Marlene van Niekerk - Agaat

Jak pressed the head down on the neck, pushed it against the blade with his hands on either side on the cheeks. There was a jolt as the teeth of the saw seized the wool and then it was bone, a scream rising higher and higher as the fleece got thicker along the forehead.

Jak came away from the blade with the two open halves to show you. It looked like a cross-section model in a biology laboratory, the soft grey hemispheres of the brain, the white sinus chambers, the brown furrows of the nasal passages, the mouth cavity with the long halves of purplish tongue, thinner than you’d expect, from which a trickle of blood was welling, the jaw with the two front teeth sawn apart.

Easy, see, said Jak and clapped the two halves closed like a book. He turned the head at a right angle and starting from the snout he cut it up into cubes with rapid strokes, so that the outsides fell open onto the sawing surface like the pieces of a jigsaw. He switched off the machine, removed the blade and put it in the sink, and swept the blocks into the off-cuts pail with the back of his hand.

Child’s play, he said, and with his foot he pushed the pail in by the door of the cool-room.

What could have been going through Jak’s head? The logic of his sightseeing tour escaped you.

Next was Jak’s new merino stud rams. Under the direction of the stock-breeding expert of the Tygerhoek experimental farm he’d done experiments to determine the influence of the various feeds and feed supplements on the fertility of the sheep. You listened to him explaining all this to Jakkie. You could have sworn he was a stud farmer.

There were four rams, a dozen or so ewes, each in a separate pen with a number and a steel post-box in which the records of their feeding schedule were kept.

What you see here is worth tens of thousands of rand, said Jak, all the champions of Katbosch and Zoetendals Valley and Van Rheenen’s Heights.

They’re all very close already to the Super Utility Merino. That’s the objective.

Jakkie wasn’t listening. As if he were on the look-out, his eyes kept wandering in the direction of the road which one could see from the pens.

What he was looking for, said Jak, was one hundred per cent pre-potency, a lambing rate of a hundred and fifty per cent, early weaning time and the greatest possible uniformity and regularity of build, plus then super-wool qualities.

You all had to examine the one ram with him.

Hannibal, it said on the tin name-tag.

If you consider, Jak said, that there were only fat-tailed Hottentot sheep with knock-knees and Cape sheep covered in tatters in this country when the white man arrived here, then we’ve come a long way.

The ram retreated slightly on its delicate little feet as you approached.

Down on your haunches, said Jak, otherwise he’ll get a fright.

He clicked his tongue and murmured reassuringly.

Finer of fleece than the Rambouillet and even than the Vermont, hardier than the Saxony, more compact than the Australian, such a South African merino. Perfectly adapted to our conditions.

Jak folded open the fleece on the back so that you could see the wool.

Four inches, very soft, not a cross-thread in sight, just see how wide is the staple, he said. Feel. Top spinning quality. Look at the deep crimp.

Jak isolated one tuft.

He took Jakkie’s hand and put his fingers on the tuft. See how it stands up, nice cauliflower tip as well. Just feel the character. Deep character.

He opened the fleece in two other places.

Just see, everywhere the same, even to the belly, and well-oiled throughout.

Jakkie was more interested in his father’s tone than in the information, that you could deduce from the way in which he started leading him on.

Just look at that head! Jakkie said. Only you heard the mockery.

Yes, now isn’t that spiff, Hannibal, Jak said, and turned to the sheep, we’re talking about your head.

Jak was on one knee next to the ram and took its jaw in his hands.

Big, strong, open face, alert and masculine.

He pulled open the mouth a bit so that one could see the gums and the teeth.

Broad mouth, free of blemishes. And just feel that silky-soft skin on the nose.

Jakkie rubbed over the nose with cautious fingers.

He’d never realised, he said, that a sheep had such a long nose.

As it should be, Jak said, long and finely-curved, and just see how wide a curve the horns make around the head and how big the ears are, lively soft ears for his baas.

Here and there and everywhere Jak touched the ram, as if he were sculpting something.

Broad in the shoulders, broad in the chest, deep ribcage. Sturdy flanks. See how spacious the leap of the ribs, how straight the topline from the neck to the tail, square across the rump, well-filled buttocks, enough place for the balls.

He squeezed the soft downy scrotum lightly.

The ram picked up its back foot and step-stepped when Jak touched its nuts. Jak caught the paw and steadied the ram by the horn with his other hand.

Wait, Hannibal, he said, we’re inspecting your feet. Straight and strong from the heel to the knee, he won’t stumble or twist, this sheep. Just look at that hoof, nice and amber in colour.

Jak got up and closed up the wool where he’d opened it.

Jeez, Pa, Jakkie said, you should become a praise-singer for sheep, that was quite a text for the prodigal son.

You weren’t surprised that evening at table when Jak got going.

So what do you say about the political situation these days? he asked Jakkie.

Really, is it necessary, you tried to intervene, we’re enjoying our meal so much.

For Agaat’s sake you said that, to console her where she was standing with a guarded expression over her dishes. Because we weren’t enjoying our meal. There was a silence around the table.

Agaat’s hand. It was impressive what she’d brought about there. Extra special just for the family, on top of all the preparations for the great feast the following day. All the old favourites, the choice dishes that Jakkie had grown up with, were on the table. A steamed river eel on spinach to start. Chicken pie, ox tongue, roast hare with field mushrooms that she’d dried the previous autumn, stewed dried peaches and roast potatoes, green beans with onion and shiny sweet-potatoes and cauliflower with mustard cheese sauce and pumpkin fritters, and a salad of baby beetroot in a vinegar reduction, and baby onions in a sweet-and-sour sauce. Everything dished up in the best porcelain and garnished with fresh parsley and chives and rosemary and mint.

She hadn’t as usual first asked permission to use the best table linen and the crystal glasses and the silver. There were two candelabra with candles and a flat table arrangement of cinerarias and creeper shoots. Around Jakkie’s plate she’d made a birthday garland of the first blue wine-cup babiana that she’d gone to gather in the fynbos-kloof.

What made you think that it was for herself as well? You tried to remember why you’d forgotten her birthday. Twelfth of July. The thought made the food congeal in your mouth. The day of the telephone conversation? Had that been the birthday?

You could find out if you wanted to. You’d be able to get Jakkie on his own, could ask him if she’d really been talking to him that day. Whether it was on the twelfth of July. But you said nothing then, you remained silent. You felt it welling up around you, the tide of things that had to be said. Your arms felt numb. You felt hot. Your whole body was itching.

I’m asking, what do my son’s politics look like these days? Jak insisted. Jak had drunk too much. You placed your hand on his, but he shook it off, gesticulated with his fork in the air.

He’s in the Air Force after all, surely he must know more than the man in the street.