12 July 1960 8 o’clock (after supper)
What a day! Half restless. I have a sense that I’m forgetting something, but what? Have just gone and peeked if the light in the outside room is off yet, but it’s still burning. Jak says it’s the first time he’s heard of a skivvy’s room with electricity is this my interpretation of the Light we’re supposed bring to the Southern Tip of Africa. Simply put my foot down. She has to be able to see to read & to embroider how else is she supposed to occupy hrself in the back there in the evenings? J. looks at me as if I’m off my trolley.
The door is still open a crack as I left it behind me I suppose she’s drinking hr tea I suppose it’s all very new for her perhaps she’s washing hr clothes. Don’t know how she’ll get the blood out of the white jersey.
Honestly thought it would be good if she could work herself to a standstill before moving into hr room. Went this morning & put the brown suitcase with hr possessions on the half-shelf under her little table. Was at first tempted to surprise her & to unpack everything for hr like fairy godmother but had second thoughts. She has to be independent. In any case you have to find your own bearings in a new place perhaps she’ll see for herself now that hr old things don’t go with hr new things & perhaps she won’t even unpack them & forget all about them that will be best.
And I must also forget. Otherwise I’ll go mad. Or get sick. Can’t afford it now with the child in me.
Took the precaution yesterday of devising a whole list of things to be done today so that she can stay busy one shouldn’t have too much time to think on a day like this. First little routine chores with which to warm hr up sweeping the stoep washing dishes doing laundry & ironing & folding & packing away then the sheep-slaughtering.
I imagine that with the child I won’t have time to supervise personally. A. must become the slaughter-hand on Gdrift. Sent message to the cottages last night Dawid must teach her the basics & I’ll stand by so that he can behave himself. Ten o’clock this morning he’s standing in the kitchen door, no the slaughter animal has already been picked do I want to see it first he asks no I say tether the sheep in the shade & give water because I didn’t want to go too far away from A. she was still ironing shirts & sheets in the spare room & I had to show her how you get the collar smooth without wrinkles & how you fold the sheets.
Everything went reasonably smoothly with the slaughtering except for myself who felt unwell later on at the slaughter-drain. D. & two helpers brought the sheep closer a well-set little wether still half lamb from the little camp of hanslammers that we had to cull. Take it by the ear I said to A. don’t be timid she goes & takes the ear with the little hand & the wether stands & looks at her use your strong hand I say he’ll jerk loose & right then the wether steps back violently I give A. the knife in hr good hand & I say hold her hand show the way next thing D. is all giggly from being so close to the girl’s body & takes the wrong hand so the wether jerks its head & bleats & steps back & squitters a green splodge over D.’s shoes & against A.’s dress & her leg & the farmworkers roll around laughing & next thing the whole yard’s littl’uns are there heyno shouts Dawid he doesn’t know about this if it’s going to work Mies.
A. is still too small for sheep-slaughtering. He must keep his mouth shut & she must learn everything I say she’s clever.
First lesson of sheep-slaughtering I teach her the animal must eat nothing for 3 days so that the gut can be nice & clean & the last day you give bran that absorbs everything that could still be in the stomach & it washes out easily now with all the talking the little sheep was all wild but make it lie down hold it down I say. So D. ups & says usually I get hold of a little sheep like this from behind in the camp before he knows what’s happening to him his throat is cut while he’s still standing & thinking it’s Christmas in the lucerne flowers then when you eat him his meat is sweet because he was never scared.
That’s the second lesson I teach hr: sheep that get panicked before they’re killed have bitter meat they secrete something from the adrenal with the fear so never dawdle with the killing so then they cast the sheep & held its neck over the edge of the cement furrow & the little wether struggled something terrible it can’t carry on like this I thought now I count to three I said to A. her eyes bulging in the sockets come nearer says D. Oh come nearer oh all ye children of the Lord the kitchen-girls sing bend says D. to A. he grasps her hand in his and quickly they draw the blade over the wether’s throat the blood spurts everywhere. A. stands back and the knife falls from her hand and rolls down the incline of the slaughtering-floor no-no-no I say you don’t throw away your knife like that climb in there and take it out the workers kill themselves laughing there you are Arsgaat check that farmgirl they shout. Be quiet I say the dogs lick the blood from A.’s shoes she stands stock-still D. goes to pick up her knife and presses it into her hand. Saar comes with the white enamel basin the workers yell catch the blood eat the meat the wool is white the meat is sweet give over I scold it’s hr first slaughtering-turn & then the little wether’s eyes roll back in its head and its upper lip retracts and the ridges on the nose smooth out & the ears lie flat I show A. all the signs and right there the wether’s body contracts into a lump & he gives an almighty kick against her shins all the hands let go & he lets fly another splodge all over her feet.
Take note of lesson 3: You don’t let go of the feet too soon it’s a convulsion kick it’s a death-throe & the animal is half-dead but that hurts the most.
And there I see Jak standing hand in the side & watching the whole business. Now that looks prosperous to me Milla, he says: Butcher baker butler then you can make her head-girl over a hundred. If only he’d rather attend to his own business it’s after all entirely at his insistence.
Have just gone to peek again if the outside room’s light is switched off yet do hope everything works out right with hr there in the back I feel all the time as if I’ve forgotten something.
10 o’clock
Everything quiet windows shut tight back there must be sleeping I can’t get the slaughtering out of my head after all it’s just ordinary sheep-slaughtering. Why do I want to write up everything? Did I leave something undone? Didn’t I teach her everything, step by step? Not easy but everybody must go through it the first time.
Lesson 4: Bleed well till empty otherwise the meat is spongy.
Lesson 5: hygiene. Provide a cloth & water you can’t slaughter if you’re covered in sheep manure look how the flies swarm. Bent down there heavy of body as I am & washed the sheep manure from her legs & shoes & next thing her knees start jerking fits fits yell the littl’uns be quiet I say no more from you or you don’t get any lung.
I took her hand with the knife & I bent behind her & I started cutting open from the gash in the throat. Had some trouble with the sternum now you & D. carry on alone I say to A., & press the knife in her hand sing I say to D. so that she can take some strength sikketir sikketir sikketeat sings D. the lamb comes to the block with its wool & its meat sing along A. I say so that you can get some life but her mouth is a straight line & then suddenly she gets some life & she looks me a very straight look & she takes the knife.