Someone said, “Muy tragico.” Heads were nodded. And then someone else said, “Well, we have also the legend of el vilvoy de las islas.”
The novelist asked, “Did you say ‘veal boy’? Or ‘beel voy’?”
Our host spelled it for her (and for me, too), “V-i-l-v-o-y,” and added, “We pronounce it—”
But I did not then hear how they pronounced it, because before the attorney had more than begun, the young priest—not meaning, I am sure, to be impolite, merely he was a bit emphatic—said, “‘El Vilvoy,’ but that is surely a collection of nonsense!”
The attorney said, very calmly, and as one certain of his facts, “Sometimes we provincials, with all our naif enthusiasm, nevertheless arrive at a conclusion more veridical than the sophisticates of the metropolis.”
“Oh, but surely I did not say ‘provincials’; and if, by ‘the metropolis,’ you mean Spain, or Madrid in particular, certainly I am a Madrileno, but—”
A servant approached with a tray. “‘El vilvoy,’” repeated Mrs. Phlux (her real name), the novelist. “But what does that mean?” More than one person began, perhaps, to reply.
Our host, taking advantage of the abrupt silence which fell after several people had realized that they were all speaking at once, said, in a rather musing voice, “It is certainly rather curious, indeed coincidental, but … just this morning I was in the library, looking through some old volumes, especially a set of Dickens which I suppose my grandfather had had bound as it had his rubrico embossed on the covers, when I found a sort of scrapbook which had been maintained on this subject. Here is Ruy with the chocolate for which his wife is famous, and I shall ask him to bring the scrapbook while we are sipping some of it.”
The chocolate well deserved that she should be famous, it was excellent (Lina had made it. Her name was Lina), it was miraculous. And while Alberta Morris (her maiden- and pen-name) was drinking it, her eyes seemed to grow larger and larger. She gave a perceptible smack as she took the cup away from her mouth, and then she said, “‘El vilvoy’! But what does that mean?”
From La Voz de la Nación, With Seccion in ingles:
What a storm of outrage swept through the streets and houses of our Ciudad Ereguay when one heard yesterday night that affront had been offered to our well-known and well-beloved mis Brethe ohara by a bruto whose name will shortly be discovered by our conscientious polis who all night sourced the meaner streets and alliedways which do no honour to us. The dear mis Vertha the grand daughter of capitan Monserrat our great Patriotic Hero had been delayed on some errand of merci to an umble casa near the port section of «town» when coming out en route to the awaiting carriage of her Papa the inglis coronel OHara (the idiom ingles does not contain of the letter R, hence coronel=colonel and Londres=London, how curious) when from the penumbrous area of some copse of trees there emerged that criminal Typico with pistole in hand who seized this innocent Mis roughly by one arm and exclaimed,—I will have at least jour money and ¡perhaps more!
In the opinion of some people (in fact, of lots), a little of such style goes a long way. A very long way. And yet … someone many years ago told me, as regards “more accurate” translations of the Bible, that he would rather read Arise, O Lord than Get up, God. And although we are dealing here with an entirely secular text, yet there is a something in the flavor of the Basic Form of it which appeals to me more than a smoother version might. Readers who disagree will still, I hope, excuse me if some more of the original from time to time seeps through.
Avanti.
Leaving to one side his discursions about the importance to the national economy of the Col. O’Hara’s factory where Ereguayan cattle were processed into an essence of beef much advertised in the United Kingdom, and reminders of the late and great Cap. Monserrat’s famous charge up the slope of Castel Ereguay to bring the Royal Spanish flag tumbling down; our reporter (Señor Cruz) at length describes the young girl’s piteous cries for help, the shameful cowardice of some unnamed “citymen” who were nearby but evidently afraid of the “pistole”—and finally plunges into the matter of our story, videlicet that there then stepped forward with impetuous gait a most remarkable young man in almost ragged garments in antique cut of “raw hyde” and upon his feet curious footwear devised also from the uncured skin of an animal, such as one has not observed in years but only in illustrations of some old leyendas. Upon his head also a hat of shaggy leather.
This young man of such startling appearance, when he heard the cry of fear and pain from the defenseless girl, Mssi Evereth, uttered a savage shout and leaped forward swinging his bushknife, or machete. Quickly he slashed in such a way as to draw the scoundrel’s blood, who [the scoundrel] was immediately lost to sight as he fled, the coward, into the enveloping darkness.
It appears that he made his way, the monster, to the night clinic of the Medical Hospital where he attempted to have reattached the severed ear, which he had brought with him “untidily wrapt” in a rag. But the “advanced medical student” on duty insisted that “a chirurgeon” would have to be summoned. Whereat “the retch fled yet again into the night. And one hears that he is attempting to depart our Countery by the back trials. But the frontera guards have been alerted by telegraph and he must soon be catched, the fiend. Unless of course he may find refuge amongst the teeming criminals which always protect the profugitives in the adjacent republic (so-called) of Bobadilla y Las Bonitas (el B & B, as we crisply put it). Falseley does that other country claim the Las Islas Encantadas, for which we are ready to shed our blood.”
Further, La Voz de la Nación had gathered the following information: The young man whose manners and appearance reminds one of the works of Juan Jacques Ruso or the novel Paul y Virginia, not to mention the arcetypo classico Robisson Cruso, is Antonio the son of the pioneer settlers Kielor, Swiss or perhaps Baltico in origin. The patriarco Kielor’s son resides with his parents and “some infant bothers” in the island Encantada Grande, whence he has come with his father to the mainland of our Republic to purchase what few supplies their humble and hard-working efforts have enabled them to afford. The europeans Sr. and Sra. Kielor have for several years inhabited all by themselves and young children this rugged Island part of that archipelago. ¡See, how they naturally regard their capital city as Ciudad Ereguay and not of some other nacion as it speciously proclaims! And there they have lived alone for most of one year to another, it being unusual to have even a visit from a fisherman’s bote because of distance and the savage seas.
Having been thus raised practically alone in a wildness, he has grown up, as one says, «a wild boy», wearing no clothes not a produduccion of that wildness and “never was sick a day in his life,” as he declares in his simple wholesome and naif way. Although void of any artifice and entirely sans sophistication exactly as one has read about in books by european savants. But consider the bravery of this doubtless Wilde Boy who has never been one day in school, how he rushed forward, careless of his own life, a true cavalier of the wilderness, he well deserves to be considered a noble son and citizen of this Republic, the justly named wildboy without a thought of fear, so similar to the bravo capitan Monserrat, our National Hero, whose garnddaughter [here the clipping ends]
Thus the report as written by Gustavo Gomez Cruz, who for many years wrote the English-language column Amigos Friends, for the daily La Voz de la Nación of which allegedly his brother-in-law was sole proprietor; but what difference does it make? As for this first mention of “Antonio” Kielor, it seems certain that mostly it was true. Thus the legend of the Wild Boy of the Islands sprang almost full grown in an instant, or anyway in a night. A few comments now to those sceptical persons who are everywhere. It is said that the boy certainly did not wear a goatskin hat in the manner of Crusoe, but that the hatband may have been goatskin. It is said that his clothes were certainly not all made of rawhide, though parts of them may have been—and certainly his shoes or sandals or boots, whatever one may call them (moccasins?) had been made by
the elder Kielor himself; and why not? Furthermore, in regard to the incident at the Night Door of the hospital, there has been some sceptical insistence that the man who had appeared there for medical or surgical attention to his ear had certainly not carried it with him in a rag, despite the firmness of the legend on this detail; but that it had been severely bitten in a cantina brawl and bore no mark of a slash with a sharp weapon such as a machete. (As for the Legend, it adjusted itself on this point: the Wild Boy had both slashed the thug with his machete and then bitten off his ear … which the thug then wrapped in a rag and carried with him to the Infirmary: a newspaper drawing not long after showed a figure looming out of darkness and carrying in one hand a pistol and in the other an Object out of which blood dripped along the ground. It was very vivid; indeed the stuff of legend.) As for the subsequent history of this man—or, if there were indeed two—either man: there is no subsequent history; fables of an earless man howling for revenge in the moonlight are, simply, fables. The darkness had swallowed him or them and the darkness continued to, as it were, keep him/them swallowed. Which, since we are in the presence of Legend, is perhaps as it should be.
And in regard to the young man’s given name, really it was not Antonio, an understandable mistake; evidently his full name was William Washington Kielor; this not having been fixed into law by the Medes and the Persians, he was sometimes called “Bill,” sometimes “Billy,” and sometimes (often) “Tony.” And the elder Kielors were, very simply, from the Isle of Man … perhaps this is not as simple as it sounds … it may be that Sr. Gomez Cruz really did think that Man was a canton in Switzerland or an island in the Baltic Sea (there, after all, are islands in the Baltic Sea … aren’t there?), or, it might be, that the word Manxman was a bit beyond him. At any rate, the elder Kielors had had some earlier experiences with island life. Why didn’t they, if tired of, say, life in London, simply go back to the Isle of Man? Perhaps because it was full of English tourists, all hoping to hear one of the eleven or fifteen people who could still speak Manx. And as for that simply despicable person sitting over there in the corner and muttering that the old Manx form of the name was Illiam (cognate Gaelic Liam), without an initial “W”—why, let him go back where he came from.
Señor Murphy having paused at this point to wet his whistle, like, with a sip of chocolate, Señora Murphy turned to the? hunter? farmer? fellow; “Your family, they are all well, I trust?” The young man answered, simply, “Yes.” After a moment she said, “My aunt will appear presently.”
I had, somehow, a faint impression that she had forgotten or simply did not know his name, but she had evidently touched the right note, because he then said, “Ah.” Not one of your very talkative types, evidently. Afraid he might scare away the game, or make the off-ox turn left instead of right. Ivan Sanderson once said that people speak of “the silence of the jungle,” when, really, they are very noisy places … or did Ivan Sanderson say just the opposite? I met him once or twice, a very nice man: but he is gone now.
But, as to the matter of “William” or of “Bill,” that is nothing compared to the word(s) … phrase, perhaps … title, perhaps … set down crisply enough by Gomez Cruz at least twice (if not consistently) as “Wild Boy.” Although one stands, shall we say, surprised at his statement that “English contains no ‘R,’” it certainly seems that Spanish does not make abundant use of “W.” Let us, however, not forget that “W”=Double “U,” that “U” and “V” are variant forms of the same letter, and that there are a number of languages (including Spanish) in which “V” and “B” are not what one would call clearly distinct: consider Servia and Serbia, Habana and Havana, Sevastopol and Sebastopol—and, for that matter, Avram and Abram. The second given name of old Kielor’s oldest son was to cause the journalists and typesetters of Ciudad Ereguay enormous difficulties: sometimes it appeared as Vashington, sometimes as Boshindon or even Uachignton, or … sometimes … Washington. (Old Kielor was much impressed by Immense Liberator Figures.) But mostly young Kielor was referred to in the press as The Wild Boy, two English words also not without their transliterational difficulties and which went through sundry forms as El Vild Boy, Wild Voy, Vildouy, or—finally and eternally—Vilvoy: a headline from some time later: BIENVENIDA VILVOY. Further transmutations and confusions, such as Bill Boy, Billy Boy, and Bell Boy, we will leave as well enough alone. Vilvoy. There! The Ereguayans knew a good loanable word when they saw one; it just took them a while to pin it down and stabilize it. And have we of the inglish idiom done a sight better with Montecuzuma or whatever, and—for that matter—batata?
No indeed.
Well, that more or less completes our survey of what we might call El Vilvoy, Part One.
Onward.
It was the practice for many years of Col. O’Hara, in his capacity as Honorary British Vice-Consul, to call formally once a year at the Presidential Palace and deliver a Note reminding the Republic of the British Claim to Las Islas Encantadas (H.M. Government, what with the Maori and the Mahdi and other such vexatious people, having other matters than that small southern Atlantic archipelago on the front of their desks. What? “its”? “desks”? Nonsense. “Her Majesty’s Government are,” no more to be said)—Claim to Las Islas Encantadas (or, as My Lords preferred to call them, Lord Iggen’s Islands); after the delivery of which The President would give him a glass of sherry and a segar … both, we understand, very good … and then they would enjoy a half-hour’s pleasant conversation on the subject of, as it might be, horseflesh … that is to say, not hippophagy, but breeding. French reminders of the French Claim were more sporadic (echo in Cada Dia, of Ciudad Bobadilla: NAPOLEON III HAS ESCAPED FROM ENGLAND AND IS DESTINED TO ARRIVE IN THE ISLAS ENCANTADAS. Nap Three never made the scene, alas). But the Claims of the adjacent Republic (adjacent to Ereguay, that is; not to France) of Bobadilla y Las Bonitas were something else. True that both Republics were agreed that Spanish sovereignty of the Islands, after the overthrow of Spanish colonial rule, had passed to … had passed to … passed, aye, there’s the rub! Passed to whom? Or, to which? Opinions differed. They very much differed. And continued to differ.
Nine Days Wonders we always have with us, and perhaps interesting news was a bit scarce at that time, at any rate, the newspapers in Ciudad Ereguay certainly made very much of the Vilvoy. And so did opinion in the not-inconsiderable portion of the public which did not read newspapers. Tributes to his modesty and, if not to his piety (old Kielor, on the single occasion when he was solicited about theology, declared himself to be a believer in An Universal Force or Influence, y nada mas), then anyway to his filial piety: headline in La Prensa Nacional: VILVOY THINKS ONLY OF HIS PAPA. We who described yesterday the collection of a purse to reward the Wil Voy for his courage are now proud to disclose that, when asked what gift he desired, the vil voy replied, “Only a pouch of good English tobacco for his papa!” It seems that the father Kielor grows naturally his own tobacco in those Islands which pertain to our Country, but this year the crop was not all what was hoped for. Colonel Ohara, father of the augustly descended sweet and becomingly timid girl whose life the Vil Dvoy saved, immediately ordered purchased and placed on board the fishingvessel by which father and son will return to their chosen island of settlement an entire case of the best Inglish pipe tobacco available from the enterprising merchants here. El Vilvoy professed himself delighted. The Prensa has learned that the coronel has offered either or both of the Kielors good employment at the factory which produces the beef essence that the English use as tea, but that they both declared that nothing will make them surrender their residencia and small farm which with such hard labour they have acked, or hewn as one might say, from the wilness. We are also precisely informed by the Ministry of National Lands that a writ of title to the aforesaid terrain will be most immediately issued to the señor Kielor.
Señora K. had remained in the Islands with her younger children; when asked if he were not afraid of her safety the father Kielo declared that no one who lives
under the flag of the Republic of Ereguay need fear any man. Also he reminds us that in a true state of the Natura one lives in harmony with nature’s laws, and then remains always without the well-founded fears to which the urban dweller is a prey. Both he and his brave son el vilvoy wear their hair much long except that the latter of course has almost no veard upon his manly young face. Observe please readers the likeness of his fearless and untainted countenance in this Press via means of the latest photographic process …
Thus it is possible precisely to date the first-known photograph of el Vilvoy; and in fact this photograph was reproduced and sold widely for quite a while through the ciudad and in one or two provincial towns, both in black-and-white and in sepia.
Father and son (and a cargo of more supplies than either had hoped for; old Kielor would not accept money, which he in fact called by many harsh names; but he agreed to accept agricultural tools, seeds, and nursery stock, fishing lines and hooks, gunpowder, lead, cartridges, and a nice new shotgun) returned presently to their far-distant Island Home. Quite a throng saw them off at the mole. And the Ministry of Correction and Justice quietly put away its plans to locate a penal colony somewhere in the Islands.
The Other Nineteenth Century Page 27