Marlene van Niekerk - Agaat

When she removed it, Jak was lying on his back on the stones with Jakkie on top of him. You couldn’t make out where the one stopped and where the other started.

Agaat threw her apron over her head and crouched forward.

Did you hear right?

Même, she groaned, ai Même, tell me they’re moving, tell me, please!

It took a while for life to return to them. They slowly disentangled themselves from each other, their green clothes clearly delineated there on the white river boulders. And then they moved together again, Jakkie in under Jak’s arm, his legs over Jak’s legs. Jak rubbed his free hand all over Jakkie, put his hand in under the green windcheater. To count the ribs, to feel if they were all whole, the bones of your child.

what remains of the mending and the making and the joining and the fixing pass here under my unprehensile hands hundreds of reels of cotton and thirteen packets of singer needles singer bobbins an extra singer foot two silver thimbles varnished darning-shell darkbrown with serrated lip worn tape-measure knitting needles of steel of plastic in all sizes crochet-hooks for doilies for tablemats pin-cushions button-boxes for coats dresses blouses brandnew zips all colours of the rainbow buckles awls prickers flax-thread for leatherwork a roll of the thinnest thongs a ball of darning-wool for black socks eyelets bronze and black of steel stiffening for belts for dresses press-studs sequins felt loops gold and silver thread a length of hatband with three feathers packets of bloomer elastic narrow and wide sponge for shoulder-padding satin belt brocade cuff shoelaces white and shoelaces black shoelaces brown and red hatpins tiepins cuff links tassels for a beret pearls fresh and salt earrings brooches ma’s ring with six garnets signet ring of my father’s engagement ring wedding ring that my fingers cannot bear a tin of mica chips feldspar agate quartz a jacaranda pod an acorn cap both with their dates on from stellenbosch love three pulleys and buckle of an abseil rope put it in the delft platter in the beak of the stork for when he comes our son for when he returns speedwell and snapdragon here under my meandering fingertips rustles a needlework basket cold lining of jewelcase thumb and forefinger have become detached from the fiddling world and free of god’s odds and ends a woman’s things rings shards reels that slip now and roll over the planks there was a time when I could sew could hem could fix could cast on stitches make buttonholes and knit could punch holes stitch a seam could pin on pin up hook could pump the singer’s pedal reconcile the world with itself close its flaps weave its threads sew on its sequins and fill mattresses with its coir and look upon it and find it was good underneath down here there are even shirt-patterns dress patterns trouser-patterns take them by all means do with them as you see fit from now on I’m an unadorned woman my ravels and my rags nobody can assemble there is no map or direction with which to navigate me.

Saturday 11 March 1972 four o’clock

A. vanished into thin air I suppose not odd that she’s unhappy. She was looking forward so much to Jakkie’s being here this weekend from Heidelberg but he brought along a friend & they left immediately with Jak for an air show in Cape Town. Will only be back tomorrow afternoon late. A. had cooked & baked but they took along only a little bit of her biltong and dried-fruit sweets for the road. You can give him & his pal each a nice food parcel to take back to the hostel I say but the face remains set on sulk. Must go & look for hr.

11 March six o’clock

Have just been to cast an eye over the milking so there was Julies flirting with A. Hey there he says my griddle-cake how about it supposedly to the cow but I can hear it’s actually for A. He doesn’t look at her he talks straight into the udder that he’s milking. For what does she walk around sniff-sniff in the hills all day just like a wildcat? is she perhaps ruttish redcat tigercat? ggggh does she hiss at me? They say all she sticks in & pulls out is a needle & a rag stick stick snip snip she doesn’t look left or right pity about those titties about that bottom that dried-out sweet potato. A. pretends not to hear shirrrr-shirrrr she strains the first milk of one cow after the other.

Thought to myself Julies you’d better keep your trap shut my boy but I didn’t want to interfere & I wanted to see what would happen & made myself small behind the tank. It’s certainly not the first time but she just remains silent & he carries on.

No, he says, his foot is skew since the axle hit him head-over-heels but he knows Gaat was there Gaat wasn’t she his little nurse that day. Didn’t he feel it how she squeezed shut his veins so he didn’t bleed empty how she doctored him that he didn’t kick the bucket didn’t he see how she cut white bands with her little shiny scissors snip snip snip how she bandaged his head nicely pinned all the loose ends together nicely with hr safety pins. But this foot of his just won’t get fixed the toes keep dragging sideways in the sand just like a hub-less wheel he’ll never get to the moon all cripple like this but who wants to see the moon if he can gravy sweet potato? He thought by himself perhaps old shuffle-shoe could have a chance to snitch a snatch with the little laundry-mangle between them they have three good legs & three arms & that’s enough for getting up on the lucerne-rick. Shipps-shipps he carries on uncouthly with the teats. Just take off he says beforehand for Djeesussake that cap with the point & that snow-white apron otherwise he schemes he’s riding in the redcross police van peeeeeep paaaaaaawp. He gives hr a flowery headscarf he gives hr a red flowery dress with a sash around the middle then what does she say about that? Shorrr-shorrr he milks rudely with his head pressed into the cow’s stomach & A. pretends not to see any of it.

Do I wish she had a heart? Do I fear it? The heart or the absence of one?

1 May 1973

A. not herself since Jakkie has been at boarding school in Heidelberg. Works herself to a standstill before he comes home every weekend sweeps the garden paths scrubs the stoep washes curtains & polishes door-knobs & all the copper & silver & bakes the cakes & tarts & pies that he likes. Knits him beautiful cable-pattern jerseys with wool that she buys with her own money when we go to town. He’s not the king I say he’s just a child don’t wear yourself to a rag he doesn’t even notice but she just carries on.

What can I do about it? I do try every time when Jakkie comes home to arrange something that’s at least an outing for A. as well. Picnic or to the ferry or the Bontebok Park or last year to the wildflower show or to the sea. Otherwise she doesn’t go anywhere & sees nothing apart from the farm & the town. But it’s difficult now that she’s no longer a nanny. Jakkie jests get a wheelchair he says then he can pretend to have cerebral palsy then A. can go along everywhere as his nurse then he’s hr licence. He says every time he sees her the point of her cap is longer. Haven’t noticed it myself now I see all the caps are indeed higher on top & more pointed & completely filled with embroidery complicated patterns overlocked at top with little holes & scallops. Jakkie says she looks like the Pope.

A. crochets her own pullovers makes all her own house-dresses & aprons. Told J. we owe her a knitting machine for what she saves us in store-bought clothes or then at least my old Singer. He says that’s going too far give them the little finger & they take the whole hand & A.’s already got hold of all of us up to the armpits. A. is not ‘them’, I say. J. says she’s not ‘us’ either & a sewing machine won’t solve the problem it’s just like a chamber in parliament before you know it they want to pass laws. J. says if he catches Jakkie again teaching A. to dance in the outside room then he’ll send him to the Paul Roos Gymnasium in Stellenbosch from Standard Eight, & then we’ll only see him during holidays. He says he’ll place him further & further away if things don’t ‘normalise’. What is normal? I ask. Nothing on Gdrift is normal, he says. It’s a hospital full of female experiments if at least it had served a good purpose or had a practical application but he thinks we’re way past the point of no return & we must just note that he’s not the one who laid the tracks here he’s been a mere passenger for a long time now he asks himself why he doesn’t jump off the train it would be better than to ride to perdition knowingly with a little gang of saboteurs on board.