crawl inside a hole. The stone house is my home.’
‘The veld is wet, Gertruidah. And it doesn’t matter what sort of people your father and mother were, you must have had a bad shock. It’s not every day you bury your father and mother. Let me come stay with you, please?’
‘Then you’ll have to sleep in the stone house too. I’m not spending the night in this house until I’m done cleaning it.’
‘Then I’ll come help you tomorrow morning. But there are things you must tell me before I can close my eyes tonight.’
‘Then ask, it’s getting dark.’
‘Who’s going to take care of things on Umbrella Tree Farm from now on? Because you can say what you like about your father, he was a hard worker and he knew a thing or two about farming. And I want to know what’s the meaning of the sign on the gate. And how long you plan to keep sleeping in the stone house.’
‘Mabel, I want to clean the house on my own. Except for the little jobs Johnnie must come and do, I don’t want anyone in the yard. I will come and tell you when I’m done. Then you and I and Johnnie will run the farm. There’s nothing here we can’t do. For dipping and weaning the calves and the big jobs in the garden we’ll get contract workers. The sign means I don’t want anyone on my land without permission. You must stick to the short-cut through the lucerne paddock. If I catch you climbing over the gate I’ll shoot you.’
Mabel laughs. ‘You won’t shoot me, Gertruidah.’
‘Don’t test me. I’ll probably sleep in the stone house until Sunday night, or else in the truck in the shed.’
Mabel holds out the griddle cakes, tied up in the bread cloth. ‘Mama sends these. Every mealtime until Sunday I’ll leave food at the kissing gate in the lucerne paddock, under the umbrella tree. Take it or leave it, it’s up to you.’
‘Thank you, Mabel. You can fetch Johnnie’s things and your mother’s medicine from the shopping bag at the water tank.’
‘Johnnie will be glad. He’s been peeling resin from the trees for Littlejohn, because that child is impossible without his jelly babies. He’s been singing right through the night: “Someone’s in the kitchen with Dina, someone’s in the kitchen I know, I know, playing the old banjo …”’
‘Do you realise he’s already in his forties, Mabel? How are we going to take care of him if Johnnie dies?’
‘Lord knows but I’m not going to be the one looking after him. And another thing: When are you going to turn your cellphone on? The teacher has been calling me to ask about you. I told him you’re at the stone house and I don’t know when you’re coming back.’
‘Tell him to stop bothering you.’
‘Heavens, Gertruidah, his heart wants you. He’s a good man …’
‘I never want a man near me again. Let alone in my bed. Now go.’
She watches as Mabel walks away towards the shed. Stands with her middle finger hooked through the knot in the bread cloth. Closes her eyes. Sees the letters in her name slide past.
G E R T R U I D A H
The habit of many years, of stringing words into sentences using only the letters in her name, makes the words slip out.
Did Gertruidah guide the dart? Dare Gertruidah trade her heart? Dear Gertruidah tried.
She must stop making up words. There are things she has to think about.
She rinses the bucket and tips it over the coop tap. It’s too late now to walk to the stone house: darkness will overtake her. You should never underestimate the fog. It sneaks up on you like a thief and makes you lose your way. She washes her hands and face at the water tank, rinses out her mouth. Stows the bread cloth with griddle cakes inside the shopping bag. Places a rock on one corner of the bag so it won’t blow away. Walks down to the river to tell the frogs and the water that the funeral is over.
By the time she’s back it’s ten past eight. She strips off the wet funeral clothes and hooks them over a nail in the shed wall. Puts on the overall she was wearing when she painted the sign the day before. Over it, her parka jacket that was lying in the truck. Crumples up a hessian bag for a pillow and lies down on the seat of the truck.
Tired Gertruidah retired at eight. Dare the dead rider hurt her here?
Thula, thula. Shhh, shhh. Go to sleep now.
As she drifts into sleep she hears Mama Thandeka sing, like when she was small and Mama Thandeka tied her to her back inside a towel while she washed the floors. She falls asleep with one ear against Mama Thandeka’s vibrating lungs.
Thula baba, lala baba, ndizobanawe … Hush, my baby, go to sleep, I’ll be with you counting sheep. Dreams will take you far away, sleep until the break of the day.
◊◊◊
The night has arrived here in our house on the mountain ridge. I sit on the chair in front of the inside fire to get warm. It is cold and wet outside in the veld, but cold and dry inside my heart. Abel gone to the Other Side, gone before I could say goodbye, has knocked the breath out of this old black woman. Missus Sarah gone too. And when I think of Gertruidah it seems my thoughts get stuck inside my skull. Nkosi alone knows what will happen now.
It was He who sent the kudu. Now it is He who must keep watch.
When Mabel came home with the half bucket of milk she covered my legs with the red blanket and pushed the chair closer to the fire. ‘Mabel, does Gertruidah look sad, does she look like one who has cried?’
‘No, Mama, Gertruidah doesn’t cry. But she did remember to get the things for Mama’s chest. I’m going to rub the Vicks into Mama’s chest, then Mama will sit by the fire so Mama won’t go to bed feeling cold.’
Then she warmed her hand over the fire and I felt it slide down inside the front of my nightgown. ‘What’s going on in the yard, Mabel? Does Gertruidah have the gun?’
‘She was busy at the chicken coop, her funeral clothes are sopping wet. The gun is on the stoep by the front door. Heaven forbid the police should come here and see the gun was just left lying around, it’ll be prison next. But Mama mustn’t worry, I’ll keep my eye on what’s going on there.’
I feel the cold leave my back as she rubs me and the Vicks fumes rise and clear my head a little. This head has been confused for a long time now, because I’m already seventy-three years old. Sometimes it thinks in the ways of my yellow-brown husband, Samuel, dead long ago. Other times it thinks in the ways of the white people of Umbrella Tree Farm. But there are times, like now when the sadness takes me and I can see the black angel waiting in the doorway, when my head remembers the way my mama talked. The things of your mama, they keep stirring somewhere inside you, they are never far away.
My mama was buried a long time ago, in a place many mountains away. Where the dappled cows graze in the long grass and the women carry bundles of firewood home on their heads in the afternoon. I could be walking with them now, that’s how clearly I see them. I can hear the hadedah calling out from the orange and purple evening clouds saying somewhere a baby has been born. I see my mama adding potatoes to the pot with our evening meal. Or on her knees beside the river. Rubbing the clothes so the
