The two brothers looked at each other, not sure what the old man was talking about.
“Who are they for?” the old man said. “Who’s going to be riding them?”
Daniel nodded that he had understood. “We are,” he said.
The old man adjusted the straw hat on his head. “Then you should be the ones to take care of them.”
“We don’t know anything about horses.”
“I know what there is to know.”
“It’s a deal, then,” Daniel said.
“Like hell it is,” old Pancia said. “I don’t come cheap.”
“We don’t have any money,” Natan said again.
“You could work for me.”
“We can’t work for you. All we want to do is tame these horses and learn to ride them.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you want. If you can’t pay me, work for me. Otherwise, you might as well sell these animals for meat and run away before your father finds out.”
Natan lowered his head and spat on the ground again. “Fuck,” he said.
“When should we come back?” Daniel asked.
“Tomorrow morning at dawn.”
“Shit,” Natan said.
“Where do we leave the horses?” Daniel asked.
Old Pancia motioned to them to follow him and moved the horses into two small diagonal spaces inside the stable, in the middle of the other horses. Then he said goodbye to the two boys and told them he’d be waiting for them the following morning.
For three months, the boys went to old Pancia’s every morning at dawn, and returned home after nightfall. They cleaned the stables, changed the hay and straw and fed the horses. As time passed, the old man taught them how to behave towards the animals, how to take them out, how to clean them, how to use the currycombs and the brushes, how to saddle them and how to put on the bit and bridle.
After only a few weeks, when the boys were already moving around among the animals as if they had been doing it all their lives and he decided they had already paid off most of their debt, old Pancia took them aside one evening and told them to go and take their horses. For Natan, who was already starting to get bored, it couldn’t have come any sooner. But Daniel said nothing. So the old man carried on, teaching them how to get the horses to walk in a circle in the enclosure, how to punish them and how to stroke them. When at last the horses were ready, he gave them the saddles and bridles. The horses shied, reared up on their hind legs and whinnied, their ears pinned back and their eyes inflamed with fear.
But in the end, as usual, old Pancia calmed them down and managed to get the boys, who at times had seemed more scared than the animals, to saddle the two horses. Both boys had learnt to command respect: Daniel through the sweat of his brow, the hours he had spent determinedly working with his bay, and Natan through sheer anger, cursing and kicking like a stevedore.
When at last the two horses were tamed, responding to every command in the enclosure, the old man and the boys stood side by side, admiring their handiwork. It was a late afternoon in summer and all three were sweating, bearing the marks of a long day’s work. They were leaning on the fence of the enclosure and, to put it bluntly, each felt a little more of a man.
“What now?” Daniel asked.
“Now you have to learn to ride them.”
Natan spat on the ground. “Shit,” he said.
Old Pancia laughed and started towards the house. “See you tomorrow at dawn.”
IT WAS IMMEDIATELY CLEAR to everyone that the horses would take the two brothers to different places. It’s pointless to keep telling ourselves that we are all equal, we all make use of the world in our own way—to get, despite ourselves, to wherever we are meant to be. Some of us use a knife to kill, others to peel an apple. The same knife, but it makes the world different for each one of us.
The villagers soon became accustomed to seeing that figure on horseback wandering on the hill with the sun behind him, and it wasn’t long before Natan told his brother that he wanted to go west, beyond the hill, and visit the city. They had heard a lot about the city, even though no one really seemed to know much about it.
“Are you coming, too?” Natan asked his brother.
“No,” Daniel said.
They were both sitting on their horses, leaning on their long necks, looking down at the valley. Natan nodded and said nothing.
One morning, Daniel went to a nearby farm: there were two horses there that needed shoeing, and old Pancia had asked him to go. During the months he had spent with old Pancia, Daniel had learnt everything there was to know about horses. Natan, on the other hand, had been content just to learn what he needed.
Although he’d finished taming his bay, Daniel had continued going to old Pancia’s. He would give him a hand and pick up some money, which he’d either save or spend on a couple of drinks down at the village inn. He and his brother had stopped stealing drinks from the cellar of the old woman at the end of the road. That was something they missed from time to time, but that’s how it was. In the same way, they sometimes missed racing their carts downhill.
When Daniel got to the farm, he saw three men in the stable, standing round a thin, hollow-looking mare, talking. The mare was a fine, tall, solid chestnut, but it was as if some mad sculptor had gone over her from head to foot, chiselling away until there was not much left.
“Hello,” Daniel said.
One of the men turned and screwed up his eyes to get a better look at the figure standing against the light. His face was creased and weathered by the sun and his legs bent outwards by overwork, like two bows.
“Hello,” the man with the bow legs said.
The other two men looked at Daniel in silence. They were chewing straws.
“I’ve come to shoe the horses,” Daniel said.
One of the two men who were chewing straws gave a half-laugh. He, too, had a weathered face and bow legs.
“Old Pancia must be slipping,” the man who had not laughed said.
“That isn’t a job for boys,” the first man said, standing in front of Daniel.
“If I can’t manage, you can complain to old Pancia and he’ll come and do it for free.”
One of the two men leaning against the stable wall took the straw from his mouth and pushed back his straw hat to get a better look at this boy who talked like a man.
“Come on, then,” the first man said with a shrug and started to walk out.
“What’s the matter with that mare?” Daniel asked, without moving.
The man who was on his way out stopped and turned to the animal. “She’s sick,” he said. “She’s dying.”
“What’s wrong with her?” Daniel asked.
“She’s old. She’s stopped eating and drinking. Must be cancer.”
“Can I?” Daniel asked, indicating the mare with his chin.
The man shrugged again and gestured to him to go ahead. Daniel approached the mare and one of the other two men moved away from the stable wall with a smug look on his face, still chewing his straw.
Daniel entered the stable and started to move his hands over the mare’s back, legs and stomach. As he went round the front of her to get to the other side, he gave her a couple of slaps on the neck and pulled her upper lip to see her teeth, then moved a hand over her muzzle as if stroking her and walked to the other side.
“She’s a fine animal,” he said from behind the mare.
The man who had let him go into the stable looked at that heap of bones with the swollen belly and let out a laugh.
“She’s old and sick,” the first man said, the one who had been about to go with Daniel to shoe the horses. “She’s no use to anyone any more.”
Daniel came out from behind the animal and, trailing a hand over her back, walked out of the stable. “What are you planning to do with her?” he asked.
“What can we do? We’re taking her to the abattoir,” the man at the door said.
Daniel turned back to the mare and moved his hand over
her again, this time on her hind quarters. “I’ll buy her from you,” he said after a couple of seconds.
The two men leaning on the fence laughed loudly this time.
The man at the door also burst out laughing. “And how much would you give me?”
“Whatever the abattoir gives you. How much do you think the abattoir will give you?”
The man said a high figure.
Daniel looked him in the eyes for a moment and gave a little laugh. “You’ll be lucky to get half that for this bag of bones. You’ll be lucky if the abattoir doesn’t laugh in your face.”
The three men had stopped laughing now. The man at the door, though, was still smiling. “What figure did you have in mind?” he asked, slightly twisting his head round.
“Half that, less something for saving you the trouble of taking her to the abattoir. I’ll take her with me today after I’ve finished shoeing the horses.”
The man stopped smiling and thought it over for a few seconds, without taking his eyes off Daniel. “Half exactly, trouble or no trouble.”
Daniel turned for a moment to take a last glance at the mare and looked at the man in the doorway again. “It’s a deal,” he said, and walked up to the man with his hand out.
The man took his hand and shook it. “Deal,” he said.
It was the first deal Daniel had done in his life and, as he followed the man out of the stable to go and shoe the other horses, he felt an electric shock down his back and a sensation as if a length of silk were unwinding round his shoulders.
Daniel followed the man who had sold him the mare into a large open space, where three horses were tied to big iron rings in the wall. Daniel walked round to the other side of his bay and started taking tools out of the big bags slung over the horse’s back. He placed the tools on the ground, tied a large piece of dark, heavy leather round his waist, picked up the tools again and approached the horses.
“Do you want me to hold the nose clippers for you?” the man asked.
Daniel stopped and turned. “The what?”
“The nose clippers. To keep the horse still.”
“Oh, no thanks, there’s no need.”
The man looked a little puzzled. Daniel had heard that some people, when shoeing horses, used a kind of tongs that squeezed the horse’s nose so that the pain made it keep still.
He had talked about it once to old Pancia.
“Rubbish,” the old man had replied.
“Isn’t it true?”
“Yes, it’s true.”
“So why’s it rubbish?”
“Because you don’t need it.”
Daniel had said nothing and continued his work.
“Did anyone ever cut your nails?” old Pancia had asked after a while.
Daniel had thought about it. “Of course,” he had said.
“And did they use clippers to squeeze your nose and keep you still?”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“I’d like to see how you’d react if, when they cut your nails, they beat your hands with a hammer and filed them with a wooden file. Maybe they’d need nose clippers to keep you still, too.”
Daniel had thought about it and in the end had decided that he wouldn’t turn a hair.
“So what are you saying?” he had asked finally.
“I’m saying you just have to do it gently,” old Pancia had said, and had carried on with his work.
That was why Daniel had never used either nose clippers or any rope or tool to keep a horse still. He would go there and give the animal a couple of slaps, let it smell his smell, give it half a carrot and then try to do the job as gently as possible. Usually by the time he finished whoever was with him would be staring at him, the way children stand and stare for hours at a man carving wooden statuettes.
When Daniel returned, leading the sick mare on a rope, old Pancia was loading a wheelbarrow with fodder.
“What’s that one?” the old man asked, leaning on the shovel, when Daniel and the horses came level with him.
“You have to lend me some money,” Daniel said as he dismounted.
The old man said nothing, did not move, but just looked at Daniel as if he were an idiot.
“I’ll pay you back,” Daniel said when he noticed, taking the tool bags off his horse.
“How?”
This time it was Daniel who looked at the old man as if he were stupid. “By working, Pancia.”
“What do you need it for?”
Daniel gave the mare’s neck a couple of good slaps. “I bought this mare,” he said, with a satisfied smile.
Old Pancia looked for a few seconds at Daniel smiling happily, then at that heap of bones that must once have been a horse, and had to make an effort not to burst out laughing. It was only the respect he had for the boy that stopped him.
Instead, he said, “Are you mad?”
Daniel stopped smiling and grew serious again. “Why?”
“What do you mean, ‘why’? Can’t you see the state she’s in?”
Daniel turned, and looked again at his new purchase and moved a hand over her. “In my opinion, she’s suffering from the same things as that horse your friend cured for us.”
A few months earlier, one of old Pancia’s horses had stopped eating and drinking and had grown visibly thinner. It wasn’t old and seemed to want to die. No one knew what was wrong with it, until one day a friend of the old man’s had turned up with a couple of horses. The old man had taken his friend to see the sick horse. He had walked all round the animal for a few minutes, punching it in the stomach, then he told them to give the horse, by force if need be, a mixture of hot water and some herbs Daniel had never heard of. Within a few days the horse had recovered, but it had been too late to ask the old man’s friend what the animal had been suffering from.
The old man rested the shovel against the wheelbarrow and approached the mare with a serious expression on his face. He moved one hand over her nose and the other up and down her front legs, then slapped her on the neck a couple of times and gave her a few punches in the stomach. Finally, he walked round her and came back to where Daniel was standing, without ever taking his hands and eyes off the animal.
“How much do you need?” old Pancia asked.
Daniel gave a slight smile, without Pancia noticing. “Not much.”
The old man looked him up and down for a moment, impatiently, then looked at the mare again.
“I’ve put something aside,” Daniel said.
“What if it isn’t that?”
“If it isn’t that, I’ll take her to the abattoir before she dies and get my money back.”
The old man was silent for a moment. “And if it is that?”
Daniel smiled. “If it is, I got a good deal.”
The old man smiled, too. “She’s not a bad animal,” he said, giving her another couple of slaps on the back.
“I know,” Daniel said.
The old man turned and gave him a little smack. “Go inside, and put on some water to boil, and get some of those herbs left over from the other time. We’ll see if you got a good deal or not.”
In the end, it turned out that Daniel had been right. For a few days the mare had been force-fed the mixture recommended by old Pancia’s friend, and suddenly had started eating and drinking as if for two. It took several weeks, though, for her to be back on form. Little by little Daniel helped her to put on weight, then got her moving, trotting round the enclosure. Day after day he watched as the mare’s limbs took shape again in front of his eyes.
By day, as he had when he was taming his bay, he would work and run errands and clean the stables to repay old Pancia. Then every evening, when his arms and legs cried out for him to go home and rest, he would go to the stable, take out his purchase and work on her for an hour or two. By the time he got home, he barely had the strength to heat up a piece of meat or a plate of soup, and usually just collapsed on the kitchen table. More than once, his father had to lift him and throw him
on the bed fully dressed. It was almost as if Daniel and Natan were no longer his sons, their father thought one evening, coming back to the living room to smoke his pipe by the fire after throwing Daniel on the bed. It was as if those two horses he had bought to keep them out of trouble had carried them off to a place he couldn’t get into any longer.
One evening, old Pancia heard his name being called while his wife was finishing making dinner. Walking outside, the old man saw Daniel galloping his mare in the enclosure in the dim light.
The old man walked to the fence and leant on it. Daniel slowed down and came to a halt in front of him with a big smile on his face.
“What do you think?” Daniel risked asking.
Pancia smiled for a moment. “She’s a fine animal,” he said after a few seconds.
She was indeed a fine animal, finer than either he or the boy had imagined. Even the mare seemed to smile.
“What’s her name?” old Pancia asked.
“First Deal,” Daniel said, pleased with himself.
“First Deal?”
“Yes, First Deal,” Daniel repeated.
The old man thought about it for a few seconds. “Rubbish name,” he said, smiling again and turning to go back to his wife. As he was about to go inside, he turned to look at Daniel again.
“You never told me the name of your bay,” he said.
Daniel had dismounted and was already taking the saddle off First Deal. “His name’s Bay,” Daniel said.
“Ah.” Old Pancia shook his head and went back in to his wife.
NATAN WAS GOING TO THE CITY all the time now. He had found out the way to get through the hills at the far end of the valley and kept going back.
The first time Natan had come back from the city, he had immediately run to wake his brother.
“What is it?” Daniel had muttered.
“Wake up.”
Daniel had turned over in bed and looked at his brother, who was standing there, very still. “What do you want?”
“Wake up.”
“I’m already awake. What’s the matter?”
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