Fiela's Child (Fiela se Kind)

Three days later, he begins walking towards his old home. First, he says good-bye to Nina and says he’ll be gone a week. She says that Willem has been seen in the village, and that he said Elias was looking for them both. Lukas urges her to stay in the hills while he is gone. She says she wishes she had not told on him so long ago; if she hadn’t, he would have been with Fiela this whole time. He says that he will come back and leaves. In the night, he hears an elephant in the forest, but it does not bother him. By morning, he is near Fiela’s home. 

Fiela is making Selling do his doctor-prescribed walking. After Dawid’s death, he did not want to get up, and his heath wasted further away. He sees a man staring up at their property. It is Benjamin. Benjamin embraces them both as Fiela cries. As an offering of thanks, Fiela forgives the Laghaans that night. In the coming months, Benjamin talks of everything but the van Rooyens. He spends more and more time in one of the old boats, rowing. One day, he tells Fiela that he still does not know who he is. He also says that he is in love with his sister, Nina. Fiela takes this as proof that she is right. He would not fall in love with her if they were actually related by blood. She says only one person can deliver him from his doubts—Barta van Rooyen.

After saying what he hopes will be temporary good-byes, Benjamin returns to Barta’s house, with the intention to talk with her and then find Nina. Barta is glad to see him, but Elias is not. He lies, half-crushed, in another room. Elephants trampled him and he barely survived. He calls Lukas a skunk and refuses to say more. Kristoffel is missing and there is no one to make the beams. Lukas is wracked with guilt. If Kristoffel does not return, how will their home survive with Elias unable to work? The next day, he helps carry Elias into the sun, believing it will help him. After working the beams for a while, he says he has a question for Barta, and she must, at last, answer him truthfully. She says that he is Lukas, he is indeed the child that was lost. He believes her. He knows that he must stay. Life with Nina as his sister will be more bearable than life without her. 

John Benn makes him a crewmember on the pilot boat and instructs the others to teach him to row. Kaliel has departed on another ship. Lukas begins living in his house. He sees Nina frequently, but it is difficult. She accuses him of not talking to her enough, and he suggests that she should not follow him around so much. He begins to wonder if he should not return to Knysna and live as Lukas van Rooyen. While working for John Benn, he witnesses an accident in which a sailor dies. He is stricken by his inability to help. Nina reappears after having been gone for three days. She comforts him, and they cling to each other without guilt or self-consciousness.

That night, Benjamin is convinced that he is not Lukas. He has no idea who he is. He vows that Barta is going to have to swear one more time that he is the lost child before he will be convinced. He goes to visit her, Elias, and Willem. Barta confesses that on the day she brought him home, she took the wrong child. Her own child had been lost in the river, and she had taken Benjamin instead. Also, she confesses that the tall man from the government had told her which boy to pick out of the lineup. Benjamin is furious. He vows to kill the government man. How dare he change Benjamin’s life with his manipulative words? He goes to the magistrate’s office and asks for the man, but when he appears, Benjamin cannot find anything to say to him. He is unable to revenge himself and no longer feels the need. He goes home and sleeps. 

Benjamin’s family writes letters to him. Tollie is in jail as a result of a drunken stabbing incident, but they do not tell Benjamin that. They tell him to come home if he ever needs to. 

Elias fumes about Barta’s deception. He turns it over in his mind, getting angrier and angrier. He thinks that Lukas was always different from them, and that they are lucky Barta did not cause them more trouble than what they have had to deal with. He feels vindicated about all of his reservations about her. 

Benjamin continues to grapple with his identity, but he is ready to say good-bye to Lukas van Rooyen. He tells John Benn that he is going to need a couple of days off. He thinks about the fact that Nina is not his sister, and he is glad. As the book ends, he begins walking towards Miss Weatherbury’s house, where Nina will be waiting.