Kruger's Alp (33 page)

He arrived home that night loaded with papers. He had gone out a tourist and come back a recruit to the American revolution. Something had caught fire within him and the roar of its flames competed with the deep internal cranial rumblings and explosions inside his damaged head and sometimes, hallelujah! overcame
them and drove them out, even quietened the continuous buzzing in his ear, warmed his stiff and stupid tongue, disciplined the feet that each went their stupid, separate ways. He carried brochures, postcards, maps, prints and an armful of books he had discovered on sale at the Visitors' Centre on Second Street. Isobel was amused by this enthusiasm. He lay there that night staring up at her sizeable breasts, swinging like bells. Later, while Isobel slept, he got up and went through his papers.

The next day he was back at Independence Hall. He admired the style of the ground-floor rooms which he now knew to be in the English Renaissance style, with graceful pilasters proceeding heavenwards in strict proprietorial order, Doric on the first floor, Ionic on the stair landing, Corinthian cornice beneath the tower ceiling. When the guide asked the tourists whether anyone could identify the rather skinny-looking chairs crowding the Declaration Chamber, Looksmart said right out loud that they were Windsor chairs, adding in his slow and rather baffling tones, that legend had it several of the chairs had been borrowed to accommodate the delegates who crowded into the Chamber on those heady days in July, 1776. The guide stared back at him, thunderstruck.

In the Liberty Bell Pavilion across the road, a plump lady in furs and dark glasses asked why the bell was cracked.

‘It cracked when they rang it,' said the guide, an innocent girl staring with big eyes at the huge brassy bell.

Looksmart stepped forward. ‘The bell has always been cracked,' he said, rejoicing that his tongue obeyed him. ‘It's been cracked from the day it was born. Since 1752 when it arrived from England and they hung it up on trusses in State House Yard. It cracked on the first bang. Pass and Stow cast it again. But this time it didn't sound right. Too much copper. The third time –' Looksmart held up three fingers ‘– they got it right. The bell rang for the Declaration of Independence in 1776, and for another fifty-nine years until, in its eighty-second year of service it rang out for the death of Chief Justice Marshall in 1835, and cracked for the last time . . .' He leaned over and with his knuckle knocked on the bell. It gave off a dim and distant echo. His audience stared. It's doubtful they understood much of this explanation, for though he pronounced quite perfectly the words came out a trifle rough and slurred and sluggish perhaps. The tourists backed away from him. The guide and the plump lady in furs beckoned frantically to the two heavy gents in green standing at the door, doubtless the guardians of the bell, and up they came and very firmly requested Looksmart to leave the Pavilion.

Looksmart sat on a bench in Independence Square and read a copy of the Declaration of Independence and I saw in my dream how the scales fell from his eyes, poor fellow. America appeared to Looksmart rather in the way that the Angel of the Lord appeared to the Virgin Mary. In Philadelphia, the cradle of revolution, an idea of an African redeemer was born.

Of course he quickly realised that the American Declaration of Independence was a document so advanced in its political thinking that, had it been promulgated on that day in his own country as the manifesto of some new party or movement, it would have been shredded on the spot and its adherents exiled or arrested, banned, imprisoned, or tortured as wild men beyond the civilised pale. It rang with phrases, any one of which would have brought blood to the eyes of the followers of the Regime; it spoke of equality, of inalienable rights, of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. It spoke of Just Powers, and, most startlingly, of the ‘Consent of the Governed'.

It must have been likely that in the years that followed the Revolution some news of its occurrence would have travelled abroad, even as far as Southern Africa. But to judge from all the evidence no such thing occurred. Of course it was not unusual nowadays to claim kinship in retrospect. It was put out by the Regime that they too had fought for their freedom against the Imperialists, to say that ‘we were fighting for our freedom from the British at about the same time as the Yanks, you know.'

In fact they hadn't stayed to fight at all, they had not been set afire with a light of freedom. Instead, deeply unhappy about the loss of their slaves and chafing at the English overlordship, though they had settled the country with their first colonists at about the same time as the Americans, they put up with successive overlords for years – until damn busybodies got between them and their slaves, and the disgruntled Boers migrated northward with God as their guide and their guns loaded, set the whips cracking over the backs of oxen, and the covered wagons rolling north into the interior in search of fresh grazing, uninterrupted privacy, and plenty of servants, in search of a heaven in the middle of nowhere. A Garden of Eden free of English and full of garden boys. Over half a century had passed since the time the Massachusetts militiamen shot it out with the British at Lexington. But no news of these great events appeared to have reached the Boers. Or if it had, Looksmart suspected, they wouldn't have liked what they heard. The early Americans wanted a nation free and independent among the
nations of the world. The Boers had no nation, distrusted freedom and cared nothing for the world. The very idea would have had your average Boer choking into his brandy. What he wanted was to be left alone and to put as much distance between himself and the English enemy as possible, to trek until he reached that magic land, the land of Beulah, where the game was limitless, grazing good and armies of black slaves kept him in clover. That was the cloud-capped summit of the dream towards which they had trekked. Trekked once more. And Uncle Paul had trekked yet again.

In the end they had to stand and fight. They found you could never go far enough. It wasn't just that the English were following them, it was history that stalked them down and chased them and in time overtook them and ran them to earth. They fought and lost. But when the Dutch farmers lost the war to the English rednecks at the turn of the century, and Uncle Paul Kruger fled into exile, it was the end of the Boers forever. Those who replaced them, that is to say those who remained, and never took the one-way ticket to the remote Paradise on the Swiss mountains set aside by Uncle Paul for his dispersed people, those who remained got wise. If you couldn't out-gun the English, you could out-vote the bastards. And they did. And scooped the board and so in exchange for the two Boer republics they had lost, they gained the whole damn southern subcontinent and as many servants as any reasonable man could wish to flog in a lifetime.

On through Philadelphia Looksmart trekked, to Betsy Ross House with its spinning wheel and its first American flag; then to Franklin's Tomb in Christ Church, to Carpenters Hall and to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the Revolution where Looksmart laid a dozen red roses. And towards evening he set off back down Walnut Street, forgetting, as Isobel had prophesied he would, where home really was, to Penn's Landing where he fell on his knees to the amusement of a man selling pretzels and gave thanks for his salvation. And he began to plan in his mind his ‘holy experiment', his own Pennsylvania, his own Philadelphia, City of Brotherly Love, which was to absorb him utterly from then on and dreamt in Franklin's words that he might one day set foot on its surface and say, ‘This is my country.'

It was Isobel who remained loving and true even when he fell so deeply into these reveries that he forgot who he was or where he lived and spent the winter nights in the streets crouched over the iron gratings from which the hot wind blew, like any other bum. And of course it was Isobel who, when the invitation came to
present himself at the Barclay Hotel where ‘he would hear something to his advantage' encouraged him to go at once.

‘You've heard of the wandering Jew, well you're the wandering African. Finding ways to go home.'

Isobel was a dreamer. And a bit of a dope. But she loved him. And though there are some who say that Looksmart would have learnt more of the genius of America in her arms than in all his researches into Benjamin Franklin, they forget how far gone he already was when he met her.

Looksmart's head had been repeatedly knocked against the wall by Captain Arrie Breek, who today imports famous crooners and entire Las Vegas girlie line-ups to perform in his Mountainbowl Auditorium, and arranges pro-am golf tournaments at his Palace in the Veld, with million dollar prizes, and his part in the little matter of Looksmart's head should not be forgotten. When you twirl a glass of water, the glass moves but the water stays still; unfortunately, when the head is struck and moves violently this rotation means the brain tries to move with it, with calamitous results for concentration, pronunciation, locomotion.

Looksmart crossed Rittenhouse Square in brilliant sunshine and went up to a suite on the tenth floor where he met a certain Mr Carstens and his friend, Estelle. Mr Carstens said he was an American with plenty of available capital. Estelle was a friend of his from Looksmart's country. Carstens wore a vivid green and orange shirt. Estelle was dark, authoritative, and her features were chiselled, determined and pert.

Now again, there are those who say Looksmart should have known the score. He should have spotted who Carstens was. And anyone who had looked at a newspaper in the months past would have identified Estelle as Trudy Yssel. But Looksmart did not know the score and he did not read newspapers, not when he had the mountainous literature of the American Revolution to consume.

‘Mr Dladla,' said Estelle, ‘we are here with a revolutionary plan.'

‘Mr Dladla,' said Mr Carstens, ‘you may or may not know that there is in our country a new dispensation. A New Order. Changes are occurring.'

‘Mr Dladla,' said Estelle, ‘I have here a letter of introduction from your brother, Gabriel. He is one terrific guy. And a friend.'

Again, there are those who charge that Looksmart should have known Carstens was a phoney, that his accent was ridiculous, and, anyway the shirt he wore with its mango sun floating above some
palms should have been a dead give-away. But Looksmart had long passed beyond the petty day-to-day treacheries of the Regime. He was out of all that. He had entered a new world.

And they overlooked the letter from Gabriel.

Dear Looksmart,

This is to introduce you to a couple of friends of mine, useful contacts and deep down, I believe, supporters of the cause. They have proposals to put to you which I genuinely believe can promote our struggle for liberation. I urge you to listen carefully to what they have to say and to act quickly.

Remember me in your prayers.

Your brother in Christ, Gabriel Dladla.

‘We represent a force so radical we cannot reveal ourselves,' said Carstens, ‘so secret it speaks only through its appointed agents. The Regime wouldn't tolerate our liberal aspirations or pragmatism. The Americans will not believe them. We have a problem. We wish to invest in several of the communications media in this town to promote our message. A couple of radio stations, a closed-circuit TV station and a news magazine.'

‘What can I do for you?' asked Looksmart.

‘Scepticism, cynicism, downright suspicion of our intentions is what we have to combat. If we are to buy into these businesses, our enemies would cry foul. But if you were to bid, or to allow us to bid for you –'

‘You want me to buy some radio stations?'

‘We will do the actual buying,' said Carstens.

‘We will do the actual paying,' said Estelle. ‘But you'll be the owner.'

Looksmart stared at them, wonderingly. This they misinterpreted.

‘Of course, we would make it worth your while. I understand you are a student of history here. We believe you wander the streets. Sleep rough.'

‘I'm a student of revolution,' said Looksmart proudly.

‘Aren't we all?' said Carstens politely.

‘Don't want money,' said Looksmart.

‘That's up to you. Maybe you want something else. You just tell us and we'll see if we can help.' Estelle smiled sweetly.

‘Do you know anyone in the Regime?' Looksmart demanded. ‘Do you know President Bubé?'

After some hesitation Carstens said he had met the President, briefly, on one of his foreign tours, he thought.

‘O.K.' said Looksmart. ‘Now this is what I want.'

In the darkness on the mountainside Blanchaille and Kipsel heard him waving what he had got, his slip of paper, his dream. ‘Here it is! Here it is! Pennsylvania here I come!' The little torch was switched on, the light pale on the paper.

‘You fool,' said Blanchaille. ‘You idiot!' Blanchaille yelled. ‘You'll never do it. Our country is already torn into independent kingdoms, homelands, reserves, group areas, Bantustans, casinostans, tribal trust lands and all you're proposing to do is to fucking well found another!'

‘Mine will be different!' Looksmart's voice cracked and trembled. At Blanchaille's raised voice he could feel the tears beginning to start. ‘We'll have no racial separation, no servants, no gold mines, no Calvinists, no faction fights. In my country the Boer will lie down with the Bantu.'

‘Numbskull!' Blanchaille shrieked. ‘They're
all
different. All these places. That's why there are so many of them. Everybody who is different has got to have one. The one thing we have got in abundance is difference. Difference is hate. Difference is death. I spit on your difference.' And he did, spitting noisily into the night. ‘You've been gypped, by your brother, by the Regime, by yourself.'

They heard the scrabble of paper as Looksmart returned the precious document to his pocket. ‘You can't scare me,' he replied through his sobs, ‘I will continue. Oah yes, right on to the end of the road, as the song says. I will enter Uncle Paul's place and lay my case for a new republic before the lost souls. And they will hear Looksmart, and return with me to our homelands leaving you behind, Blanchie, like the last bit of porridge clinging to the pot.'