The Monster's Daughter (11 page)

Flames somersaulted over shattered glass, bounding up, clasping the tablecloth. Benjamin tried to get up, get away, kerosene wet on his nightshirt. He tried to push himself up. A sharp pain shot up from his palm. When he looked, he saw a shard of glass that stuck out of his hand, reflecting the fire, as if it was growing out of him, as if he was the fire. He stared at it, mesmerized, as blood spiraled down his arm in thick black vines. Heat radiated from his left foot where the fire
gnawed on it. He became the light as flames crawled up his left leg. Benjamin tried to stand up, to show the others, but his lungs burned, the pain suddenly excruciating. He didn't want to be the light. “Make it stop make it stop make it stop,” he screamed. There was a commotion somewhere far off. Someone ran toward him and covered him with something rough and heavy, bearing down on his body, and suddenly he existed in in a world of nothing.

“Bennie?”
Matrone
Jansen sat at his bedside, her hands clutching the rails. “You're awake.” Her lip quivered, her eyes shining in a way Benjamin had never seen before. He fought the numbness, the fog pushing against raw pain.

Two rows of beds lined the long colorless room. Grown-up heads with cotton-candy hair peeked above starched sheets, few of them showing any signs of life. A nurse pushed a steel cart down the middle, stopping at all the beds, forcing something down every occupant's throat.

“It's time to change your bandage.”
Matrone
Jansen pulled the sheets back, exposing Benjamin's thin body, amber pus seeping through a thick bandage on his leg. He felt something hollow and tingling in his tummy when he looked at it.

“You are a brave boy.”
Matrone
Jansen unwound the gauze, revealing raw flesh. She ripped at the last piece of gauze.

“
Eina!
”

“There, now. The worst is over. God has spared you.”

Benjamin's eyes teared up. He whispered the words he had been thinking. “I didn't want Him to.”

Matrone
Jansen wrapped her hard bony hands around his face, bringing it close to hers until their foreheads almost touched. “It is not for you to decide, son. Earthly pain is nothing. Your soul will burn like this for eternity if you refuse Him.” She let go. “And if you keep talking like that, I can't look after you anymore. I'll never see you again. Is that what you want?”

Benjamin felt a pain worse than his legs in his insides.

“You should rejoice, Bennie. You have been purified with fire. You are His now.”

Benjamin didn't understand God, didn't understand why God had chosen him or burned him. To Benjamin, God was even scarier than Satan.

Matrone
Jansen ran her hand over his hair. She resumed changing his bandage, her mood lifted, jovial even. “I have talked to the new administrator. He said, when you are better, you can come with me to my house. Maybe for a while.”

Benjamin stared silently at her, not trusting his words.

Matrone
Jansen stopped fussing with his bandage. She looked unsure of herself. “You would like that, wouldn't you?”

Benjamin nodded.
Matrone
Jansen kissed him on the forehead. He felt warm inside, light. He wondered if this was why people did all these things for God, so they could maybe get to go to an eternal home in Heaven.

Alet canvassed the Terblanche farm with Mathebe glued to her side. He demanded clarification for every colloquialism, taking copious notes in careful block letters. The process was cumbersome. They had to leave the van parked on the side of the road and hike up narrow footpaths to get to the houses, knocking on weather-weary doors, questioning glassy-eyed men and wary women. News of the murder had spread, and it was hard to ferret out useful information between rumor and imagination. Nobody knew anything about a missing girl.

“The workers will show up here for their wages at four,” Alet said as they neared the main gate of the Terblanche farm.

“You know the family, Constable.”

“
Ja
, but maybe Boet will tell you things that he doesn't want me to know if you're by yourself. You know. Man stuff. Besides, I still have to look into that call from the school.”

Mathebe nodded. He stopped the van at the Terblanche farm gate. “We will meet at the main house in two hours,” he said and got out.

Magda Kok's house was half a kilometer inside the farm border, where the distance between the small houses grew larger as the road followed the rise of the mountain. Alet pulled to the side of the road, partially blocking a dirt walkway that led to a small rectangular building with a red zinc roof and narrow windows. Water stains crawled down painted brick. An outhouse leaned against the outer wall of
the house like a cancerous growth, its slanted metal door rusty, an air hole gaping above the frame. A brown mutt with a white chest was tied to a post in front of the door. The dog growled, its chest heaving with punctuating barks. He bared his teeth, his short muscular legs straining.

A young coloured woman leaned against the door frame, perched on one leg, her hands behind her back. She wore a short black dress, her droopy breasts visible through its keyhole. Her shiny round face peeked out from under a floppy yellow hat. Alet only knew Magda Kok by reputation. The women of the valley talked about her as if she was a necessary evil, rather than competition for their husbands' affection. Amid the moral condemnations, Alet had often heard notes of sympathy.

Alet got out of the van. “Magda?” She had to raise her voice to be heard above the barking.

Magda nodded. “
Miesies
.”

“I'm Constable Berg. I need to talk to you for a bit, okay?” Alet took a step closer. The dog lurched forward suddenly, pulled back in midair by its chain. Magda didn't move. Alet smiled at her. “You think you can get the dog?”

Magda looked at Alet with hooded brown eyes. “Hey, Voetsek!
Sharrap
man!” The dog quieted down, pacing as far as its chain would allow, keeping small black eyes trained on Alet.

“Can we talk inside?”

“I don't know,
Mies
.”

“Just talk. I promise.”

Magda grabbed the dog's collar behind his neck and pressed his hindquarters down, crouching beside him. The animal's body shivered with a low growl. She nodded in the direction of the door. “You can go now.”

Alet stayed close to the wall as she slipped into the house. Sparse furniture lined the front room: a worn couch, a low, rickety table, a vase with red plastic roses on top of a boom box. A faded rug with a paisley pattern partially covered the rough concrete floor. In the corner, an old baby cradle was covered in blankets and clothes. Panels of thick net curtains covered the doorways that led to the other rooms of the house. A single silver garland, intertwined with fairy lights, draped over two nails on the wall.

“You're getting ready for Christmas, hey,” Alet said when Magda walked in behind her.

Magda's eyes scrunched to slits, her mouth opening to expose the gap where her two front teeth used to be. She covered her smile with her right hand. “It's for the little one,
Mies
.”

“Nonnie, right? That's her name?”

Magda's smile faded.
“Ja.”
She eyed Alet suspiciously.

“I'm sure it's very pretty when you turn the lights on.”

Magda nodded, her hand still over her mouth. She bent down in front of the garland and flipped the plug's switch, a slight tremor in her hand. The fairy lights flickered on, their reflection dancing in the silver of the garland. “Like they do in the stores.”

“It's beautiful, hey.”

“Every night we put it on and sing a
Krismis
song. Nonnie teaches me the ones she learns in school.”

Alet imagined the intimate scene, mother and daughter sitting together under the lights, talking about their day. “Is Nonnie home?”

Magda's body tensed, her fingers digging into her fleshy upper arms. “Just now,
Mies
. She goes to a friend's house after school for a bit, see?”

“Magda, the school called us. They said Nonnie was talking about the Thokoloshe coming here.”

“
Ai!
” Magda shook her head. “That child!”

“What was she talking about?”

Magda's eyes trailed to the doorway. “I don't know,
Mies
.”

Alet sighed. “Magda, I need you to be honest with me, okay? I know what you do here.”

Magda backed away from Alet, waving her hands emphatically in front of her. “It's not true. Those bitches in the valley, they all lie.”

“It's all right, Magda. I told you, no trouble. I just want to know if Nonnie is here when you do it. When the men come.”

Magda dropped her head. After a moment she shook it slowly. “Never when Nonnie is here,
Mies
. Never.”

“They only come in the day?”

Magda looked at the doorway again.
“Ja, Mies.”

“You're sure?”

“Nonnie goes on sleepover to her
ouma
on Saturdays. Sometimes then.”

“Nonnie has never seen the men? She's never been here when they come around?”

“They know not to come then.”

“Have there been ones who you don't know? New men?”

“No. Only if I know them. Too much trouble otherwise.” Magda's eyes started to water.

Alet clenched her hands. “No, don't cry.”

Magda drew one of the curtains aside and went into a small kitchen area. Alet followed her. Magda reached for a box of tissues perched between mismatched plates. Clippings from the local paper were taped to the door of an oversize old fridge. Alet stepped closer to take a look.

“That one. That's Nonnie.” Magda wiped her eyes with a tissue. She pointed at one of the faces in the picture. “She was in the papers for the school play.” A thin girl of about seven stood in a staggered line with other kids in the photograph, all of them dressed in what looked like puffy white sacks. “She was a snowflake. I helped make the costume with
Miesies
Terblanche and the other teachers.”

Alet smiled. “Very cute.”

“Nonnie is clever,
Mies
. Not like me. Just the other day she got a gold star for recital. She's going to go to hostel. I'm saving.”

The farm school only went to the fifth grade. The children who wanted to go to high school had to go to Unie. It was too far to walk, and most of the workers couldn't afford the hostel fees. Some kids paid for a ride into town on the back of a smuggler's pickup, but most of them stayed behind, earning money by working on the farm, getting pregnant when they were still children themselves. On one of her patrols, Alet had found a ten-year-old boy in the orchards. When she'd asked him why he wasn't in school, he'd shrugged his shoulders. “What's the point in finishing,
Mies
?” he had said, the skin of his abdomen visible through a tear in his shirt. “
Pa
says you don't need school to pick peaches.”

Magda touched Nonnie's face in the paper clipping with her index finger. “Nonnie, she's gotta learn, so she gets a good job one day.” She threw the crumpled tissue in a plastic bucket that served as a trash can. “Do you want coffee,
Mies
?”

“Thank you, Magda. I'd like that.” Alet pulled one of the green
Formica chairs out and sat at the kitchen table as Magda turned the kettle on and scooped teaspoons of instant coffee into mugs. The condensed milk Magda put out formed a congealed bubble on Alet's teaspoon before she dunked it in her cup. Alet remembered punching two holes in a tin of condensed milk when she was a kid, sucking the sweet liquid through them until the tin made a hollow gurgling sound. Voetsek started barking.

“Mamma?” A child's voice strained to be heard above the din.

“It's Nonnie. I have to go get Voetsek,” Magda said apologetically. The people who gave him to me weren't nice people. That's why he's so
bedonnerd
. He doesn't let anybody come near him but me.”

“Aren't you scared he's going to bite Nonnie?”

“No,
Mies
. He protects us, see?”

Alet followed Magda to the living room and watched through the open door as she dragged Voetsek to a wire cage, the dog digging his hind legs into the dirt. Magda returned, holding a young girl's hand. Nonnie wore a black pinafore and a plain white shirt, her hair tied in a thin braid with pink baubles at both ends. Almond eyes stared up at Alet. Nonnie had the same round face as her mother, but with honey-colored skin. Sharp cheekbones and full lips gave her an unusual look, straddling the world between white and black.

“
Haai
, Nonnie.” Alet smiled at the child, feeling like she was imitating people who knew how to deal with children.

“The
Mies
is here to talk to you, so you be good, hear?”

Nonnie looked at her mother, rebellion threatening in her scrunched-up eyes. “I didn't do anything.”

“You told stories at school. I told you, don't do that.” A stern tone had crept into Magda's voice. Nonnie shook her head and looked down at the ground, her bottom lip bulging out slightly.

“It's okay.” Alet got down on her haunches in front of Nonnie, hoping she could calm everyone down, but Nonnie bounded past her into the bedroom.

“Come back here, right now.” Magda marched to the doorway, pulling the net curtain aside. She turned to Alet. “She's a good girl,
Mies
. I don't know what's gotten into her.”

“There's no problem, Magda.”

“But you come here,
Mies
. The police only come because of trouble. I do what I can. I don't drink. I don't buy things for me or get my hair done in the salon. I give that girl everything I can.”