vermin! You!” she said, turning to Midnight. “Eat your soup before it gets cold. And you,” she added, facing my father, “you are to refrain from further jests. And you,” she said, staring at me, “you … you just sit there and listen!”
“That’s what I was doing.”
“And don’t speak to me in that tone of voice!”
“As you wish, Mama.” While Midnight ate his soup, I nudged his arm and said, “Will you take me hunting with you someday?”
Before he could reply, my mother snapped, “This conversation is absolutely impossible. John, I forbid you from hunting.”
“You don’t understand what I mean, Mama. Not for four days. Just for one.” I held up a single finger, then turned to Midnight. “We could go for just a day, couldn’t we? When the sun is out. I mean, we would not have to stay in the forest during a thunderstorm and hide our clothes in trees and eat ants. We could hunt in a less … a less — ”
Fearing a quarrel, Papa interrupted my stammering and said, “John, I would greatly appreciate it if you would allow your mother and me to discuss this matter later, please.”
Mama frowned and said, “James, there will be no discussion of hunting in this household.”
I decided to sulk, but none of them seemed to notice, which only infuriated me more.
After supper, I wanted to stomp off to my room, but Papa gave me a meaningful look and said that I was not excused.
Midnight took pity on me and said, “You know, John, while I was gone, I did see an unusual bird.”
“What kind might that have been?” I asked imperiously.
It is a testament to my family’s true fondness for me that they were all able to resist a good laugh at my expense.
“One day,” he began, “when I was a lad no older than you, I stopped at a little lake to drink. It was near Gemsbok Valley, where I was born. In the water, in the reflection, I saw a great-great bird.” He spread his arms as far as he was able, his fingers fanning out. “She was all white — purest ivory carved into wings and a long tail. But when I turned to look at her, she vanished over the tops of the trees of the Forest of Night, and from that moment on I was consumed by a longing to get a proper look at her.”
He drew in deeply on his pipe, but only tiny wisps came from his mouth when he next talked, which made me imagine that most of the smoke had been transformed inside him to words.
“It was like love, John, this feeling of mine. So I left my people for a time to find the bird. But I was unable to. And no one I met had ever set eyes on her.” He tapped my leg with his foot. “I never did catch another glimpse of her until just two days ago.”
He leaned back and sat there smoking as though he had said all he wished to say on the subject. Mother picked up some letters she’d recently received.
“So what happened two days ago? What did you see?” I exclaimed, already changed in mood and eager for more.
“It was very, very strange. You see, John, I was drinking at a lake, and I saw the white-white bird in the reflection of the water again — just like the first time.” He leaned forward expectantly and pointed the stem of his pipe at me, which had the effect of pulling me up into a kneeling position.
“This time, John, I heard a screech when I turned.” Here, Midnight made a sharp cackle.
My mother looked up, furrowed her brows as though she might rebuke Midnight, then sighed dramatically and said, “I can see it is useless to try keeping my mind on anything but your story.”
Midnight grinned and said, “I followed the screeching to the top of a nearby hillside. But my beloved bird was nowhere to be seen, so I danced our Ostrich Dance.”
The Bushman clamped his pipe in his mouth and, without getting up, flapped his hands and jerked his head forward until we could all envision the flightless bird racing before us.
“What happened then?”
“A voice spoke to me: ‘Look there! Look there!’ And when I turned I saw a great white feather floating down out of the golden sunset.” Midnight reached as high as he could and closed his fist around the imaginary plume.
“After so many years, I had her feather. I could feel it beating inside my hand, as though it were alive. And do you know, I felt a peace greater than I had ever known before. All my hunger was gone. It was as if I had reached my kin after years in the desert.”
I was trembling with curiosity by now. “So what did the bird look like? What kind was it?”
“The kind that never lets itself be seen by anyone. No one has ever gotten a good look at it. No one even knows its name. But one feather of hers is enough to make a man content for life. And one feather placed on the head of a chief can bring happiness to all.”
“Midnight, you’re making this up,” I declared.
He winked. “You think so? Then get my pack, if you please.”
I jumped up, ran to our garden door, took the pack down from its peg, and carried it to him. Reaching in, he produced a slender white feather, about a foot and a half in length. He rubbed it under his chin, then inhaled its fragrance as though it were perfume.
My mouth fell open. I had never seen a feather so long and lovely.
“Where did you get it?” I asked.
“Are you not listening to me? It fell from the sky.”
“From the bird without a name?”
He nodded.
“From the great white bird without a name?”
“Yes.” He grinned and handed it to me. “It is for you, John.”
When I took it, I, too, felt it beating inside my hand.
“Why are you giving it to me?” I asked.
“But who else could appreciate it as much as you?”
I chose strategic moments over the next several days to flatter my mother in order to win permission to join Midnight on a hunt. As my first bouquets of charm elicited only snorts of disbelief, I grew more poetic. One day I said she was lighter and more agile than all the stars in Pegasus. I thought this a winning observation, but Mama burst into laughter until the tears were rolling down her cheeks.
By way of explanation, she said, “Forgive me, John, but I am not often favorably compared to a horse.”
Though all looked lost to me, my father had learned certain techniques over the previous decade for wearing down her opposition, and in the quiet of their bedroom he soon succeeded in winning her permission, as long as I refrained from eating ants or injuring a single creature myself. This was an easy promise for me to make, as I had no intention of eating anything with six legs and antennae and I had never even once held a weapon of any sort, let alone one as difficult to master as a bow and arrow.
As the following Saturday was blessed with sun, Midnight and I left at dawn. Within two hours we were striding through a thick, damp forest of fern, pine, and oak, several miles east of the city. We removed our shirts and tucked them into Midnight’s pack, which we hung over a branch. He also took off his breeches, stockings, and shoes. I was too shamed by my skinny frame to make such a bold gesture.
I quickly learned that he tracked animals in three ways: through their scent, their footprints, and their droppings. So adroit was he that in examining a single print pressed lightly in the soil he could tell how long ago the creature had passed our way and what its general shape had been.
A single whiff was enough to set him stalking on silken tiptoe. He crept and crouched with the precise care of his beloved Mantis — silence given purpose and direction.
He was so agile with his bow and arrow that they might have been a part of his own body. That morning I saw him pierce the heart of a hare shrouded by thick grass fifty paces away. The arrow sliced through the air, flying to the unsuspecting creature as though guided by an electric force. With his weapon, our good-hearted Midnight was transformed into deadly fate.
Most amazingly, the Bushman could release an arrow while running, and in this way I saw him strike a deer from seventy paces as it bounded through the trees. The wounded creature did not fall but instead bounded off with
