The Power of One (27 page)

“She seems to be the only one who can understand you, Peekay, so we've brought her along as interpreter. It was my idea and a good one, even if I say so myself,” Mrs. Boxall declared. Marie was dressed in a freshly starched nurse's uniform and looked even more scared than I felt.

Mr. Andrews left us and we had to wait a long while, sitting on a bench in the waiting room. Finally, Mr. Andrews came in and said the judge would see us privately in the magistrates' chambers and, depending on how things went, I wouldn't be required as a witness.

None of this made very much sense to me, but we had to walk

down a long corridor of cork lino that smelled of floor wax. A lady with a trolley full of teacups went rattling past us and she stared at me. I was not yet used to people seeing me with my jaw wired up. I looked into every open door in the hope that I might see Doc. We finally reached a door with
MAGISTRATE
in gold lettering on a square of polished wood screwed to the door. Mr. Andrews knocked on it softly and a voice said “Come!” and we followed him in. Sitting behind a desk was a man wearing a proper uniform with a tie and polished leather Sam Browne belt. He stood up when we entered, and I could see he wore long pants and a revolver at his side. Mr. Andrews introduced him to us as Colonel de Villiers. There were four chairs arranged in front of the desk, and we all sat down. My notes were on the desk on top of a file that was tied with purple tape. Colonel de Villiers put on a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles that slid down his nose as he looked up so he looked over the top of them as he spoke.

“Well, now, young man, Mr. Andrews here tells me that you are bright enough to have written these notes.” He tapped my notes with his forefinger. “How old are you?”

“Seven, sir,” I rasped at the back of my throat. The colonel, Mr. Andrews, and Mrs. Boxall turned to look at Marie. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Her whole face appeared to be frozen in terror. Then two big tears squeezed out of her eyes. She tried again, but still nothing came out. I held up seven fingers to the colonel, who looked stern and cleared his throat.

“I see, seven. Well, you write very well for a seven-year-old. I think someone must have helped you, don't you?” I looked at Marie, who was sniffing into a hanky Mrs. Boxall had handed her. I shook my head. “Umph!” the colonel grunted and looked at Mr. Andrews. “These alleged swear words the sergeant is claimed to have said, they would seem an unlikely part of the vocabulary of a seven-year-old child who, you tell me, has a religious background. I am also a little surprised at his knowledge of Latin.
Senecio serpens
and
Glottiphyllum uncatum
seem a little esoteric for a small boy who, I imagine, like all small boys, is more interested in getting his mouth around a sucker than a Latin noun.”

Mrs. Boxall said, “The professor is an amateur botanist of considerable ability, and the child has been trained by him to take punctilious notes. Besides, he has almost perfect recall.”

“Hmm... a bit too perfect, if you ask me, madame,” the colonel said, as though talking to himself. I could see Mrs. Boxall bristle.

“He did it all himself. I seen him do it in the hospital,” Marie said suddenly, her voice quaking with terror.

“Well, that's one good thing, little Miss Florence Nightingale has found her voice,” the colonel said. “Perhaps we can get on with the interview now?” He turned to me. “Son, I want you to tell me the whole story again, just as it happened.” I repeated the story, although Marie had no chance of pronouncing the Latin names of the two succulents, which I then referred to as “blue chalksticks and another succulent genus which I can write for you, if you want.” The colonel pushed a piece of paper across the desk, and I wrote the Latin names on it. “Extraordinary. It seems I owe you an apology, madame,” he said, dipping his head at Mrs. Boxall. When we got to the swear words, Marie refused to say them. “Please, sir, I can't say them words, I've never said words like that in my whole life,” she said fearfully but with absolute resolve.

The colonel would cut in every once in a while and ask me questions such as “What was the color of the sergeant's cap and belt?” They were all questions that involved some minor piece of detailing, but I had no trouble answering them.

When I was finished he told Marie that she had done an excellent job and she blushed crimson and the pimples stood out on her face. Then he turned to Mr. Andrews.

“The child's statement coincides almost precisely with that of the prisoner. We have already determined that neither has been in a position to compare notes nor to have a third party coordinate a defense. Mrs. Boxall did try to see the prisoner but was not allowed to do so. The prisoner has been visited and interviewed only by military personnel, and I am satisfied that the incident took place as the boy has alleged. I am quite sure the court will find for the defendant in all matters except one. I will ask that the charges of assault to a minor and attempted escape be withdrawn. Quite obviously the striking of the provost sergeant was under severe emotional provocation and the court is likely to look upon it as such. Both the army and the prison reports state that the prisoner smelt heavily of whisky, but we can quite easily ascertain whether his coat sleeve is stained.”

He pulled at the purple tape on the file and opened it up. Inside were two folded copies of
The Goldfields News,
the picture of me sitting on the rock, and a number of Doc's other photographs and also one of his small spiral-bound notepads. The colonel held up one of the newspapers. “Really, this kind of hysterical nonsense makes it very difficult for us. The trial of aliens is distressing enough without having the general population turning the butcher, the baker, and the music maker into enemies of the state. The only charge Professor von Vollensteen faces is a technical one, that of not having registered as an alien.” He rose from his chair and smiled briefly at me. “I only wish I could be here to have a chat with you when your jaw is better, young man. I am also beginning to form a healthy respect for the teachings of your professor.” He shook Mrs. Boxall and Mr. Andrews by the hand and said something privately to him. Then Mr. Andrews hustled us out of the room.

When we got back to the waiting room, Mr. Hankin of
The Goldfields News
was waiting. Mr. Andrews spoke to him and nodded toward the colonel's office. Mr. Hankin rose and walked toward the office. “I think Mr. Hankin's career as a spy catcher is about to come to a sticky end,” Mrs. Boxall said to me. Then she started to laugh. “We won, Peekay, we won!” she said triumphantly.

But we hadn't won. While Doc was acquitted of all the charges, just as the colonel had said he would be, he was charged with being an unregistered alien and the court ordered him to be detained in a concentration camp for the duration of the war.
The Goldfields News
headline read NO
SPY BUT STILL
A GERMAN! It was a year before Mrs. Boxall agreed to resume her column,
“Clippings from a Cultured Garden
by
Fiona Boxall.”

Doc was to be kept in custody at the Barberton prison until arrangements could be made to send him to a concentration camp somewhere in the highveld. Two days after Doc had been sentenced, I went to the library to take a bunch of roses from my mother to Mrs. Boxall. Mr. Andrews had explained to my mother how my evidence had saved Doc from a severe sentence, one that might well have killed a man of his age. He had also persuaded her that we had nothing to be ashamed of and that he only wished his two sons, now at boarding school in Johannesburg, had had the benefit of a man as remarkable as the professor. My mother decided that the Lord had guided her in the matter and that His will had been quite clearly wrought through me. The roses to Mrs. Boxall were her sign that the librarian's trespass into the hospital to see me had been forgiven.

Mrs. Boxall seemed excited when she saw me come through the door. “I'm so fearfully glad you came, Peekay, I have a letter for you.” I handed her the roses. “How very nice of your mother.” She placed them on the book-sorting table and withdrew into her tiny office to return with a small blue envelope, which she handed to me. The envelope was sealed, and I opened it carefully, pulling back the flap at the back, the glue giving way reluctantly. “Do hurry, Peekay, I can't bear the suspense,” Mrs. Boxall said, looking over my shoulder. I withdrew a single sheet of cheap exercise paper and opened it. Doc's neat hand covered the page. “Oh dear, I'm such an awful nosy Parker! May I read it with you?” Besides Hoppie's note, it was the only letter I had ever received and the first one sealed in an envelope. I would have preferred to read it alone, but of course I couldn't possibly say so, and I nodded my agreement.

Dear Peekay,

What a mess we are in. Me in this place where they tear down a man's dignity and you with a broken jaw. But things could be worse. I could be a black man and that would be trouble and half. Absolute.

I have been placed under open arrest, it means I can go anywhere in the prison grounds and my cell is not locked. Best of all, it means I can have visitors. Will you come and see me?

Ask Mrs. Boxall to telephone the people here and make arrangements. There is also good news about the Steinway. The kommandant is going to allow me to have it in the prison hall. This is good news, ja?

I do not think of myself as a German. What is a German? To say a man is a German, what is that? Does it tell you if he is a good man? Or a bad man? No, my friend, it tells you nothing about a man to say he is German. A man must think what he is inside. What he is on the outside, how can this matter?

Also, because I am German, I am well treated by the warders. This also is stupid. Have you planted the
Senecio serpens?
No, of course not, I am getting old and think only of my own welfare. Perhaps Mrs. Boxall will take the books in the cottage and put them in the library? In the meantime I am treated well and whisky is getting easier not to have. Please come soon.

Your friend,

Doc

“We will call the prison at once,” Mrs. Boxall said, inviting me into her office.

The superintendent of Barberton prison, Kommandant Jaapie van Zyl, told Mrs. Boxall that Colonel de Villiers had said Professor von Vollensteen should be allowed access to the boy within the normal rules of the prison. He added that he had heard of my bravery and wanted to meet me himself. That if Mrs. Boxall cared to have me bring Doc library books, this would be permitted. The professor was a musician and a scholar, and Barberton prison was honored to have him.

Mrs. Boxall selected three botanical books she knew to be among Doc's favorites, and I set out with a note from her to visit Doc in prison.

I arrived at the gates of the prison, which were made of wrought iron and locked with a huge chain and padlock. It was the biggest lock I had ever seen, nearly twice the size of a grownup's hand. I wondered how big the key would have to be to open it. The gate seemed about twelve feet high, and along the top there were pipes welded every two feet or so. They were about three feet long, bent inward at a thirty-degree slant and threaded with strands of barbed wire six inches apart. These same rods threaded with barbed wire were set into the top of the wall surrounding the prison. The walls were made of huge blocks of blue granite. Without thinking I identified the components of the rock, mainly feldspar and quartz quarried in the Barberton district, so in addition it contained a fair amount of mica. After a year with Doc it had become second nature to me to identify almost anything that didn't move, and I was an expert at the geology of the district.

I decided that escape from inside the wall would be impossible. Set high up to the side of the gate was a church bell and from it, hanging almost to the ground, was a rope. A sign fixed onto the wall read
ring for attention
. My heart beat wildly as I tugged on the rope, and the noise from the bell seemed deafening as it cracked the silence. Almost immediately, a warder carrying a rifle slung over his shoulder came out of a guardhouse some twenty feet from the gate and walked toward me. His highly polished black boots made a scrunching sound on the white gravel driveway. I handed him my note through the bars of the gate, and he opened it suspiciously. He looked at the note for a bit and then looked up at me.

“Praat jy Afrikaans?”
he asked.

I nodded my head, indicating to him that I understood Afrikaans. The swelling in my tongue had subsided, and while my voice had very little volume and sounded a bit gravelly I could talk quite clearly through my wired-up mouth. The young guard looked relieved and started to talk in Afrikaans. He asked me to read the note, as he didn't have much English, coming from the Northwestern Transvaal, where only the
taal
is spoken. “It says that I am here to visit Professor von Vollensteen and have permission from Kommandant van Zyl,” I told him.

“I will get on the telephone and ask. Better wait here, you hear?” He walked over to the guardhouse, and I could see him talking on the phone. He was quite young and looked nervous. Finally he replaced the receiver and stuck his head out of the door. “
Kom!
” he beckoned to me. But the gate was locked, and he shook his head in exasperation and disappeared to return with a very large key on a huge ring. To my surprise the gates opened smoothly and closed with a clang as he locked them behind me. The young warder told me to report to the office in the administration block and pointed it out to me. “
Tot siens
and thanks for reading the note, you are a good
kêrel,
” he said.