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Seretse & Ruth

Merlin Press Ltd

The Meeting

Seretse Khama looked forward to the hospitality evening – a sherry in the warden's flat followed by dinner and dancing. He joined the group of students clattering down the stairs. To a man they were smartly dressed in dark suits and white, collared shirts – their individuality only showing through in a fancy silk handkerchief here and a natty bow tie there. A gregarious bunch, sunny-natured from sunny places around the globe, they had been transplanted into war-time Britain in search of education. This was the Holy Grail that would liberate them – and help them to liberate their countries – from poverty, ignorance, fear of the unknown and colonial domination. They chattered loudly in anticipation of the evening to come.

Although they were rather formal affairs, with staff members keeping a close watch to ensure suitable behaviour, these evenings were welcomed by the young men from the distant corners of the empire, for they were lonely in London. Such occasions provided an opportunity to meet British contemporaries and to have a few drinks at the warden's expense. There would also be music – the lifeblood of the young. Seretse hoped there would be some decent jazz. He was crazy about the newly-emerging bebop, forerunner of rock 'n' roll.

It was 1947, and Britain was sweltering in an unusually hot June. Seretse found the high levels of humidity most unpleasant. Running his finger around inside his collar – already damp although he had changed just half an hour previously – he thought longingly of the dry heat of his motherland, the Bechuanaland Protectorate, a barren place on the rim of the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa. Raised in those great arid plains, the heir apparent of the royal line of Khamas – whose lineage stretched back over 200 years as Chiefs of the Bamangwato Tribe – Seretse had been sent to England by his royal uncles to complete his tertiary education. His year at Oxford, where his uncle Tshekedi's reputation as an enlightened ruler had opened doors into the homes of the leading academics and leftist politicians of the day, had left him polished in the social graces of the British upper class. But although born to be king and possessed of a certain nobility of presence if one cared to notice it, Seretse in London, aged 26, was just another black student.

At the entrance to the warden's flat he stood aloof for a moment, his wide-set brown eyes surveying the gathering – an unusual one in Britain in the 1940s, for most of the men were black and all the women were white. Against the dark suits and complexions of the men, the pale women with their silky, shoulder-length hair looked like hothouse lilies. His heart, as it often did, went back to a scene from his homeland – the honey, mahogany, chocolate-skinned women in their bright cotton dresses, tight curls covered by gay doeks, gossiping around the well, or gathered outside the church after a Sunday service.

He accepted a glass of sherry, and after greeting the warden and his wife, squeezed himself into a corner beside his best friend Charles Njonjo – a cheerful fellow from Kenya who was also studying law. The buzz of conversation enveloped him like the sound of the noonday cicadas in the makala trees of Serowe – the musical West African intonation blending harmoniously with the Southern and Eastern African accents, while the clipped British vowels provided a staccato counterpoint.

He and Charles were soon deep in conversation about their studies and the eccentricity of the British legal system, which required them to eat a specified number of dinners at the Inner Temple in order to be admitted to the Bar. Forbes Burnham, a fellow student, joined them and the discussion turned to his favourite subject – the shortcomings of British colonial rule. Seretse, not himself a firebrand nationalist at all, was well acquainted with Burnham's rather radical views, and his attention wandered. Glancing around, he noticed an attractive young woman with reddish-gold hair and blue, or were they green? eyes.

During supper she was placed at the farthest end of the table from him and seemed to be the centre of a lively group. The conversation around her was frequently punctuated by bursts of laughter. Seretse was engaged in a serious discussion with Charles about the relative merits of small group versus big band jazz. The big band sound had recently become extremely popular in Britain, particularly under the American band-leader Glen Miller. Seretse, however, did not care for it, considering it to be a divergence from 'true' jazz.

The main course was served, and he looked sadly at the small helping of stew on his plate accompanied by the usual wrinkled peas and mushy potatoes. Almost two years after the war, shortages of many basic commodities persisted. Beef was scarce, and this was a great trial to Seretse as he was of robust build, over six feet tall and accustomed to eating large quantities of meat. Bechuanaland was beef country. As the King's son, Seretse had always had as much as he could eat – except, of course, when he was away at boarding school, during which time he wrote plaintive letters to his uncle saying how much he longed for the holidays when he would be able to return home and eat beef and game to his heart's content.

When the gathering moved into the lounge to begin the dancing, he found an easy chair on the periphery and settled down to enjoy the music. He was a good dancer, but with the weather so oppressive that night, he preferred to watch the others. Going across to ref ill his glass during a break in the music, he chatted to Braim Nkhondo, one of the two Northern Rhodesian students resident at Nutford House. Braim was an irrepressible character, tonight sporting a polka-dot bow tie.

Taking Seretse's arm, he said: 'Seretse, my friend, you must meet Ruth – Muriel's sister. She's here for the first time and wants to meet us all.'

Braim steered him across the dance floor to a table where he recognised an acquaintance, Muriel Williams, who had often come to these social evenings. Sitting next to her, fanning her face which was flushed from dancing, was the girl with the red-gold hair.

'Hello, Seretse, how nice to see you!' said Muriel.

He leaned over to shake her hand. 'Good to see you, too. Hot, isn't it?'

'My goodness, it is. By the way – this is my sister, Ruth. Ruth, meet Seretse.'

'How do you do?' murmured Seretse. The girl smiled at him briefly, and let her eyes wander away over the room.

'He's a fellow southern African,' boomed Braim. 'He's the chap we told you about at tea, who likes your type of music.'

'So what kind of music is that?' she said, coolly.

'Count Basie, Louis Armstrong and the Ink Spots,' he said.

'Well, I agree with you there. The Ink Spots are the best, in my opinion,' she said.

One of the young men in her orbit left in search of a drink and Seretse took his seat. Her hair glowed in the light of a nearby lamp and he caught himself thinking of sunrise across the plains around Serowe, when the sandy expanse turned just that shade of reddish-gold.

'Whereabouts in Africa are you from?' she asked.

'The Bechuanaland Protectorate,' he replied. 'I don't think you would have heard of it – it's a small country next to South Africa. Actually, most of it is desert – the Kalahari Desert.'

'So this heat doesn't bother you then,' she said, fanning her face with a paper napkin.

'On the contrary,' he replied, mopping his neck with a handkerchief, 'the humidity here is something I have never experienced before. Our heat may be hotter, but it's a dry heat, which is much more bearable.'

'You do realise you're speaking to royalty, don't you? I hope you are going to be suitably polite,' interrupted the ebullient Braim.

'Royalty?' said Ruth, raising one eyebrow.

'Oh yes,' chipped in Charles. 'This boyo is our revered Chief Khama, don't you know?'

Ruth turned questioning eyes upon Seretse, who shrugged his shoulders and then said with mock pomposity: 'Yes, I'm the Paramount Chief designate of the Bamangwato nation. Any objections?' The group dissolved into laughter, and the music started up again.

'Actually,' said Ruth to Seretse, 'I have heard of your country. Isn't that the place the royal family visited recently? I seem to remember reading somewhere about them going to the Kalahari Desert. But I'm afraid I haven't a clue where it is.'

'Here, let me show you,' said Seretse. He took out his cigarette box and drew a rough map of Africa on the back of it. 'Bechuanaland is right here,' he said, marking the spot with an X as he spoke and handing the box to her. As she glanced at it, Harry Nkumbula, the other Northern Rhodesian student in residence, interrupted them.

'Come on Ruth, dance with me,' he said, pulling her on to the dance floor and proceeding to demonstrate his fancy footwork. Harry – witty, exuberant, hard-drinking and a student at the London School of Economics – was the unofficial leader of the African group of students at Nutford House.

Seretse lit up another cigarette and turned his attention to Muriel, who had taken Ruth's seat beside him. He had met her a few months previously and greatly admired her rather serious and sensible nature, as well as her sin-cere concern for him and his fellow African students. She was friendly and open, in contrast to many of her compatriots with their characteristic re-serve, which often made the naturally extrovert Africans feel like fish out of water. She had been telling him for weeks that he must meet her sister Ruth, believing the two would have much in common.

'How did you become involved with the African students here?' he enquired.

'I went to a missionary conference and met a few of them. From Northern Rhodesia, actually. I had ideas about becoming a missionary at one stage. Anyway, they invited me to a couple of these evenings, and I enjoy them very much. I think it's so important to learn about how people from other countries live. What they think and feel.'

'And your sister? Does she care about how other people think and feel?'

Muriel laughed. 'To be honest, Ruth cares about having a good time and lots of friends. She's the glamour in the family. But she seems to be enjoying the evening.'

At a signal from the warden at 11.30 p.m., the bandleader announced the last dance. As Ruth circled the floor in Harry's arms, Seretse experienced a pang of regret that he had not made an effort to dance. She and Harry end-ed with a flourish at the table, and Seretse and Muriel applauded.

'My goodness, I'm hot!' exclaimed Ruth, ineffectually fanning her hot face with a limp napkin. Seretse emptied his cigarette box, unfolded it into a makeshift fan and handed it to her with a smile.

'Oh, thanks!' she said in surprise, and then they all stood up to leave. The warden and his wife positioned themselves at the door to receive the formal farewells. Harry and Seretse accompanied Ruth and Muriel out onto the porch. They stood smoking companionably for a while, enjoying the slight breeze that was blowing up Brown Street, and then the girls set off to catch the last train back home to Lewisham.

'So, Seretse, you've met the beautiful Ruth. What did you think of her?' asked Harry as they went up the steps to the solid wooden double doors at the entrance to Nutford House.

'She's pretty, but rather frivolous, I should imagine,' Seretse replied with a small smile as he pushed the door open.

In the train on their way home Ruth and Muriel discussed the evening. It had been the first time Ruth had accompanied her sister to an event at Nutford House. She had not been particularly keen to go, but Muriel's enthusiasm about the excitement and novelty of socialising with the foreigners had been so infectious that she had agreed. Muriel was fascinated by the African students. She was later to recall: 'Our lives were so humdrum and ordinary at that time. Meeting the African students was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to us. It broadened our horizons most won-derfully.'

The presence of thousands of black American soldiers in Britain during the latter part of the war had given rise to a pronounced sociological phe-nomenon dubbed at the time 'Negro glamour'. One of the consequences was that jazz had become extremely popular. The Williams girls were part of the transitional generation during which England was transformed from being almost totally white by the influx of people of colour from the colo-nies. They stood on the brink of British urban society's awakening to racial consciousness. It affected them both profoundly, yet differently. Muriel was the more serious of the two, having become a fervent socialist during the war, when she had been evacuated from London to a coal-mining village in Wales. She had recently left the Anglican Church to join the Congregational-ists, whose progressive social views she felt to be more in line with her own.

Ruth concerned herself more with having a good time than with public issues. But she told Muriel she had thoroughly enjoyed meeting the black students, and the music and dancing. 'Those Africans are very good dancers,' she said, 'none of the boys I've ever been out with can move like that. I'm worn out trying to keep up with them.'

'I told you you'd enjoy yourself,' said Muriel. 'They're also more intelligent than most of the boys we know around here – and much more interesting, and polite, if you ask me.'

A few days later, Muriel set out for Nutford House and one of her regular discussion groups. Ruth decided to accompany her. She had so enjoyed the social evening that she was keen to spend more time getting to know the black students. The girls agreed to keep their activities a secret from their father, George, who had served as a captain in the British army in India and was a typical product of his generation. Known as the Empire-Builders, they tended to regard all other races as being inferior. His attitude infuriated Muriel, who could not reconcile it with his otherwise kind, intelligent nature. Ruth was more pragmatic. He had been brought up that way, she knew, and would not change now, even though the times were changing. As long as George was not aware that they were socialising with black people, the girls decided, peace would reign in the Williams household.

'Let's have some music,' said Seretse, after the group session was over. 'George Webb's Dixielanders.' He went over to the gramophone and wound it up.

'That's a good sound,' said Ruth, going over to join him.

Seretse pulled chairs for them both closer to the gramophone. 'Have you heard the latest release from Jelly-Roll Morton?'

'No, I haven't.'

He jumped up, ran upstairs to his room and came down with an armful of records.

'My goodness, what a collection!' she said, riff ling through them. 'Do you have this kind of music at home? In Bechu-an-a ...'

He laughed. 'Bechu-a-na-land,' he enunciated each syllable slowly.

'Bechu-a-na-land,' she mimicked.

'That's it – you've got it. I suppose we do have a kind of jazz, but it's played on very different kinds of instruments. Wooden drums, penny whistles, homemade guitars. But I learned to appreciate American jazz when I was at Oxford.'

'When were you at Oxford?'

'I went up in September 1945 to read law. My uncle wanted me to study law over here so that I could guide the Tribe in future with some under-standing of the British way of doing things. I did a BA general degree at Fort Hare university in South Africa and then came over here straight after the war. I came down to the Inner Temple last year.'

'So are things very different for you here?' asked Ruth, finding herself more and more interested in this tall foreigner with the neatly-trimmed moustache and intelligent eyes.

'Couldn't be more different,' he said. 'The weather, the buildings, the roads, the cars, the people. At home there's only one mile of tarred road in the whole country. And we only have one railway line – but it goes all the way from South Africa to Southern Rhodesia along our eastern boundary. And there's only one train a day!'

'Hey, you two – are you going to sit in the corner and listen to music all night?' called Muriel. 'We've got a train to catch.'

'Why don't you come over tomorrow evening and listen to my new Dizzie Gillespie?' said Seretse.

'All right,' called Ruth over her shoulder, as she and Muriel hurried out of the door.

As they walked briskly down the Edgware Road to the tube station, Muriel said: 'You spent a long time chatting with Seretse. What do you think of him?'

'He knows an awful lot about jazz, and he's got really good taste,' said Ruth. 'He's the first person I've met who's not potty about Glen Miller.'

'He speaks well,' said Muriel. 'I like his accent – quite different from the West Africans.'

'Mmm,' said Ruth. 'Much easier to understand. And he has a nice, musical voice. I like listening to him talk.'

At 23, Ruth Williams was cheerful, outgoing and confident, with a pleas-ant warmth of manner and an engaging laugh. She was one of the new generation of British women whose lives had been changed forever by the hardships and upheavals of the Second World War. At the age of 17 she had been evacuated from her middle-class home in Blackheath to Surrey, but a bout of acute anaemia caused her father to bring her home to London and the blitz. As soon as she turned 18, she gave up her volunteer mobile canteen work and joined the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) – as close as a woman could get to the war.

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Excerpted from Seretse & Ruth by Wilf Mbanga, Trish Mbanga. Copyright © 2005 Wilf & Trish Mbanga. Excerpted by permission of Merlin Press Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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