A Blade of Grass by Lewis DeSoto

itself to strike.
    Only then does the fear that holds her break into panic, and she springs backwards, slamming into the wall, then turning to the door, and out of the corner of her eye she sees the flash of the black body extended its full length and the mouth bared and the fangs snapping at the spot where she stood a split second ago.
    Then she is running, down the long corridor, and across the vast expanse of the living room, and across the veranda, and down the steps, lifting her feet high, with small cries of distress coming from her throat.
    In a moment she is outside the house, and there is nobody around, and she must go for help, but she is safe here, in the middle of the lawn, where nothing can approach without her seeing it. She must go for help and find somebody to kill the snake, find Ben, but there is nobody here, and she is afraid to run in the long grass in her bare legs, and her bladder is full to bursting.
    Märit watches the house, she watches the door, which she left open, she watches the darkness beyond the door, where the snake will appear, for it is in there, in the shadow behind the door. If she was brave, if she was a true farmer’s wife she would find a shovel, that one, leaning against the wall in the flower bed, and take it and kill the snake. But she is not brave.
    When she opens her mouth to call for someone, to call for help, her voice croaks in her throat and all she can do is watch the house and wait for the snake.
    And then there is someone, a person, just crossing to the side of the house. Tembi.
    Märit tries to call out for help but her throat has seized up. She forces her tongue against her teeth. “Tembi!”
    Tembi stops and looks over.
    “Tembi! Quickly, come here.” What is the word for snake in their language, Märit wonders. “Slang,” she whispers in Afrikaans, and then remembers the word, one of the few she knows. “ Nyoka! There…” She points.
    Tembi’s eyes widen as she looks at the house.
    “A mamba, in the laundry room. Mamba! Get someone, get the men.”
    Tembi looks at the house, frowning, unsure.
    Märit tries to still the quivering in her voice, takes a deep breath and speaks clearly. “Tembi, there is a snake in the house, in the laundry room. Fetch someone to kill it.”
    “In the washing?”
    “Yes, for God’s sake. Go and find the Baas or one of the men. Quickly!”
    Instead, Tembi moves to the shovel standing in the flower bed, grasps it, and slowly climbs the veranda steps, then enters the house.
    “Don’t,” Märit cries in a choked voice. And still she is frozen where she stands.
    Nothing happens. Tembi has disappeared.
    Now Märit hears the sound of a vehicle, and here, coming up the driveway is the pickup truck, with Ben at the wheel, Joshua the bossboy next to him, another one of the workers sitting in the back.
    Ben sees her, waves, then stops the truck and gets out.
    As he walks closer he sees her face, and his step quickens. “What is it? Märit, are you ill? What’s wrong?” His arms are around her, and she wants to collapse, to give in to her fear, to let him take over.
    “Tell me what’s wrong, Märit.”
    She takes a deep breath. “There is a mamba in the laundry room and Tembi has gone in there.”
    Ben shouts to the men in the truck, “Nyoka!” points to the house, then runs up the steps. The two men dash after him, Joshua swinging a hammer in his hand.
    For a moment Märit is alone again, still standing alone on the lawn, and the house has swallowed her husband too now. She hears voices shouting, then silence. And the dark door of the house holds only shadows.
    It is Tembi who emerges. She walks down the steps slowly, the shovel in one hand, her face dazed, slack. In her other hand hangs the limp form of the snake, like a length of rope. Then the two men emerge, and some moments later Ben follows. He strides quickly across to Märit.
    “It’s all right now, darling. She’s killed it. It’s dead.”
    Joshua takes the snake