I went into their beautiful house, which was on one of the hills overlooking the bay, I was full of comradely emotions. The last time I had seen it, it was positively the area office for every kind of progressive activity. I was greeted with an unmistakable atmosphere of liberal detachment, and the words: ‘Of course we have left the Party and we are no longer prepared to be made use of.’ Now I was hoping I might be asked to stay a few days while looking for a room; in fact I had been invited to stay any time I liked. I became even more confused as the conversation proceeded, because it seemed that not only had they changed, I had, too. Whereas, previously, I had been fundamentally sound, with my heart in the right place, yet with an unfortunate tendency towards flippancy about serious matters which ought to be corrected, now I was a dogmatic red with a closed mind and a dangerous influence on the blacks who were ever prey to unscrupulous agitators. I was trying to discuss this last bit reasonably, when I was informed that Cape Town was overflowing, that no one but a lunatic would arrive without arranging accommodation, and there was no hope of my finding a room. My situation was, in short, admirably deplorable. While my son has always been the most delightful, amiable and easy-going person, yet, being two years old, he needed to sleep and eat. My total capital amounted to £47. I was informed that the prices for even bad accommodation were astronomical. They telephoned some boarding houses which turned out, much to their satisfaction, to be full. They then summoned a taxi. On my suggestion.

The taxi-driver was an Afrikaner and he had an aunt who ran a boarding house. He instantly took me there, refused payment for the trip, arranged matters with his aunt, carried in my luggage — which was extensive, because I had not yet learned how to travel — taught my son some elementary phrases in Afrikaans, gave me a lot of good advice, and said he would come back to see how I was getting on.