Страница 8 из 86
I hadn't gone very far before I heard a child crying. My first thought was that it was lost, naturally, and I hurried on up the stream to rescue it, scrambling over the rocks. But after a minute or two of that, I decided that it was probably very frightened, and if I burst in on it I might frighten it more, and it would run away. So I slowed down, and sort of crept along, though I was still going pretty fast. By good luck, the stream was making enough noise to cover up the sounds I made when I kicked a stone by accident or had to walk across gravel.
Pretty soon I came upon a very dirty woman holding a very dirty and very naked little boy so that the water came up to his knees while she scrubbed him with a very dirty rag. I dashed over to her and asked her what in the whorl she thought she was doing. The poor child was already red as beet and trembling in a way that made my heart ache for him, freezing and terrified.
The woman looked up at me quite calmly and said that he was her son and not mine, and that if she chose to wash him there that was her affair.
Well, I'm not as strong as Mora and I doubt that I'm as strong as that woman was, but I didn't think about any of that then. I shook my fist under her nose and told her that when a child is being mistreated it's the business of anyone who happens along to stop it. I said that I would never dream of interfering with a mother who was spanking her child for misbehaving or bathing him in the ordinary way, but that water was like ice and would be the death of him, and if I had to stop her by throwing stones at her or beating her with a stick, that was what I would do. I picked up a stone, finally, and she lifted him out and hugged him.
"You say this water will kill him, " she said to me, "and that is truer than you can have guessed. I brought him here to drown him, and I am going to do it as soon as you go."
Bit by bit I got her story out of her. Her husband had died, leaving her with six children. For the past few years she had been living with a man whom she hoped would eventually marry her. He was the father of the child she had been washing. He had left her now, and she could not provide for so many. She had determined to lighten her responsibilities by one at least, and had settled upon this little boy, her seventh child and her youngest son, because he was the least able to resist. When they reached the water, however, she had been seized by a twisted sort of pride, and had decided to make him as presentable as she could so that his body would not disgrace the family when it was found.
When she finished, I asked whether she had changed her mind while she had been speaking. She said she had not, that the boy was clean enough now, and she firmly intended to drown him as soon as I was out of sight, adding that he looked more like his father every day. When I heard that, I knew there was only one thing to do. I got her to give me the child, and promised her that if she would come to the house where I was staying that evening, I'd see to it that she got food for herself and her other children.
It was embarrassing to go back to the house in which I was a guest, and to tell the truth something of a poor relation, with a ragged boy of about three in tow. But I did it, and they were good kind people there and fed him and contrived a little bed for him in the room they had me use. I talked it over with the lady of the house that evening before his mother came, and we agreed that the best thing would be for me to bring him home with me, and try to find a good family here that would take him in. You mustn't think, because there's some trouble between our town and theirs, that they're all bad people around Soldo. So that was what we decided, and when the boy's mother came around she gave her two nice fat geese.
Everyone agreed that he was a very nice little boy, even though he wasn't terribly bright and became rather sickly from the terrible washing he'd had, or because he had been so badly frightened when he thought his mother was going to drown him. He didn't know his name, or if he did he wouldn't tell it; we called him Bricco, because he'd been so black when I brought him there.
His mother was the problem. She came to the back door on the first night, as I said, and got the two geese. The next night she was back wanting something else, and got it, and the next night the same, and the night after that, and the night after that. On the next-to-last night they gave her two turnips, I believe, and on the last night nothing at all.
Then she went to the law and said I'd stolen her child, and the judge sent a couple of troopers to get him back. This judge wasn't the Duko, you understand, just somebody he had appointed to try minor cases.
It ended up, as I ought to have known it would, with the boy and his mother and me in court, and the relatives I was traveling with there too to back me up, and the relatives we'd been staying with on hand as well. I told the judge what had happened, just as I've told you tonight, and the mother said it was all a lie: she and her son had gone out berry picking, and I'd stolen her son the moment she took her eyes off him.
That's what she said at first, anyway. A few sharp questions from the judge showed how matters actually stood, and the woman we'd been staying with testified that she'd never once asked for Bricco back, just for food to take home to her other children.
Then the judge did a very intelligent thing. He put Bricco himself on the little platform next to him, and talked to him for a bit, and asked whether he wanted to go back home with his mother or stay with me. Bricco said he wanted to stay with me, and that ended it.
After that we set off for home right away. We'd had to stay almost a month more than we had meant to because of the trial, and everyone was mad to go. On the first night we slept on the road, as the saying is, but on the second night we put up at an i
I wanted to go back to look for him, I really did, but the others wouldn't hear of it, and I didn't want to go back alone. You know how dangerous the roads are for somebody like me traveling alone. It was obvious what had happened, or anyway we thought it was. He'd gotten homesick and flown. We speculated a little on whether he'd get back there all right, and a couple of the men rode back for an hour or two looking for him. But they didn't find him, and the rest of us decided that he'd probably get home eventually, or stop off if he found someplace better.
"Right here, " Fava said, "I want to stop and ask all of you what you think of my story so far. I know the rule is that nobody can interrupt, so we'll call that the end. But there's a little bit more I'll add to it when we've talked about it."
Inclito said, "It shows what a bad time poor people have in Soldo. In sixteen years, this family's lost whatever land it got. It's almost starving. We try not to let that happen here." He looked around at us, challenging us to dispute with him, but no one did.
His mother asked, "This was two years ago? You can't have been more than a child yourself, Fava."
Fava nodded and looked at Mora, inviting her comment; I could not help contrasting the two then, Mora larger already than most men, almost freakish in her blue gown and paint, and Fava half her size, and if not actually beautiful, attractive at least with her piercing eyes and blooming cheeks.
In her heavy, slow voice, Mora said, "I think you acted well throughout it all, Fava. The others won't, I know, but I do."
Smiling, Fava invited me to speak, too. "You're probably the oldest person here, Incanto, and my present host says you're very wise. May we have your opinion now?"
"If I were wise, " I told her, "I wouldn't offer any opinion until I'd heard the whole story. Because I am not, I will admit that it interested me. The bit about the trial particularly. It reminded me of a similar case I once heard of, in which a certain woman claimed that a servant girl was her daughter, although the girl herself denied it. Now let us hear the rest."