The Luck of the Devil

When did it become a crime to be afraid, I wonder..?

All I know is that since I can remember it has never been an option. It simply did not happen in our family. On the Afrikaans side, my father’s side, I have a Great Uncle who ran off to join the fighting against the British when his family was taken to the infamous camps – three of his siblings never made it out of them. He found his father’s Kommando and ran alongside his father’s horse, hanging onto the mane until a horse became available. He was twelve. My great-grandmother had a different sort of courage – the sort that can endure watching three children die of sickness and starvation and still never lose faith in God or in mankind.

My father went to war as a pilot aged seventeen.

On my mother’s side they appear to have been equally fearless, dying in The Great War and in the Zulu Wars, and surviving the “White Man’s Grave” that is Africa, according to Kipling..

So while my family has been known to tolerate many small foibles and indiscretions (particularly on my mother’s side), cowardice was never one of them.

And yet I’m sitting here, heart pounding every time the birds start up, or I hear one of the big palm fronds falling over the pond.

It had to happen eventually. Our small part of the valley is experiencing a crime wave and every house around me has been hit. It was only a question of time…

I woke up all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed yesterday at seven thirty, which is very early for me. The shadowplay of light in the lounge is irresistible between eight and ten, and I hate to miss it. The branches of the big trees over the verandah are all dancing in the August wind, scattering the sunlight into little twinkly bits. It makes my day to see it. It is still too cold to sit outside then, but I love the view from the sofa, snuggled up with my dogs and sipping cocoa and doing my daily morning journal.

I had just got up and was preparing for the daily Odyssey up to the Water-tower to turn the water on (it all runs out during the night), when the dogs all rushed out of the French Doors in my bedroom, barking madly. I peered out and saw a man up in the rose garden near the Tower.

It didn’t worry me particularly – I thought it was my neighbour’s worker. He had promised to come down with his man and have a look at my leaks. I figured he’d come early to look at them before I filled the tank. So I called the dogs in before they scared the poor fellow to death and phoned him.

“Selwyn, is that you crashing around in my undergrowth?”

“No. It isn’t.”

“It isn’t..??”

“Hang on – I’ll be right down”

And he was. By then I was up there looking for tracks. I’m blind as a bat without my lenses – too bad an astigmatism for glasses – so I told myself it might have been a cow, and was looking for hoof-tracks (my neighbour-to-the-west’s cows are always jumping over the electric fence). There weren’t any.

My neighbour fought in the Rhodesian Bush Wars and is a tracker of note. He found the tracks. There had been three of them. He showed me where the first two had come in – where they’d stood and observed the house. A lovely view of my open bedroom door…

He found the path the third one had taken – the one I’d seen. And where the three of them had come together. The dogs had also picked up the scent. I got onto the radio.

“Papa Delta, Papa Delta, come in for Charlie Foxtrot”

“Go ahead Charlie Foxtrot. I receive you”

“Three intruders, nice fresh tracks. Only 15 minutes ago. I saw one. I think it’s a good case for the Sniffer Dog and the Tracker”

“I’ll organise it, Charlie Foxtrot”

“I’m warning you, I’m still in my pajamas”

“Are those sexy pajamas, Charlie Foxtrot?”

“Most definitely not, Papa Delta”

And he did. It took a while though, to organise.

“They’re taking a long time” said Selwyn.

“They’re much quicker at night. Remember, they’re all at work now, so they have farther to come”

Selwyn went home, he had things to do.

I went and washed my face and made coffee in case anyone wanted any, and put on some clothes. My bright pink furry dressing gown made far too good a target. It took a while for the tracker to come.

Papa Delta arrived.

“So would you have been quicker if I’d said the pajamas were sexy?” I enquired.

He laughed.

Wagner arrived with his beautiful Alsation, Jaffa. Introductions all round. The tracker was a fresh-faced young man with eyes shining with a rare pureness of spirit. I liked him and his dog instantly.

I went up to show them where the tracks were, but found that I wasn’t that clear on it (I’d kept back so as not to mess the scene up) and had to run back to the house to phone the long-suffering Selwyn, who arrived two minutes later.

It was fascinating to watch. Selwyn pointed out where they’d come in, reading signs that were plain to the other two men but invisible to me. As soon as Jaffa picked up the scent, she sat down. Then the hunt was on! It was uncanny how accurate Selwyn had been. The track led through the field, past the rose garden, behind the cottage, across another field through blackjacks and shoulder-high grass, to the fence. Wagner pointed out the loose strand, not apparent to the eye. He waggled it, to show us how loose it was compared to the others.

“This is not their first visit”, he said. “They’ve been through here before”

We left the track, went out through the gate, and as soon as Jaffa found the scent again on the other side of the fence, she sat down. And so we went on, Papa Delta pointing out shoeprints that he recognised from a cable-theft at his house. Safety boots and takkies.

“They’re armed, these guys”, he said.

 Selwyn compared his foot with the print. It was massive. So, a big guy…

I’m astonished that I kept up. I was the eldest of our little group by ten years..

Eventually, we called a halt. It was plain where the tracks were headed.. Past the local Shebeen to a new squatter camp housing mainly Zimbabweans. I remembered that I’d left the gate open and my radio and phone and mobile on the verandah, and all the dogs locked inside (for Jaffa)

We retraced our steps. No need to photograph the prints – Papa Delta already had them on record. Pointless calling the police. Nothing had been taken. What could they do, anyway..?

“Not much they can do until these guys do something to you” said Wagner. “But they’ll be back”.

“Probably tonight, or tomorrow. Better be on the lookout for the next few days”

“Ja, they case the joint during the day then come back later when it’s dark”

"Would any of you like some coffee?” I asked. No-one did. Every one of them had a job to get back to.

It was after they’d all gone that it hit me. I had been very, very lucky.I always have been. My Irish Granny called it the luck of the devil. My Afrikaans Ouma called it the hand of God. 

A few minutes later, and I’d have run right into them at the pump house…Unarmed and in my pajamas. I don’t even take my radio or phone with me – after all, it is just a stroll in the garden..! The dogs are almost always with me on the way there. But not always when I return an hour later to switch it off..

And very lucky that my door is always open. Who knows how close to the house they might have got? It could have gotten ugly. Someone was bound to get hurt..

And so here I sit, waiting, the television off, no music.  It is midnight now. Will it be tonight..?