The Donkey Rustlers

by Gerald Malcolm Durrell

  “Oh, I shouldn’t think so,” said Amanda. “I should imagine that they swam them over.”

  “Can donkeys swim?” asked Papa Nikos.

  Amanda kept a straight face with difficulty.

  “Ask the Mayor,” she replied.

  “Yes, yes,” said the Mayor, “they can swim. The day when I fell off the bridge and these brave children saved me, my donkey was swimming like a fish.”

  “I suggest that you take them back the same way,” said Amanda.

  So the villagers, with infinite care, led their donkeys down the steps from the little church to the shore of Hesperides. But the holiday had obviously done the donkeys and the little horse too much good. They were even more reluctant to enter the water than they had been with the children, with the result that the beach resembled an uncontrolled rodeo, with villagers pushing and tugging and struggling to get their donkeys into the water.

  Mayor Oizus was kicked in the stomach by his little horse quite early in the proceedings and had to go and lie under a cypress tree to recover, leaving the job of getting his beasts of burden into the sea to Amanda and David. Eventually, however, the flotilla of little boats, with the line of reluctant donkeys swimming behind, rowed back to the mainland, where the rest of the villagers were assembled on the jetty and gave them the sort of ovation that is normally reserved for the maiden voyage of a large ocean-going liner. Everybody had to pat and touch the donkeys, everybody exclaimed on what a miracle it was they had been discovered and how clever Amanda and David had been. Finally, exhausted, they reached the village square where the Mayor, in a fit of unprecedented generosity, sent for a bottle of his own wine so that he could toast Amanda and David. Solemnly the two children were toasted, then as they drank, cries of “Bravo,” “Beautiful children,” “Golden ones,” and similar shouts of endearment came from the villagers.

  “You won’t forget the reward, will you, Mayor Oizus?” asked Amanda demurely, putting her empty glass on the table. The Mayor, who had been wreathed in smiles, started and almost dropped his glass.

  “Reward?” he said. “Reward?”

  “You know,” said David, “what you have written on the posters. The reward of twenty thousand drachma.”

  “Ah, that,” said the Mayor. “Ah — um — yes, but that was to get the Communists to show their hand. It was, as you might call it, a ruse.”

  “I told you so,” whispered David to Amanda.

  “But Mayor Oizus,” said Amanda firmly, “it says quite clearly on the posters that you will pay twenty thousand drachma to anybody who told you of the whereabouts of your donkeys. We not only told you of their whereabouts, but we showed you. So, therefore, we are entitled to the reward.”

  “But, my sweet ones,” said the Mayor, starting to perspire. “it was all a joke.”

  “It was not a joke,” said Papa Nikos grimly, “and you know it.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Papa Yorgo, “it was not a joke.”

  “You offered to pay the reward,” said Papa Nikos, “and so you must pay it. These children have earned it.”

  “Yes, they have indeed. They have indeed,” chorused the villagers.

  “Well,” said the Mayor in desperation, “if that’s a unanimous decision, I suppose I’ll have to, but I haven’t got the money with me here. I shall have to go into Melissa and fetch it.”

  “That’s all right,” said Amanda sweetly. “We’ll come and collect it to-morrow afternoon at four o’clock.”

  “Yes, yes,” echoed the villagers, “at four o’clock.”

  “At four o’clock,” agreed the Mayor dismally.

  So the children, having been patted and hugged and kissed by the grateful villagers of Kalanero, made their way back to the villa.

  “Well,” asked the General when they appeared on the terrace, “how did it go?”

  “It was splendid,” said Amanda. “I wish you could have seen the Mayor fall into the water, it was even funnier than seeing him fall off the bridge.”

  “Yes, I missed that,” said David gloomily.

  “And then,” Amanda said, “they were so excited at getting their donkeys back that the Mayor actually kissed his.”

  “If people took more time in life to kiss donkeys,” observed the General, “the world would be a better place.”

  “They had a terrible time trying to get the donkeys to swim back,” said David. “and the Mayor’s little horse kicked him in the stomach.”

  “A retribution long overdue,” said the General with satisfaction.

  “We got them all back,” said David, “then we asked the Mayor about the reward.”

  “Ah,” said the General, “and what did he say?”

  “Oh, he tried to pretend it was all a joke,” said Amanda indignantly.

  “I told you he would,” said David. “I wouldn’t trust that man for anything.”

  “Fortunately,” said Amanda, “the villagers all backed us up and said we had earned the reward, so eventually the Mayor had to give in. We are going down to collect it tomorrow at four o’clock.”

  “Masterly,” said the General with satisfaction. “Quite masterly.”

  “I am surprised at your approving of this,” said Amanda.

  “Why should I disapprove?” inquired the General. “It was a well-conceived plan, carefully carried out; it hurt nobody and it is going to do Yani a lot of good. I see absolutely no reason why I shouldn’t approve of it.”

  Amanda shrugged; the General’s thought processes had always been and would always remain an enigma to his daughter.

  “I shall come down myself,” said the General, “and I shall bring your mother, too.”

  “Where to, Henry?” inquired Mrs Finchberry-White, who had just appeared in a dazed sort of fashion on the terrace.

  “Down to the village to watch Amanda and David getting their reward,” said the General.

  “Reward?” said Mrs Finchberry-White. “Reward for what?”

  “I spent the entire morning,” said the General irritably, “telling you on my leg drum, and I refuse to go over the whole thing again.”

  “It’s just that the villagers lost their donkeys,” explained Amanda hastily, “and we found them and so we can claim the reward that they offered for them.”

  “How very nice, dear,” said Mrs Finchberry-White. “Have you seen that tiny little green orchid that grows down in the trees there? I’ve a very strong feeling that it isn’t in my collection.”

  The following morning the Mayor on his little horse trotted along the dusty road to Melissa and, though it seared his soul to do so, he drew twenty thousand drachma out of his account at the bank, counted it carefully and stowed it away in his wallet. Then he trotted sadly back to Kalanero.

  At four o’clock there was not a single inhabitant of Kalanero (who was not too old or too young to be present) who was not assembled in the village square to watch the giving of the reward. The pleasure it gave the villagers was twofold. Firstly, because Amanda and David were such favourites in the village and secondly because the villagers were enchanted at the thought of the Mayor having to part with twenty thousand drachma. Major-General Finchberry-White and his wife walked down and stood on the outskirts of the crowd in the square and Amanda and David made their way forward to the café where the Mayor was seated behind a table covered, for this special occasion, with a white cloth, The Mayor, since he realised he was going to have to part with his money, decided to put the best possible face on things. And so, as Amanda and David came to a halt in front of the table, he rose to his feet and made a little speech.

  “People of Kalanero,” he said oratorically. “It has long been the reputation of Melissa and in particular of the village of Kalanero, that they have always been eager to have strangers living in their midst and have been hospitable to them.”

  “Quite right,” muttered Papa Yorgo.

  “When these golden ones first came to live with us,” the Mayor continued, “we took them instantly to our hearts. Brave,
noble and modest aristocrats.”

  A mutter of assent ran through the village square.

  “During the time they have been here,” said the Mayor, “they have done many wonderful deeds for us, the people of Kalanero, not least among these being the saving of my life when the bridge collapsed under me.”

  He paused and drank a glass of water.

  “Now,” he continued, throwing out his arms dramatically, “they have, through their astuteness and courage, saved the entire village of Kalanero by recovering for us our donkeys and my little horse.”

  “I do wish he would shut up,” said David, who was getting increasingly embarrassed.

  “Poor man, let him have his fun,” whispered Amanda.

  “As you all know,” said the Mayor. “I offered a reward for the recovery of the donkeys and being a man of my word, I intend to give that reward now to these two wonderful children.”

  With a flourish he pulled his wallet out of his pocket and proceeded with great care to count out two piles of hundred-drachma notes. You could hear every villager counting with the Mayor as he put the notes down. He slapped the final note on the table and threw his arms out.

  “Twenty thousand drachma,” he cried in a shaking voice. “Twenty thousand drachma which I am paying for the recovery of our donkeys by the two foreigners in Melissa that we love most.”

  The cheers of the crowd were deafening.

  “Go on,” muttered David, “you pick up the money.”

  “No, you do it,” said Amanda. who was feeling as guilty as David.

  “Well, let’s do it together,” said David as a compromise. So they both stepped forward and each picked up their pile of ten thousand drachma. Instantly silence settled on the little square and it was obvious that the villagers expected the children to reply in some way to the Mayor’s speech. Amanda glanced at David, but he was red-faced and tongue-tied, so Amanda cleared her throat and began.

  “People of Kalanero,” she said. “To-day we have been greatly honoured by Mayor Oizus inasmuch as he is paying us the reward for the discovery of your donkeys. Now, we know that there are many of you here who are poor, who are much poorer than us, for example, and so I and my brother feel that it would be unfair to take this money.”

  The Mayor started at this and a faint feeling of hope crept over him.

  “So, my brother and I,” Amanda continued, “have discussed what would be the best thing to do. You know that all the people of Kalanero are our friends, but one of our particular friends is Yani Panioti.”

  She beckoned to Yani, who was in the crowd, and he came forward and joined the children by the table.

  “As you know,” said Amanda, “Yani’s father died last year and unfortunately he died in debt.”

  “Yes, yes,” murmured the villagers, “we know that.”

  “So my brother and I,” said Amanda, “have decided to give this money to Yani so that he may repay his father’s debts.”

  The cries of “Bravo,” “What generosity,” and other similar statements were overwhelming. Amanda and David solemnly handed the money over to Yani. Yani, with tears in his eyes, kissed David on both cheeks and to the delight of the villagers he kissed Amanda full on the mouth. Then he turned to the Mayor.

  “Mayor Oizus,” he said, “here is the eighteen thousand drachma that my father owed you. The entire village is witness to the fact that I am now paying up his debt in full.”

  He placed the sheaf of notes carefully in front of the Mayor. Again the shouts of “Bravo” were deafening, but the Mayor, instead of being pleased at having most of his money returned to him, appeared to be undergoing a strange change. His normally pale, cheese-coloured face had suddenly become suffused with blood and his eyes bulged.

  “You did it,” he shouted, suddenly getting to his feet and pointing a shaking finger at Amanda, David and Yani.

  “You did it.”

  The villagers fell silent. This was a new twist to the plot which they had not anticipated.

  “They took the donkeys,” shouted the Mayor, almost apoplectic with rage. “They took the donkeys so that they could claim the reward so that they could give it to Yani Panioti and deprive me of my legal right to his land. They are the “Communists” that we have all been searching for.”

  The villagers, round-eyed, looked at the children. It took a moment or so for the Mayor’s words to penetrate, but when they did, and the villagers grasped their implication, the whole gorgeousness of the situation dawned upon them. The Mayor had been treated ignominiously, had been forced to part with twenty thousand drachma, and Yani Panioti had been saved, and all by the cleverness of their English children. It was Papa Nikos who started it, for as soon as the full beauty of the situation dawned on him, he uttered a bellow of laughter that could have been heard half a mile away. Any other crowd would have been indignant at what the children had done, but these were Melissiots and they thought differently. All the villagers started to laugh and they laughed and laughed and laughed. The Mayor shouted and raved for a time, and then gave up in despair because he could not make himself heard for the great waves of laughter.

  And so the three children, with something very much approaching a swagger, made their way through the village square, through the villagers, some of whom were laughing so much that they could hardly stand, and wended their way up to the villa.

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