"Did my father..."
"Yes," she said. "Reverend went berserk."
"But when? Where?"
"Yesterday. At Ka's deathbed."
"I don't believe a word of it," I said angrily.
"It's still true. Leentje Buys came home lame because the minister hit her. And at a deathbed of all places."
"Who told you that?"
"Leentje told me herself. Reverend has such a temper, you know that. And when he loses his temper, well, he goes berserk, you know that as well."
Yes, I knew that very well. A few weeks before he had kicked a chair to pieces. A new chair that my mother had bought at a sale. They started arguing about the purchase, the argument escalated - like all my parents' arguments - and then my father kicked the chair to pieces with his sturdy black boot and shouted, "There!"
Whereupon my mother burst into tears and sobbed, "Mistreating dumb animals!"
That was a reference to the same boot, but given to the cat earlier in the argument. But I still couldn't believe my father losing his temper like that at a deathbed.