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Conflicting love and hostility play out against the backdrop of apartheid and street politics of South Africa's violent townships.
Immigrant Acker kills time drinking and flouting South Africa's strict immorality laws. He gets involved with Thoko, who makes a living by entrapping white men. Her controller is D-S Harrid of the S.A.P. Acker takes Thoko to Mama Poppie’s Sowetan shebeen to escape Harrid's clutches but lands in a riot and is grabbed by gangsters, along with Poppie’s husband. Both men are beaten; deals are offered for their lives. Thoko must decide which side she is on; will she pay the price demanded for Acker’s life? Acker and Poppie play the ruthless gangster, Fats, against the political activist, Mokae. But the People's Council is adamant: someone must die. Will it be Poppie's husband, or the wild honky? Acker finds himself fighting on two fronts — against a tide of black hatred, and internal conflicts erupting from his emotionally raw past. Contains some bad language and explicit sex scenes.
Excerpt
(Thoko's initiation into the business.)
‘Not yet, boss.’ Thoko was beginning to panic. ‘I'm not ready.’
The burly Afrikaner grabbed her wrist and pulled her caressing hand away from his member. ‘Well, I am. You have been doing that long enough, meisie. Time for chichi!’ He laughed and dragged her slim body across his ample stomach, ignoring her protests and seating her astride his groin.
She felt his probing hardness; her muscles convulsed, foiling the attempt.
Thoko struggled with the big farmer, their naked bodies rolling from side to side on the cramped cot, until he had her pinned against the whitewashed wall of the abandoned outbuilding. Her anxious eyes found the bolted door, but no signs of impending rescue.
‘No, boss.’ She forced a laugh. ‘Let me do this first. You'll like this.’
He allowed her to push him back down onto the mattress and grinned as she began brushing herself slowly against him, first her breasts, then her belly, grinding sensuously into his groin, playfully denying him entry. The big farmer lay back and enjoyed the game, watching by the candle's flickering light as the girl's dark curves flattened against his pale blubber.
Oh, God! Thoko's thoughts raced. Where were they? Why didn't they come? It wasn't supposed to go this far. She was careful to maintain her smiling mask as she serviced the middle-aged white man, rubbing her firm young body into his sweating groin and answering his lopsided leer with a slow, practised wink. Smiling, rubbing, winking — and dreading the inevitable outcome.
It shouldn't be like this, she thought. Not her first time. She wanted more than this. The teenmags had promised excitement, romance and tenderness with the man of her dreams; that was the way to lose her virginity. Not like this, not to an evil-smelling white man in a filthy shack. But she could see no way out. Unless ... would he accept a substitute?
Sliding down the farmer's body Thoko cupped her breasts into a fleshy tunnel and sank onto his groin. ‘I'm ready, boss. Do it to me.’
‘Nee!’
The farmer's roar and savage backhander took the girl by surprise, and the force of the blow jerked her head back, slamming it against the wall. She slumped onto her attacker, a red trickle forming on her cheek where his ragged nails had caught her face and drawn blood.
‘Do not shortchange me, meisie, he screamed. ‘I want chichi, nothing less. You hear me, bitch?’
Thoko could hear him, but couldn't make sense of his ranting: her dazed brain was filled with unconnected sounds and strange moving shapes. All at once the room exploded into noise and blurred motion. The outside world burst into the shack in the form of agitated blue-uniformed figures who flashed light beams and barked urgent commands. The farmer was dragged off the bed and bundled into a corner to stand there naked, his face shocked and his manhood wilting under the scrutiny of strangers.
Thoko regained her senses to find a dark figure hovering over her with a blanket. ‘Poppie, where were you?’ she whimpered as she accepted the covering. ‘He was going to —’
‘I'm sorry, honey, I'm sorry. We could not find you.’
‘But I gave you the address. I told you —’
A voice boomed from the open doorway. ‘Do you know how many outbuildings there are on this farm, meisie?’
Thoko looked up as the police sergeant stooped to enter the room.
He glared down at the two girls. ‘We've spent the last hour searching every shack from the farmhouse to the river. Poppie, let's talk. Outside.’
She followed him out of the shack.
‘Your chummy has done a good job,’ the sergeant said in a low voice. ‘We have suspected this kaffirboetie for some time. I can use the girl on a regular basis. She's young and pretty — ideal bait. But don't get her too involved with the physical side of the business ... she'll live longer. All I want from her are names, times and meeting places. We'll do the rest.’ He dropped an envelope into her open palm and, ignoring her curtsy, turned to the nearest man.
‘Constable, go to the madam in the big house.’ He smiled. ‘Tell her she can stop worrying. We have found her husband.’
(Acker in captivity.)
Acker stank.
He hadn't washed in days, and the foul smell of Fat's urine in his hair mingled with the stench rising from his own trousers. His captors had dragged him out of the tin shack every night after dark to squat over a hole in the corner of the yard, but during the long daylight hours there was no relief. Trussed up on the khaya's earthen floor he had no option: when his bladder was full he was forced to saturate his pants. He had used up all his shame; he was past caring.
And now he sat roped and gagged at the shebeen table, surrounded by boozing, laughing blacks who didn't seem to mind the smell. He was vaguely aware of a soft crooning in the background: Mama Poppie was on her knees in a corner, spoonfeeding her husband and singing softly to him as he tried to chew the rubbery mielie pap with badly swollen jaws.
Across the table Fats was busy stuffing an old tyre with crumpled sheets of the Sowetan. He would pack in a wad then glance up at Acker, chuckling to himself as he rotated the tyre between his legs, ready for the next sheet. Chuckling and enjoying the immie's discomfort.
On either side of the big African stood Thoko and Anna, wearing painted, nervous grins.
‘Need a new tyre for your car, baas?’ Fats beamed. ‘Oh, I forget — your car don' need tyres now, does it?’
He bounced the tyre a few times. ‘Well, we got to find somepin to do with this. Maybe we can use it as a punishment for police informers, or for honkies who stray from their cosy white suburbs and end up where they shouldn't be. Think it will catch on? We could get you to sit in it ... maybe soak it with petrol ... then drop in a match — and burn your balls off.’
The room exploded with laughter.
‘Or maybe you could wear it like a scarf ... keep you warm on the cold winter mornings. Once, anyway.’
More guffaws spread around the table.
Anna tried a winning smile as she stretched an arm along the man-mountain's shoulders. ‘You must not be wasting your time with all this, my man. We got better things to do.’
‘You want the honky free,’ Fats said.
Anna's smile wavered. She withdrew her arm.
‘What's in it for me?’ he grinned.
‘What do you want?’ Anna asked, pressing close. ‘Me?’
‘I've had you.’ He threw a glance at Thoko. ‘Her.’
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