Брайс Куртенэ - The Power of One

It was a lopsided sort of a catch-as-catch-can education, added to by Miss Bornstein who had been busy preparing me for a scholarship to a posh private school in Johannesburg. An education well beyond my mother’s income as a dressmaker. I was not yet twelve, the minimum required age for entry into a secondary school, and I had languished in standard six for three years during which Miss Bornstein had privately educated me in ‘all those things there’s never time to learn at school’.

A month before my twelfth birthday I sat for the scholarship exam to the Prince of Wales School, and at the end of the term to my absolute mortification Mr Davis, the headmaster of Barberton school, announced that I had received the highest scholarship marks this school had ever given. That I would be starting as a boarder at the commencement of the first term in 1946. Doc, Mrs Boxall and Miss Bornstein had trained me well, if sometimes a little erratically. I was to find at the Prince of Wales School my knowledge in some things exceeded that of the senior forms and even the masters themselves, while in others I was no better than the brighter chaps in my form. But above all things I had been taught to read for pleasure and for meaning, as both Doc and Mrs Boxall demanded that I exercise my critical faculties in everything I did. At twelve I had already known how to think for at least four years. In teaching me independence of thought they had given me the greatest gift an adult can give to a child, besides love, and they had given me that also.

And so the last summer of my childhood came to an end. I also sat for the Royal College of Music Advanced Exams and passed, although my marks weren’t spectacular. I think this was as much as Doc expected from me. He knew I had no special gift for music and what I achieved had been simply out of love for him. For his part he had fulfilled his contract with my mother, for whom my passing the exam was confirmation of my genius. In my mother’s mind I had become the logical successor to the young Artur Rubinstein, and it was one of the major disappointments in her life that at boarding school I would elect to play in the jazz band. Jazz was the devil’s music and another indication to her that I had hardened my heart against the Lord.

Before Geel Piet died he had been teaching me how to put an eight-punch combination together. I worked solidly all summer on this combination and at the championships held in Boksburg I retained the under twelve title, though this time without effort, even stopping a bigger kid in the second round on a TKO. Killer Kroon had not entered the championship even though he would have been in the division above.

Everyone, even Doc, seemed pleased that I had won a scholarship to the Prince of Wales School in Johannesburg, though I think he was trying very hard to be brave about the break-up in our partnership. Writing for the Goldfields News , Mrs Boxall really went to town in her column, ‘Clippings from a Cultured Garden’, writing about the town’s budding intellect and its finest flower which turned out to be me. News of my pass in the Royal College of Music exams had me declared a blossoming musician. In the Afrikaans section of the paper my name appeared as the winner of the Eastern Transvaal under twelve boxing title. My mother declared, ‘Our cup runneth over!’ but if I would accept the Lord into my heart her joy would be a hundredfold what she was feeling now. But I could see she was pleased, especially when she started to receive invitations to tea from the town’s most important families and her dressmaking business picked up so much that she only had time to accept the juiciest invitations.

I kept my apprehension about returning to boarding school to myself; it seemed I would once again be the youngest kid in the school, though this aspect anyway now left me unconcerned. If they had a Judge at the Prince of Wales School, all I could say was he’d better be able to box. In fact, the only question I asked about the school was about boxing. The reply came back that boxing was a school sport and the boxers were under the instruction of Mr Darby White, ex-cruiserweight champion of the British Army.

The final crisis of that last summer of childhood came when the clothing list arrived from the Prince of Wales School. As she read it the tears started to roll down my mother’s cheeks. Marie was there on her afternoon off from the hospital so it must have been a Wednesday. My mother read the list aloud. ‘Six white shirts with detachable starched collars, long sleeve. Three pairs of long grey flannel trousers (see swatch attached). Six pairs grey school socks, long. One school blazer (see melton sample attached), school blazers or blazer pocket badge and school ties obtainable from John Orrs, 129 Eloff St, Johannesburg. One grey V-neck jersey, long sleeves. Shoes, with school uniform, brown. Shoes, Sunday, black. Blue serge Sunday suit, long trousers.’

‘We don’t have the money, we simply don’t have the money,’ she kept repeating.

‘Ag man, jong, where’s your faith?’ Marie said indignantly, not impressed by my mother’s tears. ‘The Lord will supply everything, just you see. We going to pray right now, go down on our knees and give the precious Lord Jesus Peekay’s order. C’mon let’s do it now!’

My granpa rose from the table and excused himself but I was obliged to kneel with Marie and my mother. Marie must have reasoned that, as a heathen, my prayers wouldn’t have too much impact, because she took the clothing list from my mother and handed it to me. ‘We going to pray out loud to the Lord, it’s always best when you need something bad to pray out loud. When I tell you, you read out the list, okay?’

I nodded, grateful that I wouldn’t have to pray out loud.

‘Precious Lord Jesus, we got a real problem this time,’ Marie began.

‘Praise the Lord, praise His precious name,’ my mother said.

‘You know how clever Peekay is and how he has won a thing to go to a posh school in Johannesburg for nothing.’

‘Precious Saviour, hear thy humble servants,’ my mother said, attempting to bring a bit of tone into the whole affair.

‘Well we got lots of trouble, man, I mean Lord,’ Marie continued, ‘the clothing list arrived today and it broke our hearts.’

‘Precious Jesus! Blood of the Lamb!’

‘The cupboard is bare, there are no clothes for school hanging up in it. What we need, Lord Jesus, Peekay is going to say right now, so please listen good and you talk up, Peekay, so the Lord can hear, you hear? He’s going to tell you now, Lord,’ Marie prayed, cueing me in.

I must say I’d never been quite as close as this to the Lord before and I was quite nervous. ‘Ah er… six white shirts with detachable starched collars, long sleeve,’ I read. ‘Three pairs of grey flannel trousers (see swatch attached).’

‘Show him the swatch, man,’ Marie whispered urgently. I didn’t know quite what to do so I held the swatch of grey flannel up to the ceiling. After a few moments, when I reasoned the Lord had had a good enough look, I continued, ‘Six pairs of grey school woollen socks, long.’

‘Only three pairs, man! What about the three pairs you already got for school here?’ Marie said in a stage whisper.

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Only three pairs, please.’ My mother had stopped punctuating Marie’s remarks and I looked at her. At first I thought she was crying, her face was all squished up and she was holding her hand across her mouth. Then I realised that she was desperately trying not to laugh. I started to giggle.

Without opening her eyes Marie admonished me. ‘Peekay, stop it! God will punish you! It’s hard enough asking the Lord for you, you are not even being born again an’ all that! But if you laugh we got no chance.’ Her voice became conciliatory. ‘Sorry, Lord, he didn’t mean it, you got my word for it, it won’t happen again. Go on, start reading again, the Lord hasn’t got all day you know!’