Who's The Daddy?

An old newspaper clipping stirs up emotions and deepens a mystery that started in a forgotten Kombi

- Janice Gardner

The newspaper cutting, tatty and yellow-brown with age, falls out of the very last book I toss into the box. I pick it up gently and turn it over. Its edges are roughly torn, now feathering into sneeze-inducing dust, but the print is still clear. It’s an advert from a newspaper Personal column: If the legal owner of VW Kombi CA 1234 does not collect the vehicle within 21 days it will be claimed to defray costs.

I hold the paper delicately as befits its age and historical significance. Newspaper is fast becoming obsolete, except for packaging the now obsolete contents of this house, now that my mother has gone.

There’s no date on the clipping but it’s a hint of a time when such a vehicle was desirable, available and in working order.

I remember seeing re-runs of the adverts – think of the man on the bicycle, wearing red veldskoene and a flat hat, swinging his blik-kitaar to the beat of an almost forgotten culture.

I hear a muffled thud from below where my wife is clearly being challenged by the sorting and packing of the kitchen. Her expletives indicate that she’s okay but something else now doesn’t need to be packed up.

I THINK it’s time for a short break. I go downstairs and hold out the scrap of paper to her. “Alison, take a break and have a look at this.”She straightens her back with a stifled groan and turns towards me. She is dusty, tired and slightly irritable at my interruption and I think she is absolutely beautiful.

She pushes her glasses up her nose with the knuckle of one finger and reaches out with a yellow-plastic-gloved hand.

“What is it?” she asks.