27 February 1954
A third fire! Agaat thinks I can do magic. With a flat bit of softwood, half mouldy with wood-mite, and a straight stick. Next to the river in the shade. It took hours, later the sweat was pouring off me, you can’t let go, otherwise you have to start all over again. Twirl, twirl, twirl in the little hole. Up and down, my hands burning after a while. First you smell it, the first little curl of smoke appears, up from the base of the stick. Agaat on her knees, looks as if she wants to stare it on fire. Blinks the eyes, looks at me, blinks the eyes, blinks at the turn-stick, blinks at the flat piece of wood. Please! Please! Fire fire in my hand, I say, who sees the first spark in the land? When the smoke was curling properly, I took out the stick, here comes the little hand with the smallest, finest threads of dry straw. As if she’s done it often before, as if she knows exactly how, she sprinkles a few shreds into the hole, blows with pursed lips, could hardly believe it, anther shred she adds, blows with the gentlest breath, until the little flame leaps up. Wherever did you see it, Agaat? How do you know so well to start a fire? Who taught you?
Then she looks over my left shoulder, I look round, see nothing, then she looks over my right shoulder, I look round, still nothing, then she looks on the ground, then in the air, then in the palm of her strong hand! And I fold it open nicely and make a show of looking and see nothing. All prim and proper she looks at me!
I think that’s the first joke, the first tale that she’s told me.
Who taught you about fire?
The Nowherewoman, the woman without name, who is everywhere but who can’t be seen, she taught me about starting a fire.
Then I continued the tale: Once upon a time there was a little girl who wanted to learn how to start a fire, and I watched her closely to see if she’d give an indication, hot or cold, but she doesn’t let herself be read.
Perhaps there were concrete and specific circumstances when she was still very small, many more, far worse than one could dream up in a fairy tale.
4 March 1954
Agaat is a closed book. Sometimes I think she’s wiser than she is. Sometimes I think she’s retarded. When you have to communicate through the eyes, live by inferences, misunderstandings are easy. I must remember she’s only a child. Seriously damaged. I mustn’t want to read too much into things. I mustn’t expect too much. Can’t help thinking it’s the most challenging and also the most promising task I’ve ever set myself, that the Lord entrusted to me to enrich and fortify me in my spiritual life, to feed my capacity to love my neighbour, to sharpen my insight into my fellow man. I must write down the commission. I must write how I found her otherwise I’ll forget how it was, but it seems too much, I’m scared to commit it to writing. Would I find the right words?
6 March
I encourage her to touch things and tug at them, open her hands, to give, receive. Go and fetch my little book, I say, so that I can write down how you are. She knows exactly what I’m talking about, brings it and opens it for me on a blank page. It’s going better by the day now. Must silence her because she grabs the silver hand-bell in the dining room and then J. comes to eat and the food isn’t nearly ready. It’s just the talking that must still be sorted out, everything else will follow quickly once we’ve got that on track.
11 March
I play shadow puppets for her against the wall. Rabbit, snake, camel, dove. She opens her hands now, the strong hand more readily than the weak, the sly hand, the monkey paw, as I call it. I take the little hand in mine, I open and close it, open and close so that it can become human, I say, but she doesn’t like it, she always keeps it half out of play, the weak arm always half out of the way, as if it’s private property. I count to five on the fingers of the good hand, I give them names. Pinkie, Golddinky, Laureltree, Eye-washer, Bugsquasher. At night I leave a candle-end with her. I peep through the slot to see what she’s doing. She lies and stares at the flame for hours. Plays shadows against the wall with her hands. Weak hand makes the snout, ears, tail. Strong hand the neck of the buck, the head of the horse. Earlier this evening I thought I heard a whispering on a long in-breath like somebody counting sheep and not wanting to lose tally, I suppose I mustn’t expect miracles. She doesn’t sleep before the candle is burnt down. Every evening before bedtime she brings the candlestick so that I can fit a new candle-end, she carries it to her room as if it’s a great treasure.
14 March, seven o’clock
Agaat can talk! So I wasn’t wrong about the whispering! She talks to herself in bed but I can’t make out what. The whispering is on the in-breath. I see the little chest swell as she takes the breath. Have just gone to press my ear against the slot, a rustling of little sentences, almost voiced, repetition of the same word or phrases, but I only now and again catch something. The rhymes I say to her all the time? Fragments of the stories that I tell? Granny, why are Granny’s ears so big, Granny, why are Granny’s teeth so long. I know she understands. When I’m telling a story, she looks at me wide-eyed. Sometimes I get the impression she’s on the point of asking me something about the stories. But it’s as if she’s assessing me, as if she’s scared that I’m going to take something from her if she opens her mouth.
Quarter past seven
I could spoil everything if I exert pressure now. Have been to listen at the door of the back room again, this time it was unmistakable. What do I hear there?
In the road is a hole, in the hole is a stone, in the stone is a sound. In one sustained in-breath she said the riddle!
Her finger was on the tip of her tongue, as I always have it when I’m saying the riddle to entice her to talk, as if language is something one can taste.
I went to sit on the side of her bed. I won’t look, I whispered, I look elsewhere, then you tell me what you lie here and say to yourself, won’t you? I swung my legs onto the bed so that I could lean against the bedpost, tried to relax, so that she could relax as well. Wanted her half to forget that I was there and just carry on with her bedtime stories. Sat there for probably an hour without saying anything. She said nothing further but that’s the best that I’ve yet felt with her. Peaceful. Secure. A kind of motherhood even.
Half past eight
Sat on the stoep for a long time, tried to think of everything that happened there in Agaat’s little back room tonight. It’s as if I’m too scared to write it down. As if writing would efface the fragile event, as if words would spoil everything.