The White Giraffe

Martine slowly makes her way through the garden and toward the game reserve gate. Having memorized the lock code that she once heard Gwyn give Tendai, she successfully opens the padlock and lets herself into the game reserve. She carefully walks through the dripping wet bush, aware of each sound she hears. A waterbuck startles her when it bounds through the shrubbery, but she sees no sign of the white giraffe. Feeling foolish for chasing after a fantastical animal, Martine decides to return to the cottage, but suddenly she sees a Cape cobra staring her down, ready to strike. Before she can react, something white dashes through the trees and knocks Martine to the ground. When she awakens, she thinks she is back home in London and then remembers that she is in Africa. She realizes that the white giraffe saved her life and is now licking her face. Though she longs to touch it, Martine avoids frightening the shy creature. Feeling an otherworldly connection to the giraffe, Martine suddenly knows that its name is “Jeremiah […] Jemmy for short” (60) and understands that it is lonely, just like her. Martine remembers that her mother once told her that if she loved something, then she must be prepared to let it go, and one day it will return. She walks away from the giraffe and heads back toward the cottage but soon realizes that Jemmy is following her. She stops to stare into his eyes, and Jemmy nuzzles his head into her shoulder and makes a pleasant humming sound. A lion’s roar shatters the perfect moment, and both Martine and Jemmy take off running for safety.

The next morning, Martine attempts to disguise her dirty clothes by pretending to work in the vegetable garden. Pleased to see her granddaughter helping more around the house, Gwyn prepares Martine a special breakfast. Alex du Preez arrives and offers to drive Martine to school. Gwyn gladly accepts since she has a long to-do list, but inside, Martine is upset because Alex makes her uncomfortable. On the drive to school, he asks her if she has seen a white giraffe in the preserve. Martine denies having seen anything and reminds him that the white giraffe is a myth, but when he pulls out her pink flashlight, she knows that she has been caught in a lie. Alex tells Martine that finding and selling the white giraffe would be very financially rewarding for her grandmother and warns her not to go snooping where she’s not allowed. Once at school, Martine runs from the car, sobbing.

Martine and her classmates take a field trip to Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens in Cape Town. On the bus ride, Martine notices Ben sitting alone, but the upsetting conversation with Alex distracts her, and all she can think about is seeing the white giraffe again. Ben’s face is filled with joy, and Martine can tell that he is excited about seeing the gardens. Meanwhile, Martine socializes with her classmates, and for the first time, feels as though she fits in with them. When they arrive at the gardens, Miss Volkner divides everyone into groups for tours, and Martine’s group consists of some of the Five Star Gang, a large boy named Jake, and Ben. Miss Volkner leads them through the gardens explaining the indigenous flora and fauna of South Africa. In the Fragrance Garden, she shows them a brook that was once used as an escape route for enslaved people when the British colonized South Africa. She also explains that many children have gone missing in the forest nearby. Though Martine enjoys the stunning views of Table Mountain and the South African landscape, she gets an uneasy sense of déjà vu and feels as though she knows this place. The weather begins to shift, and Martine can see that a storm is brewing.

When a student has an allergic reaction to a bee sting, Miss Volkner leaves her group to address the situation. As soon as she is out of sight, the group disperses and runs amok. Meanwhile, Ben has disappeared. Suddenly, Martine realizes that the scene before her is just like the dream she had on the night her house burned. Just as it happened in her dream, the students find an injured goose and joke about killing it. Martine begs them not to harm the animal, but they poke fun at her, and Jake tosses the goose at Martine. She catches it and falls to the ground. Remembering Grace’s words about knowing what to do, Martine instinctively places her hands on the goose, and they heat up as if on fire. Miraculously healed, the goose flies away as Martine’s classmates stare in shock. They accuse Martine of being an “umthakathi” (75), the Zulu word for “witch,” but although Martine denies it, the hostile students chase her into the forest. Martine runs as fast as she can until someone grabs her through the trees. Ben is hiding among the leaves and bids her to be silent. As the band of students approaches, Ben tosses pebbles to confuse them into tracking the other way. He silently laughs and points to a sign reading, “WARNING: RAW COMPOST TANK DO NOT ENTER” (77).

Ben and Martine enjoy the concert and a lovely lunch while Martine’s pursuers fall into the compost pile and arrive back at the bus angry and filthy, promising retaliation. Martine doesn’t tell her grandmother about the incident at the botanical gardens, and Gwyn continues to warm up to her granddaughter, even allowing her to enter the reserve accompanied by Tendai. One morning, Tendai takes Martine into the reserve, and they watch the sunrise while having tea and breakfast. The beauty of the bushland overwhelms Martine, and the view fills her with grief as she longs to share the moment with her parents.

She asks Tendai how he got the scar on his face, and he opens his shirt to reveal that his entire torso is marked with thick scars. He tells her that when he was young, he and his family moved into the city of Soweto for work. Cruel, merciless white people ran the town and forced the Black citizens to live in crowded, filthy areas and produce identification papers wherever they went. One day, a police officer caught Tendai without his papers and began to beat him. When Tendai fought back, the police officer took him to prison and whipped him with a “[…] sjambok, a whip made out of rhinoceros hide […]” (83), leaving him permanently scarred. After authorities released him from prison, he came to work on the preserve. Tendai says that Martine’s grandfather believed in the equality of all men, and Grace taught him to forgive his persecutors.

Tendai teaches her about the plants in the bush, including the medicinal properties of aloe and the marula plant. He also teaches her how to make a compass using just a stick so that no matter where she is, she can find north. Her new knowledge makes her feel more at home in South Africa, and she thinks, “It was as if the landscape itself was creeping into her soul” (84). As they walk out of the reserve, Tendai abruptly shoves her off the path just before she nearly steps on a den of baby adders. After the near miss with the cobra, the encounter unnerves Martine, but she is thankful that Tendai saved her life.

As Tendai and Martine walk back to the Jeep, he continues to teach her about the animals in the reserve, and his extensive knowledge of the wildlife amazes Martine. Tendai finds a snare left by poachers and uses pliers to destroy it, explaining to Martine that it is getting more difficult to keep them out of the reserve. Martine becomes worried about Jemmy, concerned that he might become trapped in a snare.

They see a kudu bull in a clearing and stop to watch it silently. Suddenly, gunshots whizz by, barely missing Tendai, but the bullet mortally wounds the kudu. Alex appears and laughingly apologizes for the near miss. He claims that he thought the kudu was trapped in a snare, but Tendai accuses him of lying. While the two men argue, Martine attends to the dying kudu. She sees that the bullet punctured its windpipe and feels its heartbeat slowing. As she holds the dying animal, she remembers that Miss Volkner taught them that termite saliva could seal and disinfect wounds, so she finds a termite mound and uses the insects to close the bullet hole. As her hands heat up, she places them on the kudu’s heart, and it jumps up and bounds away, fully healed. Martine feels a tremendous sense of accomplishment and thinks, “Dad would have been proud of me” (92).

Martine interrupts Tendai and Alex’s argument and tells them that the kudu left. Alex is angry, and before he leaves, he reminds Martine to watch herself. Tendai asks Martine what she did to help the kudu and asks if she has “the gift” (94), but she claims that the kudu was just resting. Tendai begs Martine not to speak of the incident to her grandmother.