Great breakthrough! Got the bright idea just now, after reading her a bedtime story. Put three pink Star sweets in her hessian sack, left it at the foot of the bed.
I wonder what’s in here, I said. Do you still remember? They’re your own little things that you know! Do you remember Lys? Lys packed it for you to play with when you came here. Don’t you just want to have a look? Perhaps there’s something good inside that I put in there for you.
Go on, you like sweet things, don’t you? Then I went out and peeped through the spy-hole to see what she would do.
The room was in twilight. I switched off the light in the passage to see better. Dead-still she lay under the covers for a long time. Then she sat up straight, there’s a hand creeping out! First the strong one, then the little paw like a flat-iron. Then she sat up even straighter. First stared fixedly at the sack. Then her eyes moved. The first time in just this way, I could see the whites showing. Forward inclination in the body, the head rigid on the neck. My heart beat very fast. I could feel myself straining my own body forward, as if it was I that had to get to the sack. My knuckles I see are raw where I bit them from the tension, didn’t even notice.
Fist in the mouth, fist out of the mouth she sits there, sits weighing and wondering, an eternity it felt like. Hand creeping cautiously to the lip of the sack. Gauging with the fingertips the hessian fringe, then the ravels of the sack between thumb and forefinger. Then she pulled in her breath sharply. Open is the hand, in slips the hand, mole wriggling in the sack! Deeper and deeper up to the elbow. Further still up to the armpit. Then the other hand, the weak one, like an outrider. Feel feel feel. There! Got it! Then both hands are working. Wrapping off. Teeth apart. Quickly she slips it into the mouth-hole. Lump in the cheek. Sucks. Smoothes flat the bit of paper, folds it, can you believe it! with quick precise little fingers, and puts the paper back into the bag!
I trembled. I couldn’t believe it. But that wasn’t all.
Then she took the moleskin and the little wheel and the stick out of the sack. Mole in the neck, stick in the wheel. Head at an angle. Fur against the cheek. Point against the rim. One, two, three, small revolutions she makes with the little wheel on the cover. Everything together again, from the beginning, breathe in and once more. Mole in the neck, stick in the wheel, roll! Bull’s-eye! Her own game! I told Jack when he came home.
Fantastic! he shouted, bravo! He clapped hands loudly. His face was ugly. Now you’ve broken her in. Clay in your hands. A blank page. Now you can impress anything upon her. Just see to it that you know your story, Milla. It’d better be a good one. The one that you fobbed off on me didn’t work so well.
Lord, he can be so terrible.
So phoned Mother instead. She just listened. Right at the end she said what I suppose I could have expected: You’re making yourself a bed, Milla, but it’s your life, you must do as you see fit. She did though ask whether I’d taken her to a doctor. Suppose I must do something about it.
4 January 1954
Took her today for a once-over. Don’t know if it was a good thing. She’s terrified all over again. Ai, it breaks my heart, after all my trouble the last few days to tame her. While I was about it I had all the milk-teeth drawn at the out-patient’s clinic for the coloureds there next to old Kriek’s rooms. Set up a commotion, certainly not mute. They don’t give anaesthetic there. Blood on the new frock in front. Had to apologise to the next doctor because I didn’t want to drive back all the way to the farm then to go and get clean clothes on her. Ramrod-rigid and wild and convulsive she was all the time, threw her little hat as far as she could. It took two sisters to hold her down on the trolley bed. The internal examination showed exactly what I’d suspected. Multiple penetration, says the little chap, Leroux’s holiday partner. He’s too young, looks pretty inexperienced to me, but on top of that he was arrogant as well. He doesn’t know if she’ll ever be able to have children. All the better, we both of us thought. Apart from that there’s nothing wrong. The flat black moles are not malignant, be can burn off the one on her cheek, he says, but he thinks it gives her face a bit of character — I think he’s making fun of me. There are, though, signs of malnutrition. Weak right hand and arm probably an ante-natal injury. Eyes, ears, throat, nose, pooper, examined all the holes. Tonsils will have to go. She was fairly upset by all the shiny instruments. The squeaking noise again. Inoculations high up on the little deformed arm. Took blood samples. Pale gums and rim of eye suggest anaemia, but that can be put right. She has to be fed lots of liver and spinach. Doctor can’t say if she’s mentally in order. Looks to him like a state of shock. I must bring her again when she can talk, then he’ll be able to form an opinion. He stares at me with such blunt eyes, the little doctor. How do I get her to talk? I ask. I must decide how much I want to spend, he says. Remediation is nowadays possible for all kinds of handicaps. It depends on what your ultimate goal is with someone like that, he says. Half provoking, as if he suspects me of something. Got annoyed with the man, as if I had to account for myself to him. I’ll work on her myself until she’s caught up, I said. I’ll look after her, she has nobody else on the face of the earth. There are few people who are prepared to do so much for the underprivileged, Mrs de Wet. Drily. Felt humiliated when I walked out of there. What kind of attitude is that to somebody who wants to do something that everyone is forever preaching and praying about? Love thy neighbour as thyself? Then they should by rights rather be asking: What can we do to help you with the poor child on whom you’ve taken pity? Hypocrites! The old wall-eyed nurse Schippers and so-called highly educated Sister Goedhals with their po faces in their white uniforms, tchi, tchi, on the crêpe-soled shoes, they stared me out of the door of the consulting room, as if I were trespassing on their territory, as if I’d polluted it. That’s the last time that I’ll take them Christmas prunes! How is the world supposed to become a better place if that’s how the medical profession feels about the under-privileged?
Bought a cup of ice-cream for A. and myself afterwards from the café. Needed it. Went and sat in a quiet spot next to the river with her. Couldn’t get the ice-cream into her. Knuckle in the mouth. Quite closed up all over again. On the way back bought a celluloid windmill on a stick and showed her how it works. Sang her an old song, The Magic Mill, from my childhood and was moved to tears by it myself.
Turn the mill in the mountain’s fall
turn the mill in the sea
turn the mill in the time of joy
nobody ever content can be.
She didn’t want to take it from me. I held it out of the car window with one hand so that it could spin.
Turn fine the good white salt
turn soft the falling snow
grind small the grains of wheat
nothing’s too hard for the mill of God.
Watched her in the mirror. Sits there with large eyes fixed in her face. It looks as if she’s crying without tears.
Nothing to cry about, Aspatat, I say, we’re getting you ready for life, that’s all. Just the tiniest flickering when I mention her name. But it’s not your real name, I say. Your name you still have to be given.
Still 4 January after supper
Had a terrible storm of crying, couldn’t stop. Too many emotions for one day I suppose. Jak says I’m putting it on. He says it’s New Year’s disease.