Black Mischief (24 page)

‘This
is an intolerable outrage. But I don’t see what we can do about it at the
moment. Sir Samson will have to lodge a complaint.’

‘We
can’t possibly remain here. We can’t possibly go out into the street. There is
only one place for us — the roof.’

This
position was easily accessible by means of a ladder and trap-door. Hastily
equipping themselves with rugs, pillows, sunshades, two light novels, cameras
and the remains of the biscuits, the resolute ladies climbed up into the
blazing sunlight. Dame Mildred handed up their provisions to Miss Tin, then
followed her. The trap-door could not be bolted from above, but fortunately the
tin roof was weighted in many places by rock boulders, placed there to
strengthen it in times of high wind. One of these they rolled into place, then,
sliding down the hot corrugations to the low cement parapet, they made their
nest in a mood of temporary tranquillity.

‘We
shall see very well from here, Sarah. There will be plenty of time to have
those natives punished tomorrow.’

Indeed,
from where they sat the whole city lay very conveniently exposed to their view.
They could see the irregular roofs of the palace buildings in their grove of
sapling blue gums and before them the still unfinished royal box from which the
Emperor proposed to review the procession; small black figures could be
observed working on it, tacking up coloured flags, spreading carpets and
bobbing up the path with pots of palm and fern. They could see the main street
of the city diverge, to the barracks on one side and the Christian quarter on
the other. They could see the several domes and spires of the Catholic,
Orthodox, Armenian, Anglican, Nestorian, American Baptist and Mormon places of
worship; the minaret of the mosque, the Synagogue and the flat white roof of
the Hindu snake temple. Miss Tin took a series of snapshots.

‘Don’t
use all the films, there are bound to be some interesting things later.’

The sun
rose high in the heavens; the corrugated iron radiated a fierce heat. Propped
on their pillows under green parasols the two ladies became drowsy and
inattentive to the passage of time.

The
procession was due to start at eleven, but it must have been past noon before
Dame Mildred, coming to with a jerk and snort, said, ‘Sarah, I think something
is beginning to happen.’

A
little dizzily, for the heat was now scarcely bearable, the ladies leant over
the parapet. The crowd was halloing loudly and the women gave out their
peculiar throbbing whistle; there seemed to be a general stir towards the royal
‘box, a quarter of a mile down the road.

‘That
must be the Emperor arriving.’

A dozen
lancers were cantering down the street, forcing the crowds back into the side
alleys and courtyards, only to surge out again behind them.

‘The
procession will come up from the direction of the railway station. Look, here
they are.’

Fresh
swelling and tumult in the crowded street. But it was only the lancers
returning towards the Palace.

Presently
Miss Tin said, ‘You know, this may take all day. How hungry we shall be.’

‘I’ve
been thinking of that for some time. I am going to go down and forage.’

‘Mildred,
you can’t.
Anything
might happen to you.’

‘Nonsense,
we can’t live on this roof all day with four petit-beurre biscuits.’

She
rolled back the stone and carefully, rung by rung, descended the ladder. The
bedroom doors were open, and as she passed she saw that quite a large party was
now assembled at the windows. She reached the ground floor, crossed the
dining-room and opened the door at the far end where, she had been informed by
many penetrating smells during the past weeks, lay the kitchen quarters.
Countless flies rose with humming alarm as she opened the larder door.
Uncovered plates of horrible substances lay on the shelves; she drew back
instinctively; then faced them again. There were some black olives in an
earthenware basin and half a yard of brick-dry bread. Armed with these and
breathing heavily she again climbed to the trapdoor.

‘Sarah,
open it at once.’ The rock was withdrawn. ‘How could you be so selfish as to
shut it? Supposing I had been pursued.’

‘I’m
sorry, Mildred. Indeed I am, but you were so long and I grew nervous. And, my
dear, you have been missing such a lot. All kinds of things have been
happening.’

‘What
things?’

‘Well,
I don’t know exactly, but look.’

Indeed,
below, the crowds seemed to be in a state of extreme agitation, jostling and
swaying without apparent direction around a wedge-shaped phalanx of police who
were forcing a way with long bamboo staves; in their centre was an elderly man
under arrest.

‘Surely,
those are clothes of the native priests? What can the old man have been up to?’

‘Almost
anything. I have never had any belief in the clergy after that curate we liked
so much who was Chaplain of the Dumb Chums and spoke so feelingly and then …‘

‘Look,
here
is
the procession.’

Rising
strains of the Azanian anthem; the brass band of the Imperial Guards swung into
sight, drowning the sounds of conflict. The Azanians loved a band and their
Patriarch’s arrest was immediately forgotten. Behind the soldiers drove
Viscount and Viscountess Boaz, who had eventually consented to act as patrons.
Then, marching four abreast in brand-new pinafores, came the girls of the
Amurath Memorial High School, an institution founded by the old Empress to care
for the orphans of murdered officials. They bore, somewhat unsteadily, a banner
whose construction had occupied the embroidery and dressmaking class for
several weeks. It was emblazoned in letters of appliquéd silk with the motto:
WOMEN OF TOMORROW DEMAND AN EMPTY CRADLE. Slowly the mites filed by, singing
sturdily.

‘Very
sensible and pretty,’ said Miss Tin. ‘Dear Mildred, what very stale bread you
have brought.’

‘The
olives are excellent.’

‘I
never liked olives. Good gracious, look at this.’

The
first of the triumphal cars had come into sight. At first an attempt had been
made to induce ladies of rank to take part in the tableaux; a few had wavered,
but Azanian society still retained certain standards; the peerage were not
going to have their wives and daughters exhibiting themselves in aid of
charity; the idea had to be dropped and the actresses recruited less ambitiously
from the demimonde. This first car, drawn by oxen, represented the place of
women in the modern world. Enthroned under a canopy of coloured cotton sat Mlle
‘Fifi’ Fatim Bey; in one hand a hunting-crop to symbolize sport, in the other a
newspaper to symbolize learning; round her were grouped a court of Azanian
beauties with typewriters, tennis rackets, motor-bicycling goggles, telephones,
hitch-hiking outfits and other patents of modernity inspired by the European
illustrated papers. An orange-and-green appliquéd standard bore the challenging
motto: THROUGH STERILITY TO CULTURE.

Enthusiastic
applause greeted this pretty invention. Another car came into sight down the
road, bobbing decoratively above the ‘black pates; other banners.

Suddenly
there was a check in the progress and a new note in the voice of the crowd.

‘Has
there been an accident? I do hope none of the poor oxen are hurt.’

The
trouble seemed to be coming from the front of the procession, where bodies of
men had pushed through from the side streets and were endeavouring to head the
procession back. The brass band stopped, faltered and broke off scattering
before the assault and feebly defending their heads with trombones and kettle
drums.

‘Quick,
Sarah, your camera. I don’t know what in the world is happening, but I must get
a snap of it. Of course the sun
would
be in the wrong place.’

‘Try
with the very small stop.’.

‘I do
pray they come out; I had such bad luck with those very interesting films of
Cape Town that the wretched man ruined on the boat. You know it looks like
quite a serious riot. Where are the police?’

The
attackers, having swept the band out of the road and underfoot, were making
easy work of the High School Orphans; they were serious young men armed with
clubs, the athletic group, as the ladies learned later, of Nestorian Catholic
Action, muscular Christians who for many weeks now had been impatiently biding
their time to have a whack at the modernists and Jews who were behind the new
movement.

Down
went the embroidered banner as the girls in their pinafores ran for safety
between the legs of the onlookers.

The
main focus of the assault was now the triumphal car immediately in front of the
Hotel de l’Empereur Seth. At the first sign of disturbance the members of the
tableau had abandoned their poses and huddled together in alarm; now without
hesitation they forsook their properties and bundled out of the wagon into the
street. The Christian party swarmed on to it and one of them began addressing
the crowd. Dame Mildred snapped him happily as he turned in their direction,
arms spread, mouth wide open, in all the fervour of democratic leadership.

Hitherto,
except for a few jabs with trumpets and drum-sticks, the attackers had met with
no opposition. Now, however, the crowd began to take sides, individual
scuffles broke out among them and a party of tribesmen from up-country, happily
welcoming this new diversion in a crowded day, began a concerted charge to the
triumphal car, round which there was soon raging a contest of I’m-king-of-the-castle
game. The Nestorian orator was thrown overboard and a fine savage in lion skins
began doing a jig in his place. The patient oxen stood unmoved by the tumult.

‘Quick,
Sarah, another roll of films. What
can
the police be thinking of?’

Then authority
asserted itself.

From
the direction of the royal box flashed out a ragged volley of rifle shots. A
bullet struck the parapet with a burst of splintered concrete and ricocheted,
droning, over the ladies’ heads. Another volley and something slapped on to the
iron roof a few yards from where they sat. Half comprehending, Dame Mildred
picked up and examined the irregular disc of hot lead. Shrill wails of terror
rose from the street below and then a clattering of horses and oxen. Without a
word spoken Dame Mildred and Miss Tin rolled to cover.

The
parapet was a low one and the ladies were obliged to lie full length in
positions of extreme discomfort. Dame Mildred slid out her arm for a cushion
and hastily withdrew it as a third burst of firing broke out as though on
purpose to frustrate her action. Presently silence fell, more frightening than
the tumult. Dame Mildred spoke in an awed whisper.

‘Sarah,
that was a
bullet.’

‘I
know. Do be quiet or they’ll start again.’

For
twenty minutes by Miss Tin’s wrist-watch the two ladies lay in the gutter,
their faces almost touching the hot, tarnished iron of the roof. Dame Mildred
shifted on to her side.

‘Oh,
what
is it,
Mildred?’

‘Pins
and needles in my left leg. I don’t care if I am shot.’ Dim recollections of some
scouting game played peaceably in somewhat different circumstances among Girl
Guides in the bracken of Epping prompted Dame Mildred to remove her topee and,
holding it at arm’s length, expose it over the edge of their rampart. The
silence of the stricken field was unbroken. Slowly, with infinite caution, she
raised her head.

‘For
heaven’s sake, take care, Mildred.
Snipers.’

But
everything was quiet. At length she .sat up and looked over. From end to end
the street was silent and utterly deserted. The strings of flags hung limp in
the afternoon heat. The banner of the Amurath High School lay spread across the
way, dishevelled and dusty from a thousand footsteps but still flaunting its
message bravely to the heavens, WOMEN OF TOMORROW DEMAND AN EMPTY CRADLE. The
other banner lay crumpled in the gutter. Only one word was visible in the empty
street. STERILITY pleaded in orange-and-green silk to an unseeing people.

‘I
think it is all over.’

The
ladies sat up and stretched their cramped legs, dusted themselves a little,
straightened their hats and breathed deeply of the fresh air. Dame Mildred
retrieved her camera and wound on the film. Miss Tin shook out the pillows and
looked for food. The olives were dry and dull-skinned, the bread crisp as
biscuit and gritted with dust.

‘Now
what are we going to do? I’m thirsty and I think
one of my headaches is coming on.’

Regular
steps of marching troops in the street below.

‘Look
out. They’re coming again.’

The two
ladies slid back under cover. They heard the grounding of rifle butts, some
unintelligible orders, marching steps proceeding down the street. Inch by inch
they emerged again.

‘Some
of them are still there. But I think it’s all right.’

A
picket of Guards squatted round a machine-gun on the pavement opposite.

‘I’m
going down to find something to drink.’