?That is correct.?
?My name is Dalindyebo. I need some help.?
?You have come to the right place, sister.? A strong voice. The minister stepped back and held the door open. Two veined bare feet showed under the burgundy dressing gown.
The agent stepped inside, swept her eyes over the room, the bookshelves along two walls, hundreds of books, the other walls hung with black-and-white and color photos. The room had simplicity, no luxuries, an aura of restfulness and warmth.
?Please sit down. I just want to tell my wife she can go to sleep.?
?I apologize for the late hour, Reverend.?
?don'?t be sorry.? The minister disappeared down the passage, bare feet silent on the carpet. The agent attempted to see the photos from her chair. The minister and his wife in the middle, with bridal couples, at synod, with amorphous groups of people. At one side, a family photo, the minister young, tall, and straight. In front of him stood a boy of six or seven, a serious frown on his face, an overbite of new front teeth. The agent wondered if that was Thobela Mpayipheli.
The old man appeared from the passage again. ?I have put the kettle on. What do you bring to my house, Miss Dalindyebo??
For a moment she hesitated, suddenly doubting the prepared phrase on the tip of her tongue. There is something shining out of the old man, a love, compassion.
?Reverend, I work for the state. ??
He was about to sit down opposite her when he saw her hesitation. ?Carry on, my child, don'?t be afraid.?
?Reverend, we need information about your son. Thobela Mpayipheli.?
Deep emotion moved over the old man?s face, across his mouth and eyes. He stood still for a long moment as if turned to stone, long enough for her to feel anxiety. Then slowly he sat, as if his legs were in pain, and the sigh was deep and heavy.
?My son?? One hand touched the gray temple, just the fingertips; the other gripped the arm of the chair, eyes unseeing. A reaction she had not expected. She must adjust her time scale and review her questions. But for now she must remain quiet.
?My son,? he said, this time not a question, the hand coming loose from the chair and floating to his mouth as if weightless, his gaze somewhere, but not in this room.
?Thobela,? he said, as if remembering the name.
It took nearly fifteen minutes for the old man to begin his story. He first asked after the welfare of his son, which she answered with vague lies to spare him anguish. He excused himself to make coffee, treading like a sleepwalker. He brought the tray, which he had arranged with a plate of rusks and biscuits; he dithered about where to begin the chronicle of Thobela Mpayipheli, and then it came out, at first haltingly, a struggle for the right words, the right expression, till it began to flow, to make a stream of words and emotions, as if he were confessing and seeking her absolution.
To understand, you need to go back to the previous generation. To his generation. To him and his brother. Lawrence and Senzeni. The dove and the falcon. Jacob and Esau, if you would forgive the comparison. Children of the Kat river, of poverty, yes, simplicity but pride, sons of a tribal chief who had to do herd duty with the cattle, who learned the Xhosa culture around the fire at night, who learned the history of the people at the feet of the gray- haired ones, who went through the Xhosa initiation before it became an exploitation of the poor. The difference between them was there from the early days. Lawrence the elder, the dreamer, the tall lean boy, the clever one who was always one step ahead of the others at the mission school with its single classroom, the peacemaker. Senzeni, shorter, muscular, a fighter, a born soldier, impatient, short-tempered, fiery his attention fully engaged only when the battles were retold, his eyes glittering with fighting spirit.
There was a defining moment, so many years ago when he, Lawrence, had to defend his honor in a senseless adolescent fist-fight with another boy, a troublemaker who was jealous of his status as chief?s offspring. He was baited with cutting ridicule and within the circle of screaming children had to defend his dignity with his fists. It was as if he were raised above the two boys facing each other in ever diminishing circles, as if he floated, as if he were not really there. And when the blows began to rain down, he could not lift his hand against the boy. He could not ball his hands into fists, could not find the hate or anger to break skin or draw blood. It was a divine moment, the knowledge that he could feel his opponent?s pain before it existed, the urge to assuage it, to heal.
Senzeni came to his aid, his little brother. He was staggering and bleeding in the ring of boys, head singing from the blows, blood in his eyes and his nose, and then Senzeni was there, a black tornado of rage ruthlessly thrashing the other boy with frightful purpose.
When it was over he turned to Lawrence with disdain, even a degree of hate, reluctant to accept this new responsibility and questioning without words how they could be brothers.
Lawrence found the Lord at the mission school. He found in Christ all the things he had felt within him that day. Senzeni said it was the white man?s religion.
Lawrence received a scholarship through the church, and their mother encouraged him. He studied and married and began the long eternal journey as disciple here among his own people in the Kat river valley. And his brother was always there, a counterweight, by default the next tribal chief, the warrior who fastened onto the rumors of a new movement from the north, who read every word on the Rivonia trials over and over, who became another kind of disciple? a disciple of freedom.
And then there was Thobela.
The Lord made the boy with a purpose. He looked at the ancestors and took a bit here and a little there and sent the child into the world with the presence of his grandfather Mpayipheli, the ability to lead, to make decisions, to see past the angles and sides of a matter and make a judgment. The Lord gave him the body of his father, tall, the same limbs that could run the Ciskei hills with characteristic rhythmic stride, the same facial features so that many, including Thobela?s own father, would mistakenly assume the same peacemaker inside.
But God created a predator in him, a Xhosa warrior, the Lord went far back in the bloodline, to Phalo, Rharhabe, Nquika en Maqoma, as he did with Senzeni, and gave Thobela Mpayipheli the heart of the hunter.
In early years his likeness fooled everyone. ?His father?s son,? they said. But the son grew and the truth
