BLACK ISRAEL: The Unending Experiment.
LAKE COUNTY, BAKANA.
TUESDAY 25TH SEPTEMBER 1962 (1820 HRS. GMT)
Establishment shot: Descending aerial shot of a series of Nissen huts. Zoom on a hut. Cuts to interior.
As if unsure of her surroundings, a girl puts out her right leg. Tentatively. She is lying on a bachelor – style bed, just enough space for two. The floor admits the leg, she pauses for a while, now certain of a foothold, she introduces the other as she sits up with a woeful mien. Her back is towards her lover; it appears. Pretty. Almost beautiful. Nineteen tops.
Unable to contain herself any longer, she turns suddenly to pull at his leg the way an excited dog would tug at the slipper of its master.
"Mmmhmm?" Her reward from the sleeping figure.
"Wake up, I want to talk", she says fretfully.
"Leave me alone, I'm tired, Bethune. Let it wait," he says with lethargy as he turns his back.
"Sit up, Nthule. It's important". Her voice up a decibel.
"Say your piece, I'm all ears."
"I'm pregnant. It's two weeks late", she nearly sobs.
"Congratulations! You remember that song by James Muzenda?"
Nthule manages to convey a feeling of boredom.
"You are a moron, Nthule. With your meager earnings at the store, can you afford a baby?" Bethune spits out contemptuously.
"We can always manage besides, you have your own income, that should come in handy". His back is still towards her.
"Eighty-seven shillings?" She screams.
"Yes. Why not?" Nthule queries irritably.
"Maudit sois le jour que nous connaissions. You unambitious good-for-nothing soul."
The ambience changes dramatically. It assumes a mournful cloak. The man, Nthule, twenty-seven tops, slowly crawls out of bed to sit on the only chair in the bedsitter. His expression growing murderous by the second. She cringes not, as she watches his chest heave frantically.
"I'm having an abortion. I don't want a pathetic life with the constrictions of a low income as it is, how much more the responsibility of having a baby. And all you do is joke about it. James Muzenda my foot,'' she says in a voice that could cut through ice, absolutely rejecting the dismal prospect.
"An abortion, eh? Okay, go and have it and stay away from me. I know you have been reacting to the attention that Chiluba of a man has been favouring you with, 'Miss Neptune Stores'," he hauls at her with spite and derision.
"That's none of your business, at least he is upwardly mobile", Bethune says with a sneer.
"Oh, so you have been seeing the floor manager already, eh?" Nthule bellows. Bethune gets off the bed and moves toward the door.
"Now, where do you think you're going?" He shoots out of his wooden chair and spins her around forcefully.
She slaps him, picking the force for it from the momentum as she turns to meet him. She stares at him with intense feelings as she dares him to react.
Nthule feels the sting of the blow and touched his face gingerly, his jaws coming loose at the hinges, gaping at her in amazement as if it is her first impetuous act. In this confusion she goes out of the room.
The scene fades to reveal Nthule busy at his writing-desk. Pen skipping and gliding frantically across white paper. He pauses occasionally to gaze at her side of the bed that is still probably with the imprint of her weight. Perhaps for burning inspiration or to relive the episode. Who can tell for sure? He leans back in his chair and lifts the paper to peer into it. And reads aloud.
STILL WARM
That place it touches,
Mine, enamoured to hold,
One I crave to mold,
Wrought into ways I'm told;
So primordial;
Pristine white of spread, now crimsoned,
Testimony to the habitude of yore,
Once lost, but there to restore.
The touch,
That hold,
This existence mold,
Experienced, not told:
Shapely vestige of rumpled days,
Remain sacrosanct and darkly
Within this proud sinewy confine,
When all appears to have gone fold."
He nods, his satisfaction apparent in his bold features. Someone knocks on the door.
"It's open", he calls out. The door opens and a woman enters.
"Ah, madam, good evening to you", he smiles.
"Evening, Nthule. What is that, another script?" She asks as she sits on his bed, beating and smoothening the sheet with suggestive motions. A woman with the invisible "Married" tag hanging from her neck. A woman in her late thirties.
"No, Mrs. Temba, this one is not for Reuben's Cousins, it's a poem." Nthule smiles self-consciously.
"What about?" The curvaceous woman enquires teasingly from the bed as she eyes his naked torso with brazen interest. Nthule is aware of her scrutiny and seems overcome by an odd feeling of shyness. He hesitates. The woman perceives this and smiles knowingly.
"It's about a woman, isn't it?"
Nthule exhales and nods affirmatively.
"Sad?" She asks narrowing her eyes. He nods again.
"Bethune, I'm sure. That girl seems to have this remarkable knack for causing you so much grief. Let me read it". She extends her hand toward Nthule.
"You like to waste your time with teenagers, wasting your valuable creative moments in unnecessary despair when there are mature and interesting women at your disposal", she says seriously.
She leaves the bed when she sees that he is unwilling to part with the paper and snatches it from him. She reads silently for a long while. A whisper of a smile touches her pretty features as she looks up into his anxious eyes. Eyes that seem to seek approval. Anything else could further sink his spirits and batter his ego.
"I see…. Your bedspread is still warm and has been the mould, but tell me, was she a virgin when you met her?" Her smile broadens. His jaws slacken once again. In a mixture of embarrassment and surprise.
"Mrs. Temba, I know that you are quite good in literature but I cannot understand this grasp you seem to have concerning my style and its import." Nthule shakes his head in amazement.
"That's what the study of comparative literature can do for you. Nthule, maybe I can help you with your poetry; get it published in London. You are a valuable member of Reuben's Cousins, and the theatre, I must tell you, has got valuable connections abroad". Mrs. Temba smiles reassuringly. Nthule moves to the edge of his chair, his face manifesting great anticipation.
"Can you? Will you, Mrs. Temba?"
She nods.
"Compile the lot and have them typed and I'll take it from there." Nthule's features mirrors his elation.
"Thank you very much, Mrs. Temba. This is good news, just when someone has labelled me an unambitious good-for-nothing."
He laughs. Mrs. Temba's brows furrow.
"Qui a dit Cela?" She asks rather crossly.
Nthule exhales. "Bethune. Not quite long, before you came in," he says, in a sombre tone.
"She's not the type for you, Nthule. In this poem, you wrote: 'when all appears to have gone fold', should I assume that you are through with her?" Mrs. Temba shows curiosity. And her eyes assume the glint of an enchantress.
"I'm not too sure about that. There is a problem presently. She's pregnant and wants an abortion. We had a quarrel over the matter." Nthule summons his confidence.
"Let her have it, if that's what she wants. It will be good for you ultimately. I don't want you mismatched with a girl like that. A half-baked salesgirl!" Mrs. Temba spits contemptuously.
"With what do I pay the doctor? It's still a fortnight till payday and I'm dead broke as it is", Nthule says miserably.
Mrs. Temba merely smiles.
"See the doctor and let me know about his charges. Okay? But you will have to leave the poor wretch alone. You deserve a lot better than that." She stands up.
"I was passing down the lane and decided to check you up. The stroll does bring back memories of days when I was growing up around here. The 'Barracks' they called it in those days. It hasn't changed since then 'am afraid. Nthule, how would you like to write yourself out of this dehumanizing existence, out of the persistent annual flooding that finds its way into your room, out of filled and maggoty toilet bowls, out of gutters that are so nauseating you could die just by looking at them?" She says with drama gesturing towards the open window.
"I love to, with all my heart", he says earnestly.
"Then you need the right company, not uncultured and unwashed teenagers." Mrs. Temba moves to his position and kisses him full on the lips. Her eyes willing a response from him.
"But…Mrs. Temba, what…?" Nthule begins uncertainly.
"Enough of 'Mrs. Temba', call me Liza."
She pulls him to his feet and gestures towards the door. He understands and makes for the metal door to lock it. Nthule returns to see her undressing herself. He watched the captivating display of her endowments like a heathen awed speechless at the strange prowess of his god.
Her round and firm breasts tumble out of the bra cups to his delight.
The cinema audience whoops its excitement and even more so when the on-screen lovers began to exert themselves sexually, leaving nothing to the imagination. God…Momma would hate me for this.
The screen folds.
The façade of a hospital. It cuts to the interior. A doctor finishes his examination and Bethune gets off the obstetrical table and the metal stirrups and self-consciously begins to put on her clothes. She follows the doctor into the consulting room where Nthule waits patiently.
"Your friend has tried in the past to terminate the pregnancy," the doctor states with authority looking enquiringly at Nthule and attending to an itch on his nose. Nthule nods.
"Its been difficult trying to find a doctor and we had used various laxatives and local gin and pills…"
"When?" The doctor asks pushing his specs up the bridge of his beaky nose.
"About four weeks now", Nthule returns. The doctor shakes his balding head.
"What I'm saying dates farther behind than that. Something like ten weeks would be close to the mark".
The man sniffs perhaps to ease the itch on the bridge of his nose.
"Is it a difficult operation? Can it still be done?' Nthule's visage betrays him. An apprehension. Perhaps monetary. The doctor merely smiles his pity.
"Actually, it is painless…well almost…depending on the individual's sensitivity towards the anaesthetic. It is relatively simple. A speculum is inserted into the vagina, and the cervix is dilated using dilators and the womb is finally scraped. Simple. But not so in this case. There are complications. It appears that her uterine wall has been worn thin and there is a gut-feeling aside from the obvious professional conclusion that something very disagreeable could occur. She may feel so much pain and I might be compelled to increase the level of anaesthesia, and she might not come out of it. I advice you to have the baby. There is also the eventuality of bareness even if she survives it." He sniffs and rummage briefly through a load of papers in an in-tray on his desk. He steeples his fingers and gazes at the couple.
"It is safer and healthier for her to let the pregnancy remain. I'm not a hungry man, or else I would have gone ahead with it, and if she dies, you take your rubbish home with you. I have an interesting list of patients…powerful and rich people, and my safety is guaranteed. That's the truth, young man. Go home, and you can forget about the examination fees". The doctor concludes his lecture with a crooked smile at the unhappy couple.
The scene fades out.