The Click of a Pebble

by Barbara Spencer

  ‘Thank you, Rico, answered like a true son.’ Pascual smiled warmly at him before addressing Yöst again. ‘The elderly couple where you’ve been living, are they your guardians?’

  He hesitated, unsure what Ramon had told her. ‘Yes,’ he admitted wondering what had upset Rico and how he could put it right. Perhaps he might ask Pascual.

  Without waiting for a reply, she continued, ‘When we first arrived in this country, you were a baby, Rico, not much older than TaTa.’ Yöst picked up on the ease with which she had used the child’s nickname. ‘It was Yöst’s guardians, Monsieur and Madame Meijer, who saved us from starvation and helped us onto our feet. And for a few weeks, while Ramon was searching for a job, I stayed with them. Now it is our turn to repay that debt.’

  While they’d been talking Ana and one of the twins had cleared their plates, carrying them out through the curtains to what presumably was a kitchen. They returned with tiny cups and a tall pot of coffee, the two girls helping the adults to sugar.

  Yöst had been astonished at how little disruption their unannounced arrival had caused, no one asking where they had come from, and seemingly oblivious of Zande’s dark skin. That had surprised him, especially after the curiosity of the town’s people, who had doubtless scented some hidden story. He’d promised M. Meijer never to mention his history to outsiders, although he still felt concerned about conjuring up lies to avoid telling the truth. Start with a lie, his grandmother had warned, and before long you will have told ten, with no way of remembering which lie you told to which person. Their lack of curiosity had made things easier; except, with the casualness of their welcome, he had let his guard down and almost said things he shouldn’t.

  Pascual rose to her feet. ‘The children are worn out and I expect you are as well, Yöst. Come, child, and I’ll show you where you sleep.’

  Picking up a lamp from the table, she took Zande by the hand, leaving Yöst to carry his sister, who had fallen asleep, her head dropped down onto her chest. Still too shy to speak, he smiled his thanks at Ana, following Pascual towards the far end of the room. Against the back wall, a row of low partitions shielded a series of pallets, a line of goose-down quilts folded neatly like white marble tombstones.

  ‘Ramon wants our children to stay close,’ she explained, tucking Zande and Tatania top to toe and kissing them both goodnight. It was a matter-of-fact gesture, as automatic as her hand smoothing their pillow. Nevertheless, after a day dominated by tumult and anxiety, Yöst felt tears welling up. ‘I have arranged a pallet for you with the men. Ramon and I sleep upstairs as do Adelita and Katarina.’

  Despite his exhaustion, he lay wide awake, listening to the murmur of voices, grateful for the concealing darkness that hid his thoughts. He felt lonelier and somehow emptier than he had ever felt in his entire life. When his mother died, his grandmother had been there to wipe his eyes and place her arms around him. When she died, Willem had not left his side day or night. His loss had brought Mme Meijer into his life with her cheerful understanding, carefully binding the many cuts life had dealt him. Now she was gone too.

  Determined not to breakdown and cry, Yöst buried his face in his pillow, doggedly seeking Willem’s face and voice, seeing instead the flames that had consumed him.

  ‘You awake?’

  Startled, he shot upright to find Rico sitting astride the neighbouring pallet.

  ‘Ma sent me to bed early; said if I was ever rude to a guest again, she’d tan my hide.’ He shifted uncomfortably, hedging a grimace. ‘She didn’t really,’ he confided, ‘she just thought you might feel strange. It’s a funny place our house.’

  He hesitated. ‘I didn’t know it was your people that gave Pa his start.

  Yöst accepted his words as an olive branch, that tomorrow they would start over, yet still puzzled as to why Rico had been so angry. What was so special about an ugly cripple?

  ‘You about in the morning?’ he yawned, worn out by the stresses of the day.

  ‘If Pa agrees, I’ll take you exploring.’ Rico shrugged again as if to say, that’s the best I’m prepared to offer, take it or leave it.

  12

  Yöst woke and stared into the shadowy darkness. Disorientated, he imagined himself back on the island, the lingering traces of his dream so strong he stretched out a hand convinced he would feel Willem’s shoulder, his flesh warm beneath his fingers. He tried to hold onto the feeling, to slip back into that happy place with its sense of quiet calm, but it had gone. Instead, waiting just out of sight, was the bitter misery of past days, invading his reason in the same way lice had once overrun his hair. That day, his grandmother had rowed across to the mainland to buy carbolic soap and paraffin, his scalp red raw after the treatment, but lice free. He wished he could do the same with his memories, rub them away, except you couldn’t do that with memories. They became ingrained like dirt under fingernails and on knees that no amount of soap and water would shift.

  He stretched, feeling the air heavy and cloying, smelling of sweat. He needed to be outside. Silent in his bare feet he crossed the floor, bending down to check on Tatania. Somehow in the night she had twisted round and was now cuddled up to Zande, his arm wrapped around her, the silken strands of her hair entwined with his dark curls. Straightaway, he was back on the island, staring over the cliff at the tangle of bodies, his sense of loss almost unbearable. The warmth of Pascual’s welcome, chatting with Rico, the light-hearted banter of the dinner table – they were no match for the pain that wracked his mind.

  His sharp ears caught a sound and he swung round to see Maestro awake, his small shape diminished even further by a bulky quilt, his bright eyes resting on him, his glance speculative.

  ‘Did I wake you?’ he muttered nervously.

  The previous night, not one question had been asked by the family as to where they came from or what sort of journey they had had; normal questions that anyone would ask on finding a stranger occupying a chair at the dinner table. They had simply taken no notice. Not in an unfriendly way, Yöst hadn’t felt that; except for Maestro. Throughout the meal, he’d been aware of the dwarf’s interest and wondered if he had overheard him use the term crippled.

  ‘No. My aches and pains are mostly night owls. They, like me, rarely go to sleep before dawn. You are going out?’ Yöst shrugged a yes, uneasy under the man’s scrutiny, yet embarrassed to admit he found the atmosphere of the hall claustrophobic. ‘It’s my favourite time of the day,’ he explained, holding on tight to the words: when the world seems renewed and filled with hope. He needed those words in his life. If he repeated them often enough, maybe, in time, he would come to believe them.

  Pepe gave a loud grunting snore and turned over, the boards of his pallet creaking under his weight. Remembering how Ramon had spoken about his own vigilance, watching and never sleeping, Yöst wondered if Pepe had assumed that role, his bed closest to the main door and the first one a stranger would encounter. Although much good he would be, the giant so deeply asleep, it would have taken a lightning storm to waken him.

  ‘Pa had to build him an especially long bed,’ Rico had confided. ‘Even so, his feet still overlap the edges. The winter solstice last year, Clara hung streamers on his toes.’

  Yöst glanced over at the curtains screening the kitchen and the passage out to the back door. If he tried to go out that way, he might wake someone.

  ‘Why not use the main door?’ Maestro suggested, seeing him hesitate. He nodded towards the double doors adjacent to the staircase, ‘Of course, it might be wise to duck if you do.’

  ‘Duck?’

  ‘Correct me if I was wrong, weren’t you considering Pepe so fast asleep, it would take an earthquake to waken him?’

  ‘Yes, but how …’

  ‘Many a dead soldier has made that mistake.’ Picking up on Yöst’s incredulity, he added, ‘Tomorrow, ask Pepe to show you his knife. As far as I’m aware he has never missed.’ Repenting of his mischief-making, he added, ‘If you hold back the curtain with your one hand,
you can slip through quietly enough.’

  Nodding his thanks, Yöst pushed the curtain aside, the long strings of walnuts tapping gently together as they swung back into place.

  Pushing up the bar on the yard door, he stepped out. The ground beneath his bare feet felt hard, baked to a crisp by months of summer sun, splinters of compacted dust lying loose on the surface. Hearing a nail scrape behind him, he spun round and saw the two dogs, their heads resting on their paws. In the early light, their short-haired jackets were tinged with brown, their eyes pools of inquisitive darkness. As he watched, Léon edged his paw forwards.

  In warning or simply saying hello?

  Hoping for the latter, Yöst nodded a greeting, feeling some sort of recognition on his part was necessary, uncertain if their acceptance of him remained in force.

  In the open-fronted barn two horses lay on their sides, presumably asleep, although Yöst wasn’t sure if animals did sleep, horses as much an unknown quantity as dogs.

  He took a deep breath swilling away the close confinement of the house, the fresh air caressing his skin like the touch of his mother’s hand, soothing away his tears whenever he hurt himself. He took another breath and then another, filling his lungs over and over. They were safe, Mme Meijer had promised they would be; not even that zealot of a priest would think of canvassing the countryside. Yet it still felt alien, the aromas of the barn as unfamiliar as the sounds of the waking day. He jumped as a mouse scurried over his feet, vanishing into a pile of straw bedding laid down for the horses.

  With a wry smile, he wandered on across the yard, his thoughts staying with his two companions, wondering if they shared similar misgivings about their future. Not Tatania, she was far too young. Besides, her interest was exclusively reserved for food. But Zande? Remembering how Clara had immediately gravitated to the boy’s side, Yöst dismissed this also. The boy was already different from him, possessing a calm certainty about life, and acquiring friends as easily as anyone else might attract bruises and scratches. Perhaps this awareness, this being able to bend others to your will, was yet another aspect of his inheritance, all part of being born a Black. Yet even Zande had felt alarm at the priest’s dogged pursuit, drawing out his fear in the shape of a bird, a creature free from human constraint. Nevertheless, once M. Meijer had explained his role as the son of their leader, a cool confidence had replaced any lingering uncertainty. No different from Rue, the day he had fledged, who accepted the changes to his body as normal.

  Following a well-marked path Yöst wandered out into the meadow, a glimpse of water drawing him like a magnet. Here, the air felt balmy, scented with grass and clover, very different from the salt-laden gusts that had shrieked across their island whenever autumn struck. Dawn was not far away, the dark shades of night slowly softening into its pre- dawn wash of grey. High up on the rock-filled crags goats grazed, springing effortlessly from ledge to ledge, their white bodies ghostly against the dark of the hillside. Below, a river cut a wide path across the valley floor, its flow reduced to a gentle amble after the heat of the summer.

  Why then was he so different? Willem had once suggested that maybe they were half-children of the god. ‘And we will change into our mothers, not our fathers,’ he had said, gently stroking Yöst’s hair.

  ‘No!’ Yöst had retorted, brushing his hand away. ‘It’s what I live for, what I dream about every night; soaring to the heavens free of the earth.’

  Now all he could see was a future ruled by danger.

  Still trawling through recent events, he shinned down the river bank, and squatting back on his heels trailed his fingers in the stream. Where the river lay deepest, fish milled restlessly, their silvery shapes luminescent in the dawn light. A ripple broke the surface, as an insect drifting on the current was gobbled up by a hungry mouth. Across the river, the ground rose sharply into a steep hillside covered in vines, their long stems secured by lengths of stout wire strung between stubby posts. Hidden within their curtain of green leaves were bunches of grapes, their black skins bulging with ripeness.

  Catching a faint sound, Yöst spun round and saw Ramon, the dogs at his heels, strolling down the slope towards him. ‘I’m glad to see you don’t take after my son,’ he called. ‘He’s a lazy devil and would sleep all day if he could. Are you also good at working?’

  In the dawn light, the lightness of spirit Ramon had evinced at the dinner table was gone, only his resemblance to the Black remained, despite their different colouring – one dark and one fair – the power and potency of the adult male predominant and very evident.

  Awkwardly jumping to his feet, Yöst sought for a reply, remembering how often he’d tried his grandmother’s patience by running away and hiding, when there was work to be done. More often than not, tired of nagging, she’d eventually tackle the job herself. After her death, living with the other boys, none had bothered about chores, rinsing a cup or plate in a bucket of water, and wearing their clothes until they were stiff with dirt and needed chucking away. Instead, they had stayed awake late into the night, never bored with watching the cobs shape-shift into carinatae, with their powerful swan wings, or snoop on the ceremony of the celeste, sleeping late into the morning. Rue and Tast had proved the most slavish of the six. Spellbound by their beauty and skill, they had listened intently whenever one of the cobs recounted tales of former migrations that took them to the far corners of the earth, describing the many marvels they had witnessed. Desperate to fledge, they’d been jealous also of the cobs’ success with women, Tast boasting about the girls he’d fall in love with and the children he would spawn. Now they were both dead, the wonders of creation beyond their reach.

  ‘Grandmother didn’t think I was much good at anything.’ Yöst tossed the pebble he’d been clutching into the water, scattering the fish. ‘That’s why she sent me to school. Told me I might as well put what few brains I did possess to good use.’ Struggling with nerves, he pointed to the far bank. ‘Does the vineyard belong to you?’

  ‘No, more’s the pity. The land beyond the stream belongs to our landlord and tomorrow we will be working for him, picking grapes.’ Ramon nodded towards the strengthening sun, rays of gold and peach peeking over the crest of the hill, pushing away any lingering darkness. ‘Grapes grow best on a south-facing slope and since my landlord’s sole interest is wine, he agreed to sell me this hillside in exchange for twelve days’ labour each year for twelve years – a very long twelve years. There are still six more to go.’

  Bending down, he picked up a clod of soil, crumbling it between his fingers. ‘The soil this side is too thin for crops so I decided to leave it to grass and build a house instead.’ Letting the particles of soil slip through his fingers, he pointed west to where a line of trees marked the horizon. ‘I also rent the orchard and fields we drove past last night. That land has lain fallow for years and is riddled with bindweed. Our landlord believed it good for nothing. Nevertheless, it was not cheap.’

  Seeing Yöst’s bewilderment, he grunted an explanation. ‘It’s a weed and the very devil to get rid of. I have been working those fields for six years, putting them to the plough spring and autumn. This year, I finally got a decent crop of potatoes and beans. Next spring, I will plant fruit trees to replace the old stock that is no longer fruiting. Fortunately, our landlord has no children and little interest in his land, except for the vineyard. One day, God willing, if we work hard …’ he swept his arm across the hillside and the distant wood, ‘all of this will belong to Rico and his children, while I sit by the fire and take my ease. Not today though. Today being Sunday, we rest.’

  Yöst shuffled his feet, wishing he were braver and could ask the many questions that needed asking. ‘My brother?’ he hazarded, ‘will he be expected to work? He’s …’ he hesitated. How old was Zande? He’d held up four fingers when Madame Meijer asked. ‘He’s not very old,’ he substituted. Automatically, he took a step back, anticipating the loudly voiced rebuff that would have come his way had he dared question the Black.<
br />
  ‘Zande is your brother? Rather a strange combination especially with the girl being so fair. Was that your idea?’

  ‘Zande said he wanted a brother,’ he substituted hastily, ‘so I volunteered.’ He scuffed his bare toes in the dirt, wishing he might explain how every child of Zeus was considered a brother or sister, the Black, their leader, a father figure. Although for someone not conversant with the customs of the clan, was it even possible to understand? Monsieur Meijer had confessed, even after thirty years his wife occasionally questioned his motives. Still, Monsieur Meijer wasn’t here to explain, nor advise him what to do or say, and who to trust or mistrust. It was now up to him. ‘What do I say when they ask,’ he had begged Mme Meijer, just before they left the house. ‘Only that your mothers are dead,’ she had whispered her reply. ‘That’s quite sufficient to stop the questions.’

  ‘I was thinking about it just now when I was walking down here. It makes sense particularly if you’ve suddenly been orphaned; you still need to belong.’

  Ramon grunted. ‘Madame Meijer said the boy had lost his mother. Nevertheless, he’s quite big enough to help. I was working a full day at six. He can pick grapes, those growing closest to the ground, anyhow. It will be good for him. Make him feel he belongs. And it will please Adelita. She’s always complaining how stooping makes her back ache. Besides, at this time of the year, an extra pair of hands is always useful. The little girl, Tatania is it?’

  Yöst’s mouth gentled into a smile at the memory of her asleep and happily dreaming, if her expression had been anything to go by. ‘She insists on being called TaTa.’ He shrugged, his eyebrows soaring skyward, making the comment for him: I don’t know why.

  Ramon nodded. ‘She will be company for my youngest daughter.’ He glanced upriver, where the land rose up into a swathe of dense woodland, inspecting the sky to the east of them. ‘This month should see some rain. Then maybe you can put your schooling to good use and teach my children to read.’ He swung on his heel, clicking his fingers to the dogs.