communist.
Manfred had a finely tuned style of oratory, and he thrust out his jaw and flashed those topaz-coloured eyes, he wagged his finger at them, and stood with arms defiantly akimbo when they stood up to applaud him at the end.
Shasa's style was different, relaxed and friendly, and when he tried his first joke, they responded with genuine amusement. He followed it with assurances that the government would increase the already generous subsidy for farm products, especially wool and wheat, and that they would at the same time foster local industry and explore new overseas markets for the country's raw materials, particularly wool and wheat. He ended by telling them that many English speakers were coming to realize that the salvation of the country lay in strong uncompromising government and predicted a substantial increase in the Nationalist majority.
This time there was no reservation in the tumultuous applause that followed his speech, and the votes of confidence in the government, the National Party and the Nationalist candidate for South Boland were all carried unanimously. The entire district, including the United Party supporters, turned up for the free barbecue on the local rugby grounds, to which Shasa invited them. Two whole oxen were roasted on the spit and were washed down with lakes of Castle beer and rivers of mampoer, the local peach brandy.
Tara sat with the women, looking meek and demure and speakiJ little, allowing the older women to develop pleasantly matern feelings towards her, while Shasa circulated amongst their husband talking knowledgeably about such momentous subjects as scale ( wheat and scab on sheep. The whole atmosphere was cosy and reassu ing, and for the first time Shasa was able to appreciate the depth planning by the party organizers, their dedication and commitmel to the Nationalist cause, which resulted in this degree of mobilizatio of all its resources. The United Party could never match it, for tk English speakers were complacent and lethargic when it came t politics. It was the old English fault of wanting never to appear t try too hard. Politics was a kind of sport and every gentleman kne that sport should be played only by amateurs.
'No wonder we lost control,' Shasa thought. 'These chaps or professionals, and we just couldn't match them' - and then he checke himself. These were his organizers now, no longer the enemy. H had become a part of this slick, highly tuned political machine, am the knowledge was a little daunting.
At last, with Tara at his side, Shasa made a round of goodnight: with a party organizer steering him tactfully to each of the enos important local dignitaries, making sure that none of these wa slighted, and everybody agreed that the family made a charmint group.
They stayed overnight with the most prosperous of the local farmers, and the following morning, which was Sunday, attended the Dutch Reformed Church in the village. Shasa had not been in a church since Isabella was christened. He was not looking forward to it. This was another grand show, for Manfred De La Rey had prevailed upon his uncle, the Reverend Tromp Bierman, moderator of the church, to deliver the sermon. Uncle Tromp's sermons were famous throughout the Cape, nd families thought nothing of travelling a hundred miles to listen to them.
'I never thought I would ever speak for a cursed rooinek,' he told Manfred. 'It is either advancing senility, or a sign of my great love for you, that I do so now.' Then he climbed into the pulpit, and with his great silver beard flashing like the surf of a stormy sea, he lashed the congregation with such force and fury that they quivered and squirmed with delicious terror for their souls.
At the end of the sermon, Uncle Tromp reduced the volume to remind them that there was an election coming up, and that a vote for the United Party was a vote for Satan himself. No matter how some of them felt about Englishmen, they weren't voting for a man here, they were voting for the party upon which the Almighty had bestowed his blessing and into whose hands he had. delivered the destiny of the Volk. He stopped just short of closing the gates of Heaven in the face of any of them who did not put their cross opposite the name of Courthey, but when he glared at them threateningly, there were very few who felt inclined to take a chance on his continued forbearance.
'Well, my dear, I can't thank you enough for your help,' Shasa told Tara, as they drove home over the high mountain passes of the Hottentots Holland. 'From here on it looks like a cakewalk.' 'It was interesting to watch our political system in action,' Tara murmured. 'All the other jockeys got down off their mounts and shooed you in.' Polling day in South Boland was merely an endorsement of certain victory, and when the votes were counted it appeared that Shasa had wooed across at least five hundred erstwhile United Party voters, and, much to the delight of the Nationalist hierarchy, increased the majority most handsomely. As the results came in from around the rest of the country, it became apparent that the trend was universal.
For the first time ever, substantial numbers of English speakers were deserting Smuts' party. The Nationalists took 103 seats to the United Party's 53. The promise of strong uncompromising government was bearing good fruits.
At Rhodes Hill Centaine gave an elaborate dinner dance for 150 important guests to celebrate Shasa's appointment to the new cabinet.
As they swirled together around the dance floor to the strains of 'The Blue Danube', Centaine told Shasa, 'Once again we have done the right thing at the right time, chgri. It can still come true - all of it? And she sang softly the praise song that the old Bushman had composed at Shasa's birth: 'His arrows will fly to the stars And when men speak his name It will be heard as far And wherever he goes he will find good water?
The clicking sounds of the Bushman language, like snapping twigs and footsteps in mud, raised nostalgic memories from the distant time when they had been together in the' Kalahari.
Shasa enjoyed the Houses of Parliament. They were like an exclusive men's club. He liked the grandeur of white columns and lofty halls, the exotic tiles on the floors, the panelling and the green leathercovered benches. He often paused in the labyrinth of corridors to admire the paintings and the sculpted busts of famous men, Merriman and Louis Botha, Cecil Rhodes and Leander Starr Jameson.
heroes and rogues, statesmen and adventurers. They had made this country's history - and then he reminded himself: 'History is a river that never ends. Today is history, and I am here at the fountainhead,' and he imagined his own portrait hanging there with the others one day.
'I'll have it commissioned at once,' he thought. 'While I am still in my prime. For the time being I'll hang i at Weltevreden, but I'll put a clause in my will.' As a minister, he now had his own office in the House, the sam suite of rooms that had been used by Cecil Rhodes when he wa prime minister of the old Cape parliament before the House hoc been enlarged and extended. Shasa redecorated and furnished it a his own expense. Thesens, the timber firm from Knysna, installec the panelling. It was indigenous wild olive, marvellously grained ant with a satiny lustre. He hung four of his finest Pierneef landscape on the panelling, with a Van Wouw bronze of a Bushman huntel standing on the table beneath them. Although he was determined to keep the artwork authentically African, the carpet was the choices' green Wilton and his desk Louis XIV.
It felt strange to enter the chamber for the first time to take hi place on the government front bench, a mirror image of his usua view. He ignored the hostile glances of his erstwhile colleagues smiling only at Blaine's
