Read Online Hottentot Venus by Barbara Chase-Riboud - Free Book Online

the dead in those coffins. These sleeping colored women were dead. For twenty-three nights I had slept on the fragrant earth with only the stars above me. How long before I would sleep again under the moon, wrapped in my husband’s antelope skin, my headrest caressing the nape of my neck, the amulet given me by the thing-that-should-never-have-been-born dropped onto my heart, which beats and beats and beats? Not the sickening pounding of a long-distance runner, but the steady, steady rhythm of an unborn child in his mother’s womb, muted, fragile and determined to live.
    The days following that first night blended into one. I learned cooking, cleaning, flower arranging, silver polishing, washing, ironing, napkin folding, gardening, preserve making, even a bit of hairdressing and wig making. I tried to think only of the task at hand. I was found to be not apt for housework and it was decided I would become a children’s nurse. My breasts sometimes ached for my own little one and it didn’t displease me to hold one of the mission orphans in my arms.
    Sometime later, at the approach of Star Death moon, Mistress Van Loott, who had taken the Reverend Freehouseland’s place, called me into her office. It was a Sunday.
    —Saartjie, I think I have a family for you. They will tend to your pass and your registration. This is Colonel Caesar, a planter from the Flat Mountain Valley. He’s looking for a nurse for his children.
    A tall cherry-faced white man stepped from the shadows.
    —Colonel Caesar, this is Ssehura. We call her Saartjie, little Sarah.
    —How do you do? I said in English.
    He didn’t hold out his hand, but placed his wide straw planter’s hat on Mistress Van Loott’s desk.
    —How do you do? I said in Afrikaans.
    —You understand Afrikaans? he asked.
    Mistress Van Loott answered for me.
    —Yes, she was at the mission as a child. She went back to her tribe but she hasn’t forgotten your language.
    —Indeed. Fine. She can’t read or write, can she?
    —No.
    —Don’t want any Kaffirs that can read or write around the farm. Too much damn trouble—too dangerous. They teach it to the Kaffir children . . . Learning spoils the best niggers in the world.
    —No, I assure you, she can’t read and she can’t write.
    —How old is she? She looks no more than ten or twelve . . .
    —I’m sixteen, sir.
    —Oh, she’s a grown woman, Colonel Caesar, a mother and a widow.
    —Oh, I see, not a maiden at all . . .
    Mistress Van Loott looked confused.
    —Oh, no, she’s a widow, and I assure you she can’t read and she cannot write, she repeated.
    I thought of the mute book that wouldn’t answer black people but I said nothing.
    —We’ve got three small children under six. Clare, Karl and Erasmus.
    I was content. I loved children. I would take care of the three as if they were my own.
    —I love children, sir, I said, still speaking Afrikaans.
    —Is that so, Saartjie. Well, that’s fine. My wife’ll be real pleased. She likes Hottentot servants even if they do have a reputation for running away.
    —She won’t run. Will you, Sarah?
    —No, ma’am.
    Run where? To the Khoekhoe garbage heap outside of town? To the famine in Namibia? Into the sea? Run where? I was a prisoner in my own country.
    —Well, Saartjie, get your things together. You’ll be leaving with Colonel Caesar at sunset. His wagon train’s traveling by night.
    I was overjoyed to leave this coffin of a house. The idea of returning to the outdoors, of sleeping once again under the stars, of being close to a herd of cattle, pleased me greatly. The image of my father flashed before me.
    —I herd cattle, sir. I was brought up to do it.
    —As small as you are?
    —Yes, sir.
    Miss Van Loott laughed.
    —You’d think she would have trouble even standing up. Some of them look as though they are going to fall over backwards. But Saartjie is amazing. She runs like a man. Long distance.
    —Well, fancy that! A shepherdess. Well we have lots of