The Cry of the Go-Away Bird Read online

  They had a good laugh at that, and then Auntie Mary said, ‘No way, man. They know what side their bread’s buttered on. No farm means no wages. And they’re bluddy stupid if they think Bob’s going to give the land to the squatters. He just gives it to his cronies.’

  ‘Do you need us to come down?’ Mum asked.

  ‘No, we’re fine, hey. I’ll give you a call if anything changes. Here’s hoping they stop banging those bluddy drums soon.’

  ‘Here’s hoping.’ Mum hung up. ‘See? She’s fine. We’ve been through all this before, except worse. So stop worrying.’

  On the weekend, we heard that Uncle Pieter’s farm had been invaded, properly. While he and Auntie Mary were out doing their shopping in town, the War Vets went into the farmstead and made themselves at home.

  ‘Chinhoyi is the breadbasket of Zimbabwe,’ said Mum. ‘Mugabe is a fool.’

  Uncle Pieter and his workers threw the War Vets out, but they came back. Their chanting and drum-beating doubled.

  ‘We’re getting no sleep,’ said Auntie Mary. ‘They came up to the house today and demanded that we kill them a mombe. We said no, at first, but then Pieter said he’d rather kill one of the cows himself than see them try to do it with a bhadza, so he killed one and had it sent out. They’re cooking it now. At least they’ve stopped singing.’

  ‘Did they take anything from the house?’ asked Mum.

  ‘Ja, a few things. Beat up Phineas a bit too, poor bugger.’

  The Trinepon Man. ‘Is he all right?’

  ‘Ja, he’ll be fine.’

  Whenever I saw Mugabe on the news, I wanted to reach in through the screen and shake him by the neck as if he were the scrawny rooster painted on the ZANU PF building. He had a way of speaking and pausing that made each word sound like a prophecy.

  ‘There have been very few cases of violence,’ he said about the farm invasions, ‘but if the farmers start to be angry and start to be violent, then, of course, they will get that medicine delivered to them. And it can be very, very, very severe, but we don’t want it to get there.’

  He pronounced each ‘very’ slowly and with weight. We had been given a warning. Behave, or suffer the consequences.

  In the middle of all this, we had another dry spell. The ground cracked like the dry skin on our heels, and our dry skin cracked like the crust of the ground. The grass was yellow, when there was grass at all. Mum put a brick in the toilet cistern so that it would use less water. We went back to leaving wees in the toilet and only flushing for something larger, or when the urine started to rot in the bowl and smell like old vegetables. We were not allowed to water our garden any more, or wash the car. We had shallow baths and we shared them, one after the other. I usually got the hottest, freshest water, because I had to go to bed earlier. Mum usually went next, and Steve was left to sit in the cooling, grubby remains.

  In the evenings, I used the remains of our rain-water barrel to water the vegetables.

  Tatenda was uprooting the sad, limp carrots. ‘It is because the land is being taken,’ he said. ‘Because of what Mugabe is doing.’

  If I were indoors, I might not have believed him. But we were outside, looking at a pale fingernail of moon, and it seemed perfectly reasonable.

  Mum and Steve were drinking gins and tonics on the verandah.

  ‘Tatenda says the rains won’t come because of what Mugabe is doing,’ I said.

  Mum raised her eyebrows and Steve spluttered into his drink. ‘Well, I suppose that’s one theory,’ he said.

  Mum pulled out a chair for me, and I sat with the adults.

  ‘Can I have a sip?’

  Mum sighed and passed me her drink. ‘Ja, but just one, hey.’

  I took a sip. It tasted like medicine. By the time it reached my throat, all the liquid had gone and it was nothing but fumes.

  ‘Medicinal,’ said Steve. ‘Been used by the colonials for generations. The tonic water protects against malaria.’

  ‘And what does the gin do?’

  ‘Painkiller.’ They all laughed.

  ‘I’m sick of this bluddy drought,’ said Mum. She had her eyes closed and her head tipped back. The sky was starting to turn lavender. I heard the first whines of mosquitoes and saw the dusty shape of moths start to move towards the house.

  ‘You could do a rain dance,’ said Steve, and snorted.

  ‘Shut up and make yourself useful,’ said Mum.

  Steve sighed and heaved himself out of his chair. He closed the door into the house and lit a mosquito lamp.

  I slid my legs off the chair on to the cool tiles.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Outside.’

  ‘Take a jacket,’ said Mum.

  The evening air felt like a light blanket clinging to the hairs on my arms and legs.

  ‘All right, Mum.’

  I did not take a jacket, but I did slide my feet into flip-flops. In the dark it was hard to see the fallen acacia thorns lurking in the grass.

  I walked down to the end of the garden, to the avocado tree. I could feel the squish of ripe fruit under my flip-flops.

  I spent my days making bargains with the gods. If I could climb to the highest branch of the avocado tree, the farm would not be invaded. If I picked up a stone every time I went outside and put it on a little tower of stones beside the door, my family would be safe. I trusted the old gods. They were not compassionate or merciful, but they understood things like sacrifices and offerings.

  Maybe a rain dance would have some effect. Even if the dance was danced by a white girl in Harare. I started by moving some sticks into a circle. I was not sure why, except that circles seemed to be important for magic. A fire would have made the whole thing more effective, but Mum and Steve would get suspicious if I went back for matches.

  The only rain dances I had seen were Native American ones in the movies. I started to hop on one foot around the circle, making vague chanting noises, but then I felt silly and stopped. Instead I stood and listened. I could hear crickets more as a shivering in the air than a sound, and the rustle of creatures in the hedge and in the trees.

  I sat in the middle of my circle and let my breathing slow down until I could not hear it any more. I knew that N’angas would go into a trance and let a spirit possess them if they wanted rain. I wondered if I could do it. The idea would have seemed ridiculous in the hot, hard sunlight, but was perfectly reasonable in the rustling night.

  I closed my eyes. I saw myself from above, sitting on the ground with my legs crossed. At first I thought it was just my imagination, but then I felt like I was floating further away from my body. I panicked and opened my eyes. My body was wide awake again, heart thumping, legs itching from the rough grass.

  I decided to try it again. I closed my eyes and felt myself float away. I wondered if I really had gone somewhere outside my body and, if so, what was left down there inside the skin and muscles and blood. I wondered how N’angas welcomed spirits in. A hot red light hung in front of my eyes, as if I were tilting my closed eyelids up at the sun, and I drifted into a warm sleep.

  When I woke up, I was thrashing on the ground and my mouth was full of saliva. I spat it out in a white glob on the grass, and coughed. Tatenda was crouching a few feet away, watching me with wide, white eyes.

  ‘Are you all right, Medem?’ he asked me.

  ‘Ja.’ I took deep breaths. It felt like I was trying to catch the air in a net. I could not draw nearly enough into my lungs. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I heard you shouting,’ said Tatenda. I saw sweat on his forehead and I realised that he was afraid.

  ‘What was I saying?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Was I saying something?’

  He stood up. ‘You should go back inside,’ he said. ‘You are not well.’

  When I got back to the house, Mum and Steve were drinking tea in the living room.

  Steve looked at his Blue Duiker head. ‘Hey, when’s the last time Saru dusted?’


  ‘Yesterday.’

  ‘Well, there’s bluddy dust all over Bluey.’

  Mum followed his gaze. ‘I’ll tell her to clean it.’

  I poured myself a cup of tea and did not say anything. I lifted my hand up to my head.

  ‘Are you okay?’ said Mum.

  ‘Headache.’ I never got headaches. Mum had migraines sometimes, and when she felt one coming on she drew the curtains and lay on the bed with a beanbag over her eyes to block out the daylight. She knew when she was getting a migraine because she could see tadpoles swimming in front of her eyes, she said. I could see little black dots in front of my eyes now and I wondered if that was what she meant. I told her.

  ‘Migraine,’ she said. ‘Must be a storm coming.’

  She put me to bed, and I lay in the darkness feeling my head swell and fill up with blood until there was no room for thoughts. I felt the heavy clouds outside pressing down on me.

  Whatever spirit I talked to must have listened to me. The rain came and felt like a release, like when you really need to pee and have crossed your legs for hours and finally reach a toilet. The heavy, throbbing blood seemed to rush out of my head, leaving it clean and sharp. I listened to the fingers of rain drumming on the roof and realised that there was still some tension left behind after the storm had broken. The world was not washed as clean as usual. We were not just waiting for the rain, but for some other release.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The first time I heard someone outside at night, it was just a slight crunch on the gravel. I thought it was an animal until I heard another crunch: measured, deliberate, as if someone were placing their feet very carefully and listening for a response between each step. There was a human mind behind those feet.

  Silence fell again. I decided to go to the curtain, count to three and pull it back suddenly. Then, when I saw nothing, I could relax and go back to sleep. It was better to do it quickly, like ripping off a plaster.

  I did not turn on the light, because it would make everything beyond the window an impenetrable wall of black. I slid my feet out of bed and on to the floor, and stood shivering with one hand on the curtains, feeling the chill from the glass. I counted silently, and pulled back the curtain with a clatter and ring of runners.

  A face flashed into view, so close that if there was no glass I could have touched it. I felt the air rushing up from my lungs and then heard my own voice screaming, slightly muffled by the swoosh of blood pulsing through my ears.

  The face was gone as quickly as it had appeared. Mum and Steve ran in. ‘What the yell?’

  Steve had his old school cricket bat. Mum had brought a pillow. I told them about the face at the window.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Ja.’ It was a flesh-and-blood person, not a tokoloshe or a ghost.

  ‘Oh well.’ Steve lowered his bat. ‘There’s no point calling the police now. He’ll be long gone, whoever he is.’

  The next night, I heard footsteps again. I ran through to Mum and Steve’s room in my pyjamas. This time Steve went into the garden armed with a rifle and a torch. He found nothing.

  This happened every night for a week.

  ‘Probably bluddy Jonah,’ said Steve, ‘coming to see what else he can steal.’

  Once he had said that, I lay rigid in my bed waiting for the footsteps. Of course, I thought. It must be Jonah. He must know what I did. He is coming back to find me. I could not sleep, and in the mornings I was grey and limp.

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’ said Mum, laying a cool hand on my forehead.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘These prowlers getting to you?’

  ‘Ja, a bit.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Mum and ruffled my hair.

  I tried to remember if it was Jonah’s face I had seen on the other side of the glass. I imagined him coming into my room with his angular face and angry stare. I woke Mum up with my screams the next time we heard the footsteps.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ she said, ‘this is getting bluddy ridiculous.’

  ‘What do you expect me to do?’ said Steve. ‘Call the police? They’re worse than useless. I can handle them.’

  Mum and I did not trust Steve’s cricket bat and ancient rifle as much as he did.

  On the next night, I woke up to the sound of shouting and bumping and banging from the study. I poked my head out of the door and saw Steve charging down the corridor, wearing only a pair of boxer shorts. Mum pursued him with his ratty dressing gown.

  I followed them. When we arrived in the study, it was a rather pathetic crime scene. The window was open, the computer was gone, and there was a perfect, red-dust shoe-print on the windowsill. The raw-onion smell of body odour hovered in the air.

  ‘Agh, hell,’ said Steve. He ran into the garden, but returned after a few minutes.

  ‘Couldn’t find anyone. I think he’s buggered off.’

  Mum put on the kettle and brewed a pot of tea. We sat in the kitchen sipping it while we waited for Steve to call the police.

  Steve came in again, jingling his car keys.

  ‘What the bluddy yell are you doing?’ said Mum.

  ‘The police don’t have a car available,’ said Steve. ‘I’m going to pick them up.’

  ‘You’re going to pick them up?’ Mum repeated. She gave a snort of laughter.

  ‘Back soon,’ said Steve.

  Mum and I sat and drank our tea. When we had finished, Mum poured us another cup. It was from the bottom of the pot and tasted like tar. When we had finished that cup and were staring at the dregs, we heard Steve’s car in the driveway.

  ‘About bluddy time,’ said Mum.

  Steve came in, followed by two policemen. One was obviously more senior; smiling, obsequious. His eyes slid around our faces, never quite landing on our eyes.

  Steve took them into the study. They stood looking at the footprint, making concerned noises.

  ‘Eh-eh.’

  ‘Oh-oh.’

  One made a few desultory notes. Steve was red-faced and desperate.

  ‘Pointless,’ said Mum under her breath. ‘The police are worse than the criminals.’

  I did not know if it was my imagination, but it seemed to me that one of the policemen eyed our television in a suspicious way.

  They accepted tea from us. Mum even brought out the best biscuits. The policemen sat and drank their tea, smiling at us, and then left. Apparently one of their colleagues could pick them up now.

  ‘Good night Baas, good night Medem.’

  ‘Useless,’ said Mum after they’d gone. ‘Oh well.’

  ‘Ja, well hopefully it gave the burglar a fright, if he’s still somewhere around,’ said Steve.

  Mum shrugged. ‘So why did it take you so long to get back?’

  ‘The police station was empty.’

  ‘The one you called?’

  ‘Ja. All the lights were off.’

  ‘So where the yell . . .’

  ‘Well, I thought they must have gone home or something so I drove to another police station and couldn’t find anyone there, either. Then on the way back I spotted a couple of them drinking a Scud outside the shopping centre.’

  ‘You picked them up from the shopping centre?’ Mum said.

  ‘Ja. Not like they were doing anything. Poor buggers,’ said Steve. ‘You can’t blame them half the bluddy time.’

  The next morning, we examined the scene more closely.

  ‘Shouldn’t we leave it for the police?’ I ask.

  Mum snorted. ‘No.’

  ‘But there might be fingerprints.’

  ‘They won’t bother with fingerprints. Come on.’ Mum studied the window. ‘It may well have been Jonah,’ she said.

  ‘Bluddy Kaffir!’ shouted Steve.

  ‘Steve!’ Mum shushed him.

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  Mum fiddled with the window catch. ‘This was painted over. We never opened the window. But someone has chiselled the paint away and worked it loose. You could
only do it from inside.’

  ‘Shit!’ Steve kicked the doorframe. ‘I’m going to find him,’ he said. ‘I’m going to track the bugger down.’

  ‘Ja, you’ll get your pack of dogs and track him across the Bush,’ said Mum. ‘This isn’t bluddy Rhodesia, you know.’

  ‘I’ve got my rifle.’

  ‘Ja, and your father’s bayonets. So?’

  Steve subsided. ‘Would be more trouble than it’s bluddy worth, anyway,’ he said.

  The police did not contact with us again. We did not expect them to. Mum superstitiously refused to clean the footprint away, in case we ever found Jonah again. After a few weeks, I stopped noticing it.

  Even though Steve consulted the neighbourhood jungle drums, he could not find Jonah. No one seemed to know where he had gone.

  ‘Good riddance to bad rubbish,’ said Steve.

  We got a big, red panic button installed. Steve instructed Mum and me in its use.

  ‘What’s to teach?’ said Mum. ‘You just press it.’

  ‘Ja,’ said Steve, ‘but there is a code to type in to cancel it.’ He showed us. If we set off the panic alarm, the armed response unit would phone us. If we answered the phone and gave the five-digit code, they would cancel the response. If we gave the wrong code, or the phone rang and we did not answer it, they would send a team of men to the house.

  ‘Better than the bluddy police,’ said Steve with satisfaction.

  We had a rape gate installed as well – a bolted gate that separated the bedroom wing from the rest of the house.

  The next time we thought we heard a prowler, Mum pressed the panic button and the alarm went off. Steve ran outside with one of the old guns and a torch to check the garden.

  ‘No one there. Or he ran off,’ he said.

  We watched the phone for a while, waiting for it to ring.

  ‘Should I call them?’ said Mum, worried.

  ‘Nah, they’ll call,’ said Steve.

  We waited a little longer.

  ‘Something must be wrong with the transmission,’ said Steve. ‘I’ll call them in the morning and get someone to fix it.’

  We went to bed.

  Not long after I fell asleep, I was woken up by shouts and barking dogs.