The guard looked me over.
“Insolent girl . . . what are you . . . twelve?”
“Are you mad? I’m fourteen . . . will be fifteen on my next birthday.”
“You’re small.”
“So is the tsetse.”
He had the nerve to smile. He looked at the fence, looked back at me again, and scanned the fence line. No other guards were in sight.
“All right . . . just this afternoon. I’ll be back around in a couple hours and they’ll have to be gone.”
Within half an hour, a dozen more blankets were drying on the wire, with more families bringing out their bedding.
Moeder stood when I finally entered the sagging tent. She handed me a pair of black boots, shiny from what appeared to be a fresh dubbin treatment.
“Try these,” she said.
I held the sole of one up to my mud-blackened foot. It was too large by several inches, but they showed very little wear.
“Where did you get these?”
“Ouma van Zyl. . . . She brought them over. . . . They were her daughter’s. She said she’s been saving them and wanted you to have them.”
I padded them with rags and laced them tight; I spent the rest of my days in camp walking in a dead woman’s boots.
28
September 1901, Concentration Camp
A distant whistle sounded, the first of the night. I scanned the dark rows to look for my uncle answering its grim call. I thought of the images he must carry from these nights when he was hailed by the whistle. And I wondered why so many seemed to die at night. Did they feel their day was done and it was time to let go? Having gone another day without relief, perhaps they found it easier to accept death as if it were just falling off to sleep. Could they not face the idea of another sunrise, another day?
I had reached the point where even I was bothered by all my questions. I hoped that someday my nature would allow me just to accept things as they happened, or spend less of my time sorting through the contents of my increasingly jumbled mind.
I kept my eyes turned upward even on the way back from the camp’s edge, pretending I could use the stars to navigate through the identical rows of identical tents, down the identical muddy passages. Most were dark by this time of the night, but the tents of the ill were lit with candles or paraffin lamps, and they glowed like muted canvas lanterns. And when the candles guttered, the distorted shadows of the people seemed to dance. I imagined them as the Shadow People, spirits connected to the real people, but happier, dancing above their still forms.
Down one row, women gathered around a small fire, stirring a pot. The smell was of a warming poultice or the vile teas used to treat the sick. I kept a respectful distance as I passed, but then I came upon another cluster of women gathered at the next tent that glowed from within.
It was the aasvo?ls, as Moeder called them, the vultures. They would pitch up without announcement or invitation, even in the deep night. Drawn by scent or evil instinct, they formed a loose black coven and pulled themselves in tighter near the tent door. They absorbed light, rendered heat, and served as death’s relentless scouting party.
I slowed and circled, trying to study their faces so that I could give them scornful looks if I ever saw them during the day. But their black kappies hooded their faces, and only harsh sounds escaped from the faceless pack.
“Vultures,” I shouted, but none turned, all focused on the tent door.
“Measles. . . . The mother should have made the little one drink goat-dung tea,” one said.
“But where to get goat dung now? And wormword? Not in this camp.”
“Why is there no blind over that child’s eyes? The eyes burn with the measles.”
“The strangling angel took a whole family last week,” one said. “Throats swollen shut.”
“Strangling angel?”
“Ja . . . bad.”
“Better than some.”
“Ja . . . praise God.”
“Praise God.
“And a better deathbed.”
Others harmonized assent, heads bobbing like black-feathered hens.
“Like the last child,” another said. “God’s gift.”
More nodding and mumbles.
“Such a beautiful deathbed.”
“The mother was so strong she hardly cried.”
“True mother’s love.”
“But she cried enough,” another said.
They passed judgment on the quality of the handling of the ill, on the death, and on the proportional grief of the family.
These women had gone mad.
Dear Lettie,
Yes, lice are everywhere. We have a large tank on this side just for boiling clothes and bedding to rid them of the vermin. I’m so happy to hear your brother and sister are well. Cee-Cee looks up to you so. Truly pleased about your reading and writing. I believe you have greatness in you, Lettie. You’ll find it.
I have asked around as I might but have heard nothing about those who would question your “desirability.” But I know they do watch. The only thing I heard about was a thing or two about our messenger that I can’t write for obvious reasons. I will continue research. I love you, dear. Best to your brother, and kiss your little lamb of a sister.
Love,
Tante Hannah
I’d been foolish not taking Cee-Cee on walks with me. No, in truth, I’d been selfish. That had been my time to read, to clear my mind . . . to see Maples. It would be slower walking with Cee-Cee, but better, meaningful. In the tent we had the distraction of the Huiseveldts, and I had allowed us to lose much of the closeness we’d shared at home after the men had gone.
It would be good for her to get out when the weather allowed. We could have the time to walk alone together, I thought. I immediately wrote down that phrase: alone together. It would be time for us, the two of us, just as when Schalk had taken me for rides on outings, forging a closeness I’d never forget. There were only special people with whom you could feel alone together. I wanted to be sure Cee-Cee felt that way about me.
“Ceec . . . do you want to go with me?” I asked, heading out one afternoon.
“I’m still too small to carry water.”
“No . . . just to walk . . . the two of us. . . . Is it all right, Ma?”
“Not far.”
It was a clear afternoon, although brisk.
“Look at the sky, Ceec,” I said. “So vivid.”
“Looks like home,” she said.
“You’re right . . . same sky.”
Some women who passed could not help stopping and petting her curly hair, which had darkened a shade in the past year or so, as Moeder predicted it would.
She wanted to talk about home and Vader and Schalk, so we did, but I wasn’t sure it was good for either of us. She said she could not remember much of home.
“Miss them?” she asked.
“Of course . . . very much . . . Schalk especially.”
“Me, too.”
I held one of her hands; she held her doll, Lollie, with the other.
“You worry about them?” she asked.
Hmmm. What to say?
“Ja, sometimes . . . but they’re strong and brave.”
She looked at other little girls we neared, wanting to approach them but not comfortable.
“We’ll bring Rachel next time,” she said.