has a good job in the Ministry of Information and an apartment, and I will box professionally to earn enough to live on until I can begin my career as a lawyer. Then we will return to South Africa. You have planned it all, Uncle Tromp sighed, and Manfred nodded; his eyebrow was still knotted with crusty black scab, and he would be scarred for life. He touched the injury now as he asked, You will not deny me your permission, will you, Uncle Tromp? we will marry before you leave to go home, and we both want you to be the one to marry us. I am flattered. Uncle Tromp looked distraught. He knew this lad, how stubborn he was once he had set on a course.
To argue further would merely confirm his decision.
You are a father to me, Manfred said simply. And yet more than a father. Your blessing would be a gift without price. Manie! Manie! said Uncle Tromp. You are the son I never had, I want only what is best for you. What can I say to persuade you to wait a little - not to rush into this thing. There is nothing which will dissuade me. Manie, think of your Aunt Trudi, I know she would want me to be happy, Manfred cut in.
Yes, I know she would. But, Manie, think also of little Sarah, 'What of her? Manfred's eyes went fierce and cold and he thrust out his jaw, defiant with his own guilt.
Sarah loves you, Manie. She has always loved you, even I have been able to see that. Sarah is my sister, and I love her. I love her with a brother's love. I love Heidi with the love of a man, and she loves me as a woman loves. I think you are wrong, Manie. I have always thought that you and Sarah, Enough, Uncle Tromp. I don't want to hear any more. I will marry Heidi, I hope with your permission and blessing.
Will you make those your wedding gifts to us, please, Uncle Tromp? And the old man nodded heavily, sadly. I give you both my permission and my blessing, my son, and I will marry you with a joyous heart.
Heidi and Manfred were married on the bank of the Havel
Lake in the garden of Colonel Sigmund Boldt's home in the Granewald. It was a golden afternoon in early September with the leaves turning yellow and red at the first touch of autumn. To be there both Uncle Tromp and Roelf Stander had stayed over when the Olympic teams scattered for home, and Roelf stood up with Manfred as his best man while Uncle Tromp conducted the simple ceremony.
Heidi was an orphan so Sigmund Boldt gave her away, and there were a dozen or so of Heidi's friends, most of them her superiors and colleagues in the Ministry of Propaganda and Information, but there were others, her cousins and more distant relatives in the black dress uniforms of the elite SS divisions, or the blue of the Luftwaffe or the field grey of the Wehrmacht, and pretty girls, some of them in the traditional peasant-style dirndls of which the Nazi Party so strongly approved.
After the short and simple Calvinistic ceremony that Uncle Tromp conducted, there was an al fresco wedding banquet provided by Colonel Boldt, under the trees, with a four-piece band wearing Tyrolean hats and lederhosen. They played the popular Party-approved music of the day, alternating with traditional country airs, and the guests danced on the temporary wooden floor which had been laid over the lawn.
Manfred was so absorbed with the lovely new wife in his arms that he did not notice the sudden excitement amongst the other guests, or the way that Colonel Boldt hurried to greet the small party that was coming down from the house, until suddenly the band broke into the stirring marching song of the Nazi Party, the Horst Wessel song, All the wedding guests were on their feet, standing rigidly to attention, and though he was puzzled, Manfred stopped dancing and stood to attention with Heidi at his side. As the small party of new arrivals stepped onto the temporary wooden dance floor, all the guests raised their arms in the Nazi salute and cried together, Heil Hitler! Only then did Manfred realize what was happening, the incredible honour that he and Heidi were being accorded.
The man coming towards him wore a white jacket buttoned high at the throat with the simple Iron Cross for valour its only decoration. His face was pale, square and strong; his dark hair was brushed forward over his high forehead, and there was a small clipped moustche under the large well-shaped nose. it was not an extraordinary face, but the eyes were like no others Manfred had ever seen, they seared his soul with their penetrating intensity, they reached to his heart and made him a slave for ever.
His right hand was still encased in plaster as he held the Nazi salute and Adolf Hitler smiled and nodded. I have heard that you are a friend of Germany, Herr De La Rey, he said.
I am of German blood, a true friend and your most ardent admirer.
I can find no words to describe the great but humble honour I feel in your presence. I congratulate you on your courageous victory over the American negro. Adolf Hitler held out his hand. And I congratulate you also on your marriage to one of the lovely daughters of the Reich. Manfred took the Fuhrrer's hand in his own undamaged left hand and he was trembling and filled with awe by the significance of the moment. 'I wish you great joy, Hitler continued, and may your marriage forge iron links between yourself and the German people. The Fahrer's hand was cool and dry, the strong yet elegant hand of an artist, and Manfred's emotions welled up to choke him. Always, my Fuhrer, the links between us will last for ever. Adolf Hitler nodded once more, shook hands with Heidi, smiled at her joyous tears, and then he was leaving as suddenly as he had arrived, with a word and a smile for a few of the most important guests.
I never dreamed -'whispered Heidi, clinging to Manfred's arm. 'My happiness is complete. That is greatness, Manfred said, watching him go. That is true greatness. It is hard to think he is mere mortal, and not a god!
Sarah Bester pedalled down the main street of the little village of Stellenbosch, weaving through the light traffic, smiling and waving at anybody she recognized on the sidewalks. Her school books were strapped on the carrier behind the saddle of her bicycle. The skirt of her gymshp billowed up almost as high as her knees, and she had to keep clutching at her school hat.
That morning her class had been given the results of the previous term's work and she was bursting with the need to tell Aunt Trudi that she had pulled up from fifth to second place. The headmistress had noted on her school report, Well done, Sarah, keep up the good work. It was her last year, in October she would be seventeen and she would write her matriculation the next month.
Manie would be so proud of her. It was his inspiration and encouragement which had done so much to make her one of the top girls in the school. She started to think about him now, daydreaming as she pedalled along under the oaks. He had been away so long, but soon he would be home; then she would tell him and it would all be all right. She wouldn't have to worry and cry alone at night. Manie would be back - strong, kind, loving Manie would make it all right again.
She thought of being married to him, cooking his breakfast, washing his shirts, darning his socks, walking to church at his side, calling him Meneer the way Aunt Trudi called Uncle Tromp, lying beside him every night, waking beside him every morning and seeing his beautiful blond head on the pillow beside her, and she knew there was nothing else in all the world she wanted.
Only Manie, she whispered. Always and only Manie. He is all I have ever had, all I have ever longed for. Ahead of her she saw the postman at the gate of the manse and she jumped down off the bicycle and called, Have you got
