Chapters (57)
- Cover
- Half-Title
- Dedication
- Series
- Title
- Part One
- 1 Catherine, 1990s
- 2 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 3 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 4 Stephen, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 5 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 6 Stephen, Rhodesia, 1950s
- Part Two
- 7 The Courtaulds, Courmayeur, 1919
- 8 Ginie, London, 1920s
- 9 Ginie, London, 1920s
- 10 Ginie, Italy, 1910s
- 11 The Courtaulds, London, 1920s
- Part Three
- 12 Stephen, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 13 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 14 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 15 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 16 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 17 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 18 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 19 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- Part Four
- 20 The Courtaulds, London, 1930s
- 21 The Courtaulds, Eltham, 1930s
- 22 The Courtaulds, Eltham, 1940s
- 23 Ginie, Scotland, 1940s
- Part Five
- 24 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 25 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 26 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 27 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 28 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 29 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 30 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 31 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 32 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 33 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 34 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 35 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 36 Stephen, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 37 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 38 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 39 Ginie, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 40 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 41 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 42 Catherine, Rhodesia, 1950s
- 43 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
- Epilogue: Catherine, England, 1990s
- Author’s Note
- Acknowledgements
- A Note on the Author
They didn’t want to live in Europe. They wanted a warm climate and a new patch of earth; a place where they could start again. Their thoughts turned to Africa, which Ginie had loved since her Egyptian honeymoon with Paulo. Stephen hired a pilot and a plane and they travelled south, looking for somewhere to settle. They flew over the ochre of Egypt and the sands of the Sudan, over the forests of the Congo, the mountainous and arid terrain of Basutoland and eventually over the Victoria Falls; tumbling, smoking sheets of water that tossed rainbow arcs into the sun.
They looked all over and didn’t find anything they liked. They were about to give up and try South America when an acquaintance of theirs who farmed in the low veld, Barney Howard, suggested that they look at the Imbeza Valley in the east of Rhodesia, near a little town called Umtali.
Part Five
PART FIVE
24 The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
24
The Courtaulds, Rhodesia, 1950s
It rained heavily for several days without stopping. Ginie lay in bed, curled in on herself, face to the wall. The blinds were drawn, leaving the room in a muggy, yellowish gloom. She held Jongy’s collar in her hand, slept with it, would not be parted from it. It was as if all the trials she had suffered in her life had been rolled up into the single blow of his death and it devastated her.
Hour after hour, she lay there, inert but for the tears that wouldn’t stop. Pain consumed her. It came in waves, burrowing into her, hollowing her out. There were brief times of respite, when her mind shut down and feeling gave way to numbness. But then, the pain started up again.
In her mind’s eye, she kept seeing the jerking, nightmarish figure of the lemur. The smell of his flesh was in her nostrils; she could hear his tortured, breathless screams as the ants tore through tissue and muscle and organs, mouthful by mouthful. No one knew what to do for her. Gideon and Dixon left useless offerings of soup, tea and cake outside her room. The dogs scratched at her closed door, whining pitifully. Stephen came in and sat down on the edge of her bed.
‘I don’t suppose you want to talk about it.’
She shook her head and closed her eyes, listening to the blood pushing and throbbing through her body. Hot tears welled under her eyelids. She couldn’t talk about how she felt to anyone, because there were no words for it. Her mind was trapped in a black place and she couldn’t pull herself back.