Sunday 15 May 2011

The Moon 5.


Final excerpt from the short story, Drieka and the moon, by Herman Charles Bosman.

Well, there is not much left for me to tell you. In the days that followed, Drieka Breytenbach was always in my thoughts. Her long, loose hair and her red lips and her feet that had been in the roadside sand with mine. But if she really was the ghost that I had at first taken her to be, I could not have been more afraid of her.


And it seemed singular that, while it had been my words, spoken in the moonlight, that helped to bring Drieka and me together, it was Drieka's hot breath, whispering wild words in my ear, that had sent me so suddenly from her side.


Once or twice I even felt sorry for having left in that fashion.


And later on when I heard that Drieka Breytenbach had gone back to Schweiser-Reneke, and that her husband had been shot dead with his own Mauser by one of the black farm workers, I was not surprised. In fact I had expected it. Only it did not seem right, somehow, that Drieka should have got a  farm worker to do the thing that I had refused to do.


All photos used in The Moon posts, from the Internet.

1 comment:

Kay L. Davies said...

A surprising end to the story, Phillip. I wasn't expecting it. I like the final sentence.
— K

Kay, Alberta, Canada
An Unfittie's Guide to Adventurous Travel