Les Blancs (10 page)

(
TSHEMBE
proceeds to change into native garb, a skirt of handsome leather
)

ERIC
Are they really sending him home for that?

TSHEMBE
The government in Europe has persuaded the government here to talk to him, and he agreed to come.

ERIC
What will happen?

TSHEMBE
Talk!

ERIC
Will he support the terrorists?

TSHEMBE
When did you become interested in politics, Little Toy? Does your doctor whisper politics when he pours your whiskey?

ERIC
(
Bitterly, lifting his head above it
)
He
discusses many things with me.

TSHEMBE
(
Somewhat chastened
) How should I know what Kumalo will do? And don’t call them terrorists: that’s for the settlers. Call them rebels, or revolutionaries. (
Looking off with his own sad irony
) Or fools. But never terrorists. (
A beat
) Tell me about my father in his last hours. Of what things did he speak?

ERIC
(
Curtly—to hurt in return
) Only of his ancestors, what else?

TSHEMBE
Why do you say it like that, Eric?

ERIC
Because it’s true. He was just an old savage who went to his death rubbing lizard powder on his breast and chanting out his kula or some damn thing!

TSHEMBE
(
Grabbing the boy violently
) So did our mother! Do you despise her memory too? Have they finally turned the world
upside down in your head, boy? (
They stare hard at one another
.
TSHEMBE
releases him
) Does Madame Neilsen know about my father?

ERIC
(
Shaking his head
) I thought that you would want to tell her.

(
During this a third man, unnoticed, has approached the hut and stands now at some distance: taller, older, wrapped in a great African blanket
)

ABIOSEH
You are as our mother said you would be, Tshembe—lean, handsome, with the face of a thinker! (
The brothers turn with astonishment
) So were you named, so have you come to be. Greeting!

(
He raises his arms in the “sign” of greeting and
TSHEMBE
returns it
)

TSHEMBE
Abioseh!

(
It is a shout of joy as the two rush together and embrace fully, then stand back and look at one another
)

ABIOSEH
(
Turning at last to the younger one
) And you, Eric. Are you well?

ERIC
(
Blurting it out in his nervousness
) Tshembe has a wife with gray eyes and red hair and they have a son eight pounds …

TSHEMBE
(
To
ERIC
,
saluting
) Thank you!

(
The three brothers laugh
)

ABIOSEH
Is it so?

TSHEMBE
It is so. Ah, Abioseh, Abioseh! It is a long time. I have seen both Europe and America since last we met.

ABIOSEH
(
Smiling tenderly
) The Wanderer, my brother called Tshembe, who is Ishmael. Tell me of your doings.

(
The three brothers sit as of old
)

TSHEMBE
Well—I worked in the mines on the coast for a while. (
He offers his brother a cigarette but
ABIOSEH
declines
) And then I got a job on a newspaper. But when the resistance began the government closed it down. Poof! (
ABIOSEH
looks at him curiously
) So I scraped together some cash and went off to Europe. At first I
roomed with Titswali Okele. You’d approve of Okele, Eric. He got
two
girls in a fix: one European and one black American. And sent them both to an East Indian abortionist.

(
He laughs and settles back
)

ABIOSEH
“Resistance,” Tshembe? You mean the terror. (
With obvious concern for his brother
) You are not involved in this trouble—are you?

TSHEMBE
(
Carelessly, an assumption
) All Africa is involved in this trouble, brother.

ABIOSEH
(
Smiling
) I can see that you have learned the philosophical reply.

ERIC
He talks funny now.

TSHEMBE
I think funny.

ABIOSEH
Y
OU
are different than when you went away, Tshembe.

TSHEMBE
Inside and out! (
Bending his head over
) How do you like my part? Something, huh?

ABIOSEH
(
Ruffles his brother’s hair fondly. Then, searching his eyes
) I hope you have not been swallowed up in the fanaticism. It is everywhere. The killing. You have heard?

TSHEMBE
I have heard.

ABIOSEH
(
With great enthusiasm—pouring it forth
) Tshembe, these are new times. There are those in London—some even in Zatembe—who recognize that this is our country too. We have had feelers—

TSHEMBE
“Feelers”?

ABIOSEH
Nothing official, you understand—

TSHEMBE
“We”?

ABIOSEH
We have a group—responsible, educated, enterprising. Men like ourselves who want to build—not destroy. But the settlers won’t budge, of course, while fanatics give them the least excuse—

TSHEMBE
I don’t recall that the settlers ever needed excuses. (
Shrugging mightily as the other starts to answer
) Oh, dear brother, what does it matter! I worried about such things for years and then, one day, sitting on a bench in Hyde Park—watching the pigeons, naturally—it came to me as it must to all men: I won’t come this way again. Enough time will pass and it will be over for me on this little planet! And so I’d better do the things I mean to do. And so I got up from that bench and went to meet the girl I had been wanting to marry but had not, you see, because of—(
On his fingers, deliberately mocking the words
)—the liberation! the Movement! “AH-FREE-KA!”—and all the rest of it. Well, I was, as Camus would have it … (
Ironically, with a small introspective laugh, for he does not in any sense feel the “freedom” he boasts about
)
…
“a free man” in that moment because I “chose” freely.
I chose
. And so, you see, it is all over with me and history. This particular atom has discovered himself. (
He gets up and signals to
ERIC
to fetch the funeral robes and pulls out a pot of ceremonial paint
) In any case, we should get ready for the ceremony.

(
ABIOSEH
watches with disbelief
)

ABIOSEH
And what do you propose we do at the ceremony, my disenchanted, world-traveled young intellectual? (
ABIOSEH
rises and stands very tall, still holding the blanket about him
) Should we also paint our cheeks?

TSHEMBE
(
Holding the pot of paint out to him
) Yes.

ABIOSEH
(
Staring hard at him
) And dance?

TSHEMBE
Of course.

ABIOSEH
With yellow ochre on our cheeks and the rattle in our hands?

TSHEMBE
We should.

ABIOSEH
(
His voice rising with hostility
) To chase away the spirits of evil that have taken our father away?

(
TSHEMBE
starts to paint his own face
)

TSHEMBE
Why do you ask these things, Abioseh?

ABIOSEH
Do you believe in any of it?

TSHEMBE
Of course I don’t believe in it.

ABIOSEH
Then why?

TSHEMBE
We are our father’s sons. Our people expect it. What great harm is there in lizard powder, Abioseh? (
ERIC
hands him the ceremonial robe, a great imposing garment of animal skins, and he advances, holding it out to
ABIOSEH
) It is your place to wear the robe now.…

(
He reaches out and pulls the blanket from his brother—who stands revealed in the cassock and crucifix of the Roman Catholic Church
.
ERIC
gasps
.
TSHEMBE
regards him in silence
)

ABIOSEH
I take the final vows in the spring.

TSHEMBE
(
Donning the robe himself
) And what will be your name then, my brother?

ABIOSEH
Father Paul Augustus. (
TSHEMBE
and
ERIC
exchange looks
) I thought to tell you of this in a different way.

(
The two are confronting each other; one in the mystical robes of ancient and contemporary Africa—the other in the mystical robes of medieval and contemporary Europe
.
TSHEMBE
laughs
)

TSHEMBE
I see. Such is the marketplace of Empire! You, the son of a proud elder of the Kwi, are now pleased to change your ancient name for that of a Roman Emperor! You came home not to pay respects to your father but to rail against a few pots of innocent powder!

ABIOSEH
Some day, Tshembe—

TSHEMBE
You have found Reason in a bit of dirty ash—(
Hotly touching his forehead
)—and Humiliation in the rattles and feathers of our ceremonies!

ABIOSEH
Some day a black man will be Archbishop of this Diocese, a black African Cardinal. Think of what that will mean!

TSHEMBE
It will mean only the swinging jeweled kettle of incense of another cult—which kept the watchfires of our oppressors for
three centuries! (
Gesturing impatiently to
ERIC
’s own robe, which is far less imposing
) Eric, get dressed!

ABIOSEH
You were raised by Christians, Eric!

TSHEMBE
(
Simply, without passion
) And maimed by them!

ABIOSEH
Some dreadful thing has happened to you, Tshembe. (
Coming towards him with hand outstretched
) But it is not too late—

TSHEMBE
(
Drawing violently away
) The sale, dear brother, has been completed and you are wearing the receipts!

ABIOSEH
(
With determined gentleness
) Ah, Tshembe, Tshembe … you dare to equate my faith, my acceptance of the supreme morality of humankind—with purchase?

TSHEMBE
(
Reaching out and taking the silver crucifix in his hands
) I know the value of this silver, Abioseh! It is far more holy than you know. I have collapsed with fatigue with those who dug it out of our earth! I have lain in the dark of those barracks where we were locked like animals at night and listened to them cough and cry and swear and vent the aching needs of their bodies on one another. I have seen them die! And I think your Jesus would have loved those men—

ABIOSEH
I see that you remember at least
part
of your teachings—

TSHEMBE
—but I think He would have cared nothing for those who gave you this!

(
He flings the cross back at him, and
ABIOSEH
passionately falls to his knees
)

ABIOSEH
Y
OU
are ravaged by things that will destroy you, Tshembe!

TSHEMBE
(
Quietly, evenly
) I am ravaged.

(
He turns to go
)

ABIOSEH
(
Clutching the crucifix to his lips
) Tshembe, come and kneel and pray with me! Jesus will—

TSHEMBE
(
At the door, rattle and headpiece in hand: it is a great imposing affair of furs and animal horns
) Abioseh, I know the tale of Jesus.
But I think now if there was such a man he must have been what all men are: the son of man who died the death of men. And if the legend is true at all that he was a good man, then he must have despised the priests of the temples of complicity! I am going out to our people.

(
Looking from one brother to the other, he dons the headpiece
)

ABIOSEH
You are condemning yourself to hell, Tshembe Matoseh! (
TSHEMBE
throws back the door flap, and a sudden shaft of yellow light glints on the silver crucifix as
ABIOSEH
raises it above his head and intones a prayer in ringing liturgical Latin
,
TSHEMBE
throws back his head and begins, with all his power, to join in the offstage funereal chant. The two barbaric religious cries play one against the other in vigorous and desperate counterpoint. The lights come down on the novice Paul Augustus on his knees and the terrified
ERIC
,
still clutching his robes as
TSHEMBE
sweeps out
)

CHARLIE
“And it shall follow as the night the day—” (
Calling inside
) Say, Doctor Gotterling, you know this is the only place I’ve ever been where the night really
does
follow the day. Whatever happened to your twilights here?