In their blankets, and Sean and Katrina were sleeping around

head-on-chest in the wagon. In the morning Katrina was quiet and a

little pale.

Sean didn't notice it until she told him that she felt tired and was

going to lie down, immediately he was all attentive. He helped her into

the wagon and settled the pillows under her head.

Are you sure you're all right! he kept asking. Yes . . . it's

nothing, I'm just a bit tired. I'll be all right, she assured him. She

appreciated his concern but was relieved when finally he went to see to

the business of reloading the wagons for Sean's ministrations were

always a little clumsy. She wanted to be left alone, she felt tired and

cold.

By midday the wagons were loaded to Sean's satisfaction. He went to

Katrina's wagon, lifted the canvas and peeped in. He expected her to be

asleep. She was lying on the cot with her eyes open and two of the

thick grey blankets wrapped around her. Her face was as pale as a

two-day corpse. Sean felt the first leap of alarm, he scrambled into

the wagon. My dear, you look ghastly. Are you sick? He put his hand

on her shoulder and she was shivering. She didn't answer him, instead

her eyes moved from his face to the floor near the foot of the bed and

Sean's eyes followed hers. Katrina's luxury was her chamber-pot; it was

a massive china thing with red roses hand-painted on it. She loved it

dearly and Sean used to tease her when she was perched on top of it. Now

the pot stood near the foot of the bed and when Sean saw what was in it

his breathing stopped. It was half full of a liquid the colour of milk

stout. oh, my God, he whispered. He went on staring at it, standing

Very still while a gruesome snatch of doggerel he remembered hearing

sung in the canteens of the Witwatersrand began trotting through his

brain like an undertaker's hack.

Black as the Angel, Black as disgrace When the fever waters flow They're

as black as the ace.

Roll him in a blanket Feed him on quinine But all of us we know It's the

end of the line.

Black as the Angel Black as disgrace Soon we'll lay him down below And

chuck dirt in his face.

He raised his head and looked steadily at her, searching for the signs

of fear. But just as steadily she looked back at him. Sean, it's

blackwater! Yes . . . I know, Sean said, for there was nothing to be

gained by denial, no room for extravagant hope. It was blackwater fever:

malaria in its most malignant form, attacking the kidneys and turning

them to fragile sacks of black blood that the slightest movement could

rupture.

Sean knelt by her cot. You must be very still. He touched her forehead

lightly with the tips of his fingers and felt the heat of her skin.

Yes, she answered him, but already the expression in her eyes was

blurring and she made the first restless movement of delirium. Sean put

his arm across her chest to hold her from struggling.

By nightfall Katrina was deep in the nightmare of malaria. She laughed,

she screamed in senseless terror, she shook her head and fought him when

he tried to make her drink. But she had to drink, it was her one

chance, to flush out her kidneys that she might live. Sean held her

head and forced her.

Dirk started crying, hungry and frightened by the sight of his mother.

Mbejane! shouted Sean, his voice pitched high with desperation. Mbejane

had waited all afternoon at the entrance of the wagon. Nkosi, what can

I do? The child . . . can you care for him?

Mbejane picked up the cot with Dirk still in it.

Do not worry about him again. I will take him to the other wagon. Sean

turned his whole attention back to Katrina. The fever built up steadily

within her. Her body was a furnace, her skin was dry and with every

hour she was wilder and her movements more difficult to control.

An hour after dark Kandhla came to the wagon with a pot of steaming

liquid and a cup. Sean's nose wrinkled as he caught the smell of it.

What the hell is that?

I have stewed the bark from a maiden's breast tree . . .

the Nkosikazi must drink it It had the same musty smell as boiling hops

and Sean hesitated. He knew the tree. It grew on high ground, it had a

diseased-looking lumpy bark and each lump was the size and shape of a

breast surmounted by a thorn. Where did you get it? I have seen none

of these trees near the river. Sean was marking time while he decided

whether to make Katrina drink the brew. He knew these Zulu remedies,

what they didn't kill they sometimes cured.

Ifflubi went back to the hills where we camped four days ago . . . be

brought the bark into the camp an hour ago. A thirty-mile round journey

in something under six hours, even in his distress Sean could smile.

Tell Hlubi the Nkosikazi will drink his medicine. Kandhla held her head

and Sean forced the evil-smelling liquid between her lips, he made her

finish the whole potful. The juice of the bark seemed to relieve the

congestion of her kidneys; four times before morning she passed frothy

black water. Each time Sean held her gently, cushioning her body from

any movement that might have killed her. Gradually her delirium became

coma; she lay huddled and still in the cot, shaken only by the brief

fits of shivering. When the morning sun hit the wagon canvas and lit

the interior, Sean saw her face, and he knew that she was dying. Her

skin was an opaque yellowish white, her hair had lost its glow and was

lifeless as dry grass.

Kandbla brought another pot of the medicine and they fed it to her. When

the pot was empty Kandhla said, Nkosi, let me lay a mattress on the

floor beside the Nkosikazi's bed. You must sleep and I will stay here

with you and wake you if the Nkosikazi stirs Sean looked at him with

haunted eyes. There will be time to sleep later, my friend. He looked

down at Katrina and went on softly. Perhaps, very soon there will be

time.

Suddenly Katrina's body stiffened and Sean dropped on his knees beside

her cot. Kandhla hovered anxiously behind him. It took Sean a while to

understand what was happening and then he looked up at Kandbla. Go! go

quickly! he said and the suffering in his voice sent Kandhla stumbling

blindly from the wagon. Sean's second son was born that morning and

while Kandhla watched over Katrina Sean wrapped the child in a blanket,

took him into the veld and buried him. Then he went back to Katrina and

stayed with her while days and nights blended together into a hopeless

muddle of grief. As near as Katrina was to death, that near was Sean to

insanity.

He never moved out of the wagon, he squatted on the mattress next to her

cot, wiping the perspiration from her face, holding a cup to her lips or

just sitting and watching her. He had lost his child and before his

eyes Katrina was turning into a wasted yellow skeleton. Dirk saved him.

Mbejane brought the boy to him and he romped on the mattress, crawling

into Sean's lap and pulling his beard.

It was the one small glimmer of light in the darkness.

Katrina survived. She came back slowly from the motionless coma that

precedes death and with her hesitant return sean's despair changed to

hope and then to a wonderful relief.

Her water was no longer black but dark pink and thick with sediment. She

was aware of him now and, although she was so weak that she could not

lift her head off the pillow, her eyes followed him as he moved about

the wagon. It was another week before she learned about the baby. She

asked him, her voice a tired whisper, and Sean told her with all the

gentleness of which he was capable. She did not have the strength for

any great show of emotion; she laid quietly staring up at the canvas

above her head and her tears slid down across her yellow cheeks.

The damage that the fever had done to her body was hardly credible. Her

limbs were so thin that Sean could completely encircle her thigh with

one hand. Her skin hung in loose yellow folds from her face and body

and pink blood still stained her water. This was not all. the fever

had sucked all the strength from her mind. She had nothing left to

resist the sorrow of her baby's death, and the sorrow encased her in a

shell through which neither Sean nor Dirk could reach her. Sean

struggled to bring her back to life, to repair the terrible damage to

her mind and body. Every minute of his time he employed in her service.

He and the servants scoured the veld for thirty miles around the laager

to find delicacies to tempt her appetite, wild fruits, honey, giraffe

marrows, the flesh of a dozen animals: kabobs of elephant heart and

duiker liver, roasted iguana had as white and tender as a plump pullet,

golden fillets of the yellow -mouthed bream from the river. Katrina

picked at them listlessly then turned away and lay staring at the canvas

wall of the cot.

Sean sat beside her and talked about the farm they would buy, trying