White Dog Fell From the Sky (37 page)

“Who
are
these
people?”

“I don’t know that either. They
know Isaac.”

“Who’s Isaac?”

“My gardener. The man who disappeared.
Is there more there?”

Pet picked up the letter again.
“Please inform us immediately that the pickup has been successful.” She
turned the page over. “Then they give their phone number. It’s signed
Hendrik Pretorius.” She looked at Alice. “How well do you know
Isaac?”

“As I said, he was my
gardener.”

“Was he involved with the
ANC?”

“He may have been. I don’t
know.”

“If I were you, I’d throw this
letter away and have nothing more to do with it.”

You’re not me, thought Alice. She
always hated it when people said “if I were you.”

“It sounds to me like an arms
shipment. I’m telling you, I’d have nothing whatsoever to do with this. The
ANC is full of desperate individuals.”

And why are they desperate? thought Alice.
Because they’ve been fucked over all their lives. And they haven’t a
goddamned thing to lose. “It’s not necessarily arms,” she said.
“And if it is, I’ll leave them there.” She stood up. “I really
appreciate your time and your help.”

“To tell you the truth,” said
Pet, “I regret helping you.” She handed over the letter. “Promise me
that you won’t meet that train.”

Alice said nothing.

“Listen,” said Pet, “I
hardly know you. But I know South Africa. To be perfectly blunt, you wouldn’t know
squat about what goes on there.”

“I appreciate your help. I’m
sorry if I’ve upset you.”

The shipment was three days away. She damn
well would meet that
train. She went home and found that the
electricity had gone off all over the Old Village. Itumeleng had left dinner on the
table for her, covered with a dish towel, but she wasn’t hungry. She got up to
call the phone number in the letter, but there was no dial tone. That was nothing
new.

The next day she kept trying. On the evening
of March 25, hours before she was to meet the train, she dialed again, and this time the
call went through. A man’s voice answered in Afrikaans, the voice shaded, deep,
elderly. “I don’t speak Afrikaans,” Alice said. “Do you speak
English?”

“Of course.”

She explained where she was calling from and
that Isaac had worked for her as a gardener until he’d disappeared. And she
apologized for opening his mail.

“Where’s Isaac?”

“He’s been deported. The police
believed he was a double agent.”

For a moment, Alice thought the phone had
gone dead. When Hendrik spoke again, his voice was raspy. “I’ve known Isaac
since he was a young boy. He’s never been anything but exemplary. This
couldn’t be worse. God help him … What did you say your name
was?”

“Alice Mendelssohn.”

“Alice, what are your
circumstances?”

“I’m an American. I work for the
Botswana government.”

“Are you married?”

“No.”

“Are you strong?”

The question took her by surprise.
“Physically?”

“No, I mean strong.”

“Yes, I suppose I am.”

“I must ask my wife … no,
there’s nothing to be done. The shipment is already on its way. I can’t give
you the details. My phone may be compromised. All I can tell you is that this is
extremely problematic. Isaac’s mother has worked for us for years. She and my wife
and I deliberated about what was the right thing to do. We had no idea he wouldn’t
be there. Can you meet the train?”

“Yes, but what do I look for?”

“I think it will be apparent once the
train has unloaded and the platform has emptied. And please call.” The
conversation felt wooly, dreamlike.

“When?”

“As soon as possible. Whatever
happens.”

“Yes, I’ll be there. I’ll
let you know.” She rang off.

After dinner, she walked over to Will and
Greta’s house, carrying a flashlight, needing to be surrounded by the chaos of a
prospering family. It was Friday night and the kids were still up, the littlest one in
tears over a broken arrow. “Never mind,” Will said. “I’ll make
you a new one.”

“But it won’t be the same. There
won’t ever be one like this one.” His son cradled the broken bits in his
arms.

“You’re right, there will never
be one just the same. But listen Bronco-roo, it’s past your bedtime, and your
mother and I want to talk to Alice.”

“Why can’t I talk to
her?”

“You wouldn’t be talking.
You’d be shouting. Now get your pajamas on. Now. I mean it.”

He went off.

Greta poured a glass of Stellenbosch for
each of them and sat down and put her feet up on a stool. Then the little one was back,
staggering with fatigue. “Come on, tiger,” Greta said.
“Bedtime.”

He began to cry. “I’m not tired,
not a bit tired.”

Greta laughed. “I’ve never seen
such a tired boy. C’mon now, I’ll read to you about the mouse dentist who
tricked the fox who had the sore tooth.”

“And he was going to eat the mouse
after the mouse fixed his tooth.” He stumbled after her.

The two bigger boys were still outside, up a
tree. Will called them in. They stood in the middle of the living room like wild
animals, cornered, having to be polite. Soon, they disappeared into their room.

“Just watching you makes me
tired,” Alice said.

“You find your groove. They’re
good kids. The problem is they have ten times the energy we do. Did you never want kids
of your own?”

“It never happened. Probably a good
thing considering how things have turned out.”

“The only good thing about no kids is
that you’re not stuck having to be nice to Lawrence the rest of your life.”
She thought of what a child of Ian’s and hers would have been like. Fierce,
curious, lively. Don’t go there, she told herself. She took a gulp of wine.
“So. Something’s happened. A letter came for Isaac.”

Greta came back into the room.
“He’s conked. We didn’t get three pages into the story.” Will
handed over her glass of wine and she sank into a chair.

“A letter came for Isaac,” Will
said.

“I had Petronella translate it. It was
in Afrikaans.”

“Who?”

“Pet. I think you’d know her, at
least by sight. That tidy, uptight South African woman? She was very unhappy with the
contents. I just spoke to the man from Pretoria who sent the letter. A shipment is
coming tomorrow by train, but he couldn’t tell me what was in it. He thought his
phone might be tapped.”

“It sounds like arms.”

“I don’t know. I’m meeting
the train tomorrow.”

“Is that wise?”

“I promised.”

“Do you want me to come?” Will
asked.

“Thanks, but I don’t want to get
you into trouble. I’ll leave it on the platform and call the police if it looks
dangerous.”

“You won’t do anything
foolish,” said Greta.

Alice laughed. “Spoken like a true
mother.”

“And you’ll let us
know?”

“Of course.”

“How
are
you?” Greta
asked.

She had another swallow of wine and set down
her glass, unable to speak for a moment. “I’m managing. When I think about
him, sometimes I almost can’t breathe. Like trying to get my breath
underwater.”
She really meant like trying to breathe under sand.
Too often, she imagined his body, the sand clogging his nose, his mouth. The thought of
him suffocating took her to a place beyond bearing, as insane as she knew it was. She
rubbed her face with her open palms.

“My mother called. She wants me to
come home.”

“And?”

“I told her no.”

She’d been standing on the platform
since half past three. The train was already over an hour late. The heat rose up through
the soles of her sandals, and her stomach turned over. She felt that whatever was coming
down the tracks would change her life irrevocably. She thought of Ian, ready for
anything, heart wide open. Next to him, she felt cautious, slow to trust. It was one of
the things she’d loved about him—how he’d made her unafraid.

All at once, it seemed the activity around
her increased. Porters appeared, an old man with a large metal container of milk tea
shuffled onto the platform. She felt the train’s presence at a distance before she
saw it. Then the single light far down the tracks. She stood up a little straighter and
took a step back. It was closer, and then very close. People crowded the platform, and
the noise of the steam engine and huge pistons engulfed the crowd. The brakes screeched,
the steam spread out over them like a vision from hell. As the steam cleared, passengers
began to pour down the steps of the train carrying suitcases, paper bags, boxes wrapped
with string, chickens in crates. She peered into faces, searching for a person with a
question mark to match hers. A pair of lovers embraced, weeping, and Alice’s eyes
pooled to see their happiness.

The platform began to clear. She walked up
and down searching for Isaac’s name among the parcels that railway workers had
loaded into the large-wheeled iron carts. The hubbub subsided. A couple of skinny boys
came and pushed the iron carts toward the freight office, and she
was
left standing on the quiet platform. She was thirsty, exhausted. There was nothing here.
She’d go home and call Hendrik Pretorius.

Just then, she caught sight of a boy and
girl huddled together beside a wooden coal bin. The boy, who appeared to be about seven
or eight, had an arm protectively around the girl. His legs were spindly and looked
dusted with ash; his eyes were bright as a bird’s. The girl’s hair was
neatly plaited in a dozen or more sticking-out braids, each one finished off with a
different colored plastic barrette. She looked a year or two younger than the boy. Her
blue dress was faded almost to white at the shoulders, too small for her, so the fabric
was rucked across her chest. She’d lost a shoe and stood on one foot, her bare
instep resting on the top of a white plastic sandal.

As Alice approached them, she saw that the
girl was trembling.

“Isaac?” she asked them.
“Isaac?
A o itse
Isaac?” Do you know Isaac?

“Isaac
o kae?
” the boy
asked eagerly. Where is he?

“
Ga ke itse,
” Alice
said. I don’t know.

The girl began to cry.

“Isaac,” Alice repeated.
“Come with me.
Tla kwano.
Come.

“Come,” she said again.

The boy took the girl’s hand and
pulled her along.

The girl nearly refused to get into the
truck, and she whimpered all the way down the road to the Old Village. Alice sat them
both down at the big wooden table in the kitchen and scrambled four eggs, thinking that
might be a familiar food. They ate it. And toast with butter and jam. Then she made
mealie meal porridge, and they ate that and drank two glasses of milk each.

When they’d finished, Alice pointed to
herself. “Alice.
Leina la gago ke mang?
”

“Moses,” said the boy.

“Moses,” she repeated.
“Moses.” He smiled.

She asked the girl her name. There was no
reply.

“Lulu,” said the boy.

“That’s a nice name,” said
Alice. “Lulu.”

“Isaac
o kae?
” asked
Moses. Where is Isaac?

“
Ga ke itse.
”

“Isaac
o kae?
” Moses
asked again.

“Wait a moment.” Alice walked
out behind the house to Itumeleng’s servant’s quarters.
“Itumeleng?!” she called. “Can you come?”

Lulu would not close her eyes. The chair
felt hard on her bottom, and her heart beat wildly. She felt she might be sick. It would
have been better not to eat that white woman’s food. She had gone outside calling
to someone, but what would she come back carrying? Back home she had heard stories of
enchantresses who lure children to their homes and put them in the stove and eat them.
They fatten children with food that cannot be resisted, and when they are
fat … zoop! The enchantresses are sweet, like the food. They find children
wandering in the desert without their mothers, in trouble, and they are kind and smile
like this white woman.

Moses was not clever. If something
glittered, he took it in his hand without thinking, but there are things that glitter
that you must never take in your hand. She would not eat any more food in this
place.

She understood now that her mother had lied
to them. She told them that Isaac was not far away, that he was working in a place near
where they would go to school. They would not have to speak Afrikaans at this school,
and the teachers would be kind and not beat them. They would live with Isaac during the
week, and they would come to their granny on the weekends. The place was not far away,
she said. They would like it there. The night before they were to leave, Lulu heard her
mother weeping. She had come from Pretoria to see them in Bophuthatswana. “Never
mind,” she said when Lulu asked her why she was crying. “You will get a good
education.”

“How will we get home?”

“You will come by train. Don’t
worry. It is not far. Isaac will put you on the train.”

“But why have you given me a knapsack?
The children who go to school have only small sacks.”

“You are going to a special school.
Now be quiet and listen to me. These are the papers that you must give to the conductor
when you
are going on the train … Moses!
Tla
kwano! …
I am giving these papers to Lulu not to lose them. If the
conductor asks where you are going, say you are going to stay with your brother in
Gaborone. If the conductor asks if you are from South Africa, you must say, ‘No, I
am from Botswana, I have only been visiting my granny in South Africa.’ Can you
remember this?”

Lulu nodded her head.

“Moses, where are you from?”

He grinned. “From
Bophutatswana.”

She cuffed him on the side of his head.
“It’s not a funny joke. You are not from Bophuthatswana.”