The interminable correspondence with the officials who surrounded Mandela flew back and forth. We'd only get ten minutes, they said. The former President of South Africa was a very busy man.

Finally, Peter and I stood on the threshold of his house in Houghton, a leafy suburb of Johannesburg. His house was tasteful, but not ostentatious. We were ushered in and offered tea. Mandela was a tall man who radiated warmth. He spoke quietly. The force of his words did not depend on volume. He was intensely focused. You knew he was listening with the full force of his concentration.

Mandela, who grew up on the banks of the Mbashe River in eastern Cape Province and who died Thursday at age 95,