There was a time when he had a soft spot for Alma, third of the three sisters on the farm. How would he be received, old bachelor Simón, if he were tomorrow to pitch up at the farmhouse door, dressed in his best suit and carrying a bunch of flowers, making a stab at courtship? Would he be invited in, or on the contrary would the sisters set the dog on him?
His ruminations are interrupted by a knock at the door. At first he does not recognize his visitor: he takes her for one of the neighbours from the apartment block.
‘Yes? What can I do for you?’ he says.
‘It is me, Rita,’ she replies. ‘Remember? I looked after your son in the hospital.’
His heart gives a leap. Is fate proposing an answer to the question Where to now? in the form of this not unattractive young woman? ‘Of course!’ he says. ‘How are you, Rita?’
‘Can I come in?’ says Rita. ‘I have brought you David’s book, the one he lost. We did a big clean-up and I found it in the staff common room, I have no idea how it got there. How are you, Simón? Are you bearing up? I cannot tell you how we miss David, all of us. It really broke our hearts when…you know…’
He offers Rita a glass of wine, which she accepts. The book she has brought is of course The Adventures of Don Quixote, which since he last saw it has acquired a dark stain on the cover.
‘I must tell you,’ says Sister Rita, ‘I was in two minds. At first I wanted to keep it as a memento; but then I thought, it must carry so many memories for Simón, maybe he should have it. So here it is.’
‘I cannot tell you how grateful I am, Rita. Would you believe it, it was out of this book that David taught himself to read. He knew it by heart, the whole of it.’
‘That’s good,’ says Rita.
He presses on. ‘Rita, you were with David during his last days. Did he ever speak to you of a message? Did he leave any message behind?’
‘Curious that you should ask. Just recently we were discussing David and what he meant to us. Because when you battle to save a patient, and lose, as we did, it is good to learn from it and take a message into the next battle. Otherwise you can get pretty despondent, believe me. In David’s case we decided the key to his message was bravery. David was a brave, brave boy who suffered badly but never complained. Be brave, be cheerful in adversity: that was his message, I would say.’
‘Be brave. Be cheerful. I will remember that when my time comes.’
‘And your wife, Simón? How is she bearing up? She and David were very close, I could see that.’
‘Inés is not actually my wife,’ he says. ‘In fact she and I will be parting before too long and going our separate ways. But certainly she is David’s mother, his true mother, even if she does not have papers to prove it. His mother by election. Inés is his mother, and as for me, I acted the part of his father, in the absence of anyone better. Yes, Inés and I will be going our separate ways. In fact, I must tell you, at the moment you knocked at the door I was wondering what the future holds for me. Inés will be returning to Novilla—that is where she is from, she has family there. I will be staying on in Estrella. I have a job of a kind, it is not a great job, but I get satisfaction from it. I am a bicycle messenger. I distribute advertisements to householders. I suppose I will go on doing that. At the moment you knocked I was wondering who would replace Inés in my life. She and I have been together for nearly five years, I have grown used to being with her, even if we have never been husband and wife in the conventional sense.’
Even as he speaks he realizes that he is saying too much, far too much, and evidently Rita feels the same way, for she wriggles uncomfortably in her chair. ‘I must go,’ she says, rising. ‘I am glad I brought the book back. I hope you and Inés find peace soon.’
He ushers her out; from the doorway he watches her neat little figure recede down the corridor.
He flips through the book she left behind. The stain on the cover—coffee?—has seeped through and stuck the first few pages together. The binding is coming loose. But David’s fingerprints are all over it, if invisible. It is a relic of a kind.
Gummed inside the back cover is a slip of paper he has not noticed before. It is headed City of Novilla—City Libraries, followed by the words:
Dear Children,
We in the library like to hear whether you have enjoyed reading our books and what you have carried away from them.
What is the message of this book? What will you most of all remember of it?
Write your answers below. We look forward to reading them.
Your friend the librarian.
In the space provided, two readers from the time before he, Simón, borrowed the book from the friendly librarian (and then failed to return it) have left their comments.
I liked Sancho, reads the first. The message of the book is, we should listen to Sancho because he is not the crazy one.
The message of the book is Don Quixote died so he could not marry Dulcania, reads the second.
Neither comment is in David’s hand. A pity. Now it will never be known what, in David’s eyes, the message of the book was, or what most of all he remembered from it.
Also by J. M. Coetzee
Dusklands
In the Heart of the Country
Waiting for the Barbarians
Life & Times of Michael K
Foe
Age of Iron
The Master of Petersburg
Disgrace
Elizabeth Costello
Slow Man
Diary of a Bad Year
Three Stories
The Childhood of Jesus
The Schooldays of Jesus
The Death of Jesus
J. M. Coetzee was the first author to win the Booker Prize twice and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2003. His work includes Waiting for the Barbarians, Life and Times of Michael K, The Master of Petersburg, Disgrace, Diary of a Bad Year and most recently The Death of Jesus. He lives in Adelaide.
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Copyright © J. M. Coetzee 2019
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First published in Australia by The Text Publishing Company in 2019
Jacket and page design by WH Chong
Cover image composed from iStock images.
Typeset by J&M Typesetting
ISBN: 9781922268280 (hardback)
ISBN: 9781925774993 (ebook)
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of Australia
The Death of Jesus Page 16
