The Smell of Apples: A Novel (2 page)

uniforms from all our country's wars in the museum. You can see big wooden dolls that have been dressed up in uniform, and if you walk slowly from one showcase to the next, and if you read the notices carefully, you can get to know our whole history, just by knowing the uniforms and the different wars. I wrote an essay for school about it, and Miss Engelbrecht gave me nine and a half out of ten. She said that in all her years of teaching she's never given anyone else such high marks for an essay, and one could see how well I knew the subject I wrote about. She said she would submit the essay to the school annual at the end of the year, so now I'm holding thumbs because I know how proud Dad will be of me.

While we were in the museum, we also looked at the gigantic dinosaurs and the stuffed-up fish. There's a huge black marlin right at the very back of one of the showcases. Once, in the deep-sea at Hangklip, Dad caught a black marlin that was almost a False Bay record.

In one of the smaller showcases there are also some ancient photographs of the Kalkbay whaling station. I love it when Jan Bandjies tells me old whaling stories, and I wondered whether one of the whalers holding a harpoon in the photograph was one of his ancestors. I told Jan that he should come to the museum one day to look at the photos and to see whether it was his family. Then he could also see how small the harpoons were that the whalers used to kill the whales. When I asked Mum whether we could take Jan to look, she said we could think of doing that, but she wasn't sure whether Coloureds are allowed into the museum. I told Jan and he said it doesn't matter, and I'm forever making too much of a fuss about the fish anyway. I told him that whales aren't fish, because they have live babies. But Jan said they're close enough to fish to be called fish and from then on I've also been calling them fish.

Mark Behr

'I wish they'd catch a whale and stuff it up,' Frikkie said, while we stood looking at the harpoons. He spoke softly because you don't raise your voice in a museum.

'A whale would never fit in here!' I answered.

'Did you know a whale's thing is eight feet long?' Frikkie asked, and I got irritated with him for suddenly thinking he knows something about whales.

'What thing do you mean?' I asked.

He looked at me and said: 'Its thing, man!' and he patted the front of his school trousers where his John Thomas is. 'Its bloody cock is over eight feet long. Did you know?' I looked up to see whether anyone had heard what he said.

'You're mad, man. Eight feet is taller than Dad . . .'

'I swear it's true. I saw it in the National Geographic?

'That's impossible! That's as long as me and you put together. Where have you ever heard of a fish with such a big one?'

'I swear before Jesus Christ it's true!'

'Don't swear like that!' I said.

For a while he was quiet, then he said: 'It isn't cursing if you swear on the truth.'

'It is,' I answered. 'Our Sunday-school teacher says it's a sin even when you just say Good Lord"

By the time we got outside into the bright sunlight, Frikkie was still going on: 'Well, when my dad's angry he sometimes says Jesus Christ"

'Then your dad's going to hell one day,' I said, because I know that it's one of the greatest commandments, never to take the name of the Lord in vain. It's one of those sins where the punishment gets carried from one generation to the next. Even if you don't take the name of the Lord in vain yourself, but your great grandfather did, you'll still be punished for it.

'Are you trying to say my dad's going to hell?' Frikkie

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asked, and came to a standstill with his hands on his hips.

'Exactly/ I said, and carried on walking up Victoria Road with Lions Head in the distance. He followed when I spoke again: 'And all of you will end up going as well . . . Your mother and you and Lou-Marie and I think Gloria -and even Chaka - because the Bible says: You and your whole family together with your servants and your livestock will burn in the everlasting fire. I think dogs, like Chaka, are included under livestock.'

He was quiet for a while. When we turned up Orange Street towards Table Mountain, he said: 'Tonight I'm going to tell my dad you say he's going to hell.' And he walked up ahead of me.

I made as if I didn't care, even though I wasn't sure what would happen if he told his father. I caught up with him and said: 'If you tell your dad, then I'll tell my dad that you said bloody cock.' When he didn't answer, I added: 'And I'll tell him that you smooched with Zelda Kemp.'

'You liar! When did I smooch her?'

'At the tidal pool. Last time we were there. I saw you, you were holding her hand underwater.'

'You liar! It's you she's after. You felt all sorry for her when she howled about nothing at your birthday party . . .'

'You're crazy, Frikkie,' I said, and we walked home in silence.

As we went through their garden gate it was Frikkie who spoke first: 'If you don't say anything about the cock, then I won't say anything about the hell.'

It's over.

Southern Angola, which forces you in other seasons to search for a dry spot, has become a sea of dust and desperation.

Mark Behr

The explosions and thunder of Cuban MiGs, invisibly shattering the blue sky just north of us, get closer every day. I don't know how long we'll be able to hold out. The messages coming in from the South African side of the border are disordered and riddled with contradictions.

No one knows what to believe any longer.

We were instructed by radio to get the troops battle-ready. It seems we 're going to attempt breaking through. In the distance we can hear increased bombing and artillery movement. The commander's voice over the radio said that we should prepare ourselves for The Battle of Africa.

I called together the sergeants and section leaders and instructed them to prepare the extended platoon. While I spoke, I could see the flicker of simultaneous thrill and fear in every set of eyes. After weeks of aimless waiting for a sign - anything to relieve the deadening listless-ness - the time has come. Again there is reason to understand our presence here. Once more it is a choice between life and death. Gone is the heavy lassitude of heat, the smell of dust, of merely awaiting the instruction from above.

At Newlands, Eddie Barlow's team is doing a good job of showing the British how cricket was meant to be played, but because the whole world hates South Africa, the Springboks were forced to postpone their tour against the All Blacks.

Dad says Nixon will be out of the White House before Christmas and it looks like the Americans are going to lose the war against the communists in Vietnam. Dad says it's typical of the Americans to try and prescribe to the Republic how we should run our country while their own

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president is such a rubbish. Dad says you don't tell someone else how to make his bed when your own house looks like a pigsty.

Use is almost six years older than me and on her way to Standard Ten at Jan Van Riebeeck High. At the annual prize-giving on the last day before the December holidays, she'll hear if she's going to be head girl for next year. The head girl business is a big thing, not only because Jan Van Riebeeck is the oldest Afrikaans school in the country, but also because Dad was head boy when he went to school there.

Mum says that Use is very mature for her age, and that she can even teach her teachers a thing or two, specially about literature and classical music. Even though Use never gets her nose out of her books, she isn't a drip like other bookworms, because she plays netball and does athletics, and besides that she's also very pretty. Drips have to be ugly, like the Jewish twins, David and Martin Spiro, who live down the road from us. Every year at the eisteddfod, Use also walks off with all the Golden Diplomas for singing and piano. Last year she was even awarded a scholarship from the Dutch Foundation to study singing in Holland for six weeks. Ever since she went overseas, she fancies herself to be all grown up, and she irritates me with all her claptrap. Because she's so good at everything she does, she's much too big for her boots and she always treats me like I'm still a pipsqueak. When she ignores me, or when she belittles me, I wish I could be older, just to give her a good dose of her own medicine. But if I could be older, I'd want Frikkie to be older as well.

I'm still in primary school and after the December holidays I'll be in Standard Four. Dad says I'll have to deliver the goods if I want to follow in Use's footsteps. But he says he's not too worried about me, because I'm doing well in

Mark Behr

all my school subjects, and I've also been the vice-captain of my rugby team every year since Standard One.

Just before my birthday, Dad became the youngest major-general ever in the history of the South African Defence Force. After his promotion was announced, Mum cut her long blonde hair so that it just touched her shoulders. Before that she'd always worn it stacked on top of her head in big curls.

'The short hair is my gift to myself. They swept the hairspray right out of the door with the chopped hair,' Mum said, on the evening of Dad's promotional dinner. She stood in front of the mirror, slipping her long golden earrings through the holes in her earlobes. She tossed her blonde hair to one side, and pushed the tiny hooks through, first left, then right. She was wearing the long purple evening dress she'd had designed specially for the occasion by Elsbieta Rosenworth. It was Mum's first real designer dress since she and Dad were married.

Because of Dad's important work, him and Mum have to go to lots of dinners and all kinds of official functions. Sometimes we go and sit on their big double bed and watch as they get dressed before going out. Because the promotional dinner was such a big to-do, and also because Mum was wearing her new dress that night, Use and I went into their bedroom to watch them get ready. While Use watched Mum doing her face I went into the bathroom where Dad was shaving.

Dad was using Oupa's old shaving brush to lather his chin in quick little circles. The handle of Dad's shaving brush is inlaid with ivory from the bottom ends of tusks of an elephant that Oupa shot next to the Ruvu in Tanganyika. The tusks are mounted on either side of the fireplace in our lounge. Dad's hair was combed back with tonic. Even though my hair is still fair, I know it will go

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dark like his when I get older, because on Uncle Samuel's photographs and slides of Tanganyika, where Dad is still a boy, you can see his hair also used to be light.

I watched Dad in the mirror, and I wished I was old enough to shave. The shaving cream always smells so fresh and strong. Because Dad is six feet tall, he has to bend forward to see into the mirror. The razor crossed his chin and slid down close to his white collar. I watched it closely, and every time it went down I wondered if a drop of bright red blood might appear on the stretch of cleared skin. Dad's chin is almost completely square and Mum says you can know by just looking at it, that a man with a chin like that should be in uniform.

'Aren't you scared of cutting yourself, Dad?' I asked, and he peered down at me, and stretched his eyes wide as if he was really scared of cutting himself.

'No, my boy. When you start shaving one day, Dad will show you how. Once you've drawn blood a couple of times you'll quickly get the hang of things.'

'Did Oupa teach you how to shave?' I asked while Dad wiped the last shaving cream from his face.

'Oh yes, in this same bathroom. But then of course the shower hadn't been put in.' And he nodded his head towards the cubicle where we usually take a shower together.

'Without those curls you look much younger, Mummy,' Use said. Both of us sat on the bed looking at Mum dabbing perfume behind her ears.

'Thanks, my girl.' She smiled into the mirror. Mum looked so pretty in her purple dress, that I couldn't help staring. Not that Mum isn't always pretty. But on that night she looked even more beautiful than Frikkie Delport's mother who came second in the Miss South Africa competition. Everyone in Jan Van Riebeeck thinks

Mark Behr

Frikkie's mother is the prettiest woman in the Cape, but on that evening I knew they'd think differently if they could have seen Mum. And anyway, Mum's hair is naturally blonde, not like Frikkie's mother who sometimes has black roots showing under her false hairpiece full of curls. I've heard that they make those things of horses' hair or corpse hair. But I'd never say that to Frikkie, because we've been taught that unless we have something good to say about someone, we shouldn't say anything at all.

Mum leaned forward to put on her lipstick. The purple dress fell open slightly and I could see into the dark valley between her breasts. They looked big, white and soft. I shot a quick glance at Use to check whether she saw what I was looking at.

'Mum, you look like Miss South Africa tonight,' I said, and Mum turned back from the mirror to smile at me.

'Thank you, my little piccanin. That's a big compliment!' And Mum and Use laughed, maybe because they didn't really think it was such a compliment. Mum says it's mostly a certain kind of woman who goes in for things like the Miss South Africa competition. Of course Mrs Delpprt is an exception and Penny Coelen as well. Penny Coelen is one of the few decent ones, and the only one who became Miss World. These beauty queens usually get married to rich casanovas. I heard Mum say that Mitzi Stander, who was also Miss South Africa, died in a car crash the other day. She was hardly in her grave when Die Burger had an article about her husband already going out with the new Miss Orange Free State. Mum said we could only pray that Mitzi's own slate with the Lord was clean when she died.

Dad came into the bedroom dressed in his black penguin suit.

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'And how do I look?' he asked, and crossed over the carpet so that we could take a good look from all sides. His dark moustache was trimmed and his mouth stood out more clearly.

'Daddy, you look like Sean Connery,' said Use.

'Ja,' I added, feeling so proud because Dad was becoming a general, 'Dad looks just as pretty as Mum.'