Tandia (25 page)

Madam Flame Flo took the hanky and dabbed at her eyes. She was embarrassed by her outburst and at the reprimand from her older sister.

Tandia rose from her chair. 'I think I'll go for a walk,' she said quietly, in an attempt to extricate herself gracefully from the situation.

'No, please, Miss Tandy, you stay,' Madam Flame Flo sniffed, pulling her head right back. 'I'm orright now, really, it's okay, all over.' She smiled through the last of her tears. 'You can be my daughter, you hear?'

Tandia smiled back. 'What about being my Aunty? I'd like to have you as my Aunty Flo. But only if you call me Tandy.'

'That's true,' Mama Tequila chuckled. 'No more Miss Tandy, this not the right place; just Tandy from now on.'

'You got it!' Madam Flame Flo said smiling broadly.

'From now on I'm your Aunty Flo and you just plain Tandy who is beautiful and clever and has nice manners also.'

The crisis was over and Mama Tequila flipped open her cigarette case and removed a cork-tip, lit it and blew a cloud of smoke towards the ceiling. 'Ja, okay, Tandy, you go for a walk, but just be careful, you hear, all the bright boys and the tsotsis will want to make your acquaintance.'

'Juicey Fruit Mambo will want to come,' Tandia replied. She would have preferred to venture up the street alone, to feel the strange sense of freedom she'd experienced the moment they'd entered the ramshackle do-it-yourself township, but she knew Mama Tequila would expect the big black man to tag along.

'Ja, that's a damn good idea,' Mama Tequila said.

'Goodbye, Aunty Flo,' Tandia called softly to Madam Flame Flo.

Madam Flame Flo smiled. She seemed to have recovered, and she watched Tandia leave the room. 'So beautiful and so clever!' She handed the balled, wet hanky back to her sister.

Mama Tequila returned the handkerchief to her bag. 'Ja, I never seen Tandy like this before. Usually the cat got her tongue. She's a very quiet type person. I think maybe being up here on the Rand and in Sophiatown is making her different.' She turned to her sister. 'Flo, I must go lie down for my beauty sleep, you hear? I going to take three Aspro, I got a terrible headache from the drive. Is there water in my room?'

'Oh my God! I forgot the pudding!' Flo said, alarmed.

'Some pudding! Wait, you must have some. It's jelly and custard with peaches, just how you like it always!'

'No, jong,
ek is heeltemal versadig, liefling.
I don't like to eat much at lunchtime. Tonight maybe, hey?' Mama Tequila pushed her plate away, made a clearing on the table directly in front of her, and placed her handbag onto it. Then she put both her hands flat on the tablecloth and, pushing down, slowly rose from her chair. She smiled at her sister. 'We made a good start today, Flo. Here, man! This Swaziland thing, it a blerrie wonderful idea! We talk some more tonight, hey?'

There is water for washing in your room. I'll send the kitchen girl with some nice cold ice for your sore head,' Flo said, grateful that she was back in her sister's good books.

'Flo,
moenie worry nie, alles sal reg kom, liefling!'
Mama Tequila comforted her. 'Lots can happen in young love between the diamond ring and the band of gold. And don't' worry about yourself, you hear? When they going to bulldoze your house?'

'When the winter comes, June, July, maybe August. We won't have another summer in Sophiatown. This the last.'

Mama Tequila killed her cigarette in the ashtray. 'Little sister, we seen a lot of things in our time. We seen hard times and some good. But one thing I know, as long as a white policeman can be bribed - and that a long, long, time, baby - and as long as men like to get drunk and their one-eyed snake want pussy, we got no problems, only we got opportunities.' She glanced towards the door, which was something most coloured and black people seemed to do when they were about to mention the Boer government. 'Even if that bastard Strijdom tries to close us down, like he trying to close down Sophiatown! Maybe with Sophiatown he can do it. He can come in and smash everything with a big bulldozer so people's houses are just bricks and their past lies in the dust. But if he thinks he can come here and bulldoze the Van der Merwe sisters, that will be the day! He got to get up very early in the morning to do that!'

Flo was dishing out a small helping of jelly for herself. 'Maybe just a little pudding, to take with me in my room,' Mama Tequila said, and then continued. 'You know who we like, little sister? We like when you put a drop of that mercury stuff. You know, what they call it, man? Quicksilver! Remember when we was young
oubaas
we would pour some quicksilver on the linoleum and then we'd try to pick it up with our two fingers. Remember that? Well, that what we like, you and me!' Mama Tequila suddenly burst out laughing. 'As long as a man got a mouth so he can open it to drink and a one-eyed snake trying to wake up in his trousers, you and me, darling, we in business!' She took the bowl of jelly, custard and big halves of golden tinned peaches which Flo had now heaped almost to overflowing into a soup plate and, chuckling, waddled from the room.

'Slaap lekker, ousie,'
Madam Flame Flo called after her.

'Ja, I will sleep like a baby,' Mama Tequila called back.

Tandia found herself outside in the bright sunshine. January is hot on the high veld, but at nearly six thousand feet,

Johannesburg has no humidity and the air is almost always crisp and clear. Sometimes when the wind blows it raises a fine curtain of dust from the mine dumps that settles over the city and causes the skin to itch and the eyes to inflame. But these occasions are infrequent and generally the high veld climate is delightful. So at half past one on a cloudless day, despite the dirt and the piles of rubbish burning on the side of the road, the ruts and the puddles left from last night's rain in the roadway, Good Street looked bright and inviting to Tandia.

Juicey Fruit Mambo was outside beside the Packard. He'd washed it down and now it was surrounded by street urchins helping him to polish the big brown machine. They were laughing and shouting and having a high old time. Almost all the kids had a sucker stick poking from the corner of their mouths. Juicey Fruit Mambo's small-boy magic evidently worked just as well with these tough little urban kids as it did with the kids from the kraal down beside the river. He was a master of small-boy psychology, which was generally heavily slanted towards unabashed and blatant bribery.

'Have you eaten?' Tandia asked as she approached.

'Yes, Missy Tandy, plenty scoff in dis place,' Juicey Fruit Mambo answered. 'Madam Flo, she very nice madam.'

'I see you have made friends already, hey?' Tandia indicated the kids who had come to stand around the big black man and now stared shyly at her. She lifted her hand in a signal of friendship, waggling her fingers. 'Hi, everyone!'

'Good afternoon, miss!' they chorussed. It was a classroom routine which neither they nor she had expected and both parties seemed surprised at the spontaneous reaction. Juicey Fruit Mambo grinned. 'Eh, eh, eh! Dis boys dey big skelms, but I tink dey my friend, also.' He suddenly looked serious. 'You want to go somewhere, Missy Tandy?'

'Just for a walk. You can stay if you like, I'll be all right on my own.'

Juicey Fruit Mambo looked shocked. 'Dis very bad place, Missy Tandy. You not walk by yourself, plenty tsotsi boys in dis place!'

Tandia loved Juicey Fruit Mambo too much to protest, and they set off down the street followed by at least a dozen urchins of various shades, the darkest of them seemingly a full African while the lightest, despite the dirt that seemed to cover him from head to toe, was unmistakably a tousle-headed blond with blue eyes.

'Dis skelms, dey ask for me, is dis young missus a fillim star? Ja, for sure! I say. Ja, ja, dey tell to me also, we know dis, we hear dat big fat mama how she talk Americano language!'

'Juicey Fruit Mambo! You shouldn't say such things, they'll tell grown-up people and then we'll get into trouble!' Juicey Fruit Mambo began to laugh uproariously and all the kids joined in, not knowing why he was laughing but prepared to share in the merriment of their new friend. After all, he had bought them suckers all round at the coolies' and told them about his magic gold teeth. Which of course, they knew was a heap of crap, but a person couldn't let a good story like that go past when it came from someone who looked after a Packard and also a big, fat American fillim star and a very pretty young one who could possibly be just about anyone a person could see on the fillims.

'Maybe she's Snow White!' Flyspeck Mendoza, a dark-eyed, dark-skinned, curly-haired kid said gravely.

Dog Poep Ismali, whose father had a bicycle shop in Annadale Street, objected, 'Ag, man! Snow White wasn't a real person! She was just pitchers
drawn
with a pencil and coloured in! You can ask my sister, if you like? You mad if you think there is real people who is dwarves like Grumpy and Dopey?'

Too Many Fingers Bembi, the small black boy who looked like a pure African, giggled. 'Your stupid brother who is gezonked in the head looks like one of them dwarves and he is dopey!'

The kids all laughed, but Dog Poep Ismali, who was the cleverest in the class, ignored them. 'I think she definitely the one riding the black horse in
National Velvet.
That for sure, man!' To emphasise his certainty, he added, 'Only she was much younger then, now she's grown up some more.' Dog Poep offered this observation as though he was fitting the last piece of absolute proof into place.

They all instantly agreed with him, even those of them who hadn't seen the picture. Dog Poep had a sister who worked as an usherette at the Odin bioscope and so he was considered a bit of an authority on the fillims. Besides, they all very much wanted to believe him.

'Why you laughing, Juicey Fruit Mambo? You told them something you shouldn't have, didn't you?'

'Dis boys, dey want for you to marry,' Juicey Fruit Mambo giggled. Then he beckoned to one of the older boys. 'You tell for Missy Tandy, who you want for her to marry, okay?'

'What's your name?' Tandia asked the small boy who had stepped forward. He was too dark to pass for white. His matted hair was brown and curly and his eyes a lighter coloured brown than Bantu. His shirt was dirty and it missed two buttons and the pocket of his equally dirty shorts was tom.

Taking a raspberry sucker from his mouth the boy smiled as he answered, 'Johnny Tambourine, miss!' Then, resting his head on his shoulder, he looked up at her cheekily and asked, 'Have you come from Hollywood to marry Gideon Mandoma, miss?'

The kids must have seen how she instinctively reacted to the buyer's name, for they all started to laugh. Of course, that was it! Mandoma, the welterweight who had lost a disputed title-fight decision to Geldenhuis, must live in Sophiatown. The brown-eyed kid was talking about one of the two boxers Patel had rated higher than any other amateurs he'd seen in the ring.

'Mandoma, the welterweight? He lives here?' Tandia asked.

'Ja, miss, he's the best in the world! Welterweight champion of black Africa and also really the white champion because he was rooked!' Johnny Tambourine said this vehemently. 'It's God's truth! They
verneuked
him, miss. My uncle was there, he saw the whole fight. Mandoma won every round!'

Several of the other kids chorussed, 'It's true, miss, they rooked him!'

'They gave the title to the policeman whose name is Geldenhuis,' Dog Poep Ismali explained gravely, bringing a little sensible consideration into the emotional outburst. 'It was because Gideon Mandoma is a kaffir they wouldn't give it to him. The whites don't want a kaffir who could beat a white man, miss.'

At the mention of Geldenhuis's name Tandia had gone cold. He was still there, the dark shadow that never went away. She shook her head and skipped down the road ahead of the kids. She hadn't skipped like this since she'd been a little kid herself and it helped to erase the policeman's footprints in her mind.

'I don't even know Gideon Mandoma! How can I marry him if I don't know him?' she called back, covering her sudden apprehension with laughter.

'Easy, miss! You can meet him any time you want, he's a big friend of ours!' Johnny Tambourine, who seemed to assume the mantle as leader, called after her. Then all the kids, pushing their hoop-and-wire contraptions, took off after her yelling and laughing.

'Ja, he's our friend!' they shouted happily.

Tandia started to run down the road, her arms spread wide. 'Not today, thank you. Today I want you to show me all around the place, okay?'

Johnny Tambourine was the first to catch up with her. 'You can join our gang if you like, miss?' he offered.

Tandia stopped and turned. Thank you, I'd like that, that's very nice of you, Johnny!'

'Johnny Tambourine, miss, that's my name. You see my pa plays in the Harlem Swingsters with Gwigwi the Clarinet player at Balanski's Picture Palace, that's how I got my name.' He was certain that Tandia would be impressed.

'Oh, I'm sorry Mr Tambourine whose first name is Johnny. I promise on my word of honour it won't happen again.'

'You can be our
nooi!'
Flyspeck Mendoza suggested, giggling.

'Of course!' Tandia replied. She looked serious for a moment. 'Unless of course you've got some other girls for sweethearts?'