Read Online The Madonna of Excelsior by Zakes Mda - Free Book Online

to Stephanus Cronje’s house in town. During the day, when Madam Cornelia was busy ringing up the till at the butchery, counting rands and cents—some of which would end up as Niki’s share of the spoils—and weighing workers on the blackiron floor scale twice a day. Viliki would knock timidly. Stephanus Cronje would appear at the window. Viliki would give him a note from his mother. He would read it and then put some bank notes in an envelope.
    â€œGive this to your mother,” he would say in Sesotho. “And be careful, boy, don’t lose that envelope.”
    Viliki would run like the wind all the way to Mahlatswetsa Location and proudly give the envelope to his mother.
    Viliki and Niki were living a wonderfully comfortable life, what with Pule’s relentless remittances! And the few coins Niki earned once in a while when Madam Cornelia sent for her to look after Tjaart when the regular nanny had not turned up—attending her grandmother’s funeral for the tenth time. Occasions that Tjaart relished because for him there was never going to be anyone who could take Niki’s place. Occasions that Niki relished because they kept her in touch with Madam Cornelia. If only to give Madam a self-satisfied smirk. And to rejoice in Madam’s blissful ignorance.
    The romps on the hay deteriorated into moans. Moans relayed from one pair to another. Simultaneous moans. A barnful of moans. And howls of enjoyable pain. The baby cried. But no one paid attention. The baby bawled and bawled. The Brahmins outside went berserk. With their big ears, they had very keen hearing and were sensitive to strange noises. The Brahmin bulls bellowed and raised dust. No one paid any attention to them. A cacophony of moans, howls, baby cries and the deep bellowing of the bulls.
    In the middle of it all, Niki suddenly felt the weight of a chilling ball of iron somewhere between her stomach and her lungs. It was not Stephanus Cronje’s heavy body on hers. It was the weight of a memory that was determined to come between her and ecstasy. She had filed the fact that she had missed her times in some dark compartment of her mind. Now it was forcing itself back in the cacophony. More than a month had passed without her visiting the moon. To add to her woes, most mornings she was nauseous. And had a strong desire to eat damp soil.
    She wondered what Stephanus Cronje would say when she toldhim. And what murder Pule would commit when he got to know of it.
    She pushed Stephanus Cronje with both her hands, and shoved him away from her body. Just when his was getting hard and rigid.
    He watered the hay.

BIG EYES IN THE SKY
    A MAN IN blue pants, blue shirt and red beret stands on the black roof of a skewed house one blue night. He lifts his arms to the heavens in a supplication that is reminiscent of the five women in their prime. The roof almost caves in from his weight. Wide-eyed heads appear in the blue and white and yellow sky. Milky-white eyes with pitch-black pupils staring at the man. Penetrating the house with their amazed gaze. Disembodied heads like twinkling stars in the blue night. White cosmos grows wild around the house.
    Bright eyes in the sky see everything. They see a newly-born baby wrapped in white linen. An intrusive star of Bethlehem has sneaked in through one of the two skewed windows and shines on the baby’s body. It fills the room with light and yellowness. Two humans kneel on either side of the sleeping baby, hands clasped in prayer. One is a man in a blue suit and blue beret. The other is a woman in a blue nun’s habit. The big star of Bethlehem suspends itself above her buttocks.
    It had not been easy for Niki, although this was a second childbearing. The water had broken. The contractions had flooded her body. Fewer and fewer minutes apart. It should have beensmoother. But the baby had other ideas. It gave the village midwives its back, and remained stuck in the passage of life. The