The Angels Weep

"That is a secret that you and I share, Comrade Leila." "It will remain our secret, Comrade Tungata, but you and I both know that there will be need during the difficult years that lie ahead for a man as strong as Mzilikazi was strong." Tungata did not reply. He looked up into the branches of the ancient tree, and his lips moved in a silent supplication. Then he replaced the gold-rimmed glasses over his eyes, and turned back to Leila.

"The car is waiting, "he said.

It was a black bullet-proofed Mercedes 500. There were four police motorcycle outriders and a second smaller Mercedes for his bodyguards. The small convoy drove very fast, with the police sirens shrieking and wailing, and the colourful little ministerial pe

They went down the three-kilo metre-long jacaranda lined driveway that Cecil Rhodes had designed as the approach to his State House, and then crossed the main commercial section of Bulawayo, flying through the red lights at the junctions to the geometrical grid of roads and avenues, past the town square where the wagons had laagered during the rebellion when Bazo's imp is had threatened the town, down along the wide avenue that bisected the meticulously groomed lawns of the public gardens, and at last turned off sharply and drew up in front of the modern three-storey museum building.

There was a red carpet laid down the front steps of the museum and a small gathering of dignitaries, headed by the Mayor of Bulawayo, the first Matabele ever to hold that position, and the curator of the museum.

"Welcome, Comrade Minister, on this historic occasion." They escorted him down the long corridor to the public auditorium. Every seat was already filled, and as Tungata entered, the entire gathering stood and applauded him, the whites in the gathering outdoing the Matabele as a positive demonstration of their goodwill.

Tungata was introduced to the other dignitaries on the speakers" platform. "This is Doctor Van der Walt, curator of the Southern African Museum." He was a tall balding man with a heavy South African accent. Tungata shook hands with him briefly and unsmilingly. This man represented a nation that had actively opposed the people's republican army's march to glory. Tungata turned to the next in line.

She was a young white woman, and she was immediately familiar to Tungata. He stared at her sharply, not quite able to place her. She had gone very pale under his scrutiny, and her eyes were dark and terrified as those of a hunted animal. The hand in his was limp and cold, and trembled violently still Tungata could not decide where he had seen her before.

"Doctor Carpenter is the curator of the Entomological Section."

The name meant nothing to Tungata, and he turned away from her, irritated by his own inability to place her. He took his seat in the centre of the platform facing the auditorium, and the South African Museum's curator rose to address the gathering.

"All the credit for the successful negotiation of the exchange between our two institutions must go to the honourable minister who today honours us with his presence." He was reading from a typed sheet, clearly anxious to have done with speaking and sit down again. "It was at Minister Tungata Zebiwe's initiative that discussions first took place, and he sustained these during the difficult period when we appeared to be making little or no progress. Our great problem was in setting a relative value on two such diverse exhibits. On one hand you had one of the world's most extensive and exhaustive collections of tropical insects, representing many decades of dedicated collecting and classification, while on the other hand we had these unique artefacts from an unknown civilization." Van der Walt seemed to be warming to his subject enough to look up from his prepared script. "However, it was the honourable minister's determination to regain for his new nation a priceless part of its heritage that at last prevailed, and it is to his credit entirely that we are gathered here today." When at last Van der Walt sat down again, there was a polite splattering of applause, and then an expectant silence as Tungata Zebiwe rose to his feet. The minister had an immense presence, and without yet uttering a word, he transfixed them with his smoky unwavering gaze.

"My people have a saying that was passed down from the wise ones of our tribe," he started in his deep rumbling voice. "It is this. The white eagle has stooped on the stone falcons and cast them to earth.

Now the eagle shall lift them up again and they will fly afar. There shall be no peace in the kingdoms of the Mambos or the Monomatopas until they return. For the white eagle will war with the black bull until the stone falcons return to roost." Tungata paused a moment, letting his words hang between them, heavy with portent. Then he went on. "I am sure all of you here know the story of how the bird statues of Zimbabwe were seized by Rhodes" plunderers, and despite the efforts of my ancestors to prevent it, how they were carried away southwards across the Limpopo river." Tungata left the podium and strode to the curtained-off section at the back of the speakers" platform. "My friends, my comrades," he turned to face them once more.

"The stone falcons have returned to roost!" he said, and drew aside the curtains.

There was a long breathless silence and the audience stared avidly at the serried rank of tall soapstone carvings that was revealed.

There were six of them, and they were those that Ralph Ballantyne had lifted from the ancient stone temple. The one that his father had taken on his first visit to Zimbabwe thirty years before had burned in the pyre of Groote Schuur. These six were all that remained.

The soapstone -from which each of the birds was carved was of a greenish satiny texture. Each bird' crouched on top of a plinth that was ornamented by a pattern of intermeshed triangles like the teeth in a shark's jaw. The statues were not identical. some of the columns supported crocodiles and lizards that crawled up towards the bird image that surmounted it.

Some of the statues had been extensively damaged, chipped and eroded, but the one in the centre of the line was "almost perfect. The bird was a stylized raptor, with its long blade like wings crossed over its back. The head was proud and erect, the cruel beak hooked and the blind eyes haughty and unforgiving. It was a magnificent and evocative work of primitive art, and the crowded auditorium rose as one person in spontaneous applause.