Gordimer Nadine - The House Gun

Duncan is not innocent, but he cannot be guilty. The crucial matter, then, is the lawyer; again there must be the best lawyer. That decision they are not prepared to leave to him, they will be adamant about this, mother and father.

The lawyer, the good friend, they met in Court B17 has briefed a top Senior Counsel, someone, he says, in the class of Bizos and Chaskalson — Hamilton Motsamai.

That is all their son says, he does not give reassurance; only the assurance that he will be defended by what they wanted, the most capable individual available. He does not tell them; he does not tell that he will be safe because he is not guilty of the death of the man on the sofa. This has become a delicate matter that cannot be brought up, as if it were some prying question into a son’s sex life. And indeed — about the girl, of course the subject of the girl can’t be mentioned, although surely she may be needed to give valuable evidence of some sort, she must know she was not worth killing for, that kind of act isn’t in the range of emotional control in which their son’s character was formed, or the contemporary ethic that men don’t own women. Therefore the act could not have been committed. A gun in the mud. Someone else throws it there. A gardener thinks Duncan has dropped something, perhaps it was a cigarette butt discarded, and the police come upon a gun. What they bum to ask their son is: does he know why the man was killed? But that, too, is not possible, for different reasons: the warder, the policeman, is there as the three chairs and table are, but one must remember that the warder hears although his face is composed in the sulky distance of incomprehension: what the answer might be could be used in damaging evidence, the nature of some circle — how could they know — in which the son moves. Once grouped around an act of violence, anything and everything becomes suspicious.

At least, as a doctor, she has something to say.

— How much exercise are you getting? Do you manage to sleep all right?—

Either to satisfy them or in defiance, he makes light of this concern. — Well, it’s not the five-star accommodation I’d recommend. — He laughs. This room is not used to laughter; it comes back at them from the walls as a cry. — There’s some sort of yard I walk around twice a day. Oh — about the dog. I suppose Khulu or someone is feeding him, but—

— Because I can speak to the medical officer and prescribe a mild sleeping pill. And better exercise facilities.—

— No. Don’t. It’s not necessary. What about the dog?—

This is something for his father; these parents are appealing for tasks.

— I’ll find a solution; I’ll fetch him. And books?—

— Philip has brought me a few and I can buy newspapers. But you could get some of mine. From the cottage — and clothes.—

— What about a key?—

— Khulu.—

Time must be nearly up, this produces a new height of awkwardness in the awareness of each of the three: the dread of his going back down the corridors of concrete and steel and their driving away to leave him abandoned there; and the shameful impatience to have the visit come to an end.

The warder signals. The parents don’t know whether to linger or quickly leave; what the protocol is for this kind of parting, what makes it endurable. They embrace him and his father feels a hand press three times on his shoulder-blade. As their son is led away, there’s an aside, delaying for a moment the warder who accompanies him. — Don’t bring anything I was in the middle of reading.—

What he must think of us!

Think of us?

Well, what did we say to him? So cold, matter-of-fact.

He glanced aside from the road ahead and saw her hands in her lap, the thumbnail of one twisting beneath the short fingernails of the other.

What could be said?

The warder standing there. We’ll have to see if we can’t meet him alone with the lawyer, lawyers have privileges of consulting privately with the person they represent.

That’s not it.

The capsule in which they were contained moving between the irreconcilables, prison and life, was suddenly filled with their voices let loose. The fact is, we don’t know what it is we ought to be discussing.

We don’t know what his entanglement is in this whole terrible — thing — he doesn’t give any sign. He says he’s going to have a first-class advocate but we don’t have any idea of what he’s going to give him; what line of defence the advocate’s going to be able to follow, what he’s going to prove, when he pleads.

What about the advocate.

They had heard it at once, in the shock of the name; the choice of a black man. She’s not one of those doctors who touch black skin indiscriminately along with white, in their work, but retain liberal prejudices against the intellectual capacities of blacks. Yet she is questioning, and he is; in the muck in which they are stewing now, where murder is done, old prejudices still writhe to the surface. Looking at the appointment of someone called Motsamai that way, he can find an answer within its context.

Could be an advantage. If there’s one of the black judges on the bench.

His voice is dry: that he should be thinking like this. Ashamed. And why should such a calculation come to mind — a black judge inclined to think better of an accused because he has chosen a black advocate — when we are not talking here of a criminal, a murderer, appearing before him. Where does such a thought come from, for God’s sake!

But do you know anything about him? Maybe he’s just another good friend.

We can make some enquiries. I’ll talk to someone at the top, I’ve met him a few times, he’ll understand although it’s not usual to expect one advocate to pass an opinion on another, I suppose.

Damn what’s usual. I’m trying to think. What else should we be doing, Harald? Just sat there — chatting. Chatting. You might at least have assured him we’ll pay for the lawyers, anything. How do we know whether fees didn’t come into the choice? These senior counsel cost a fortune a day. If he thinks he’ll have to find the money himself, it might affect everything.

He knows it’s not a question of money. He knows he can depend on us. Not the time or the place to make some kind of magnanimous announcement.

I just thought you’d say … his father … oh all right, not about money, something—

All you could think of was to prescribe a sleeping pill.

I know. Well at least it was some sort of message that if he wasn’t being well treated I’d have pull with whoever the medical officer is. But something —

You tell me what we should have said to him.

She hit her thighs with her fists.

That we believe him.

When he says what? He has said nothing. We know nothing. I read the record of circumstantial evidence. The man is dead. A gun in the mud. What does that mean?

While he is speaking she is hammering across his words. That we believe in him! That we believe in him! That there’s no possibility, ever, in this world, that we would not! That’s what wasn’t there, wasn’t said—

He was checked in obedience to a traffic light. His hand went down to shift the gear to neutral and she moved slightly to avoid contact with the hand. He waited, with the red light, then spoke.

Believe?

You know.

There was no response.

That we believe he could never do such a thing and we’re right about that.

He was carried along with the traffic as if the car drove itself. His head was stirring, almost weaving, in some unshareable conflict, intolerable reluctance.

Claudia — he knew he should qualify the formal use of her name with some intimacy, but the old epithets, the darlings and dearests were out of place in what had to be stated, hard. Begin again.