TEN YEARS - DISA

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moving the things. It was all so untrue and yet so true that they
were being thrown out by the scruff of the neck, like a drama
enacted in a cruel nightmare. Mrs Nyembezi did not move from
where she was sitting, holding her hands together and looking her
persecutors in the face, no longer afraid of them but hating them
— no their deed — with all her being. I say their deed because I
never knew that old woman to bear hatred for another human.
Gert saw that we were not getting started and called in the three
waiting outside to cast out everything into the street, as well as the
three of us if need be. They got to work like mules and soon
everything down to the last rag was in the street. When they
finished, Beak Nose demanded the keys and the house was
locked. The officials got into the front of the van and the three
black men behind. With screeching tyres they were gone from
sight.
The people, who had all along watched from a distance,
converged upon Vusi's mother to ask what was wrong although
they had already guessed. They came with shawls dr'aped over
their shoulders as if someone had died and they were joining the
bereaved in mourning. They did the only thing they could to show
that they were grieved at losing a long-time neighbour that way.
They collected fifteen rand, saying that perhaps it would help them
to persuade the office people to take the payment if only ten rand
was short. Some advised that it would be better to take the money
to the WRAB offices at New Canada where there were white social
workers.
Mrs Nyembezi now had fifty rand in the knot of her handkerchief.
Vusi began to cheer up a little at this. This is the best thing for us
to do, my friend,' he said. I'll take the money to the social workers
at New Canada. They'll understand the whole bleeding thing better
than those sadists at Phefeni. What I'll do tomorrow is to go and
borrow the ten rand from the mashonisa where I work and by the
time they open the offices at New Canada I'll be waiting for them.'
'Ya. I agree that's the best thing to do. How the hell did we
overlook that angle when those Phefeni people would not
understand? If we had gone straight to New Canada from Uncle
Tom's perhaps all this would have been prevented.'
As the following day's events at New Canada proved, we were
presuming too far as regards both the readiness and the ability of
the social workers to help our cause.
Dikeledi's arrival from work coincided with that of the new
tenant's to see what sort of place he would be moving into. The