Going Home - Doris May Lessing [100]
That first day on strike Samson stayed at home—by himself—since everyone in the family was out at work in the city, and knew very little about what was to happen. And then, on the second day, he was not alone, for all the houseboys and cooks and messengers of the city struck, too: it was spreading. The last to come home was his wife; she stayed at home on the third day. There was little food in the location, or township, because the authorities, who were now very angry, were not bringing food in. All the Africans were in the townships of the city, and there was no food. And around the townships were cordons of police to prevent white men getting in, or Africans from getting out.
But the family stayed in their little house, and kept themselves out of trouble.
It was on the third day that a man came to Samson and said: ‘May the committee of the strike come to your house tonight to discuss matters?’
‘But why my house?’ asked Samson, deeply troubled. And then he said yes, that they would be welcome.
As the time came near he sent his sons and daughters to a neighbour’s house, and his wife went into the second room, leaving the front room free for the men who wished to talk.
When they came, they said that they moved from this house to that for their discussions, because even their talk was illegal, and they did not wish to remain always in one place, in case the police came to arrest them. Samson was old and he was respected, and his house was a good and respected house.
He received them politely and asked them to sit down, and the wife brought tea for them from the kitchen.
There were seven men, and Samson sat, saying little, while they talked. The matters which they discussed were difficult for him. Regulations and laws and prohibitions and white papers and blue papers and the reports of committees—these were what these men discussed. But at the end of all their talk was one fact only: the strike was not legal. Yet it existed. There were no Africans at work that day, none, in any place in the city, not for cooking, or for cleaning, or for digging gardens, or for looking after children, or for taking messages, or for driving cars or lorries. So what they had to say to the Government was only: ‘Look, here is this strike. Here is this thing. And now what will you do?’
They talked for a long time, and again the wife made tea and brought it in, and the lights were going out in the houses around them.
Samson would have liked to say that it was getting late, and it would be wiser for them to go now; but he was proud they had chosen him, and so he said nothing.
Then there was a knock on the door, and through the small window they could see the shape of a policeman against the sky, and then another policeman. Four of the men in the room got up, and without a word ran out of the house by the back door into the night. For they were citizens of other countries, that is to say, they came from Nyasaland or from Northern Rhodesia, and even though they might have worked in this country all their lives, like Samson, they could be deported within a day.
When the two policemen came in there were only three men and Samson. But it could be seen that there had been more in the room. They asked to see the papers of the three men, and from these papers it could be seen that they were from this country. The three men wished Samson good night, like friends saying good night after a visit, and went out.
Then the two policemen went into the kitchen and saw Mrs Mujani sitting by her stove knitting a jersey for her daughter. She looked up and went on knitting, though it could be seen that her hands were trembling, and her knees were held together to keep them still. They left her, and went back into the other room, and Samson was straightening the chairs, like a host after his guests were gone. They stood for a moment, watching him, with their sticks in their hands, and then one saw a bundle of papers lying on the table, and he jumped forward for