Marlene van Niekerk - Triomf

Never mind what she really thought. That’s what she said. She knew Pop would’ve done the same, to preserve the peace. And now Pop wasn’t there to do it himself any more.

And Lambert said, yes, he agreed, Pop couldn’t get enough air, ’cause apart from that sheet over his head, there were all those fumes and the spray from the Wonder Wall paint, too.

But when Treppie saw the drawer broken in half like that, he began to smell a rat.

Ja, and then Toby stood there and went ‘ee-ee’ next to Pop’s shoes, the ones he was still wearing. Most of the time Pop used to kick them off before he fell asleep in his chair, but now they were shoved so strangely under the chair, you’d swear they didn’t have feet in them any more. Toby’s face also looked like he had an idea or two about that pose of Pop’s there in his chair, with his knees pointed together in front like a Parktown Prawn’s.

Anyway, she and Treppie and the painting foreman managed to get Pop into the car, and then Treppie drove them to the hospital, broken fingers and all. Lambert changed the gears for him. By now, Lambert’s foot was swollen the size of a rugby ball. She’d taken off her housecoat to wrap around her middle and she was holding on to her side where it was still bleeding so much. What else was she supposed to do?

If she hadn’t been stabbed, she said to them as they stood around outside trying to make a plan, she would have driven the car herself. But they didn’t even hear her. Neither of them took her driving lesson seriously. Lambert didn’t even know about it. He had been sleeping that afternoon, after his shooting practice. And Treppie had such drunken blues that night, he stood there playing piano in the air. First in the air and then on the edge of the stoep, as if their whole yard was a concert audience, and he was on a stage with an entire orchestra behind him.

Eventually they were all bandaged and plastered up and at last they stood there, next to the doctor, who had to write out the death certificate for Pop on the trolley.

‘Heart attack,’ the doctor said. ‘And multiple thrombosis.’ She saw Lambert take a deep breath through his mouth as he stood there on his crutch.

‘Lambert,’ Treppie said, ‘shut your mouth, you look like you’ve just seen a ghost.’

‘Multiple skull fracture,’ the doctor said next, prodding Pop’s head with his hand so they could see the pieces of his skull moving back and forth.

Lambert shut his mouth. And the doctor looked at each of them, one by one. Right into their faces.

‘We were painting,’ said Treppie. ‘The house, I mean, and I saw him clutching his chest.’

‘And then he took a dive off the ladder,’ said Lambert. ‘Boom! On his head.’

‘Took a dive?’ asked the doctor.

‘That’s right,’ said Treppie. ‘That’s what happened. We all saw it.’

Then she also rather said yes, Pop fell on his head.

‘Like a warhead,’ Treppie still said, ‘but no bang, just a puff.’

‘Of dust,’ said Lambert.

‘Of dust,’ she said.

Were there any other relatives? the doctor asked. They said no, and the doctor said well, in that case he thought a police statement was perhaps unnecessary.

‘Superfluous,’ he said, and that’s what they all three said, as if they’d practised it all their lives, just for this moment.

‘Superfluous!’ As if in one voice.

‘Shame,’ said Treppie, ‘but at least he still had time to exercise his vote.’

‘And to see the house painted white,’ said Lambert.

‘Exercise in white,’ she said, and then she felt, no, her head was giving just a little more. Almost the same feeling as a piece of tooth chipping off. First the chip washes around a little in your mouth, then it gnashes between your other teeth, and then you take it out to see what it is. Oh, it’s a tooth, you think, throwing it away. Wear and tear. But now there’s another chip gone. In her head.

They laughed at her about that ‘exercise in white’, all of them, not that she could see what was so funny, but she didn’t care. Everything had gone off well at that post-mortem.

She was still in bandages the day Pop was cremated. Treppie’s fingers were in plaster and Lambert was on his crutches.

She insisted: no coffin. And no hole in the ground, either.

Ash.

Ash is light.

First she said they must throw out the ashes next to the Brixton tower where they’d gone to eat their take-aways that time, when they watched the lightning. The day Pop got so lucky with his scratch-cards. When Gerty was still with them.

Treppie said fine, that was also where he remembered Pop the best after that sermon Pop gave him about the high current and the dead earth. But he couldn’t very well scatter ash with his fingers in plaster now, could he?

A week or two later, Treppie took off the plaster with a screwdriver, right here in the lounge. All you saw were plaster-chips flying everywhere. Lambert’s foot was another story. It didn’t want to get better in the plaster. Had to be amputated. And all the time that box of ashes just stood there on the sideboard. Then one day she thought to herself, no, now she was going to make a plan before that ash got cold and forgotten. So she dug a hole in the yard, next to Gerty, and threw the ashes into the hole. Not even three hands’ full. And half of it blew away, too.

She added to the writing that was already there on the wall, with a ball-point. They didn’t have any yellow left:

Here lies Gerty Benade (and now also the ash of Pop ditto)

Mother of Toby Benade

and sweetheart dog of Mol ditto (and beloved by Mol ditto).

(Both) dead from lack of breath.

they’re

Now in dog’s heaven

where the dogs are seven eleven .

There was some new space underneath, where Gerty’s grave had sunk down a bit, so she added:

Just the way Pop dreamt it.

Mol looks up into the sky. Now her tears mustn’t start running down her cheeks.

Last time there were even roses for fireworks.

‘What you looking at, Mol?’

It’s Treppie. He’s come out on to the stoep.

Here comes Lambert, too. In his wheelchair. His other ankle’s also giving in, the one that was always so weak.

Lambert’s much calmer ’cause of the stronger pills the doctor put him on. Patty-something.

He’s boss of the house now, he thinks. But that’s okay. He can’t corner her anymore like he used to. Now she’s faster than him. And she’s glad, ’cause when he doesn’t take his pills he’s especially full of shit.

Ever since Wonder Wall painted over his paintings, and since he’s been in the wheelchair, he doesn’t paint any more. And he doesn’t dig his hole either. Now he sits and watches TV all day. There’s just about nothing left of that big heap he dug out for his hole. Most of it got rained away and then things started growing on it. Last year, on Christmas Day, Treppie threw that watermelon on to the heap, the one they were too full to eat after Lambert’s braai. The watermelon went rotten, right there on top of that heap. Then, would you believe it, the other day she looked out of the back window and saw shoots growing all over the heap. And before long the heap was full of big, green leaves with watermelons sticking out like bums in the sun. Treppie says it’s a miracle. He says it wasn’t exactly seed that fell on fertile soil. But then again, he said, watermelons were like that. Very grateful plants. They grew from fuck-all, anywhere, any time. That’s why there was a song like ‘Sow the seed of the watermelon’. A folk song, said Treppie, was something that became popular ’cause everyone understood it, and in this case everyone ate it, too. He said he’d never heard of anyone who hadn’t enjoyed watermelon at some time or another. He hadn’t thought of it before, but that would really be a good idea for the NP’s flag, if they ever needed a new one, ’cause that little sun and those stripes hadn’t fooled anyone. That’s in the election, of course. Not that she can be bothered. The ANC party after the election looked a lot more jolly. At least they sang and danced, even old Mandela, though he took just one tiny sip of his champagne. And guess what, someone had taught that Niehaus how to dance. Treppie said it just showed you, you’d never think a dominee would be game for such high kicks. If FW wanted to get anywhere he’d have to take dancing lessons from the ANC. Marike too. It was good for frowns, Treppie said.