Church Social & Stage-Coaches!

Touched on this before so will keep it short; reckon it’s down to my judgement day looming on the horizon. A fair number of folk have been following what I write and for your support I will always be grateful. However (like that word, sort of lets me take a deep breath), blogging out book extracts and offering up a completed book come with very different price tags; putting out Sons of Africa as a whole, I could compare to me standing outside the Post Office on a Saturday morning – butt naked, open to criticism, but hopefully with some good reviews mixed in – just to balance things out. One thing I’ll say in my defence; it’s a bloody good read – a proper story.

‘Can’t win ‘em all!’ I hear you shout and that’s as maybe, but nerve-wracking nevertheless. Anyway, confidence still reigns supreme and just to prove it, will shortly be posting Sons of Africa’s new and final cover art. Hope you like; kept the theme as ‘Africa orientated’ as possible, attractive but not over-the-top. No flashing spears or leaping lions, I promise. Reckon that’s enough for now; vanity, as always, is insatiable. Now go read about my school’s church disco...

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Friday night church social; the only night that we were semi ‘let loose’ on the town – the town being a church hall at the back of St Michael & All Angels. No big deal, but we welcomed it anyway. Marched in crocodile formation and guarded by front and rear prefects we were scuttled town-wards for a whole two hours of ripping it up with the hostel girls; more importantly, for the chance of a crafty fag and a frantic fumble in the alleyway.

The girls all came in frilly frocks; the boys, denied their freedom of choice, in school uniform – really gave us the opportunity to strut our stuff. Twenty or so spotty boys dressed in striped blazers, white shirts and matching stripy ties that I swear were designed by some crack-head pyjama salesman.

The coolest kids had twenty Stuyvesant and a quarter-jack of brandy hidden inside their blazers; the geeky kids – a comb and polo mints. My buddy carried the most coveted of cool items – a Durex! Nobody knew what the word condom meant back then. I eventually acquired one and hid the relevant rubber inside my blazer lining for my last two years at boarding school. Think it was a hand-me-down from one of the senior school-leavers; had it until the foil wrapper disintegrated and the rubber bit fell to pieces. Guess rubber wasn’t meant to last that long; would rather have faced a firing squad than bargain with a half a crown’s worth of my weekly pocket money for a replacement three-pack at McGhie’s Chemist. Even the seniors would crack under Mrs McGhie’s stare; then wobble back out with unwanted aspirins, toothpaste and weak excuses. Besides, the closest I ever came to using it was waving it under the nose of a pretty girl I fancied, like milliseconds before she screamed and lamped me one.

On Friday nights, the Vicar had a break from saving souls and doubled as our DJ for two hours of musical mayhem, coughed a lot as usual; more so when the prettiest girls gave their all to Brenda Lee’s, Let’s Jump the Broomstick. Had really thick glasses so we never knew where he was looking, the funny grin and slavering lips gave him away though...

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Sons of Africa; an extract:

... Like a circus trick rider the boy flicked his feet clear of the stirrups and hit the ground at a run.

‘They’re coming in! No more than a mile behind me.’ He threw the reins to his mother and bounced through the bar-room doors. ‘Mister Dickens, sir – you said for me to watch for the coach!’ He stuck out his hand; palm up – his breathing quick with excitement. ‘You’d best be hurrying outside or you’ll be missin’ it.’

John Dickens flicked the boy a silver sixpenny coin.

He crooked a finger at Mathew. ‘Something I want you to see, been waiting nigh on two years for this.’ Mathew followed him out. Dickens had dressed himself in freshly laundered calico britches and shirt. His face still shone from a scrubbing and his beard caught well at the sunlight when he stepped out into the street; a mass of springy whiskers pressed against his chest like bees to some rocky overhang. John repeatedly sprung and latched the case on his watch.

‘At least they got the day right, I’ll give them that.’ He grinned at Mathew. ‘Keep your eye on the passengers, laddie and all shall be revealed.’

At first, the American built stage-coach seemed trapped inside the wriggling heat haze, its progress marked by a mere flickering of pale dust. Occasionally, when carried by a slight wind, the driver’s voice and the crack of his whip would carry. People crowded around the hotel frontage and craned their neck expectantly; a half dozen urchins and stray mongrels ran up the street, infected by the excitement.

‘Here she comes!’ someone shouted and the crowd opened.

‘Do I look alright?’

‘As you’ll ever be,’ Mathew smiled and saw Dickens’ eyes widen with trepidation.

As mythical spirits the mules came out from the haze and though not as well appointed as their equine cousins, still they were spectacular. At their best speed, a team of ten work-hardened hybrids dragged their Zeederberg mail coach rocking and lurching into the neck of Victoria’s First Street. Grey with granite dust, Doel Zeederberg flexed his legs at the foot-board and with his full weight against it drew back the mules, easing the thrust from their harness.

A cloud of dust caught up with the coach, together they rolled towards the crowd; magically, a woman, like a character from some fantastical dream appeared at an open coach window. Her hair, freed by the wind, glowed with the colours of a midnight sea ripping the tide off Cape Agulhas.

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‘Elizabeth Anne.’ She held out her hand. A deep cobalt blue, her eyes held him spellbound; Mathew rummaged desperately for the right words.

‘Mathew Goddard.’ Mathew accepted the hand. ‘You’re John’s...

‘Daughter.’ Elizabeth helped him. ‘You seem surprised?’

‘I didn’t know,’ said Mathew.

‘So you didn’t tell him?’ Elizabeth admonished playfully. ‘You haven’t changed, father.’ She looked around and with the sun directly overhead her hair sparkled with blue lights. Mathew wanted to touch it and though they had just met he felt his pulse quicken. Elizabeth’s father watched him from the corner of his eye and he smiled like a man who had just that minute lucked to a winning streak at the Crown and Anchor table...