Hlalanathi

I drove my car slowly up the pot-holed drive to the farm house ahead. On either side of the road behind the tall yellow grass, I saw that the avenue of beautiful Msasa trees that once lined the drive had been felled. All that remained were dried and cracked stumps, some covered with spiny creepers. Lizards basking in the hot sun slid hurriedly off the stumps into the dry yellow grass.

From a distance the old house looked more or less intact. Until I reached the end of the overgrown drive and stopped the little hired car. Surprisingly the once imposing front door was still there, sagging on its big iron hinges but still standing. The steps up to it were scarred and pitted. The windows on either side of the door were gone. The façade of the old building was of stone, carefully quarried and dressed by the old Polish man who had built the farmhouse. I wondered how much longer it would stand, lacking any care or attention. Maybe forever, or until the time someone found a use for the beautiful stone blocks.

A man detached himself from the shadow of the enormous old bougainvillea which gave its name to the farm. He must have been watching and waiting for me, as arranged. I stopped the car, unfolding myself from the vehicle with some difficulty, as I’m tall and it was a small car. Locking the car door, I turned towards the middle-aged man who stood silently before me.

“Good morning. Are you Moses?” He nodded, smiled hesitantly and came forward. We shook hands in the traditional Zimbabwean way. He was very thin and shabbily but neatly dressed in a threadbare t-shirt and frayed khaki trousers. He wore no shoes.

“Inspector Ndlovu told you I was coming?” I asked. Moses nodded. In order to visit my family’s former farm I had had to ask permission from the officer in charge of the local police station. It had taken time but he had eventually agreed but instructed me that someone would be at the farm to “help” me.

“Good morning. Yes. I am to show you the house.” He didn’t need to say that he was also to keep a watchful eye on me. I understood. It was my turn to nod.

I followed his gaunt figure through the doorway. It took some time for my eyes to accustom themselves to the darkness within. Moses didn’t seem to have the same problem. He preceded me down the passage and into what I remembered was the smaller of the two living rooms. My grandmother had called it “the children’s room” and it had been added onto the house by my grandfather. In this room we had been allowed to play our music, entertain friends in the school holidays and treat it as our very own space. I was surprised to see that the old-fashioned sash windows still retained their glass which, although filthy and cracked, allowed some light to enter. The scalloped wooden pelmets above the old windows were still in place. The floor was filthy, crunchy underfoot and littered with plastic bags and dirty scraps of paper and cardboard. In the corner stood an old television set connected to a plug in the wall. Like the rest of the room it was covered in dust and finger marks. It was the only piece of furniture in the room.

“Does someone live here?” I asked Moses, who was standing silently beside me.

There was a long pause before he answered quietly and seemingly reluctantly: “Yes.”

“Do you stay here – in the house?”

Moses avoided my gaze. “I used to stay here but not now.”

“Is the television set yours?”

He answered slowly: “Yes. When there was power I used to watch but the old man didn’t like it.”

“What old man? Does someone else live here with you.”

Moses shook his head, obviously unwilling to pursue the subject and moved away. I followed him, feeling suddenly uneasy.

We continued the tour of the house. There was nothing left of the former fittings in any of the bedrooms, the kitchen or the bathrooms. Interior doors had been ripped out, even their hinges were missing. Built-in wardrobes, carefully crafted by my grand-father had been removed. Gaping holes remained where sinks, baths and toilets had once stood. Even the enormous anthracite stove in the kitchen had been torn out and removed. Could this really be the house in which my siblings and I had grown up? It was nothing but an empty shell. Moses said nothing as he followed me from room to room. Something, however, puzzled me.

“Moses – why is there still glass in all the windows? And the outside door leading into the house is still there, but there are no doors to the inside rooms.”

He didn’t answer but jerked his head to indicate that I should follow him. He led me to the main living-room, his bare feet soundless on the filthy floor. I had been leaving this room until last. Moses motioned to me to precede him into the room. I walked in slowly. Memories came flooding back thick and fast. Here, we had talked, laughed and spent time in the company of family and friends. Now it was a dark, empty room but didn’t seem quite as dirty as the rest of the house. Shadows lay thick within it but I saw the outline of a shape against the far wall. Moses stayed just outside the doorway. He gave the impression of being poised for flight. I heard him give a sharp intake of his breath as I went to investigate the object, my eyes adjusting themselves to the gloomy interior. Silence lay all around, almost tangible.

It was an old cracked leather armchair that had been in the room ever since I could remember. The old chair still stood in the same position, before the leaded window and near the old bookcase. The window had its glass and the empty bookcase was still there. There was a battered table next to the ancient chair. Everything was thick with dust. Why were they still here when everything moveable and immovable in the house had been looted?

Moses still hovered nervously just outside the doorway. After a last look round at the silent room I turned away. I was an intruder. I had no business being in this room any more.

When I rejoined him, Moses quickly shepherded me to the back door leading off the desolate kitchen. He seemed relieved to be outside. We sat in the sunny, paved kitchen courtyard. There used to be dove cotes here, full of cooing fan-tailed pigeons, beloved of my grandfather and my father. Their wives disliked the birds, however, saying that they made too much of a mess. There was no trace of the birds now.

“Who does the television set belong to?”

Moses stared at his feet. “One of the men who took the farm,” he answered. I knew he meant one of the so-called farm invaders who seized all prime farmland some years ago, evicting the white farmers from their homes.

“Why is it still here? Where is the man?”

Moses raised his head and looked at me solemnly. “He has gone. He was too frightened. Whenever he turned it on it was switched off again. I think the old man doesn’t like it. I used to watch it but I knew he didn’t like it.”

I was becoming more and more confused. “Is there anybody living on the farm now? Working it?”

Moses shook his head, still watching me. “No. The old man doesn’t want them here. I live on the farm with my family but nobody wants to come here any more.”

“Moses – why does the big room still have some furniture left? Everything else has gone.”

Moses stared at his feet. After a long time he answered, reluctantly and haltingly.

“The old man sits there. At night. Every night. He sits and smokes his pipe and reads his books.” He shivered. “He is a spirit. That is his room.”

Then I understood - and remembered. My grandfather had bought the farm from the old Polish gentleman who had originally built the farmhouse and established the farm. The old man had had no family and had stayed on in the house, looked after and treated as a respected member of our family until he died. He passed on long before I was born but I knew that he was a great reader and spent all his waking hours reading and smoking his pipe, in the old button-backed leather armchair. My grandmother and mother swore that his presence was still in the big room and refused to move either his chair or bookcase. They said that his presence was comforting and as long as he was there, the family would be safe.

The old Polish man was buried in the small family cemetery near the dam, some distance from the house. Moses refused to accompany me there so I went on my own. The headstones were still standing although the metal railing around the little cemetery had been removed. My brother lay there, one of my aunts and both my parents and grandparents. No sentimental inscriptions on the headstones; simply names, dates of birth and death and, the words “Rest In Peace”. The headstone for the old Polish man had only his name and dates of birth and death. I was interested to see that he had been a member of the Polish aristocracy. After the passing of so many years his story was now lost. Who was alive who would remember him and why he had ended his days in a country so far from his birthplace?

Moses was waiting for me when I left the little cemetery. He was, I think, anxious to get rid of me. We walked slowly around the farmhouse, through the old neglected orchard and under the old gnarled trees. “Moses – where do you live?”

He gestured vaguely beyond the dam. “Over there. Past the dam.”

That was when I saw the Polish man’s old white Austin car, abandoned on the dry, cracked ground in front of the fence erected to prevent children from rushing down to play next to the dam. He’s been so proud of his car, which he’d parked underneath a metal shadeport next to the garages used for my family’s cars. I remembered watching him driving it down the road once, when he’d gone to visit an old friend living in the nearest town, Chegutu. The car had been immaculate, its white paintwork gleaming in the midday African sun and its silver bumpers and glass windows shining brilliantly. Now the car was forgotten, abandoned to the elements so its paint had faded and its bumpers were rusted. The dingy windows failed to hide the cracked red leather seats and the broken black steering wheel. Just like its owner, I thought sadly as I turned away. Lost and forgotten.

I realized that it was time to leave. We walked back to the hired car. I gave Moses what money I had with me and thanked him for his time. He thanked me and then looked at me as if for the first time. He smiled faintly.

“I remember you – as a small child.” He held his hand out to his side, palm down, indicating just how small I had been. “You used to play with my little brothers. Those days were good.” He sighed and shook his head.

I got into the car and drove slowly down the ruined drive, my heart heavy. Reaching the tarred road beyond the broken farm gate, I wished I had not gone back. I wondered why I had, and knew I would never return.

“Hamba Gahle”, I whispered as I turned onto the main road. My memories, like ghosts, were my companions in the car on that hour long drive back to Harare. As they drifted in and out of my subconscious my tears flowed. For my ancestors, who’d worked so hard to make the farm their home. For the Polish man, who loved the farm so much he couldn’t bear to leave. And for Moses, who lived among the ruins and dreams of the past with little hope of a better life in the future.

2062 words

Footnotes

The farm in this story was my family’s farm, who settled in the then-Rhodesia at the end of the 19th century. The old Polish count did haunt the farm, but he was a benign ghost, and only the female family members ever saw him, wearing a smoking jacket, tasselled smoking cap, smoking a pipe and reading in his old leather armchair.

“Hlalanathi” is a traditional African Word meaning “rest in peace”.

“Hamba gahle” is a traditional African word meaning “goodbye”.