‘That’s all right with you, Twa?’ Neeltje asked.
Twa’s face wrinkled into a smile.
‘Twa will do it.’
*
The next morning, Zokho was up early to help Roeloff and Neeltje get under way. She watched them ride off on one horse into the darkness of dawn. Her heart was heavy. The journey for the doctor would bring change.
Neeltje had said to keep the house warm and to give her father soup. She entered the kitchen and went to the hearth. She bent over to pick up some wood, and a pain shot across her belly. The baby had dropped lower, and a cramp was working itself up her leg. When it subsided, she went behind the partition to tend to the oubaas. He was still asleep, but opened his eyes at her approach. She looked at him in the half dark, helpless, at her mercy. In his own bed she could put a sack over his face and smother him. Hold her hand over his nose and mouth the way Tau had done with her baby. Zokho had seen her do it, but pretended it hadn’t happened. It would be over by the time his eyes rolled back in his head. She could take his sheep for her people. They would forget her past and welcome her back.
Boet got up from where he was dozing at the foot of Neeltje’s bed, and licked her ankle. She bent down to touch him, ashamed of her thoughts.
‘You’re ugly, hairy one,’ she rubbed his fur. ‘You can see in Zokho’s heart?’
The dog licked her with a slobbering affection. She was surprised, amazed as always by white people’s feeling for animals. Boet was Neeltje’s dog, and she treated him almost like a human, feeding him from her plate. Roeloff had had two dogs on Kloot’s Nek, and shared Boet’s affections with Neeltje.
‘You are stupid, Zokho,’ she chastised herself. ‘Why are you crying, you foolish girl? He’s waiting for you to empty your belly so he can feel you again. Be strong. He is yours.’
She gave the oubaas his soup, then settled his blankets, and went to her own quarters and climbed into the bed Roeloff had vacated less than an hour before. She stayed there all morning, whimpering in her sleep. A dull ache woke her in the afternoon. She got up and went to the barrel outside for water. She hadn’t yet reached the door when a knifelike pain cut across her belly, bringing her to a halt. She recognised it; the first of the pains. She looked around the room she shared with Roeloff—the small trestle table, the powder horn, the extra gun, his clothes and books neatly stacked on a ledge in the wall. His presence was everywhere in the room. But where was he? Where was he when she needed him with her? He was crossing some mountain with the oubaas’s daughter, and she was by herself. She had said he could go, and had wanted him to so that the oubaas could recover, but she had also expected more concern for her and for the baby that would come. Who was there to help her? She, Zokho, was alone. As she’d always been. At least with her people, Tau had come to her aid, and the others were there as support. She missed them. Karees with her questions—she’d enjoyed talking to her. Was Karees with Toma now? And Limp Kao? Was he still there? And where were they? Behind the Hantam, or in the land of great dryness below the yellow river? It was far, far away. She started to cry, slowly at first, then sobbing desperately into her hands with the longing for familiar smells and family fires. A sudden contraction drove her back to bed.
The ride to Jan Dissels Vlei was quick and uneventful. They stopped once along the bank of the Olifantsrivier to have something to eat and stretch their legs. Roeloff talked a little about his sister, Vinkie, his life on Kloot’s Nek. Neeltje told him how lonely it was without brothers or sisters in the Cederberg. Otherwise their conversation was strained. Both seemed aware of the other’s presence.
Neeltje knew the way to the widow Reijnhardt’s farm, a lonely little house in a dusty bowl of bush and rock in the valley. When they arrived there, they were informed by a Koi-na servant that the widow had left a day before to visit relatives. She was not expected back for a few days.
‘We have come all this way for nothing,’ Neeltje said forlornly.
‘Never mind. There is still the doctor. Hopefully, we will find him in.’
Otto Lieberband was home when they arrived, and came limping out with his wife to greet them. Visitors were always a welcome change, although he got more than most because he was a doctor and people showed up unexpectedly for his help.
‘Neeltje! What a surprise! You’ve married then, since I saw you.’
Neeltje blushed.
‘No, Oom, I’ve not married. This is Roeloff Kloot. He’s a bijwoner on the farm.’
Roeloff greeted the doctor and was introduced to Johanna, his wife.
‘Come in, come in. Kloot, hey? I met a Kloot from the Cape. What brings you here in such a hurry? Johanna and I saw the dust in the distance and said whoever it was, was coming on a matter of importance.’
They followed the couple into the house, where Johanna put on the water for coffee.
‘My father fell off his horse and lay for a day without opening his eyes. He’s woken up now, but he can’t move and talk, and his face is skew. The lip’s up on one side. We’ve come here hoping to take you back to the farm.’
‘I would, but it’s impossible with this leg. I can’t make any long trips. Martinus dropped a beam on my foot and I can’t sit for long on a horse or in a wagon. But, I think I know what’s wrong with your Pa. He’s suffered a seizure, but the danger’s over by the sound of it.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘I’ve seen cases like his. The first few days are the ones to worry about—whether he comes out of the sleep. Was he aware of it when it happened? Was anyone with him?’
‘I was,’ Roeloff said. ‘I don’t know if he was aware of it, but I was riding with him when suddenly, there he was on the ground and his heart was beating very slowly.’
Lieberband nodded.
‘And now he’s come to.’
‘Yes.’
‘That he’s come out of it so soon is good news.’
‘His right side also seems stronger than his left.’
Otto Lieberband turned to Neeltje.
‘Your father’s working too hard, that’s his problem. I told him long ago that loneliness is a hard thing for a man out in those mountains. Eventually it puts you in the ground. You need womenfolk, children. Children bring life to a home. You married, son?’
‘He’s not,’ Neeltje said before Roeloff could answer. ‘Are you saying there’s nothing to worry about? That Pa will recover?’
‘He’s out of danger. I’ll give you medicine to make him strong and ointment to massage into his skin, but what he needs most is rest. He must forget about his farm worries for now. He’ll probably regain his health and strength eventually. I’ll tell Stoffel to bring me up to date after he’s visited you in a month’s time. He was here recently. He said he hadn’t been to your father in a long time but that he was going out there.’
‘He stayed away for no reason.’
Otto looked at Roeloff.
‘He must have had his reasons. Anyway, regarding your father, he will walk again, and be able to go back to his old way of life. I’ll try to get to see him when my leg’s better.’
‘Thank you.’
