“No,” screamed Jethro, “I want Mini-mini. Where is she? I want Mini-mini. Mini-mini!”
“Don’t scream like that, lad, she is not coming back, never ever. I have sold her.” Sarith’s voice was very calm. “You can scream from morning to night, she’s gone for ever.”
“No, that’s not right, I want Mini-mini, Mini-mini.” Jethro was now howling with every breath in his little body. Just like his mother did in her childhood, he started stamping and throwing things. “I want Mini-mini.”
“Now, shut up, Jethro, and get out of my room.” Sarith was beginning to lose patience.
“I want Mini-mini, I want Mini-mini. I’ll tell papa, I’ll tell papa,” Jethro screamed again.
“You must do just that. Papa can’t do anything, anyway. Mini-mini belonged to me. I have sold her and she’s not coming back, however hard you scream,” said Sarith calmly.
But Jethro simply started screaming and yelling ever more loudly, “Mini-mini, Mini-mini.”
Esther and two of the cousins had come upstairs to see what all the fuss was about, and saw Sarith sitting up calmly in bed, with Jethro behaving like a little savage. “What on earth is happening?” asked Esther, looking in surprise on this scene. “Oh, he’s screaming for Mini-mini, but she has gone, I’ve sold her. He’ll simply have to get used to the idea.”
“You’ve sold Mini-mini? No, surely not,” said Esther, startled. “Why have you sold her, Sarith? Just look what you’re doing to that child!”
“She’s expecting Julius’ baby, that’s why,” said a now angry Sarith.
“But that’s no reason to sell her, and certainly not in Mini-mini’s case,” said Esther. “So many slave-girls have babies by their masters. Mini-mini herself was such a case.”
“You don’t understand, Esther,” Sarith had got out of bed. “She is no ordinary slave-girl, she is his concubine, his love.” For that was now clear to her: that is what she had noticed. The way Julius looked at the girl. She knew for sure: this was not a passing fancy, this was true love.
“But selling her?” Esther asked again. “Who knows where she’ll end up, poor child.”
“Poor child, my foot!” screamed Sarith, “Can someone think of me for a change? Am I supposed to accept that my husband’s concubine, his truelove, is living in my house? Is that what I’m supposed to do?”
“No,” Esther shook her head, “No, of course that’s not possible. No woman must accept that. But was there no other solution?”
“No, I’ve sold her, and that’s it. I want to hear nothing more about it. I can do what I want with my property. Jethro, shut up now. Nicolette, go and wash him.”
But Jethro began wailing even more loudly, as if that were possible, “I want Mini-mini,” and when Nicolette brought her hand towards his nightgown, he bit it so hard that blood began to well up in the bite marks.
“Oh, just leave him alone, then,” Sarith decided. “He’ll calm down, and, oh, in a few days he’ll have forgotten all about it.” And so everyone left the room, leaving Jethro behind. He had not understood exactly what his mother and his aunt had been discussing. He went and sat on the floor, desolate and despondent, his head against the knees that he had drawn up towards his chest, and he wept, and wept. For if there was one thing he had understood very well, it was that Mini-mini was gone, gone for good.
JULIUS
Julius would never be able to say later what it was in those days that had given him such a funny feeling. Was it premonition, telepathy, a sixth sense? From the very moment the tent boat was leaving he had wanted to shout, “Mini-mini, come back; don’t leave!” He had to console himself with the thought that she was going away for only a week, two at the most, and was going because she had to care for Jethro, so he should stop being childish. But still he felt so strange, so restless. He couldn’t manage to stay in one place for any length of time, but found himself pacing up and down, going through the house from the front veranda to the rear one, from his office to the next floor, always with the same thought: nothing must happen to Mini-mini. But what could happen to her? This same response always came to mind. Hadn’t she been to town so often? And Sarith was being exceptionally kind and calm since making that terrible scene. Was she no longer angry? Or was she planning something? Surely she would do nothing to Mini-mini? And then he suddenly remembered an incident he had heard about.
Long before they were married, Sarith had had the slave-housekeeper at Hébron whipped to death. No-one had ever found out exactly why, but it had been a terrible shock for the family, for the slave in question was the most trusted of them all, the one who had in fact raised the children. But surely Sarith would not be thinking of something like that with Mini-mini? They had known each other from their earliest years, and there was even talk that Mini-mini was the child of the older or the younger A’haron. He tried to console himself, but at the same time had to admit to himself that he simply did not know what Sarith might be capable of. He really did not know her at all.