Life Times Stories - By Nadine Gordimer Page 0,114

in the habit acquired at cocktail parties. With his air of being distracted from more important things by irresistibly amusing asides, he was correcting a matter of terminology for Robert Ceretti – ‘No, no, but you must understand that in the townships, a “situation” is a different thing entirely – well, I’m a situation, f’rinstance—’

He cocked his smile, for confirmation, to Xixo, whose eyes turned from one face to another in obedient glee – ‘Oh, you’re the muti man!’

‘No, wait, but I’m trying to give Bob an obvious example’ – more laughter, all round – ‘ – a man who wears a suit every day, like a white man. Who goes to the office and prefers to talk English.’

‘You think it derives from the use of the word as a genteelism for “job”? Would you say? You know – the Situations Vacant column in the newspapers?’ The visitor sat forward on the edge of his chair, smiling up closely. ‘But what’s this “muti” you mentioned, now – maybe I ought to have been taking notes instead of shaking Frances’s martini pitcher.’

‘He’s a medicine man,’ Xixo was explaining, while Jason laughed – ‘Oh for God’s sake!’ and tossed off the rest of his gin, and Frances went forward to bring the late arrival, Spuds Buthelezi, in his lattice-knit gold shirt and pale blue jeans, into the circle. When the American had exchanged names and had Spuds by the hand, he said, ‘And what’s Spuds, then?’

The young man had a dough-shaped, light-coloured face with tiny features stuck in it in a perpetual expression of suspicious surprise. The martinis had turned up the volume of voices that met him. ‘I’ll have a beer,’ he said to Frances; and they laughed again.

Jason Madela rescued him, a giant flicking a fly from a glass of water. ‘He’s one of the eggheads,’ he said. ‘That’s another category altogether.’

‘Didn’t you used to be one yourself, Jason?’ Frances pretended a reproof: Jason Madela would want a way of letting Ceretti know that although he was a successful businessman in the townships, he was also a man with a university degree.

‘Don’t let’s talk about my youthful misdemeanours, my dear Frances,’ he said, with the accepted light touch of a man hiding a wound. ‘I thought the men were supposed to be doing the work around here – I can cope with that,’ and he helped her chip apart the ice cubes that had welded together as they melted. ‘Get your servant to bring us a little hot water, that’ll do it easily—’

‘Oh I’m really falling down on the job!’ Ceretti was listening carefully, putting in a low ‘Go on’ or ‘You mean?’ to keep the flow of Xixo’s long explanation of problems over a travel document, and he looked up at Frances and Jason Madela offering a fresh round of drinks.

‘You go ahead and talk, that’s the idea,’ Frances said.

He gave her the trusting grin of some intelligent small pet. ‘Well, you two are a great combination behind the bar. Real teamwork of long association, I guess.’

‘How long is it?’ Frances asked, drily but gaily, meaning how many years had she and Jason Madela been acquaintances, and, playfully making as if to anticipate a blow, he said, ‘Must be ten years and you were a grown-up girl even then’ – although both knew that they had seen each other only across various rooms perhaps a dozen times in five years, and got into conversation perhaps half as often.

At lunch Edgar Xixo was still fully launched on the story of his difficulties in travelling back and forth to one of the former British Protectorates, now small, newly independent states surrounded by South African territory. It wasn’t, he explained, as if he were asking for a passport: it was just a travel document he wanted, that’s all, just a piece of paper from the Bantu Affairs Department that would allow him to go to Lesotho on business and come back.

‘Now have I got this straight – you’d been there sometime?’ Ceretti hung over the wisp of steam rising from his soup like a seer over a crystal ball.

‘Yes, yes, you see, I had a travel document—’

‘But these things are good for one exit and re-entry only.’ Jason dispatched it with the good-humoured impatience of the quick-witted. ‘We blacks aren’t supposed to want to go wandering about the place. Tell them you want to take a holiday in Lourenço Marques – they’ll laugh in your face. If they don’t kick you downstairs.