I doubted. I doubted every day. I was doubting at the very moment the dominee told us not to doubt. God had sent his warning to me through the preacher. Moeder never doubted. Oupa Gideon never doubted. It must get easier with age, I thought, although surely it must be more difficult.
The dominee plucked a few notes on his autoharp again and then put it aside to tell the story of Zacchaeus, the crooked tax collector. Zacchaeus had been judged evil, but Jesus could see through the faults to the good that was inside the man. I worried that if Jesus could see the good inside Zacchaeus, he could see the doubts and sinful thoughts I sheltered. When Jesus visited, Zacchaeus changed his ways and became righteous. I could be righteous again. Save from wrath and make me pure.
I looked at the faces around me. I spotted a boy. I smoothed my hair and a few strands fell out. When I looked harder, I realized the boy was only Willem’s age, but tall enough to fool me at first. Too young, but he had caught my attention. Was shedding hair my punishment for having had sinful thoughts in the house of the Lord? Wait, does this qualify as a house of the Lord? A tent? Be righteous again, I told myself. And be rewarded.
The dominee finished by reading Psalm 27. I studied his face. He was old, but not terribly old, I thought, and he had a deep, pleasant voice. He was not one of those who spit damnation with each breath. He may have realized we were dealing with enough fearful moments.
“Take these words with you tonight,” he said. He spoke this psalm slowly with no music or singing.
“When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh . . . it is they who stumble and fall. . . . Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear . . . though war arise against me, yet I will be confident.”
I tried to memorize the words he’d chosen, as they were perfect for us. But they did not take root, and I began to think I was not as sharp as when Tante Hannah was schooling me at home, when every fact found a welcoming home in my mind.
“The Lord will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble; he will conceal me under the cover of his tent . . .”
The dominee swept his right hand above him with the mention of a tent. God will conceal us . . . but I knew the tent would not conceal my thoughts from him.
The preacher picked up his autoharp and played a livelier tune. We clapped louder. Those who had been silent when they entered left the tent humming or singing or chatting. I talked to a few girls on the way back to our tent. . . . Maybe I could meet with them at the next gathering. I wanted to tell Janetta all about it, to share it with her, but their tent was silent when I walked past.
SOMEONE SQUEEZED A SAD requiem from a concertina in a nearby tent that night. I felt the slow rhythm of music, and it invited restfulness. When the tune ended, the player added a dozen or so quick-tempo notes that caused me to look at my mother. Her eyes closed, her head swayed.
“What is that, Ma?”
“Shhhh.”
She looked at me only when it stopped.
“That’s for a tickey-draai . . . a dance . . . the music that played when I met your father.”
What? Wait. What? Moeder. Dance? Young girl? Dance with Father? A flutter of unconsidered images flashed in my mind. Her existence did not start when we were born? She had a life before she was a mother? How could it be possible that she had been a girl at one time?
“Tell us about it, you’ve never said anything . . . please.”
She looked at Mevrou Huiseveldt, who could be expected to protest. A story like this might make her head actually explode.
“Please, Ma, I’ve never heard.”
“Not now . . . not here.”
I was not about to allow the dour looks from Mevrou Huiseveldt to deny me this story. The only thing Moeder ever shared with me of her youth related to her mother’s brush set and how she used it. But never anything about dances and certainly not her meeting Vader. How many other things had she been hiding about her life?
“Ma . . . what else do I . . . do we . . . have? We’ve never heard this.”
“Not now.”
I threatened: “I’ll start singing.”
She sat straight and smoothed her skirts. Willem pulled up his little riempie stool to join us.
“I was seventeen,” she said, shaking her head, understanding that we could not picture such a thing. “The dance was in town, and I’d practiced the steps with my sisters.”
I stared at her face, mentally erasing the toll of time, to see a fresh-faced young lady.
“I was waiting for Piet van Niekirk to show up, but your father’s brother came up and took my hand to dance.”
“Oom?” Willem shouted. “You danced with . . . ?”
She would not allow the use of Oom Sarel’s name. I could not picture him asking Moeder to dance, much less her agreeing to it. Willem and I looked at each other at this family revelation.
“Once,” she said. “Just once. . . . Shush if you want me to tell you.”
“Wait . . . wait . . .,” I insisted.
“Aletta . . .”
“Moeder . . . you danced with Oom Sarel?”
“Piet did not arrive . . . and . . . your father’s brother asked. He was about my age. . . . I had practiced the dances. . . . I wanted to dance.”
“Just once?”
“Once . . . yes,” she said.
“Was there something wrong?” I asked.
“That was enough. I turned away and went back with friends.”
“And then you saw Vader and wanted to dance with him,” Willem said. Cee-Cee and Klaas and Rachel quieted and turned to follow her story as well. The adults never conducted story times.
“No, I didn’t even know of your father. . . . He was a little older. . . . I had never spoken with him. I don’t know that I’d ever seen him. This was probably the first time.”
“So he asked you to dance?”
“Not until I was about to go home,” she said. “I was walking toward the door. He came to me just as the music was starting. I wanted to dance a tickey-draai and he was standing there with his hand out. I took it and we began spinning. That’s what a tickey-draai is, turning in tight circles, as if around a threepenny piece.”
She held her finger and thumb apart the breadth of the tiny coin.
“Teach me, Ma, I want to learn,” I said.
“No . . . let me finish.”
“Vader danced?” Willem asked.
“You don’t really have to be a very good dancer with a tickey-draai,” she said.
“But he was handsome?” I asked.
“Mmm . . . not to make you stop to look.”
“So?”
“We danced that one and the next one, and he never said a word. Very shy. He just kept looking away . . . or at my neck.”
She touched the empty collar of her dress.
“Your neck?”
“My ouma’s cameo brooch,” she said. “She let me wear it that night for the first time.”
“Do you still have it, Moeder?” I asked. “Please tell me you brought it from home.”
“It’s safe in my bag,” she said. “Maybe it will be yours someday.”
Willem punched my shoulder, but it didn’t bother me, as I was stunned to hear that I would someday wear that brooch. It was beautiful and I wanted it immediately.
“You should wear it,” I said.
“Not here . . . no.” She squinted me quiet. It wasn’t fair to Willem.