Petrus' Voice

I do not mind Lucy being here. She is “forward-looking.” She understands what it takes to live here. Her father needs to return to the city. He does not understand our way of life. He does not belong here. He called my relative a thief in front of family and friends. And now “I am the one who must be keeping the peace.” He is bringing up the past instead of letting it die. We have had our lands stolen from us. We are moving on. He should move on too. I have worked hard to get back what was taken from my family. Some of our people do what is necessary to get what we are owed but that is only because the law did not protect us. We want what we are owed. Besides, the insurance company will give him a new car. Accusing the boy does nothing. He cannot give the car back. Besides he is too young to be put in jail. He is the future generation and he is family. Lucy will be safe here. I will protect her. I will marry her. She knows I will protect her in exchange for land.

I wrote Petrus’ story using short simple sentences because during the few times he is allowed a voice in the novel, this is how he speaks. It gives him a very practical and matter of fact tone. Additionally, he does not speak as eloquently as Laurie because he does not have the same level of education; he is not an intellectual, he is a farmer. It can be presumed that due to the apartheid, he did not have the same opportunities as Laurie. I incorporated into my writing a lot of what Petrus says throughout the novel because that is all the insight that the reader has about his thoughts. I emphasized some of his phrases because they seem very representative of his ideas. While he does not show the hated of whites that the rapists demonstrated, the reader definitely gets the sense that Petrus wants what the apartheid took from his family. He does it through working hard and perhaps by manipulating Lucy into giving up her land. He knows that others take more drastic measures, but he seems to see it as redistributing the wealth. He does not seem to understand why Lucy’s father is so wrapped up in getting justice because he gets his car back. Petrus sees what happened in terms of material goods not morality. He does not seem to think it should be punished. After the apartheid justice is impossible; the best that can be done is to move on. There is no reason to allow the incident to ruin the life of yet another person (the boy). I purposefully left out any mention of rape because Petrus seems eager to avoid this subject. It is left up to the reader to contemplate the reason Petrus does not acknowledge the rape. Being the practical man that he is, it is likely that while he thinks the situation is unfortunate, he does not see the point in discussing it. After all, what has happened has happened, and there’s nothing that can be done about it but move on.