up to close the windows, but there is only one who comes back, for the others climb right out and are seen no more. Girl sees them go, and she laughs, for now Uncle’s carving has made the Table so low that everyone can see Grandpa and his Favourites. The People see Grandpa’s feasting and his rage, but they are not afraid, for they see that it is of no use, for the planes and their messages are still coming. As Girl watches she sees Grandpa narrow his crocodile eyes.”

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

Knowledge, at Uncle’s feet, cries out in his sleep. Hope stirs and reaches her arm around him, and they both fall back to their dreaming.

‘Who will help these Children?’ Uncle asks Girl, but he does not wait for an answer. ‘It is you and me. It is up to us. We must do this thing.’

Girl nods.

 ‘Now go!’ says Uncle. ‘Please! Tell your stories! Do not give up! The time is coming soon to move Grandpa from the Table so the truth can be told, and all the People honoured. The Bones too must have their say.’”

Rudd closes his eyes. He blocks out the room and the wind, hearing only Tonderai whose voice is that of Uncle one moment, and of Girl the next.

“Girl hopes that Uncle is right, but she does not feel strong. I am only a Girl, she thinks.

Uncle knows that this is what troubles Girl, so he gets to his broken feet, and holds out his hands so that he may help her to stand too. He pulls her up beside him. ‘Remember,’ he says, ‘you are a Girl, a brave, clever Girl. And you do this for all of us, but especially for Hope so that she may belong, and so that Knowledge may know her power.’”

Rudd, eyes still closed, hears the gumboot splash of Tonderai coming back around the table. He opens his eyes and watches as he steps into view. As he comes closer the wind begins again, clattering the door against the stove, and lifting away the linger of smoke. Outside debris scuttles in each fresh gust. Tonderai, standing still now, begins again.

“Girl lowers her eyes and nods to Uncle. Then she takes a deep breath, and walks back slowly to where she should be. As she walks she tries to push the Bones away, to think of her next story, but it is hard to do this. Her legs are still weak, and the Bones still rattle in her head. She feels dizzy, and thinks that she would like to sit down to rest, but just as she is about to do so, she suddenly sees something in the air above her head.”

Tonderai raises an arm, and points a finger through the dark towards the roof.

“There! What is that? See,” he says, and around the room glinting eyes follow his arm. “There. A small paper plane. It drifts high in the air above Girl, and then it lands at her feet.” Tonderai bends down as though to catch a fallen paper. He opens it with both hands and holds it up to read. “Girl opens the paper out, and sees there is writing on the inside. Then she looks up.” Tonderai circles slowly on his heels, eyes scanning upwards. “There! Girl sees a hand wave at her from the window. She folds the note quickly and puts it in her pocket. Now another paper plane lands at her feet, and then another. The air is full of them. She tries to catch a few and to read the messages, but she has to be quick for the Children run around her now. They too try to catch the little aeroplanes.”

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

Rain sweeps across the roof in gusts, banging and stuttering, then slowly stopping. Tonderai begins again, every word laced with dread.

“Girl remembers with a shiver, the deepest whisper, the whisper no-one dares to speak. She feels again her mother’s breath in her ear, the fear in her voice, when she told her that she must never speak of these things, for this place is a place where evil was done.

Girl trembles, for now she remembers too that beneath this secret there is another secret that is deeper still. A secret that is truly too terrible to say aloud. A secret that lies strangled in the throats of those who know it, tied so tight that few speak of it, even though they know it to be true. And what is this terrible secret?” Tonderai asks, his eyes going from face to face. “The secret is this. It is that Grandpa himself knows of these Bones. That Grandpa was there when these Bones came to be. That Grandpa holds their stories in his fists. That Grandpa will vanish any that speak of how these bones came to be broken in their own soil.”

Tonderai resumes his pacing, his head bowed, his mac gleaming grey in the torchlight. Rudd watches as he vanishes into the dark, swallowed by shadows, only his voice reaching back.

 “Girl’s legs shake for now she herself has seen the Bones. She knows that they are real. And to know this, is to know that now she too must strangle this secret in her own throat, for if she does not her plan will fail. Fright twists inside her. She lowers her eyes and backs slowly, slowly away – away from the sad eyes, away from the old people with their backs to the wall, clutching their children close. Heart straining, sweat pouring, she backs and backs away, one foot stumbling after the next, until the eyes are gone, and the bones no longer beneath her feet. Then she turns, and makes her way as fast as she can across the House, always careful not to run, not to make the People look.

At last she reaches Uncle, with Knowledge and Hope asleep at his feet. As she collapses down beside him, Uncle looks at her, but Girl does not look at him. She knows that he will know just from the sight of her.

‘You have seen,’ he says, his voice calm.

She nods her head, too afraid to speak.

‘Do you know what we must do now?’ he asks.

She shakes her head slowly and looks at him. His eyes are steady as he replies. ‘We must work harder and faster. We must do more, for those Bones will not stay silent for long.’

‘But Uncle, who else will speak, and who will listen? Those who know are so frightened. I myself have seen this.’

‘Yes,’ says Uncle. ‘I know for I too have seen, but this silence will not last. The bones will speak. So we must be brave. We must be clever. We must hurry with our plan. We must try to make a difference. Besides, if we do not try to start the change, then who will do this for us?’

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023