Recipes for Love and Murder (3 page)

The top letter was pink and addressed to Tannie Maria. The ‘i's were dotted with little round circles. I took a sip of my coffee, then I opened the letter. By the time I'd finished reading, I was so shocked I stopped eating.

This is what it said:

Dear Tannie Maria,

It feels like my life is over and I am not even thirteen. If I don't kill myself, my mother will. But she doesn't know yet. I have had sex three times, but I only swallowed once. Am I pregnant? I haven't had my period for ages.

He is fifteen. His skin is black and smooth and his smile is white, and he said he loved me. We used to meet under the kareeboom and then go to the shed and play Ice Cream. He said I taste like the sweet mangoes that grow on the streets where he comes from. He tastes like chocolate and nuts and ice cream. These are things I used to love to eat. I tried to stop the visits to the shed, but then I saw him there in the shade of the tree, and got hungry for him.

I fanned myself with her pink envelope and carried on reading.

When I told him I might be pregnant, he said we mustn't meet again. I go past the tree after school but he's never there.

I have been so worried that I can't eat. My mother says I am wasting away. I know I'm going to hell, which is why I haven't killed myself.

Can you help me?

Desperate

I put down the letter and shook my head. Magtig! What a tragedy . . .

A young girl who can't eat.

We had to get her interested in food again. I needed a recipe with chocolate and nuts. And ice cream. With something healthy in it.

I would of course tell her that you can't get pregnant from oral sex. And in case she really was not able to talk to her mother, I would give her the number for the family planning clinic in Ladismith. But if I could just come up with an irresistible recipe for her, it might save everyone a lot of trouble.

Bananas, I thought. They are very healthy, and would help her get strong again. How about frozen bananas, dipped in melted dark chocolate and rolled in nuts. I wrote out a recipe for her with dark chocolate and toasted hazelnuts. That should help her get over him. And in case the boyfriend read the paper, I put in a recipe for mango sorbet too. Mangoes were in season, and the good ones tasted like honey and sunshine.

CHAPTER FIVE

Sjoe, but it was hot and those cold recipes looked good. But there were still two unopened letters on my table. The letters did not call as loud as the frozen bananas.

‘I'm going to work from home,' I told Hattie. ‘I need to test some recipes.'

‘Mhmm,' she said.

She had a pencil in her mouth and was frowning as she worked.

‘Hattie, what time is Saturday's fête?' asked Jessie.

Jessie was at her desk, taking a little notebook out of one of her pouches.

‘Fiddlesticks,' said Hattie, pressing buttons on her computer. ‘Hmm? Two p.m.'

I stood up, the letters in my hand.

‘It's important the recipes are good.' I said. ‘Irresistible.'

Hattie looked up from her work.

‘Maria, darling. Go.'

My little bakkie was parked a few trees away from the office, beside Jessie's red scooter. We tried to stay a bit of a distance from Hattie's Toyota Etios; I already had one ding she had made on the door of my van. My Nissan 1400 bakkie was pale blue – like the Karoo sky early in the morning. With a canopy that was white like those small puffy clouds. Though the canopy was usually more dusty than the clouds. I'd left all the windows open, and it was in the shade of a jacaranda tree, but it was still baking hot in there. It really was a day for ice cream.

I popped in at the Spar to pick up the ingredients. It was a quiet time of day so I was lucky to get out of there with only chatting to three people. Not that I mind chatting. It's just that those sweet cool dishes were calling to me quite loudly, so I couldn't listen properly.

I could smell the ripe mangoes as I drove past the farmlands, through the open veld and between the low brown hills. I turned into the dirt road that goes towards my house, drove past the eucalyptus trees and parked in my driveway, next to the lavender. Two brown chickens were lying in the shade of the geranium bush; they didn't get up to say hello.

I went into the kitchen and plonked my grocery bag on the big wooden table, then straightaway peeled six bananas and put them in a Tupperware in the freezer. Then I chopped four mangoes and put them in the freezer too. I stood over the sink to eat the flesh off the mango skins and suck their sticky pips clean. It was a messy business.

Then I crushed the hazelnuts with my wooden pestle and mortar and lightly toasted them in a pan. I tasted them while they were warm. I broke the chocolate up and put it in a double boiler. I would do the melting when the bananas were frozen. I tasted the dark chocolate. I ate some together with the nuts just to check the combination. Then I prepared some more nuts and chocolate to make up for all the testing. It would take a couple of hours for the bananas and mangoes to freeze. How was I going to wait that long? My letters. I had brought back my two letters from work.

I decided to take them outside so I could focus without distractions. I sat on the shady stoep and opened one. It was from a little girl who liked a boy and didn't know how to make friends with him. I gave her a nice easy fridge fudge recipe. Little boys never say no to fudge.

The next letter I opened said:
Oh hell, I'm such a total idiot. Please tear up that last letter. If my husband ever sees or hears about it . . . I'm a fool. Please don't publish it. Destroy it. I beg you.

What last letter? What was she afraid of? I looked at the postmark on the envelope. Ladismith. The date was two days ago. I phoned the
Gazette
, and got Jessie.

‘Hey, Tannie M,' she said.

‘Did I leave a letter on my desk?' I asked.

‘Hang on, I'll check.'

I looked at the kitchen clock while Jessie was gone. Not even an hour had passed since I'd put the bananas in the freezer.

‘No, nothing. But mail did arrive after you left. And there's a letter for you.'

‘White envelope,' I said. ‘Postmark Ladismith, sent two or three days ago?'

‘Mmm . . . ' she said. ‘Yup.'

‘I'm making some choc-nut frozen bananas,' I said. ‘If you want to pop over sometime . . . '

‘Why don't I shoot across in my lunch break? I'll bring your letter.'

‘Just right,' I said.

I didn't have a good feeling about the husband in the woman's letter. It gave me an uncomfortable worry in my belly. I decided to put something sweet in my stomach instead. The banana wasn't frozen yet, but it tasted good with the nuts and chocolate. I needed to test the recipe properly – with frozen banana and melted chocolate – so I stopped at just one banana.

To get myself out of the kitchen I put on my veldskoene, old clothes and straw hat and went into the vegetable garden. I had two pairs of veldskoene: one light khaki, which was smarter, and the other dark brown, which was better for gardening. It was like a roasting oven outside but there was a part of the garden that was in the shade of the lemon tree, and I kneeled down there and started pulling out weeds.

There were some snails on my lettuce and I chucked them onto the compost heap where the chickens would find them.

I was lucky I had good borehole water. It had been too long without rain. The Karoo sun tries to suck all the moisture out of the plants and people. But we knyp it in, holding on. The little vygies and other succulents do the best job of holding onto it. I put olive oil on my skin at night so I don't turn into dried biltong. But I don't use it when I go outside or else the sun would fry me into a Tannie Maria vetkoek.

After a while the sun was too much. I stood up and brushed the soil off my knees and washed my hands under the garden tap. I took my hat off and splashed my face with cool water and wiped it with my handkerchief. Then I went inside and put the chocolate on the double boiler to melt and took the mangoes out of the freezer. They were frozen, but not rock hard, which is just perfect. I whizzed them in the blender, then put this nice sorbet in the Tupperware and popped it back in the freezer.

I heard Jessie's scooter coming so I took the bananas out of the freezer and the melted chocolate off the stove. I used my little braai tongs to dip the frozen bananas into the bowl of dark chocolate and then roll them in the plate of toasted nuts.

Jessie grinned as she came in the kitchen.

‘Wow, Tannie M, something smells lekker. Jislaaik, what is that?'

She put her helmet and denim jacket on a kitchen chair and looked at the chocolate-nut bananas that I was putting onto wax paper. When I had done five bananas I popped them in the freezer.

‘First, our starters,' I said, and dished us two bowls of mango sorbet.

‘Ooh, this is awesome, Tannie. What's in it?'

‘Mangoes.'

‘Ja, but what else?'

‘Just mangoes.'

‘No. Really?'

‘Ja. The Zill ones are the best, but they aren't in season yet. These Tommy Atkins are very nice too. Oh, and a bit of lime juice on top, to give it that tang.'

‘Wow. Amazing.'

I put our empty bowls in the sink, and got us two plates for the main course. Jessie adjusted her belt.

‘What
is
all that stuff on your belt, Jessie?' I asked, as I dished the bananas onto our plates.

‘Mmm,' she said, patting the different pouches that hung across her hips. ‘Camera, phone, notebooks, knife, torch, pepper spray. That kind of stuff.' She was looking now at the chocolate banana. ‘That looks, um, delicious.'

‘They do look a bit funny like that,' I said. ‘Not quite right.'

‘Do we eat them with our fingers?'

‘I'm not sure,' I said. ‘I've never done this before. Here's a knife and fork . . . Wait a minute. Cream. That's what they need.' I put a big dollop of whipped cream on our plates. ‘There, that looks better.'

We started with a knife and fork but ended up using our fingers because they were too delicious to waste time fiddling.

One of the best things about Jessie is that she appreciates food. She has a sensible body with padding in the right places.

We didn't talk as we ate, but Jessie closed her eyes and moaned a bit.

‘Jislaaik,' she said, when she had finished, ‘that is the best banana I've had in my whole damn life.'

I smiled and dished up her pudding. Another frozen choc-nut banana and cream. I gave myself one too, to keep her company. I wished that I could send Jessie's sensibleness to the girl I was sending this recipe to.

Jessie cleaned the last smudges of chocolate off her plate. Then she sighed and stroked one of the geckos tattooed on her arm. She sometimes does that when she is happy.

‘I'd better get back,' she said, standing up and opening a pouch on her belt. ‘Here's your letter.'

It felt hot in my hands.

CHAPTER SIX

When Jessie left I did not even clean up; I went outside and sat on the metal chair in the shade of the lemon tree, and opened the envelope. The handwriting was the same as the other letter.

Dear Tannie Maria,

I've always enjoyed your recipes. I read them every week.

I am ashamed to be writing to you now for advice. I've made my bed and I should lie in it, but then after what's just happened . . .

I promised to love and obey this man. My husband. The love has dried up, but I do my best. He does his bit too, he pays for our son who has cerebral palsy and is in a special needs home.

The beatings only happen when he is drunk or jealous. If I don't fight back it's not too bad. He says he is sorry afterwards, which in an odd way I believe, and that he won't do it again, which I don't. Sometimes something snaps. I think it has something to do with his own father and with his time in the army. He has nightmares about the army. Not that I'm making excuses for him – I'm just saying he's not a monster.

My mouth was dry and I stood up, leaving the half-read letter on the chair. I went inside and poured myself a glass of water from the fridge. My hands were shaking a bit. My chest hurt as I swallowed. It happens when I drink cold water too fast. I went back to the letter in the garden and carried on reading.

The beatings are about once a month. The sex once a week. So I have twenty-five days a month when he doesn't bother me much. I have a lot of happy hours with my woman friend, who comes to visit when he is out. I work only two mornings a week, so am at home a lot. She and I have a kind of love for each other, though I prefer to keep it platonic.

She gave me the ducks. Three white ornamental ducks. We fixed up the pond for them to swim in.

Those ducks were the first things I've ever loved in a totally pure way. Without guilt or pain. Pure bright joy. I could just watch them for hours. Swimming. Waddling. Rooting in the grass. Lying with their beaks tucked into their feathers.

He shot them.

All three of them.

With his fucking shotgun.

They were sleeping.

I wanted to kill him. I grabbed a kitchen knife and ran at him. He held my arms, until I'd cried myself into exhaustion.

My husband had drunk a bottle of Klipdrift brandy. He was jealous of my friend and of the ducks. But the final straw was the curry I made. He said the lamb was tough and the curry too spicy. He said I didn't care about him. He was right on both counts.

Could you please give me a recipe for a good mutton curry?

And any other advice?

Yours sincerely

Bereft woman

I sat there for a long time with the letter on my lap, looking at my veldskoene, remembering things I didn't want to remember. The sun slowly chased me out of the shadow and I felt its warmth on my legs and shoulders. But I was shivering and felt cold. Then suddenly I was hot, the sun burning my skin. A wind rustled the leaves in the tree and I stood up and went inside.