Marlene van Niekerk - Agaat

Water came into your mouth, of iron it tasted, of blood.

She hooked her finger into the nose-ring, turned her back, took a pace forward. Through the bars of the holding pen you saw the bull bend its knee, dragging his hind leg, starting to move forward. Six, seven, eight paces and Agaat was in the crush pen with him.

You climbed onto the wall, the stick and rope in your hand. The bull lowered its head. On both sides of his muzzle gobbets of drool were hurled against the cement walls. His small sunken eyes were on the cross of Agaat’s shoulder-straps. Soon she was invisible. You could only deduce, from the steady pace at which the bull moved forward, that she was there walking ahead of him, and that she was exerting a constant force of traction on him.

The blood in your temples! The whole twenty, twenty-five, thirty yards of the crush pen! Triumph when the bull pushed his huge muzzle over the crossbar, when you pressed down the lever, and wedged in his head, and Agaat escaped through the shutter. A yelling from the littl’uns, cries of admiration as she emerged there.

She was opposite you on her scaffolding on the other side of the gully. She wiped her hands on the bib of her apron. She pushed at her cap. On her shoulders something glistened in the sun. It was wet where the big bull had drooled on her.

Agaat held out her little hand, the back, so that the bull could feel the warmth on his nose. He tried take a step back, felt his head was fast. It would be a business if he lay down in the gully. You had to work quickly. Agaat looked at you across the hump.

You wanted to praise her because she was so brave, but the expression on her face prevented you.

First the coffee, then brandy, he needs a kick-start, she said.

The main thing was that the liquid should not end up in the lungs. Agaat passed you the bottle with coffee.

Press on his cheeks, she said, you have two hands.

You pressed on the release knobs, the sensitive salivary glands. The jaws parted slightly, you pressed down the lever a notch to pick up the head another few degrees and lifted the lip and inserted the thin tube along the gum behind the back molar on the tongue.

Swallow! Gaat said.

The coffee went down without any problems. But then the egg mixture wouldn’t pour smoothly down the tube. Agaat took it mouthful by mouthful out of the bottle and blew it into him through the tube.

After that it was the raw linseed-and-lime cream. The full two prescribed pints.

Then the two of you unlocked the clamp. Enlivened by the stimulants, the bull allowed himself to be prodded out of the crush pen. You drove him slowly to the clean straw that you’d had brought in and covered him in sacks where he stood, because then he had the shivers.

When did OuKarel appear on the scene? Next thing you noticed, there he was crushing his hat, a vaaljapie breath issuing from his mouth.

You had to flash a warning look otherwise Agaat would have scolded the old man. He was just sober enough to help. You rounded up the cows three at a time and dosed them with the boys holding their heads up. The cows shat and pissed and tried to step back and coughed. Then everybody had to let go to let them finish coughing. Raw linseed oil down the wrong gullet was the greatest risk. Terrible pneumonia could be the result.

Twice you and Agaat rushed back to the house to mix more medicine.

By six o’clock you trained the bakkie’s headlights on the scene and sent home for lanterns. Agaat and yourself you fitted out with headlamps from Jak’s mountaineering equipment. Like a cyclopic eye Gaat’s headlamp shone in the dark.

One cow looked as if she was going to succumb and had to be given a stomach-pump.

Jakkie was cold and hungry and cried.

Take him, Agaat, you said, go and bathe him and give him food, he’s upset, I’ll take charge here now. Wait until he’s asleep then you come and call me.

At half past six Jak returned from tennis. Flabbergasted. In white clothes and all he plunged into the ooze of manure and mud to help. Anew you doctored the bull with coffee and brandy to stimulate his heart. At seven o’clock the vet turned up from the clubhouse, even more sozzled than Karel. Jak went and dragged Dawid and his cousin out of the huts to come and help. Agaat returned with Jakkie tied to her back in a blanket. She went and stood in front of Dawid and Kadys. Without a word she made them both drink half a bottle of sweet coffee and three gulps of laced egg-white to fix the hangover. The bakkie lights were on them. Everybody was watching. They did as they were told. The women and the boys whispered. Dawid’s face was squint. The vet stood back as if he was scared he would also be accosted.

Now you two go and milk the Jerseys, they must be sore by this time, she said. You sent Saar along to keep an eye because they were stepping very high indeed.

Men! you and Agaat signalled to each other with the eyes. But your part of the message was vitiated by her look. Some women! it said.

By four o’clock that morning the tulip poison had been counteracted. You administered barley-water and linseed-lime because the animals couldn’t drink ordinary water. But the new herd had been saved. Hamburg was starting to see better out of his eyes. He stopped peeing and started shitting less and less. Just the one cow that had been given the enema was looking weakish.

Everybody who had helped was ready to drop from hunger and fatigue. Agaat went home and for the second time that day washed and dressed in clean clothes.

The kitchen was a chaos, lime and oil on the floor and all the separated yolks standing around everywhere in dishes and bowls. All the egg, Agaat said, overwhelmed for the first time that day, you could see.

Never mind, we can use it, you said, let’s make food for the people, they must be starving. You mixed the batter and Agaat started baking vetkoek and bacon and fried onion and pans full of scrambled eggs. Along with big jugs of sweet rooibos tea with milk you helped her to serve it in the backyard.

Aitsa, such a whitecap cattle-quack, the servants teased Agaat, how she blows a bull full of brandy!

There was new respect in the teasing and in the attitude, even of the big men when they brought back their plates and came to hand back the mugs into her hands.

You served Jak and the vet indoors. They were quiet.

That little coloured girl of yours deserves a medal, Thom Smuts said after a while to Jak with his mouth full of egg.

That’s Milla’s department, Jak replied, and gestured with his head in your direction where you were pouring coffee. It’s she who should get the compliment.

my nurse takes me under my own law she counts my blessings for me minces my meals flushes my guts wipes my arse twists my buttons into their holes coat-buttons blouse-buttons jersey-buttons knots my shoelaces girds my buckles zips up my side-zips back-zips breast-zips my hooks my eyes shrouds my body closes off my openings she cleanses me combs me powders me paints me I am a well-rounded woman an effigy of a woman a scarecrow on a broomstick

doll and gaat go to town they pretend nothing is wrong gaat starched mrs de wet packaged they step with tiny tiny steps four legs and a walking stick they nod tiny tiny nods good morning good morning good day they invite the world to tea and cake mrs de wet is sixty-seven her hands they lie in her lap she drinks through a straw her vitamins for who would ever drink tea through a straw?

next to her waits her walking stick the finches twitter in the rushes who’s afraid of a broomstick who’s afraid of a walking stick?

o who’s afraid of a walking stick

the first one was a knob-stick but soon the knob was too knobbly the second had a crook-neck but soon the neck was too crooked the third had a finger-grip but soon the grip started to slip the fourth was of light metal with rubber on the tip and rubber on the grip and a silver hoop to support the wrist