Final Settlement

By Keith Miller

Life during South Africa’s apartheid times had been idyllic for the white residents of a small village in the picturesque Nede Valley. Ken Chandler witnessed this when he moved there from England. However, he thought things would need to change following the abolition of apartheid and he saw that the nature and governance in the nearest towns and smaller townships had changed rapidly to suit the needs of the Zulu and Indian residents, but nothing had changed within the Nede valley.

How they were to maintain a “whites only” village was a major concern for its residents, but how were they to achieve this? Would it be amicably achieved or would they need to resort to violence? Eventually, change was brought about in the village, but not in a way that anyone would have envisaged.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Mar 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9781398474956

Keith Miller

Keith Miller read history of art at Cambridge. He is a journalist, lecturer and reviewer living in London. This is his first book.

Book preview

About the Author

Keith Miller was born in England but spent his childhood in Australia. On returning to England he gained a PhD and became a polytechnic lecturer, and later a senior civil servant in the department of education. Following his retirement he moved to South Africa at the end of the apartheid era to take up a university senior lectureship. During this time, he learned much about relationships between different racial groups which gave him the desire to write this book. He and his wife now share their time between living in their homes in South Africa and in England.

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank my wife, Linda, for her help and support in reading and editing the manuscript for this book.

Copyright Information ©

Keith Miller 2023

The right of Keith Miller to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398474932 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398474949 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781398474956 (ePub e-book)

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Dedication

For Linda, without whose endless support this book would not have been written.

Chapter 1

For Ken Chandler, turning fifty was a sobering event. His birthday had been on a Saturday and the following morning, while he was in the bathroom, he briefly studied his reflection in the mirror looking for signs of ageing. He decided his receding fair hair betrayed his years but he was pleased to note there was no sign of it going grey. He wondered if shaving off his neat moustache might make him a look a few years younger, but he decided that would be a matter for his wife Helen to decide.

Ken, being of ordinary appearance, sleight build and somewhat shorter than average height, was not the sort of person who stood out in a crowd. As such, he normally didn’t take much notice of his physical appearance, but turning fifty had made him a little concerned about what Helen might think of him now that he had become ‘middle-aged’, as he thought of it. He needn’t have worried. It had not been his physical characteristics that had attracted Helen to him, but rather his highly active mind. In her view, he was always analysing, questioning and rationalising everything that caught his attention. Although she did not regard him as an intellectual, she had no doubt about his intelligence and his capability for in-depth thought on any issue followed by decisive action, if required.

If asked, Ken would not recognise in himself the attributes which his wife had come to appreciate so much during their four years of marriage. If pushed, the only useful abilities he would admit to having would be his capacity for hard work and his determination to succeed once set upon a course of action. The idea of giving up without some sort of acceptable result was unthinkable to him.

As was usual on a Sunday morning, Ken had an hour to himself at home whilst Helen attended the morning service at their village’s Anglican Church. Normally he occupied this time each week by reading the Sunday newspapers in the conservatory whilst enjoying a glass of dry sherry. To him, this was a much better preparation for Sunday lunch than sitting in an uncomfortable pew and enduring one of the vicar’s sermons; he recalled that on the odd occasion when he had accompanied Helen in going to church, the sermon had failed to make the slightest impression upon him.

Sitting by himself in the conservatory, Ken started to think about what had happened to him in the past. He had been married before and it had lasted for just over twenty years and then ended in divorce. Not long after that, his father died of a heart attack and his mother had a stroke which almost completely paralysed her.

As a result of all this turmoil, Ken started to lose all interest in his work and contemplated resigning from his job. He no longer cared if he ended up jobless, homeless and destined for the gutter. However, after living alone for a while in a small flat Ken met Helen at a Christmas party, and that chance meeting was the saving of him. She herself had gone through a difficult divorce some years earlier and, understanding what he was going through, she was able to advise Ken and encourage him not to give up but rather to continue to make a success of his career. This was a novel experience for Ken as his former wife had never shown any appreciation for the effort he had put into building a successful career. He responded well and recovered his personal drive and initiative to good effect so that he was able to resume being fully committed to his work.

Ken’s relationship with Helen continued to develop well and he never ceased to thank his lucky stars in finding her. She was a few years younger than him; an attractive woman with a good figure, blonde hair and bluish eyes. Added to her overall attractive appearance she had a most pleasant demeanour. He often told her she was the nicest person he had ever met, and he really meant it.

Two years after their first date, Ken and Helen were married. They soon moved from the small flat Ken had occupied, when he and his first wife had separated, to an impressive looking double-fronted Edwardian four-bedroom house in half an acre in a small village not far from Chester. Helen was particularly proud of the fact that the house was a listed building. They totally redecorated the house and tastefully furnished it during their first year of occupation. In their second year, they landscaped the gardens and replanted the borders. All in all, Ken and Helen had proved to be an effective partnership in getting things done and they were both well pleased with what they had achieved. Within a year, they had transformed what was a listed building of some historical interest into what they both regarded as a well decorated and pleasantly furnished home that totally met their needs.

Ken fondly remembered the weekends he and Helen shared in their new home. Saturdays were usually quite busy. He accompanied Helen when she went shopping in Chester in the morning and, in the afternoon they worked together around the house or garden. During the evening they frequently went out, dining at a restaurant in town or going to the theatre or the cinema. They soon had a small circle of friends and they sometimes entertained them for dinner, or were invited to share a meal with them at their homes.

Coming back to the present, Ken looked out through the conservatory window, and asked himself, Is all this too good to be true?

He certainly hoped things would continue to go well between him and Helen so that he could finish his career and then retire happily in their Cheshire home. As far as he was aware, religion was the only thing about which they were not in full agreement. As a practising Christian, Helen took the Sabbath seriously. Ken wasn’t an atheist and, if asked, he would describe himself as an agnostic. By that, he meant he had some religious convictions but rather more doubts. As such, he would attend church with Helen only occasionally.

Ken’s reflections on his relationship with Helen were interrupted by the sound of her opening the front door. Hello, I’m back, she called out cheerily. He went into the hall and helped her off with her coat and said sympathetically, I know it isn’t frosty outside, but it seems a bit chilly to me. Was it cold for you in church?

Pleased that he was concerned for her welfare, Helen smiled and replied, No it was OK. They had those electric heaters on—you know those that are mounted high on the wall and point down.

As soon as she came into the lounge he poured her a sherry and they both sat down in front of the log fire, now well and truly ablaze since he had lit it just after her departure. She kicked off her shoes and thanked him for getting the fire going. Glancing at the open door to the adjoining dining room she remarked, I see you’ve laid the table too.

And I’ve done the vegetables—they’re in water in saucepans on the hob—and the joint’s cooking too. I kept my eye on the cooker to make sure it came on at the right time as you said you had programmed it to do.

My word you have been busy.

Grinning he replied, What do you expect from the perfect husband?

She smiled back and settled into her chair with her toes pointed towards the fire and said, You know we have a lovely home here and I think the people in the village are quite nice too. We have a lot to be grateful for.

You’re in a good mood, said Ken. Is it all to do with having your soul reinvigorated at church and you’ve come home on a high? What was the sermon about?

It was quite interesting. You should have come along; it would have given you something to think about.

If it was something to make me think, it couldn’t have been our vicar taking the service!

You’re too hard on him Ken. He can’t help it if he is getting on a bit and not as sharp as you would like him to be. But as a matter of fact it was a visiting minister; a youngish man who put some enthusiasm into the sermon and really brought it to life.

So, what was he on about?

Simply that God has a plan for each one of us, she replied quietly.

Ken took another sip on his sherry and thought for a moment before commenting as he wanted to choose his words carefully to avoid offence. You remember about a month ago I attended a service with you and the sermon was focused on the efficacy of prayer. The Vicar maintained that prayer was always effective provided what was prayed for was in accord with the will of God.

Yes, I remember that sermon; you took exception to it on the grounds that there are plenty of examples where prayers don’t seem to be answered.

I wasn’t saying that prayer never works. I was just objecting to the vicar being so categorical about prayer always working when he put an unknowable condition on its effectiveness. A prayer has to be in accordance with the will of God for it to be answered. Since we don’t know for certain what the will of God actually is, in a given set of circumstances, we can never know for certain that a prayer will be answered.

Helen said in a quiet voice, Anyway this morning’s sermon was not about the efficacy of prayer. It was about God having a plan for us all and he used the life of St Paul as an illustration.

Ken grimaced and retorted, If you believe that you’ll believe anything! I’m really glad we got together but that was surely just a matter of luck rather than divine guidance that we met at that Christmas party. You were sitting on the floor next to the Christmas tree and I sat down beside you and we started to chat. We just happened to be at the same place at the same time—certainly a matter of chance—but thereafter our relationship was dependent on how we behaved towards one another, and surely that involved free-will rather than something predetermined by God. If it was God’s plan for us to come together, why didn’t He plan it better and bring us together when we were young so that we would have been able to avoid our failed marriages of the past?

Ken could see the weakness in his argument as soon as he had spoken and so he wasn’t surprised when Helen quickly replied, The answer is we wouldn’t have learned from the experience of a failed marriage if we hadn’t been married before. It’s the same with St Paul. He was a true Jew, a Pharisee, but he saw the limitations of the Jewish Law and saw the message of Jesus was the answer. If he had never been a Jew, knowledgeable of the Jewish Law, he would not have been able to put forward ideas in a way Jewish people could accept, nor would he have been able to reach out to the Gentiles. In that sense, our individual bad experiences can be regarded as part of His plan to show us a better, more enlightened way.

Ken sensed this was the time to back down and with a grin he changed the subject. I’m getting hungry. I’ll open a bottle of wine now to let it breathe.

Helen went out to the kitchen to turn on the heat to the vegetables and Ken sampled a little of the wine to make sure it wasn’t corked, or at least that was his excuse!

Later that evening, they sat together watching a film on TV. This pleased Helen because normally Ken would spend part of Sunday evening looking through papers relevant to whatever meeting he had first thing on Monday morning. She asked him, Why are you not doing your usual preparatory work for your meeting tomorrow?

Ken replied with a smile and said, I’m not starting an inspection of a college in the morning. Instead I’ll be attending a routine meeting with my colleagues in London and I don’t need to prepare anything for that.

It was a refreshing change from his normal routine, and he told himself to make more time available on Friday afternoons to prepare for any Monday morning meetings that might be scheduled. Ken rather hoped his plan to leave Sunday evenings totally free for him to share with Helen would be the start of a more settled period in their married life.

When Ken left home on the Monday morning, he was full of the joys of Spring. He felt cheerful but was not quite sure why. A sudden thought flashed through his mind to the effect that he had subconsciously accepted Helen’s belief that God had a plan for them both. According to her, all he had to do in his daily life was to accept whatever happened and react to change in accordance with her Christian principles. He toyed with that idea for a while as he drove to the station. In the end, he decided his feeling of well-being was more to do with the quality of life he and Helen had achieved together rather than a touch of the divine hand. He had a lovely wife, a pleasant home and a secure job. What more could a man want? he asked himself.

Ken’s high spirits were maintained throughout the journey. He liked travelling by train, particularly as his Civil Service rank allowed him to travel everywhere first class which always ensured a carriage that was not overcrowded and he usually had a table to himself so that he could do some work on the way. As was his custom after an early morning start, he breakfasted in the dining car, a luxury he always appreciated. After breakfast, back in his seat, he went through his papers for the meeting and made notes on the points he might want to raise. There was nothing out of the ordinary listed on the agenda and there was no reason for him to expect anything disturbing to arise.

Leaving the train at Euston and then taking the underground, he arrived half an hour before the meeting was due to start at Victoria House, a tall office block on the South bank of the Thames which was the headquarters of the Department of Education and Science. As usual, the Science Committee started its deliberations precisely on time and the agenda items were dealt with quickly. Rather too quickly! Ken had thought, as the chairman cut short several discussions that he had found particularly interesting. At one point, Ken looked at his watch and estimated that the whole thing would be over a full hour before lunch, and wondered why because the Science Committee’s meetings had, in the past, always continued into the afternoon session.

When the Chairman received no response to his request for items to be discussed under the agenda heading of ‘Any other business’, Ken thought the meeting was about to end. However, the Chairman had no intention of drawing the meeting to a close; far from it. Instead he wanted to raise a matter that was so important it should have been at the top of the agenda, but he had put it last because he felt the discussion that might follow could make the remaining agenda items seem unimportant, if not irrelevant. Observing that some of his colleagues were starting to pack their papers away in preparation to leave, he said, quietly, Before I bring the meeting to a close I have some rather disturbing news that I would like to share with you all.

Suddenly all actions in preparation to leave halted and all eyes turned to the Chairman, wondering what was coming next. After a brief pause which allowed the Chairman to be certain he had everyone’s attention, he said in a flat, unemotional tone that underlined his concern, The Government is proposing a radical change in the way Higher Education establishments are inspected in England and Wales. There is a distinct possibility that we, as an inspectorate, will be made redundant or be forced into early retirement!

This unexpected announcement shocked all the participants and a rather animated, undisciplined discussion took place. The Chairman tried to calm things down by assuring his colleagues that it was only a proposal and it may come to nothing. He went on to point out that no such changes could be implemented before the General Election to be held in the near future, and brought the meeting to a close by declaring, In any case, no-one can predict the outcome of the election and, if a new Government were to be elected, it would be anyone’s guess as to what policies it might adopt.

So why tell us then? Ken said to himself and, somewhat cynically thought, No, this wasn’t just the Government’s plan; it was a Civil Service idea that top management would suggest to any government after the election and they are just preparing the ground for the battle ahead.

The meeting ended just before lunch and, in going up to the Department’s restaurant located on a floor near the top of the building, Ken accompanied George Pendleton—a grey haired, bearded, overweight man with a good sense of humour who had become a close friend and colleague of Ken in the Science Committee. During previous visits to Victoria House, Ken had always looked forward to the splendid buffet lunch that was on offer there, but not on this day. The high spirits Ken had enjoyed as he had set out from home that morning had evaporated and both he and George were silent and preoccupied with their own thoughts as they went up in the lift.

As they emerged from the lift George said, After a meeting like that I need a beer. Can I get you one too? Ken nodded his agreement and, almost without thinking, he moved to a table next to the window that offered a splendid view across the Thames to the Houses of Parliament. He didn’t appreciate the view as much as he had always done before; the sight of Westminster merely prompted him to think about what he had heard at the meeting. Ken’s train of thought was interrupted by George’s appearance with two beers which he put down on the table and then sat down facing Ken. They both ignored the view! After his first sip, Ken raised the question that had been on his mind since the Chairman had rather ineffectively attempted to allay fears about the possibility of redundancy or early retirement. What do you reckon they are really up to George? Have you heard anything on the grapevine?

George, after many years of service, was a mine of information about any rumours that were being circulated in the upper echelons of government. Normally Ken let it all drift over his head but not so this time as he was keen to get any hint of what was really going on with respect to the Higher Education Inspectorate. George leaned forward and lowered his voice and, becoming conspiratorial, he said, I’ve heard from a friend in the Cabinet Office that, if this government gets re-elected in April, they’re likely to abolish the Higher Education Inspectorate altogether.

Ken could not believe it and he whispered, Come on, George, they would need an Act of Parliament to get rid of us.

George nodded but, as he was sure that would not be a problem for the government, he said quietly, If that’s what they need, then that’s what they’ll get.

Ken’s facial expression was one of disbelief. George leaned forward again and whispered, Believe me, I’ve heard that the Treasury has convinced the Cabinet that the government’s finances are in a mess and there’s an urgent need for a drastic reduction in public expenditure.

Ken shook his head and, not accepting what he had just heard, he replied, But you know as well as I do that Education and Health are the two sacred cows of government spending—the government wouldn’t survive the election if they touched either of them.

I’m sure they are aware of that replied George, dropping his conspiratorial tone, but still speaking quietly, he added, But what if they wait until after the election? They could argue that they have a new mandate to govern and some entirely unpredictable crisis, such as the threat of a downgrade of UK government debt, had forced their hand.

Warming to his imagined scenario, George added, I’ve heard from someone in the Treasury that, if the problem was deemed to be big enough, they could make a case for cuts in all government departments. After a brief pause he added, And that could be the end of us!

Ken didn’t want to believe it and he shook his head in denial saying, But what about the idea of converting all the polytechnics into universities they are all talking about? We already inspect all twenty polytechnics, and the education departments in universities. If they remove the difference between polytechnics and universities, surely there will be more demand for our services—as well as the newly created universities we would have to cover all the existing university departments, not just those to do with education.

George didn’t hesitate to dispute the point, They would need to more than double our numbers if we had to cover all faculties in the thirty existing universities and another twenty or even more that would be created, and that doesn’t fit well with the idea of public expenditure cuts, does it? Ken had no answer and lapsed into silence, sipping his beer.

In the absence of an afternoon session for the meeting, Ken was able to catch an earlier train than he had planned from Euston for his return to Chester. He was decidedly fed up and he didn’t even open up his briefcase to write up his impressions of the meeting as he usually did. As on the outward journey, no-one shared his table in the almost empty first class carriage, and so he was left alone with his thoughts as he re-examined the implications of what George had said.

Ken was a worrier by nature and he was not happy until he had plans A, B and possibly even plan C, thought out for any likely development. Helen sometimes teased him about his tendency to worry, pointing out that most of his worries were about things that never happened! She sometimes chided him, in a friendly way, by telling him, Too much concern for the future could be detrimental to enjoyment of the present.

Ken tended to agree with her but kept on worrying because, as he told her, It’s the things I don’t worry about that get me!

When Ken had left academic life some five years earlier to take up his Inspectorate appointment, he had thought he would remain in post in the Civil Service until he reached sixty. He could no longer rely on that so on the train journey back to Chester he started to examine the possibilities if the worst were to happen and the Higher Education Inspectorate was to be disbanded. Having just turned fifty, he knew it would be tricky to find another job, particularly so if his colleagues, all as well qualified and experienced as himself, were looking for work at the same time.

He wondered about the possibility of being redeployed into another branch of the Civil Service, but a moment’s reflection told him this would not be possible because he thought himself to be too specialised. He could rightfully claim expertise in the physical sciences and in higher education, but in nothing else. He could easily imagine himself being interviewed by senior staff in the Foreign Office, or the Home Office, and being asked what use they could possibly make of his scientific and educational expertise. That was an obvious question for which he would have no answer.

By the time his train had arrived in Chester, Ken had decided that, if the current government was re-elected in a few months’ time he would have only one decision to make, namely to accept either retirement or redundancy. It occurred to him he had never heard of a senior Civil Servant being made redundant before.

The financial cost of his divorce had depleted Ken’s capital reserves by an appreciable amount and, to add to his financial problems if the Inspectorate were to be disbanded, he still had monthly payments to make—the mortgage on the house and maintenance payments to his former wife and their son who was still at university.

As Ken drove home from the station, he considered the financial implications of finding himself out of a job. Of course he had no real idea of what financial terms would be offered but he thought that if he were to accept being made redundant he would no doubt be offered a single cash handout. On the other hand, if he was offered early retirement he would receive a monthly income based on his pension contributions over the years. Of course no decision could be made until he knew the sums involved but there was a lot for him to discuss with Helen about what was the best option for him to choose. While Helen was still working, Ken was fairly certain that they would be able to cope, but the idea that he would, in effect, be being supported by his wife was not at all palatable to him. For his own peace of mind, he had decided that he had no alternative but to find another job.

Ken’s thought turned to another aspect of the problem, namely how would Helen react to all this? One thing he could definitely do without was a second marital problem. His earlier divorce had left him somewhat nervous over relationships and this would be a new situation he and Helen would have to face together.

Whatever happened, he had to ensure he did not lose the house—he knew it meant too much to Helen! By the time he arrived home, Ken had decided to take Helen out to dinner. He suspected she might ask why he wanted to go out for a meal at such short notice and he would have his answer ready; he would simply say he felt like it, rather than tell her about his concerns over the future of his job.

As a personal assistant to one of the managers of a major local company, Helen sometimes had to work late, but this evening she was home on schedule and was pleasantly surprised to find Ken had got back from London so early. She was particularly pleased when he said he wanted to take her out for dinner at a five-star restaurant. Having freshened up and got changed they went out for a pre-dinner drink at a pub overlooking the river Dee and then went on to the restaurant in the city centre. The venue was delightful, the service good and the meal left nothing to be desired. The only thing Helen thought was odd about the outing was that it was the first time she could recall going out with Ken on a Monday evening. She was tactful enough not to ask why, and Ken offered no explanation. He was pleased to be back with her and kept his worries to himself for the time being.

Two months after the government was re-elected it was common knowledge in the Inspectorate that the Higher Education section would be wound up. Ken attended several meetings in London where the terms of redundancy or early retirement were explained. Anyone over fifty would be offered early retirement or redundancy and those who were younger would have no choice but to be made redundant.

Helen had taken the news well and accepted that Ken would look for another job. As she pointed out, even if they could afford it, fifty was far too young to retire. She felt certain he would get bored stuck at home with just a bit of gardening to do, while she continued working.

The letter setting out the terms for Ken’s early retirement arrived in the post on a Friday afternoon. They discussed the matter all weekend. Ken had prepared his recommendation for what they should do. Bearing in mind his age, Ken was eligible for early retirement or redundancy. The redundancy lump sum pay-out was three times that for early retirement but of course there would be no pension until he was sixty and so he would need a job to pay his way until then. However, having turned fifty, there was some uncertainty about Ken managing to find a suitable job and this made the redundancy option unattractive so far as he was concerned. He felt the safer option was to go for early retirement, particularly as the government had increased his pension entitlement as a sweetener. He could accept the package and then look for another job—not such a high pressure job that he had had in the Civil Service, but one that would make up the gap between his pension and what he had been previously paid.

Helen readily agreed and Ken declared he would send off the letter of acceptance first post on Monday and start looking for another job immediately. Helen had asked where he would look for a job. Ken pointed out that it would be too limiting to look just locally and so he would be prepared to go anywhere in the country. It was then that Helen raised a sticking point. If you find a job, say in the London area, we would have to move wouldn’t we? Would we have to sell the house?

Ken sensed that there could be a problem here and replied Oh no, we wouldn’t have to sell the house—we could let it and the extra income would be of help in paying for a flat for us to rent wherever I found a job.

Helen stiffened, I’m not sure of that! You mean we would be living in some little flat somewhere while someone else occupied this lovely house. This is our home. We have only lived here for a couple of years and look at all the work we have done on it!

Ken hadn’t expected that response and for a moment was stunned. Then in a flash of inspiration he suddenly recalled that Helen had lived in Hong Kong for several years and she had told him how much she had enjoyed living and working there. In an attempt to make the idea of renting out their home a little more palatable for her, he asked, Would you feel better if I looked for a job abroad, maybe in Hong Kong?

Helen hadn’t considered the possibility but she didn’t reject the idea out-of-hand and they sat down to discuss it over coffee. Half an hour later is was agreed that Ken should seek to find a short-term contract at one of the Higher Educational institutions in Hong Kong.

Ken was pleased that Helen had not objected to him seeking such a job. The reason was that any money Ken might earn from working abroad, as well as the income they could obtain by renting out their home, would help him to cope financially.

As soon as the financial arrangements for his early retirement were finalised, Ken started looking abroad for a suitable post. He applied for a job in Hong Kong as the Deputy Head of a college but nothing came of it, and he learned later his immediate superior in the Inspectorate had been appointed to the post! Ken wasn’t sure if he should be amused or annoyed, when he realised he and his boss must have applied at the same time, and of course Ken had quoted his boss as a referee!

He had discussed with Helen a university lectureship in Dunedin, on the southern tip of the South Island of New Zealand, but she thought it would be too cold there and too far away from England, and so he did not bother to apply. Ken also wondered about making an application for a lectureship at the University of the South Pacific, based in Fiji. However, he was told by a friend, who had visited Fiji on holiday, that there was a danger of ethnic violence breaking out there between Chinese immigrants and the local population. Ken did not even mention that job to Helen because he knew she would not want to run the risk of living in a country where there was the threat of ethnic violence.

That view was rather ironic because, in early December, Ken noticed an advert in the Times Educational Supplement that invited applications for a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Science at the University of the East Coast in Durban, South Africa. What particularly interested Ken about this job was that the person appointed would be in charge of a programme aimed at helping black students from disadvantaged backgrounds to cope with the curriculum in the first year of their science degree course.

Ken was immediately interested and he discussed with Helen whether or not he should apply. Her initial response was negative because in recent years she had got the impression from press reports that South Africa was a country troubled by racial violence. She told him that, years ago, she had travelled through South Africa with a friend and seen apartheid in action. She said that, although the countryside and its wildlife were wonderful, she had been disturbed by the overt racialism which seemed to be present everywhere. She had objected to the ‘Whites only’ signs on park benches, at the entrance to beaches, as well as in many shops, restaurants and hotels.

Ken was not aware that apartheid related signs were so prevalent in South Africa, but he was not entirely ignorant about what had been going on over there since Nelson Mandela had been released from jail in early 1990 because, as a government inspector in the UK, he had often received information about developments that affected education provision in other countries. One such document had informed him that the South African President F.W de Klerk appeared to be well on the way to implementing a government programme which would stop universities recruiting students on the basis of their racial background.

Ken told Helen that, according to information he had been privy to in his previous job, things had changed quite a lot in South Africa following the moves by the government there towards the abolition of the apartheid system. After a lengthy discussion, Ken was successful in convincing Helen that there had been a big political change in South Africa which boded well for the future. As a result she agreed that provided he thought it would be safe for them to live in South Africa for a couple of years, or so, he should apply for the job at the University of the East Coast.

Before applying Ken decided he should find out as much as possible about the so-called New South Africa that seemed to be coming into being under the direction of Nelson Mandela and President de Klerk. Most of his impressions were obtained from careful scrutiny of the contents of several of the more serious British newspapers as well as watching any relevant programmes on TV and listening to BBC Radio 4.

From these sources, he got the impression that Mr Mandela and President de Klerk were working co-operatively on the transitional arrangements leading to South Africa’s first democratic elections to be held in 1994. The more Ken learned about what was going on in South Africa, in relation to the transition from apartheid to a fully democratic government, the keener he became about applying for the job at the University of the East Coast in Durban, Natal. The more he thought about it the surer he became that he really could make a significant contribution in helping black students from disadvantaged backgrounds to make a success of their first year of study at university.

Ken submitted his application in January 1993 and, after being interviewed firstly at an English university and then by several senior academic at the University of the East Coast via a telephonic conference link, he was offered a three-year contract which he did not hesitate to accept.

A week later Ken received a letter from the South African Embassy in London which informed him that he and his wife had been granted Permanent Residence Status in South Africa, rather than just being given a work permit, and that their Permanent Residence Certificates were ready for collection at the South African Embassy.

On the Sunday before their departure for South Africa, while Helen was at church, Ken spent some time thinking about what more he could do to reassure Helen that they had made the right decision. On the basis of information provided by the South African Embassy, as well as what Ken had been able to glean from the news media relating to South Africa, he was reasonably sure that the situation over there was improving, and he had already told her of that. He wondered if she might be concerned about their financial affairs as it was possible that she may not be able to get a job in South Africa. She had mentioned that possibility to him and he had assured her that his pension and his salary from the University would be more than they would need to live off, even if they were unable to let out their house in England while they were away.

While Helen was at church on their last Sunday morning before their departure, Ken could not think of anything else he could do to allay any remaining fears that she might have about their move abroad. He really hoped she had none. He was still feeling nervous about what Helen might be feeling about their imminent departure for South Africa when she returned home from Church and, when they sat down in the lounge together to have a cup of coffee he asked her one last time if there might be something that she was concerned about in moving to South Africa for a few years.

After a brief pause, Helen smiled and said softly, It’s all right, darling, you don’t have to worry about what I think because I have not the slightest doubt that we are doing the right thing.

Taken somewhat aback by the certainty in her voice Ken asked, But I thought you had become a bit hesitant about the move. What’s changed?

It was something the vicar said to me after I told him about your early retirement and that we would be going to South Africa for you to take up a university job aimed at helping black students get through their degree course.

Suddenly curious, Ken asked, What on earth did he say?

He told me It was God who was sending us to South Africa, because it was part of His plan for us!

Chapter 2

Johann Pretorius and his wife Annie, both South African citizens and residents of a rural valley populated only by white people about 150 km due west of Durban, were discussing the implications of political change in their country. The South Africa they had become accustomed to over the previous thirty years, with one of the highest standards of living in the world for its white population, was changing rapidly in the early 1990s and, in their view, not for the best.

Johann, an Afrikaner, had retired several years earlier following a successful career in banking mostly based in South Africa’s financial capital, Johannesburg. He had concentrated on retail banking for most of his career but for his last five years before retiring he was a Senior Investment Officer at his bank’s main branch in Durban.

When Johann had lived in Johannesburg, he had lost his first wife in a tragic motor accident. They had been happily married for thirty-two years and her death had dealt him a devastating blow, so much so, he felt unable to continue living in their marital home. He chose to move to the Province of Natal because his son, the only child of his marriage, had moved to Durban several years earlier to work as a security officer at an oil refinery after years of service in the South African army.

Johann had moved to Durban when he was in his early sixties. He had kept himself fit by being active in sporting activities, such as tennis, cricket and golf.

He had strikingly blue eyes and had retained his full head of fair hair, with only a tinge of grey. As a result he looked more like a man in his fifties rather than his sixties.

Johann had met Annie a year after arriving in Durban. She worked at the same bank as he did and she also had suffered bereavement a few years earlier. Her husband had been a seaman who had gone down with his ship in a violent storm in the Indian Ocean.

It wasn’t long before Annie started to find Johann attractive and he enjoyed her company. She was the first South African woman, whose mother tongue was not Afrikaans, with whom he had any close relationship. Annie had learnt a little Afrikaans while at school but not enough for her to converse freely with Johann, so they normally spoke to one another in English.

They got to know one another well and, much to Johann’s surprise, he found he didn’t even mind that her English grandfather had come out to South Africa to fight in the Anglo Boer war and had stayed in the country once the war was over!

Johann, as a child, had grown up with elders in his family who had all disapproved of Britain’s historical interference in the affairs of South Africa. Although Johann would never admit it to Annie, some of that negativity towards the British had remained deep down in his psychic but that was not the only reason that he was a little reluctant, initially at least, to get too involved with her at a personal level. He had always believed that work place romances usually came to grief sooner or later, with an adverse effect on the ability for those involved to work effectively together. However, when Annie began doing the ground work for him, in deciding whether or not a company was suitable for investment by the bank, they sometimes continued their discussions over lunch. As a result they got to know one another even better and, over time, their lunchtime chats started to include subjects of common interest to them both but nothing to do with their work at the bank.

Johann learned that Annie had long been interested in the sea and seafaring. Bearing that in mind, the first time he took her out for dinner was to a highly rated restaurant with a dining area which provided splendid views over Durban’s busy harbour. From then on, going out to dinner together during weekends, became a regular activity and slowly but surely his fondness for her increased to the extent he considered the possibility of marrying her. It was not clear to him that she would accept, if he proposed, because he was ten years older than she was.

Hoping that she would not be unduly concerned about his age, he had plucked up the courage to ‘pop the question’ while dining out with her