The Power of One

FOUR

At the end of supper, after Mr Stoffel had read the Bible lesson and concluded evening prayers, I waited for Mevrou outside the dispensary. She arrived a short time later. ‘Kom!’ Mevrou said as she brushed past me. I entered and waited with my hands behind my back, my head bowed in the customary manner.

‘Why is there blood on your shirt, Pisskop?’

I looking down at my shirt which was stained with Granpa Chook’s blood and a biggish spot where the stone had torn into me.

Mevrou signed and sat down heavily on a bentwood chair painted the same light green as the dispensary walls. ‘Take off your shirt,’ she commanded.

I hurriedly removed my shirt and Mevrou made a cursory examination of my stomach. ‘Ag, is that all?’ She prodded at the wound the stone had made and I flinched involuntarily.

‘Please, Mevrou, I fell on a rock.’ Mevrou removed the cork from a large bottle of iodine and upended it onto a wad of cotton wool.

‘Yes, I can see that.’ She dabbed at my wound and the iodine stung like billy-o and I winced and hopped up and down in dismay, wringing my hands to stop the burning pain. ‘Come, that’s not enough.’ She upended the bottle once again and dabbed hard at my tummy. This time I knew what to expect and, gritting my teeth and closing my eyes tightly, I managed to hold back most of the pain. ‘You can’t go getting blood poisoning on the train,’ she said, tossing the wad on the table. She retrieved the cork and pushed it back into the bottle.

‘What train, Mevrou?’ I asked confused.

‘Your oupa called long distance on the telephone from a dorp in the Eastern Transvaal called Barberton. You are not going back to the farm. He says Newcastle’s disease has made him kill all his chickens and he has sold the farm to a Mevrou Vorster.

‘What’s my granpa doing in the town called Barberton, Mevrou?’

My head was swimming, my whole world was coming apart at the seams. If Granpa had sold the farm to fat Mrs Vorster and was making telephone calls from some strange town in the Eastern Transvaal, where was Nanny? Without Granpa Chook and Nanny, life was not possible.

‘I’m not a mind reader. Maybe he got work in this place.’ She reached into her bag and held up an envelope. ‘In here is the ticket. Tomorrow night you will catch the train to Barberton. Two days and two nights. I will take you to the train.’ She dismissed me with a wave of the envelope.

I turned to go, and as I reached the door Mevrou called me back. ‘You can’t take the chicken, you hear?’ She looked at me smugly. ‘South African Railways won’t let you take a Kaffir chicken, not even in the goods van.’ She seemed pleased with this thought. ‘I will take the chicken, he will earn his keep even if he is only a Kaffir chicken.’

‘He is dead, Mevrou. A dog ate him today.’ I managed somehow to keep the tears out of my voice.

‘That is a shame, he was good in the kitchen.’ She rose from her chair with a sigh, fanning herself with the letter. ‘I’m telling you, man, a Kaffir chicken is no different from a Kaffir. Just when you think you can trust them, they go and let you down.

I had never owned a pair of shoes. At the time, in the Northern Transvaal, a farm kid only got boots if he had rich parents or if he had turned thirteen. That’s when the Old Testament says a boy becomes a man. A pair of khaki shorts, a shirt and a jumper when it was cold was all you got. Underpants hadn’t been invented. Even if they had been, Boer kids wouldn’t have worn them. More expense for what?

The day after Granpa Chook’s funeral was the last day of term. Everyone was up and packed long before breakfast. After breakfast Mevrou summoned me to the dispensary to tell me that after lunch we would be going into town to buy a pair of tackies for me at Harry Crown’s shop.

‘What are tackies, Mevrou?’

‘Domkop! Tackies are shoes only made of canvas with rubber bottoms. Don’t you know anything? Make sure you have clean feet or we will be shamed in front of the Jew.’

From my secret mango tree, I watched the kids leave the hostel. Parents arrived in old pick-up trucks and mule carts. Some kids left on donkeys brought to the school by a farm servant. I watched as the Judge left in a mule cart. He made the black servant sit on the tailboard, then he jumped up into the driver’s seat, took up the reins and the whip and set off at a furious pace, whipping at the mules and making the whip crack like a rifle shot. I breathed a huge sigh of relief. As my mother used to say, ‘Good riddance of bad rubbish.’

Finally everyone had gone and I climbed down from the mango tree and crossed the school playground. It wasn’t the same without Granpa Chook. The sun felt the same. The little green grasshoppers still couldn’t make it across the playground in one hit. The day moon, made of skimmed milk, still hung in the cloudless morning sky. But it wasn’t ever going to be the same again. I saved the need to grieve for a later time. I had enough on my mind with the prospect of going to town to buy a pair of shoes and catching the train. I’d never owned a pair of shoes and I’d never been on a train, never seen a real train. Two nevers in one day is enough to fill anyone’s mind.

After a lunch of bread and jam with a mug of sweet tea, I hurried to meet Mevrou in the dispensary, stopping only long enough to give my feet and legs a good scrub like Mevrou said. The same shower which had been dripping that first night when I thought I was in a slaughter house was still sounding drip, drip, drip, like a metronome. Funny how little kids can get things mixed up like that. It all seemed such a long time ago; I sure had been a baby then.

I had been waiting at the dispensary a few minutes when Mevrou arrived. She was wearing a shapeless floral cotton dress and a funny old black straw hat with two cherries on it. A third wire stem stuck up where a cherry had once been. In her town clothes she looked not unlike fat old Mrs Vorster, except younger and with a moustache.

The town I knew to be about two miles from the school. ‘Maybe we could visit the railway station as well as Harry Crown’s shop?’ I suggested tentatively.

‘It is enough that I do this for you, Pisskop. What do you want? Blood from a stone? Tonight I must do it all over again for you. There is nothing at the station to see, only sleeping Kaffirs waiting for the train.’

For the remainder of the journey we said nothing. Mevrou walked three paces ahead of me all the way to town. Her huge shape sort of rocked along, stopping every once in a while to catch her breath. The early afternoon sun beat down on us. By the time we arrived Mevrou was very hot and bothered and her special smell was worse than ever.

Harry Crown’s shop was closed and nothing much seemed to be happening in the main street. Mevrou took a large red doek from her basket and proceeded to wipe her face. ‘Everyone is still having their lunch, we must wait,’ she explained. With great effort she climbed the five steps up to the stoep of the shop and sat down on a bench beside the padlocked door. ‘Go and find a tap and wash your feet,’ she panted.

I crossed the street to the garage which had a sign that read Atlantic Service Station. It had two pumps outside a small office and workshop bay. Just inside the bay was a tap. The whole place smelt of oil and grease. I washed my feet and walked back across the road on my heels so as not to dirty my feet. Half a dozen Africans were asleep at the far end of the verandah where there was a second entrance to the shop. Above this entrance was written ‘Blacks Only’. I wondered briefly why whites were not allowed to enter.

Flies, flying heavy in the heat, settled on sleeping eyes and every now and again a desultory black hand would come up and brush at them, its owner seemingly still asleep.

One black man with his left eye missing remained awake and sat with his back against the shop wall. His cupped hands and mouth concealed a Jew’s harp which twanged an urgent rhythm.

‘The Jew is late, who does he think he is?’ Mevrou said impatiently. She half turned and addressed the African playing the Jew’s harp. ‘Hey, Kaffir! Where is the baas?’

The black man jumped to his feet, removing the tiny harp and placing it in the pocket of his ragged pants. He said nothing, not understanding Afrikaans.

‘Do you work here? I asked him in Shangaan.

‘No, small baas, I also, I am waiting. The big baas for the shop will be here soon I think. When the hooter goes for the saw mill he will surely come.’

‘He doesn’t work for Mr Crown, Mevrou.’

Just then a hooter sounded. We were familiar with the saw mill hooter, which blew at one o’clock and again at two.

Almost on the dot a big, black Chevrolet drove up and parked outside the shop. It was the most beautiful car I had ever seen. I had never imagined a motor car could be as shiny and powerful. The man inside it revved the engine before he cut the ignition and it roared as though alive. Obviously being a Jew was a very profitable business. Maybe I could be one when I grew up.

Harry Crown was a fat man in his late fifties. He wore his trousers high so that his entire tummy and most of his chest were covered with trouser top, held up by a pair of bright red braces. His white open-neck cotton shirt seemed to extend no more than eight inches from his collar before it was swallowed by his trousers. He was almost completely bald and when he smiled he showed two gold front teeth.

‘A thousand apologies, Mevrou. Have you been waiting long?’ he said, making a fuss of unlocking the padlocked doors to the shop.

‘Ag, it was nothing. Not even a few minutes,’ Mevrou said, all smiles for the fat, bald man.

In the part boarded off for white customers, two large ceiling fans whirred softly overhead and the shop was dark and cool. Mevrou heaved herself gratefully onto a chair beside the counter and Harry Crown poured her a cup of coffee from a pot he removed from a small hotplate on a shelf behind the counter.

‘What can I do for you, Mevrou?’ he asked, then turning to me he bowed slightly. ‘And for you, Mister?’ he said solemnly.

I was not used to jocularity so, not knowing what to do, I dropped my eyes to avoid his gaze.

Observing my shyness he turned from me to a large glass jar on the counter and from it produced a raspberry sucker, its ruby head wrapped in Cellophane. He held the sucker out for me to take. I looked at Mevrou who took a polite sip from her coffee cup and then nodded. I took the delicious prize and put it into my shirt pocket.

‘Thank you, Meneer,’ I said softly.

‘Ag, eat it now, boy. When we have finished business you can have another one.’ He paused. ‘A green one maybe, huh?’ He turned to Mevrou. ‘I have had this shop for thirty years and I can tell you with God’s certainty that children like raspberry first and green second. If I know nothing for certain in this life, of this one thing I am sure.’ He snapped his braces with his thumbs and gave a loud, happy snort.

I had never met a man who laughed and carried on like this and I felt intimidated, so I left the raspberry sucker in my pocket where I hoped it was safe.

‘What is your name, boy?’ Harry Crown asked.

‘Pisskop, sir,’ I replied.

Harry Crown’s shiny bald head jerked back and he looked down at me in consternation. ‘Pisskop? Pisskop! That is a name for a nice boy?’ he asked in alarm. ‘Who calls you this name?’

Mevrou interrupted sharply. ‘Never mind his name, what have you got in tackies? The boy must have some tackies. He is going on the train alone tonight to his oupa in Barberton.’

Turning momentarily to acknowledge he had heard her, Harry Crown turned back to me and gave a low whistle. ‘Barberton eh? That is in the lowveld in the Eastern Transvaal. Easy two days away in the train, a long journey alone for a small boy.’ He moved around from behind the counter and was looking at my feet. ‘We have nothing so small, Mevrou. I don’t have much call for tackies. The Boere round here don’t play much tennis.’ He chortled loudly at his own joke, which was completely lost on Mevrou and me.

‘Show me what you got, Mr Crown. His oupa did not send enough money for boots, only tackies.’

‘It makes no difference, boots, smoots, tackies, smackies, the boy’s foot is too small.’ He moved back behind the counter where he pulled a battered cardboard box from the shelf. From it he withdrew a pair of dark brown canvas shoes.

‘Let the boy try them,’ Mevrou said.

‘It is useless, Mevrou. These tackies are four sizes too big for him. It is a miracle I have these, but they are too big already.’

‘The boy will grow,’ Mevrou said, a trifle impatiently.

‘Ja certainly, Mevrou. Maybe in five or six years they will fit him like a glove. In the meantime they will fit him like the clown in a circus.’ He slapped his stomach. ‘Very amusing,’ he said to himself in English.

‘We will try them on. With newspaper we can fix them.’

‘Mevrou, with the whole Zoutpansberg Gazette we couldn’t stuff these tackies to fit. He has very small feet for a Boer child.’

‘He is not a Boer child. He is a Rooinek!’ Mevrou said, suddenly angry. She put the cup of coffee down on the counter, and leaning over grabbed the tackies and turned to me. ‘Put your foot up here on my lap, child,’ she ordered.

The first tackie slipped around my foot without touching the sides. With my heel on Mevrou’s lap the canvas shoe seemed to reach almost up to my chin.

Mevrou pulled the laces tightly until the eyelets overlapped. ‘Now the other one,’ she said.

I stood there, rooted to the floor, not daring to move and not knowing what to do next. The tackies seemed to extend twice the distance of my feet.

‘Walk, child,’ Mevrou commanded.

I took a tentative step forward and the left tackie stayed behind on the floor, though I managed to drag the right one forward by not lifting my foot.

‘Bring some paper.’ Mevrou cunningly fashioned two little boats from strips of newspaper. She then put the paper boats in the tackies and instructed me to insert my feet into them and tied the laces. This time they fitted snug as a bug in a rug. Though I must say they felt very strange and when I walked they made a phlifft-floft sound where the tackies bent at the end of my toes.

I had never felt as grand in all my life. ‘We will take them,’ Mevrou announced triumphantly. She reached into her handbag for her purse.

Harry Crown sighed. ‘Those tackies are no good, Mevrou.’

If Mevrou had had her sjambok she would have made fat old Harry Crown bend over the counter and she would have given him six of the best.

‘How much?’ she said curtly, her lips pursed.

‘Half a crown, for you only two shillings,’ Harry Crown said, adjusting the price automatically, his heart obviously not in the sale.

I tugged at the end of a lace and to my relief the bow collapsed. I did the same for the second tackie then slipped ever so carefully out of the newspaper boats and handed the tackies to Harry Crown.

‘You poor little bugger,’ he said in English. He slipped the tackies back into the soft brown cardboard box and when he saw Mevrou wasn’t looking, quickly put two green and two red suckers into the box and handed it to me. ‘I wish you health to wear them,’ Harry Crown said in English. Speaking out of the corner of his mouth he added, ‘Can she understand English?’

Not daring to reply, I shook my head almost imperceptibly, indicating no.

‘Inside is for the journey, green and red, the best! Believe me, I know. So long, Peekay.’ He patted me on the shoulder. His eyes widened and drawing up to his full height, his hands clasped over his belly, gold teeth flashing, he grinned. ‘Maybe the tackies don’t fit, but I think your new name fits perfect. Peekay! Ja, that is a nice name for a brave person who is travelling by himself to the lowveld to meet his granpa.’

Mevrou, who was practically snorting with rage, threw two shillings on the counter and marched out of the shop. I followed along with the precious box of loot under my arm. At the door I turned to say goodbye to Harry Crown.

‘Goodbye, sir!’ I said in English. The two English words sounded strangely out of place, like a language newly learned.

Mevrou turned furiously. Grabbing me by the ear, she hissed, ‘Do not talk to that… that dirty Jew in the accursed language. You will hear from my sjambok when we get home!’

‘Ouch! You have my sore ear, Mevrou.’ I knew immediately she’d feel guilty grabbing me by my recently damaged ear, even though it was completely healed.

Mevrou let go of my ear as though it were a red-hot poker. You’ve got to be quick on your feet in this world if you want to survive. Though, once you know the rules, it is not too hard to play the game.

Mevrou stormed ahead and I fell some five paces behind her. After I’d given her what I hoped was enough guilt for her to withdraw the promised thrashing, I dropped back another fifteen paces and took the raspberry sucker out of my pocket. Taking off the Cellophane wrapper I licked the tiny bits of crimson sugar crystal which had stuck to it before throwing it away. I then settled down to suck my way back to the hostel.

I was right about the sjambok, which was not mentioned on our return. I spent the remainder of the afternoon putting more stones on Granpa Chook’s grave and making a border around the pile of rocks with white pebbles which took ages to collect from all around the place. I must say, the toughest damn chicken in the whole world had a very impressive grave, a stone cairn which would probably last forever, hidden by successive generations of khaki weed and black jack.

The cook boy had packed me a big brown paper bag of sandwiches for the train journey. We left the hostel about five o’clock to catch the seven o’clock train. My suitcase, though large, contained very few things. Two shirts, two pairs of khaki shorts, my pyjamas, the four suckers which I’d hidden in a pair of shorts and my new tackies with the paper boats in them. There was plenty of room for the sandwiches. While the suitcase banged against my knees, it wasn’t really heavy and besides, with all the iron bar torture sessions, my muscles were pretty big. Mevrou was completely puffed out from making two trips into town in one day, and with the suitcase banging against my knees it took us almost an hour to get to the station.

The station turned out to be a raised platform about thirty yards long upon which sat a building with two doors facing the railway line. On one door Station Master was written and to the right of this door was a window. Above the window it read Tickets. On the remaining door it said Waiting Room. Outside the station master’s office there were three truck tyres painted white and in the middle of these grew red cannas, their long, flat leaves dusty and shredded, with the blooms equally torn and bedraggled looking. Mevrou seemed to know the station master. He opened the locked waiting room for us and brought her a cup of coffee in a big white cup with SAR monogrammed on it.

‘Don’t worry, Hoppie Groenewald is the guard on this train, he will take good care of the boy.’ He turned to acknowledge me for the first time. ‘He is champion of the railways, you know. That Hoppie,’ the station master grinned at the thought, ‘he laughs all the time, but if you get into a fight, I’m telling you, man, you better pray he’s on your side!’

I wondered what a champion of the railways was, but I clearly understood, and greatly liked, the idea of having someone on my side who was good in a fight. My life seemed to be made for trouble and it would make a nice change to have a champion of the railways beside me when the next lot hit, as was bound to happen.

Sometimes the slightest things change the directions of our lives, the merest breath of a circumstance, a random moment that connects like a meteorite striking the earth. Lives have swivelled and changed direction on the strength of a chance remark. Hoppie Groenewald was to prove to be a passing mentor who would set the next seventeen years of my life on an irrevocable course. He would do so in little more than a day and a night.

‘The boy is a Rooinek and also too small to fight yet,’ Mevrou said, as though it were only a matter of time before my bad English blood would turn nasty. She produced a ticket from an envelope and inserted a large safety pin into the hole at one end. ‘Come here, child.’ She pinned the ticket to my shirt pocket. ‘Listen carefully to me now, man, this ticket will take you to Barberton but your oupa only sent enough money for one breakfast and one lunch and one supper on the train. Tonight you eat only one sandwich, you hear?’ I nodded. ‘Tomorrow for breakfast another one and for lunch the last one. Then you can eat on the train. Do you understand now?’

‘Ja, Mevrou, for the next three meals I eat the sandwiches.’

‘No, man! That’s not what I said. For tonight and for breakfast tomorrow and lunch tomorrow. And also eat the meat first because the jam will keep the bread soft for tomorrow. Do you hear?’

‘Ja, Mevrou.’

She took out a small square of white cloth about the size of a lady’s hanky and placed it on her lap. In the centre she placed a shilling.

‘Watch carefully now, Pisskop. I am putting this shilling in here and tying it so.’ She brought the two opposite corners together and tied them over the shilling and then did the same with the remaining two. She took a second large safety pin from her handbag, then, pushing the doek with the shilling into the pocket of my khaki shorts, she pinned it to the lining.

‘Now listen good. It is for an emergency. Only if you have to can you use some of it. But you must tie up the change like I just showed you and put it back in your pocket with the safety pin. If you don’t need it you must give it to your oupa, it is his change.’

The station master entered and told us that the train was on time and we had five minutes.

‘Quick, man, get your tackies,’ Mevrou said, giving me a push towards the suitcase.

I was seized by a sudden panic. What if I opened my suitcase and she saw my suckers? I placed the case flat on the floor and opened it so the lid was between Mevrou and me, preventing her from seeing inside. Just as well, a green sucker had worked out of its hiding place in my shorts and my heart went thump. Phew! I removed the tackies and quickly snapped the case shut. I slipped each foot carefully into a paper boat and Mevrou tied the laces. I tried desperately to memorise how she did this but wasn’t sure I had the idea.

‘Please, Mevrou, will you teach me how to tie the laces so I can take my tackies off in the train?’

Mevrou looked up, alarmed. ‘You must not take your tackies off until you get to Barberton. If you lose them your oupa will think I stole the money he sent. You keep them on, do you hear me now?’

The train could be heard a long way off and we left the waiting room to watch it coming in. Real walking in my tackies was difficult and very different from the three or four tentative steps I had taken in Harry Crown’s shop. I stumbled several times as I went phlifft-floft, phlifft-floft from the waiting room to the edge of the platform. Bits of newspaper crept up past my ankles and I had to stop and press them back in.

With a deafening choof of steam, immediately followed by two short sharp hisses and a screeching sound of metal rubbing on metal, the huge train pulled into the station, and carriage after carriage of black people went by. They were laughing and sticking their heads out of windows and having themselves a proper good time. Finally the last two carriages and the goods van came to a halt neatly lined up with the platform The two end carriages read South African Railways First Class and Second Class respectively. I had seen pictures of trains of course, and sometimes at night as I lay in the small kids’ dormitory I had heard a train whistle carried in the wind, the beautiful sound of going to faraway places away from the hostel, Mevrou, the Judge and his Nazi stormtroopers. But I must say I wasn’t prepared for anything quite as big and black and blustering with steam, smoke, fire, brass pipes and hissing pistons.

Africans appeared as if from nowhere. They carried bundles on their heads which they handed up through the third-class carriage windows to the passengers inside and then climbed aboard laughing with the excitement of it all. From inside the carriages came song and more laughter and a great deal of shouting and good-natured banter. I knew at once that I would like trains.

The guard leapt down onto the platform carrying a canvas bag with Mail stamped on the outside. He handed it to the station master who gave him an identical bag in return.

The station master introduced the guard to Mevrou. ‘This is Hoppie Groenewald, he is guard and conductor until you get to Gravelotte. He will look after the boy.’

Hoppie Groenewald grinned down at me and tipped his navy blue guard’s cap to Mevrou. ‘No worries, Mevrou, I will look after him until Gravelotte. Then I will hand him over to Pik Botha who will take him through to Kaapmuiden.’ He opened the door of the second-class carriage and put my suitcase into the train and indicated that I should enter. The three steps up into the carriage were fairly high and I put my tackied foot on the bottom step. As I put my weight on the step the toe of the tackie buckled and I fell on my bum on the platform. Wearing shoes was a much trickier business than I had first supposed. A bit distressed, I wondered how adults seemed to manage so easily. I tried to get up but the tackies were too big and I couldn’t get a proper grip on the loose gravel which covered the platform.

‘Get up, man!’ Mevrou said, visibly annoyed. She shook her head, ‘For God’s sake! Even now you make trouble for me.’

Hoppie Groenewald put the canvas mail bag on the platform, and bending down he grabbed me under the armpits and hoisted me high into the air and through the door to land inside the carriage.

‘No worries, little brother, I too have fallen up those verdomde steps many a time. I, who am a guard and soon to be a conductor, and who should know better.’

He retrieved the mail bag and put it next to my suitcase. Then he hopped up the steps without even looking and unhooked a neatly rolled green flag from above the door of the carriage. He unfurled the flag and absently pulled at a chain attached to a button on his navy serge waistcoat and withdrew a large silver whistle from his fob pocket.

‘Watch the Kaffirs get a fright,’ he said with a grin. He showed me how to hold onto the handrail inside the door and lean out of the carriage so I could see down the full length of the train to the third-class carriages. He then jumped back onto the platform and began to wave the flag, giving a long blast on his whistle.

You should have seen the kerfuffle. Africans who had left the train to stretch their legs or have a pee scrambled frantically to get through the doors of the carriages as the train began slowly to move, laughing and yelling and climbing on top of each other. Hoppie Groenewald gave two more short blasts on his whistle and hopped aboard the train.

‘Goodbye, Mevrou. Thank you,’ I shouted, waving at her.

‘Keep your tackies on, you hear!’ Mevrou shouted back.

It was a dry-eyed farewell on both sides. I ardently hoped the Rooinek and Mevrou would never have to see each other again.

Hoppie Groenewald closed the carriage door as the train began to gather momentum. He quickly refurled the flag and clicked it back into its holder next to a red one above the door. Then he picked up my suitcase and opened the door to the nearest compartment.

The train was moving along smoothly now and I enjoyed the comforting, predictable clackity clack, clackity clack of the carriage wheels.

The empty compartment had two bright green leather seats facing each other, each seat big enough for three adults. A small table, which I was later to discover turned into a wash basin, was positioned between the two windows. The rest of the compartment seemed to be panelled in highly varnished wood and immediately above each green leather seat was a glass frame about ten inches high running the length of the seats. Inside the frames were lots of photographs. It was all very posh. Before it got completely dark, Hoppie Groenewald turned on the compartment lights and all seemed very cosy… just like the beginning of a proper adventure.

‘It’s all yours until we get to Tzaneen. After that who knows. No worries, Hoppie will take good care of you.’ He looked down at my tackies, bits of newspaper were sticking out of the sides and up past my ankles.

‘The old cow can’t get you now, take them off,’ the guard said. I tugged the canvas shoes off. My feet were hot and uncomfortable and had turned black from the newsprint rubbing off on them. It felt delicious to squiggle my toes again. Hoppie Groenewald stuck his hand out. ‘Shake a paw. You know my name but I haven’t had the pleasure.’

I’d already thought about what Harry Crown had said and had decided to take his advice and call myself Peekay. ‘Peekay,’ I said tentatively. I pronounced it in English, the way Harry Crown had, so it sounded like a proper name.

I suddenly felt new and clean. Nobody ever again would know that I had been called Pisskop. Granpa Chook was dead and so was Pisskop. The first two South African casualties in the Second World War.

‘All the best, Peekay. We will be pals.’ He took his cap off and put it on my head. I wondered if he was a Nazi. He didn’t seem to know I was English, so why tempt fate?

‘Thank you for taking care of me, Mr Groenewald,’ I said politely and handed him back his cap.

‘Ag man, just call me Hoppie.’ He grinned as he replaced his cap.

Hoppie left to check the tickets in the African carriages but promised he would return soon.

It was almost totally dark outside, as I sat alone in a lighted room, flying through the African night, lickity-clack, lickity-clack. I had defeated the Judge and his Nazi stormtroopers, survived Mevrou and I had grown up and changed my name, lickity-clack, lickity-clack.

Opening my suitcase I took out one of Harry Crown’s green suckers. Carefully removing the Cellophane wrapper I licked the bits of green sugar that had stuck to it. The faint taste of lime transferred to my tongue, sweet promise of the main event when I began on the sucker itself.

Harry Crown was right, of course the green ones were a very close second to the raspberry. I examined the photographs above the seats, sepia-toned pictures of a flat mountain with a streak of white cloud resting just above it. The caption underneath read, ‘World famous Table Mountain wearing its renowned tablecloth’. All there was was a big white cloud above it but I couldn’t see a renowned tablecloth. Another showed a big city seen from the air with the caption, ‘Cape Town, home of the famous Cape Doctor’. I wondered what the doctor had done to be famous and rich enough to own a big town for his home. He must have been richer even than Harry Crown. Years later I discovered that the Cape Doctor was a wind which blew in early spring to clean out the flu germs and general accumulated nasties that had gathered during the winter. Another photograph of Table Mountain was captioned ‘Truly one of the world’s natural wonders’. The last picture showed a big white house and it said, ‘Groot Constantia’s famed and spacious cellars, the home of superb wine’.

‘Well,’ I thought, ‘this will be a pretty good journey if we visit all those places!’ I decided I’d ask Hoppie about them when he came back.

Hoppie returned after what seemed ages but probably wasn’t very long. On a train, with the darkness galloping past, time seemed to disappear, the lickity-clack of the wheels on the track gobbled up the minutes.

He plonked himself wearily on the seat opposite me. ‘Sis, man, those Kaffirs stink!’ he declared then gave me a big grin and a light playful punch to the point of my chin.

‘When we get to Tzaneen in an hour we’ll have some dinner. We stop for forty-five minutes to take on coal and water and there’s a café across the road from the station. From Tzaneen I’m only the guard and another conductor takes over. What’s your favourite food, Peekay?’

‘Sweet potatoes,’ I answered.

‘Sweet potatoes, maybe and maybe not, I’ve never asked for sweet potatoes at that café. How about a mixed grill. A two-bob special, heh?’

‘I’ve only got a shilling and it’s for emergencies. Is a mixed grill an emergency?’ I asked.

Hoppie laughed. ‘For me it is. Tonight I’m paying, old mate. The mixed grills are on me.’

I didn’t want to ask him what a grill was and how it was mixed so I asked him about the pictures on the wall. ‘When are we going to see Table-Mountain-one-of-the-natural-wonders-of-the-world?’

‘Huh, come again?’

I pointed to the picture above his head. ‘When do we go there?’

Hoppie turned around to look at the picture, but he didn’t laugh when he worked out what I was talking about. ‘It’s just stupid pictures showing where South African Railways go, but we are not going there, Peekay.’ He started to study all the pictures as if he’d noticed them for the first time.

‘I almost went to Cape Town last year to fight in the finals but I was beaten in the Northern Transvaal championships. Split decision but the referee gave it to the fighter from Pretoria. I’m telling you, man, I beat the bastard fair and square. It was close, I’ve got to admit that, but I knew all the time I had him on points.’

I listened, astonished. What on earth was he talking about?

Hoppie looked me straight in the eyes. ‘You’re almost looking at the railways boxing champion of the Transvaal, you know.’ He brought his finger and thumb together in front of my face. ‘That close and I would of been in the National Railway Boxing Championships in Cape Town.’

‘What’s a boxing champion?’ I asked

It was Hoppie’s turn to look astonished. ‘What a domkop you are, Peekay. Don’t you know what boxing is?’

‘No, sir,’ I dropped my eyes, ashamed of my ignorance.

Hoppie Groenewald put his hand under my chin and lifted my head up. ‘It’s nothing to be ashamed of. There comes a time in everything when you don’t know something.’ He grinned. ‘Okay, man, settle down, make yourself at home, we’re in for a long talk.’

‘Wait a minute, Hoppie,’ I said excitedly. I clicked open my suitcase. ‘Green or red?’ I asked, taking out a sucker of each colour. I had decided that I would have one sucker in the morning and one at night, that way they would last me the whole journey. But a friend like this doesn’t come along every day and I hadn’t heard a good story since Nanny.

‘You choose first, Peekay. What’s your favourite?’

‘No, you choose, Hoppie. You’re the one who is going to tell the story so you get first choice,’ I said with great generosity.

‘Green,’ he said. ‘I like green, my mother had green eyes.’ He took the green sucker and I put the raspberry one back and clicked the suitcase shut.

‘I’ve just had one,’ I said, grateful that I had two of the best raspberry ones left for the next two days.

‘We will share then’ he said, ‘you lick first because I’m going to be too busy doing the talking. ‘He watched me as I unwrapped the Cellophane and licked it clean. ‘When I was your age I used to do the same.’ He looked at his watch. ‘One hour to Tzaneen, just about time for a boxing lecture and maybe even a demonstration.’

I settled back happily into the corner of the large green leather seat and proceeded to lick the sucker. One and a half suckers in less than an hour was an all-time happiness and having a real friend was another. What an adventure this was turning out to be.

‘Boxing is the greatest sport in the world,’ Hoppie began, ‘even greater than rugby.’ He looked up, ready to defend this last statement if necessary, but saw that I was prepared to accept his premise. ‘The art of self-defence is the greatest art of all and boxing is the greatest art of self-defence. Take me, a natural welterweight, there isn’t any man I have to be afraid of, not even a big animal like a front-row forward. I’m fast and I can hit hard and in a street fight a little bloke like me can take on any big gorilla.’ He jabbed once or twice into the air in front of him to demonstrate his lightning speed.

‘How little can beat how big?’ I asked, getting excited.

‘Big as anything, man. If you’ve got the speed to move and can throw a big punch as you’re moving away. Timing, speed and footwork, in boxing they are everything. To be a welterweight is perfect. Not too big to be slow, not too small to lack a punch. A welterweight is the perfect fighter, I’m telling you for sure, man!’ Hoppie’s eyes were shining with conviction.

I stood up on the seat and lifted my hand about another eight inches above my head. Which, of course, was about the height of the Judge. ‘A little kid like me and a big kid, big as this?’

Hoppie paused for a moment; he seemed to be thinking. ‘Ja, now you see with small kids it’s a bit different. Small kids don’t have the punch. Maybe they’re fast enough to stay out of the way, but one stray punch from a big gorilla and it’s all over, man. Kids are best to fight in their own division.’ He looked at me. ‘Who you want to fight, hey? What big kid gave you a bad time? Just you tell me, Peekay, and he’ll have to reckon with Hoppie Groenewald. I’m telling you, man, nobody hurts a friend of mine.’

‘Just some boys at school,’ I replied, delighted that even though this was the wrong place and time, I now had someone strong in the world who was on my side. I wanted to tell him about the Judge and his Nazi stormtroopers, but I wasn’t prepared to go the whole way; Hoppie Groenewald didn’t know I was a Rooinek and he might think differently if he found out.

‘Well, you just tell them next time they’ll have to reckon with me,’ Hoppie growled.

‘It is all over now,’ I said, handing him the sucker.

He took the sucker and started to lick it absently. ‘Peekay, take my advice. When you get to Barberton, find someone who can teach you to box.’ He looked at me, squinting slightly. ‘I can see you could be a good boxer, your arms are strong for a little bloke. Hey, stand up again, let me see your legs.’

I stood up on the seat. ‘Not bad, Peekay, nice light legs, you could have speed. With a boxer speed is everything. Hit and move. Hit and move, one two one, a left and a left again and a right.’ He was sparring in the air, throwing lightning punches at an invisible foe. It was scary and exciting at the same time.

‘Wait here,’ he said suddenly and left the compartment. He returned in a couple of minutes carrying a pair of funny-looking leather gloves.

‘These are boxing gloves, Peekay. These are the equalisers, when you can use them well you need fear no man. In the goods van I have a speedball, tomorrow I will show you how to use it.’ He slipped the huge gloves over my hands which disappeared into the gloves halfway up to my elbows. ‘Feels good, hey?’ he said, tying the laces.

My hands in the gloves were just as lost as my feet had felt in the tackies when Mevrou first made me put them on. Only this was different. The gloves felt like old friends, big yes, and very clumsy, but not strangers.

‘C’mon kid, hit me,’ Hoppie said, sticking out his jaw. I took a jab at him and his head moved away so my glove simply whizzed through the air. ‘Again, hit me again.’ I pulled my arm back and let go with a terrible punch which landed flush on his chin. Hoppie fell back into the leather seat opposite me, groaning and holding his jaw. ‘Holy macaroni! You’re a killer. A natural-born fighter. You sure planted one on me, man.’ He sat up rubbing his jaw and I began to laugh. ‘That’s the way, little boetie, I was beginning to wonder if you knew how to laugh,’ he said with a big grin.

And then I started to cry, not blubbing, just tears that wouldn’t stop rolling down my cheeks. Hoppie Groenewald picked me up and put me on his lap and I put my arms with the boxing gloves around his neck and buried my head in his blue serge waistcoat. The heavy chain that held the whistle was cool against my face.

‘Sometimes it is good to cry,’ he said softly. ‘Sometimes you fight better when you’ve had a good cry. Now tell old Hoppie what’s the matter.’

I couldn’t tell him of course. It was a dumb thing to cry like that, but it was as far as I was prepared to go. I got off his lap. ‘It’s nothing, honest,’ I said going to sit on my side of the compartment.

Hoppie picked up the sucker which he’d put on the table before we had started to spar and held it out to me. ‘You finish it. It will spoil my appetite for my mixed grill. You’re still going to have a mixed grill with me, aren’t you? I mean, I’m paying and all that.’

I reached for the sucker but the gloves were still on my hands and we laughed together at the joke. He pulled the gloves off and handed it to me.

‘No worries, Peekay. When you grow up you’ll be the best damn welterweight in South Africa and nobody… and I mean no-bod-ee, will give Kid Peekay any crapola. I’m telling you, man.’

When we reached Tzaneen Hoppie pulled down a bunk concealed in the wall above my head which, to my amazement, turned out to be a proper bed with blankets and sheets. From a slot behind the bunk he took out a pillow with a pillow slip, and a small towel. He then put my suitcase on the bed to reserve it, in case other folk came into the compartment at Tzaneen.

Taking me by the hand, we crossed the station platform which looked much like the one from which we had left, only the platform was longer and the buildings bigger. Opposite the station was a lighted building with a big glass window on which Railway Café was written. Inside were lots of little tables and chairs. Several people were seated eating and drinking coffee. There seemed to be a lot of smoke in the room.

A pretty young lady behind the counter looked up as we entered and gave Hoppie a big smile. ‘Well, well, look who’s here. If it isn’t Kid Louis, champion of the railways,’ she announced. An older woman came out of the back. Wiping her hands on her apron, she came up to Hoppie and he gave her a big hug.

‘Your cheeky daughter is already giving me a hard time, ounooi,’ Hoppie said. ‘She needs to go three rounds in the ring with Hoppie Groenewald and then we’ll see who’s laughing.’ He was grinning from ear to ear.

‘So when’s your next fight, champ?’ the lady behind the counter asked.

‘Tomorrow night at the railway club in Gravelotte, a light-heavy from the mines. It’s the big time for me at last,’ Hoppie smiled.

The pretty young lady giggled. ‘Put two bob on the other bloke for me.’ One or two of the other customers also laughed, but in a good-natured way. The older woman was clearing a table for us and fussing around Hoppie. He turned towards me, and taking my hand held my arm aloft. ‘Hello, everyone, I want you to meet Kid Peekay, the next welterweight contender,’ he said, keeping his voice serious. I dropped my eyes, not knowing what to do.

‘Enough of your nonsense, Hoppie Groenewald. Come sit now or you will not be fed before the train leaves,’ the older woman fussed.

The pretty young woman smiled at me. ‘How would the contender like a strawberry milkshake?’ she asked.

I looked at Hoppie. ‘What’s a milkshake, please, Hoppie?’

‘A milkshake is heaven,’ he said. ‘Make that two, you lazy frump.’ He turned to the older woman who was still fussing about. ‘Two super-duper mixed grills please, ounooi. Me and my partner here are starving.’

Hoppie was right again, a strawberry milkshake is heaven. When the mixed grill arrived I couldn’t believe my own eyes. Chop, steak, sausage, bacon, liver, chips, a fried egg and tomato. What a blow-out! I have never eaten a meal as grand and was quite unable to finish it. Hoppie helped himself to the remaining food on my plate, although I slurped the milkshake, in its aluminium shaker, right down to the last gurgling drop.

The pretty lady came over and sat with us and Hoppie seemed to like her a lot. Her name was Anna and her lips were very shiny and red. The clock above the counter read ten o’clock. It was set into a picture of a beautiful lady in a long white nightdress that clung to her body. She too had very red lips and was smoking a cigarette; the smoke from the cigarette curled up on to the face of the clock where it turned into running writing. The running writing said ‘C to C for satisfaction.’ I had never been up as late as this before and my eyelids felt as though they were made of lead.

The next thing I remembered was Hoppie tucking me into my bunk between the nice clean, cool sheets and the pillow that smelt of starch. ‘Sleep sweet, old mate,’ I heard him say.

The last thing I remembered before I fell asleep again was the deep, comforting feeling of my hands in the boxing gloves. ‘The equalisers’, Hoppie had called them. Peekay had found the equalisers.