Susanna sat in the sand with her arms around her knees in the furthest corner. The door opened. She lifted her head. It was Angela. It was not feeding time. She carried no water. No bucket. No change of clothes. The two women stared at each other as she tarried at the closed door. Susanna put her head back on her knees.
'My master sold me to the Commander about two years ago. That is how long I have been under the protection of master van Riebeeck and his wife,' she heard Angela say.
'What do you want?' Susanna did not lift her head.
Angela took a few steps closer. 'What I want no slave can give to me.' If she took a few more steps, she could touch Susanna who was poking holes with her fingers in the sand.
She got up. 'I am not in the mood for the games you van Riebeeck women play. Take your tricks with you and tell your master the one-ear slave is ready to die without the games.'
'I saw your back.' Angela bit on her lips and averted her eyes to the ground, away from the aggression towards her, evident in Susanna's demeanour.
'I trust you and your friend found delight in your labour. A beautiful piece of art work, is it not. You and your friend must be proud.'
'That is why I am here.'
'Nobody makes it past those soldiers without permission. Or instruction. Which brings you here? Permission? From whom? Instruction? To do what?'
'A request... I requested to see you. Permission was granted.'
'To trap me? Again?'
'I am not here to trap you.'
'If you like the name your master gave you, good for you. I am not about to tell you that you were born with your own. I am not going to talk ill of your good masters. I am tired. I want to close my eyes and never wake up. This is your chance. Make up something, anything, and run to them. Go! Leave!'
'You have been through a lot. Your ear. Your back. This...'Angela cast her gaze over Susanna's surroundings.
'There is no space on my back for another whipping... If you lie this time, make sure I am executed.'
'Your pain... and the many deaths of fellow slaves outside the fort cause fear. In all of us. In Catrijn and Maria too.'
'Then tell me why would one slave, your friend Catrijn, conspire against another and bring her more pain? Explain that to me...'
'You have a flaw. A most destructive one.'
'We all have flaws. What's new.'
'That is true. But you? You judge. Very easily. You judged Catrijn whose pain and suffering you know nothing about. And you made assumptions about Maria whose story you have no knowledge of.'
'And because I judged, and I made assumptions about them I deserved to be stripped naked... tied to a tree and the skin peeled off my back... left for the wild animals to devour. In the middle of winter...' Susanna wiped the tears from her cheeks.
'No. You did not deserve that... but we are all slaves. We all suffer. We all want our freedom... maybe in unusual ways. Ways you might not like. Or understand.' Their eyes met. 'Freedom has a cost. For all of us.'
Susanna sat down on her spot on the sand once more. 'If we are all slaves and we all suffer, why increase my suffering? Even scheming for my death? Maybe my words pained her at the time. But her behaviour towards Maria pained me more. She behaved like her masters. For as long as we believe we are above each other we will remain slaves. With or without our freedom.'
'That is the way she is. She was afraid that you would put ideas into Maria's head that could get her into trouble. You must understand that we did not know you, we still do not. Maria is... easily influenced. Catrijn thought she was protecting Maria.'
Susanna scribbled with her fingers in the sand for a while. It was as if she was sifting through her feelings before she responded. 'That, still, does not justify what she did. She used me as a ladder to buy favour with her masters. She knew what could happen to me.'
'I agree,' said Angela. She put her hand on Susanna's shoulder. 'That is why I am here. I came with the permission of the fiscus. His name is Abraham Gabemma.' Susanna's body remained unresponsive. 'He is the Commander's hands, eyes and feet in the Colony. He is an important man and he asked that I speak to you.'
'Why would an important man give one slave permission to speak to another slave?'
Angela assessed the ground next to Susanna and, after spotting the tiny unsoiled spot she stepped closer and sat down. She put her hand in her pocket and pulled out two pieces of wrapped candy. Susanna watched as she unwrapped it as she spoke. 'I was never in your situation, but I made one promise to myself. I was once on the deck... ordered to dance to the rhythm of the whip... remember those voyages?' Susanna nodded. None of them looked at each other. Both women had picked a spot to fix their eyes on. 'I danced. I stared across the ocean, and I danced as if my life depended on it.' She put one piece of the candy into her mouth and began unwrapping the next one. 'Do whatever you are called to, sacrifice whatever you must...dance as if it were the last dance of your life but hold onto the security of the fort. Out there awaits hell for a woman slave. Especially one from Bengal.' She extended her hand and offered the candy to Susanna.
Susanna hit it away and it landed on the dirty soil that surrounded the tiny square she sought refuge on. 'Candy? How low are you women prepared to stoop for your masters? Leave. If I am destined to die in this hole, then that is what the gods have laid out for me. No amount of candy and lies will change it. Why are you in denial of what is happening to you? To us?'
'I made peace. I am a slave. My name is Angela and I am someone else's possession. I was bought and I can be sold. Like the cattle on auction day. That is my reality.'
Susanna shook her head. 'I am Kismia from Bengal and will rather die of hunger and filth in this hole than embrace the chains of slavery. Tell them that is what I want. Leave. It is my desire to die.' Susanna got up. 'I will never be their concubine.' Angela also got up. 'Is that not your position? You women of the fort might know the inside of their bedrooms... you might know how it smells after they relieved themselves in their night buckets after a large meal... but you remain slaves. Just like everyone else out there. We are all oxen. Milk cows. We have value for as long as we plough the earth. They ravage us. Inside and outside the Fort. On the farms. At the Inn... when their ships full of sailors descend on us. That is why we are here...for their comfort and pleasure.'
'You are right... but I will determine my destiny for as long as I draw breath. Freedom demands sacrifice. The bigger the sacrifice, the higher the reward. That is what I believe, and that is what our gods demand of us. We must rise above our trials for that one chance they offer us to reclaim our lives.'
Susanna shook her head, agitated. For the first time she raised her voice. 'Your Commander and your fiscus will go to Batavia or back home to the Netherlands. You know how this works. What happens to your sacrifices then? Start all over with the yes-master-no-master act?'
She laughed. 'Dearest, dearest, Susanna. You are too serious about life. That is the future. I live now. I need protection and food now.'
Angela's reaction brought surprise to Susanna's face. Her brows furrowed and her eyes darted across the youthful face of the pretty woman who managed to laugh amid their circumstances. Angela's words struck a chord, but Susanna's nature had been altered. 'Nightmares do not turn into fairy tales overnight. I once had imaginings of a life with a man. The difference between us is how we make sense of our world. Why do you dumb yourselves down for them? I refuse refuse to smile and crawl and lie for their favour. My freedom never belonged to them. Or anyone. It was never theirs to take. My body was never theirs to buy or sell. No one will ever convince me that I must dance and smile and keep my eyes on my bare feet till the day I die. They have no rights to my body or my freedom.'
'You have strong views, and I respect that but not all of us were grabbed by slavers and sold to traders. Many of our people were starving due to the big famine. Their lives belonged to the rich landowners. They were spoils of war. We were born into a custom where parents sold their girls... pawned them for debt. This you know. That was the one side of the coin for many of us where we come from. Slavery was the other side of that coin. Not much of a choice... So, you see, many of us do not dream of returning home to parents and a loving home. We do not have families waiting to welcome us back with open arms.'
'I am, and was, misunderstood. I did not judge Catrijn. Or Maria. Or you. You have your own strategies. My past life, no matter how hard, matters. My beliefs, my name, my home, that is who I am.'
'For many of us survival is a popularity contest. It is our drives our behaviour amongst ourselves... like your experience with Catrijn. We make ourselves indispensable to our masters. That inspires us to excel. It consumes us, makes us act in ways we never imagined. But everything is done for one purpose: to retain the favour of our masters, their wives, even their children. It is called getting ahead of the herd. Freedom will not come looking for us, Susanna. We must make it happen.'
'For how Long? Till the next Commander comes. Then the next? What if you get sick? Old? Injured? What will happen if you are no longer of any use to them?'
'Like I said, I live now, and for now my freedom is in their hands. I will dance and jump and please for as long as I can.'
'With no guarantees.'
'With no guarantees,' repeated Angela after a brief silence had fallen on the exchange between the two women.
The atmosphere was pregnant with reflection. As women slaves they harboured thoughts that could not make their way into words because words were blunt instruments of communication, deficient in every respect to capture what lay beneath their emotions. Their bodies were museums, a collection of artefacts and flashes of a life contaminated by the plunder of slavery. Their skin had become canvasses tattooed with scars which narrated their journey. While their clothes and feet announced their status, their pain were concealed and revealed itself in the occasional sigh that escaped from under the neck harnesses. Or the protracted stare at the ankle chains. But, on most occasions it crept into the silence between them.
It was Susanna who spoke. 'Dancing and pretending will not bring freedom. Our bodies, our labour, our value, they will never give that up. Would you if you were a master or a madam?'
'Not all of us see our life the way you do. We have no desire to resist and oppose our masters. We dream of another life. I desire more than a full belly and a place on the floor when night falls.'
Susanna understood. Many things fell in place, and for the first time a vision of the woman in front of her emerged. 'You will live a long and prosperous life. The gods destined some of us to slip into their shoes and sleep in their beds. Their favour is on you and Catrijn.'
'There is that wicked tongue at work again...'
'No. I mean it... and I am happy for you. Some of us must walk in their shoes. Your footprints will show the way long after we have moved onto our next life.'
'Did you know that there is a war outside the walls of this fort? Your Nommoa and his people have lost. He was wounded and is on the run.'
'Nommoa? Why are you tell me?'
'The walls of this fort have ears. Women talk. Soldiers talk. Everybody knows everything that goes on in this Colony. I bring news of what is said about the Khoe man.'
Susanna sank down. 'That cannot be true...'
'When I came here you asked me what I wanted and I told you that what I wanted, you, a slave, cannot give me. But, from one slave to another, take my advice. Grab anything they offer you and get out of this hole. You have value. You are young. You can work at-'
'Is he dead?'
'Susanna, the Khoe man is the past. He cannot save you. The Commander is their master now. They lost the war, and his people blame him.'
'Are you doing this to hurt me? Did they send you? It is a most cruel thing to do...'
'It is the truth, Susanna. Look at me. Lift your head.' Angela slipped her hand under her chin and tilted her head upwards. 'If I, Angela van Bengal, could trade these hands and these bare feet for my freedom I would. But I cannot.' She held up her hands. 'These two hands can only do so much...they are not enough to buy my freedom.'
'True. Not all of us have the looks and the charm to lure those with station to share the warmth of our loins.'
'There you go again. Passing judgment. One day, Susanna van Bengal, you, too, will be judged. On that day, you will wrestle with your own demons, and you will need people who do not look at you the way they look at a filthy stain. Until then, get a strategy. Join the hunt for freedom. That my dear, is the only advice I can give you.'
'Join the hunt while I am stuck in this hole? Not all the water from the ocean will cleanse me of the filth as their slave.'
'Susanna, outside these walls slaves are dying by the hundreds because of disease, hunger and cold. Others are punished for desertion, theft, and attacks on their masters. The freemen do not want black slaves anymore. There is a huge shortage of slave labour. This is your opportunity. Grab it get out of this hole. Find yourself a spot in this Colony. Dumb down. Make yourself indispensable. Make them believe you have value. Then you might have a chance at freedom.'
'The black slaves are angry. That is why they are running away. They hate your masters for what happened on the Amersfoort.'
'What are you talking about? Is your mind affected?'
'I heard them. I watched them when they were punished...'
'Susanna, the black slaves are oxen. More suitable for very heavy work. That is why they run away. The Dutch need us. We are less trouble and we do not run away. I heard the fiscus say that with my own ears. They trust us with their families and on the farms of the freemen. We are not oxen. We have value.'
Susanna laughed and shook her head. 'You speak like your masters. Never forget that you are a slave. Just like those runaways.'
'I am a mother, a woman who wants a better life for my daughter, Anna.' She made her way towards the exit. 'I do not want this life for her. So, yes, I do what I must because it all comes down to one thing... freedom. And making sacrifices for her freedom. Nothing you or anybody says can hurt me. I know with whom my freedom lays,' say Angela. 'It does not lie with the oxen. It is in the hands of the Dutch...'
When Angela was gone, Susanna cried.
***
When Angela reported to Abraham Gabemma her emotions took an unexpected turn. The one-ear convict slave made an impression on her. She said things that caused doubt. Things that she and Catrijn never put into words. Things they took to bed with them that was best left unsaid. Unimagined. The one-ear slave had crept into her thoughts ignited emotions she thought she had buried.
What was she to report? She had, against Catrijn's advice, requested permission to talk to the one-ear slave who had been locked up for a long time. Months after the request had been made it was granted. She had almost forgotten about it until the fiscus informed her permission had been granted. Why she was instructed to report back to him she did not know.
Many thoughts went through her mind and before she knew it, she was standing in front of the inquiring face of Abraham. Was she allowed to lie? Could she bend the truth. If she did, would he know? If he knew, what would happen to her?
'The soldiers said you were there for almost fifteen minutes. What took so long?'
'The one-ear convict slave does not share her thoughts. The whipping was the cause of that. She is an angry slave who refused to speak to me.'
'You wasted all that time to establish that? Did you inform her about the wounded Khoe?'
'I did.'
'And?' He banged his fist on the table. 'Angela? Are you lying to me? Must I put on the thumb screw for on you for answers?'
'No. Please master. Off course not.'
'Out with it. Does she know if Doman is planning an attack on this fort?'
'She was shocked that he was wounded. Not too much. She hates me and Catrijn. She asked me to leave with my tricks. And...' Angela looked around, bewildered.
'And?'
'She told me to tell the Commander she wished for him to end to her life of misery.'
Abraham shook his head. 'Does she know who he is working with, or where he could be hiding?'
'She did not even know there was a war.' Angela looked down to the floor and clasped her hands.
'Are you lying to me? Look at me when I speak to you.'
She into his face, her chin held high. 'No.'
'What are you hiding?'
'Her mind is affected. She speaks of how the black slaves are tortured at night. And of a ship. The Amersfoort.'
He was deep in thought for a few seconds. 'You know what will happen if the Commander finds out that you lied to me?'
'I will never risk my life or freedom for the one-ear convict.'