The Childhood of Jesus Page 15

  ‘Do you die?’

  ‘Yes, you die.’

  ‘If he died he will go on to the next life,’ says Inés. ‘So there is no need to be worried about him. It is time for your bath. Come on.’

  ‘Can Simón give me my bath?’

  He has not seen the boy naked in a long time. He notes with pleasure how his body is filling out.

  ‘Stand up,’ he says, and rinses the last of the soap off him and wraps him in a towel. ‘Let us dry you quickly, then you can put on your pyjamas.’

  ‘No,’ says the boy. ‘I want Inés to dry me.’

  ‘He wants you to dry him,’ he reports to Inés. ‘I am not good enough.’

  Stretched out on his bed, the boy allows Inés to attend to him, drying between his toes, in the crack between his legs. His thumb is in his mouth; his eyes, drugged with omnipotent pleasure, follow her lazily.

  She dusts him with talcum powder as if he were a baby; she helps him into his pyjamas.

  It is time for bed, but he will not let go of the story of Marciano. ‘Maybe he isn’t dead,’ he says. ‘Can we go and look, Inés and you and I? I won’t breathe in any smoke, I promise. Can we?’

  ‘There is no point in that, David. It is too late to save Marciano. And the ship’s hold is full of water anyway.’

  ‘It’s not too late! I can swim down into the water and save him, like a seal. I can swim anywhere. I told you, I am an escape artist.’

  ‘No, my boy, swimming down into a flooded hold is too dangerous, even for an escape artist. You could get trapped and never come back. Besides, escape artists don’t save other people, they save themselves. And you aren’t a seal. You haven’t learned how to swim. It is time you understood one doesn’t get to swim or be an escape artist just by wishing so. It takes years of training. Anyhow, Marciano doesn’t want to be saved, to be brought back to this life. Marciano has found peace. He is probably crossing the seas at this very moment, looking forward to the next life. It will be a great adventure for him, to start anew, washed clean. He won’t have to be a stevedore any more, and carry heavy bags on his shoulders. He can be a bird. He can be anything he likes.’

  ‘Or a seal.’

  ‘A bird or a seal. Or even a great big whale. There are no limits to what you can be in the next life.’

  ‘Will you and I go to the next life?’

  ‘Only if we die. And we are not going to die. We are going to live a long time.’

  ‘Like heroes. Heroes don’t die, do they?’

  ‘No, heroes don’t die.’

  ‘Will we have to speak Spanish in the next life?’

  ‘Definitely not. On the other hand, we may have to learn Chinese.’

  ‘And Inés? Will Inés come too?’

  ‘That is for her to decide. But I am sure that if you go to the next life, Inés will want to follow. She loves you very much.’

  ‘Will we see Marciano?’

  ‘Undoubtedly. However, we may not recognize him. We may think we are just seeing a bird or a seal or a whale. And Marciano—Marciano will think he is seeing a hippopotamus while it will really be you.’

  ‘No, I mean the real Marciano, at the docks. Will we see the real Marciano?’

  ‘As soon as the hold is pumped dry, the captain will send men down to fetch Marciano’s body. But the real Marciano will no longer be among us.’

  ‘Can I see him?’

  ‘Not the real Marciano. The real Marciano is invisible to us. As for the body, the body that Marciano has escaped from, by the time we get to the docks it will have been taken away. The men will do that at first light, while you are still asleep.’

  ‘Taken where?’

  ‘Taken to be buried.’

  ‘But what if he isn’t dead? What if they bury him and he isn’t dead?’

  ‘That won’t happen. The people who bury the dead, the gravediggers, are careful not to bury someone if he is still alive. They listen for a heartbeat. They listen for breathing. If they hear even the tiniest heartbeat, they won’t bury him. So there is no need to worry. Marciano is at peace—’

  ‘No, you don’t understand! What if his tummy is full of smoke but he isn’t really dead?’

  ‘His lungs. We breathe with our lungs, not our tummies. If Marciano took smoke into his lungs he will certainly have died.’

  ‘It’s not true! You are just saying that! Can we go to the docks before the gravediggers get there? Can we go now?’

  ‘Now, in the dark? No, we certainly can’t. Why are you so eager to see Marciano, my boy? A dead body isn’t important. It is the soul that is important. The soul of Marciano is the real Marciano; and the soul is on its way to the next life.’

  ‘I want to see Marciano! I want to suck the smoke out of him! I don’t want him to be buried!’

  ‘David, if we could bring Marciano back by sucking the smoke out of his lungs, then the sailors would have done so long ago, I promise you. Sailors are just like us, full of goodwill. But you can’t return people to life by sucking their lungs, not after they are dead. It’s one of the laws of nature. Once you are dead you are dead. The body doesn’t come back to life. Only the soul lives on: Marciano’s soul, my soul, your soul.’

  ‘That’s not true! I don’t have a soul! I want to save Marciano!’

  ‘I won’t allow it. We will all go to Marciano’s funeral, and at the funeral you will have a chance, like everyone else, to kiss him goodbye. That is how it will be, and that is the end of it. I am not going to discuss Marciano’s death any further.’

  ‘You can’t tell me what to do! You are not my father! I am going to ask Inés!’

  ‘I can assure you Inés won’t tramp down to the docks with you in the dark. Be sensible. I know you like to save people, and that is admirable, but sometimes people don’t want to be saved. Let Marciano be. Marciano is gone. Let us remember the good things about him, and let go of his shell. Come now: Inés is waiting to tell you your bedtime story.’

  By the time he presents himself for duty the next morning, the pumping of the aft hold is almost completed. Within an hour a team of seamen is able to descend; and soon afterwards, while the dockers watch in silence from the quayside, the body of their deceased comrade, strapped to a stretcher, is borne up on deck.

  Álvaro addresses them. ‘In a day or two we will have a chance to say a proper goodbye to our friend, lads,’ he says. ‘But for now it is work as usual. There is an unholy mess in the hold, and it is our job to clean it up.’

  For the rest of the day the stevedores are down in the hold, ankle deep in water, enveloped in the acrid smell of wet ash. Every single sack of grain has burst; it is their task to shovel the sticky mess into buckets and pass these by relay up to the deck, from where they are dumped overboard. It is a joyless labour, carried out in silence in a place of death. When he calls at Inés’s apartment that evening, he is exhausted and in a dark mood.

  ‘You don’t happen to have anything to drink, do you?’ he asks her.

  ‘Sorry, I’m out of everything. I’ll make you some tea.’

  Sprawled on his bed, the boy is absorbed in his book. Marciano is forgotten.

  ‘Hello,’ he greets him. ‘How is the Don today? What is he up to?’

  The boy ignores the question. ‘What does that word say?’ he asks, pointing.

  ‘It says Aventuras, with a big letter A. The Adventures of Don Quixote.’

  ‘And that word?’

  ‘Fantástico, with an F. And that word—remember the big letter Q?—is Quixote. You can always recognize Quixote by the big Q. I thought you told me you knew the letters.’

  ‘I don’t want to read letters. I want to read the story.’

  ‘That is not possible. A story is made up of words, and words are made up of letters. Without letters there would be no story, no Don Quixote. You have to know the letters.’

  ‘Show me which is fantástico.’

  He places the boy’s forefinger on the word. ‘There.’ The fingernails are clean and neatly
pared; whereas his own hand, which used to be as soft and clean, is cracked and dirty, with grime worked deep into the cracks.

  The boy squeezes his eyes shut, holds his breath, opens his eyes wide. ‘Fantástico.’

  ‘Excellent. You have learned to recognize the word fantástico. There are two ways of learning to read, David. One way is to learn the words one by one, as you are doing. The other way, which is quicker, is to learn the letters that make up the words. There are only twenty-seven of them. Once you have learned them, you can spell out strange words for yourself, without having me tell you each time.’

  The boy shakes his head. ‘I want to read the first way. Where is the giant?’

  ‘The giant who was really a windmill?’ He turns the pages. ‘There is the giant.’ He places the boy’s forefinger on the word gigante.

  The boy closes his eyes. ‘I’m reading through my fingers,’ he announces.

  ‘It doesn’t matter how you read, through your eyes or through your fingers like a blind person, as long as you read. Show me Quixote, with a Q.’

  The boy stabs at the page with his finger. ‘There.’

  ‘No.’ He moves the boy’s finger to the right place. ‘There is Quixote, with the big Q.’

  The boy snatches his hand away petulantly. ‘That’s not his real name—don’t you know?’

  ‘It may not be his worldly name, the name his neighbours know him by, but it is the name he chooses for himself and the name we know him by.’

  ‘It’s not his real name.’

  ‘What is his real name?’

  Abruptly the boy withdraws into himself. ‘You can go,’ he mutters. ‘I am going to read by myself.’

  ‘Very well, I will go. When you come to your senses again, when you decide you want to learn to read properly, call me. Call me and tell me the Don’s real name.’

  ‘I won’t. It’s secret.’

  Inés is absorbed in culinary tasks. She does not even look up as he leaves.

  A day passes before his next visit. He finds the boy poring over the book as before. He tries to speak, but the boy gestures impatiently—‘Ssh!’—and turns the page with a quick, whipping motion as though a snake lay behind it that might strike him.

  The picture shows Don Quixote, trussed in a cradle of rope, being lowered into a hole in the earth.

  ‘Do you want me to help? Shall I tell you what is happening?’ he asks.

  The boy nods.

  He takes up the book. ‘This is an episode called The Cave of Montesinos. Having heard much about the Cave of Montesinos, Don Quixote resolved to see for himself its famed wonders. So he instructed his friend Sancho and the learned scholar—the man with the hat must be the learned scholar—to lower him into the dark cave, and then to wait patiently for his signal to haul him up again.

  ‘For a full hour Sancho and the scholar sat waiting at the mouth of the cave.’

  ‘What is a scholar?’

  ‘A scholar is a man who has read lots of books and learned lots of things. For a full hour Sancho and the scholar sat waiting until at last they felt a tug on the rope and began to haul, and thus Don Quixote came riding up into the light.’

  ‘So Don Quixote wasn’t dead?’

  ‘No, he wasn’t dead.’

  The boy heaves a happy sigh. ‘That’s good, isn’t it?’ he says.

  ‘Yes, of course it’s good. But why did you think he was dead? He is Don Quixote. He is the hero.’

  ‘He is the hero and he is a magician. You tie him up with ropes and put him in a box and when you open the box he isn’t there, he has escaped.’

  ‘Oh, did you think Sancho and the scholar tied Don Quixote up? No, if you were to read the book instead of just looking at the pictures and guessing at the story, you would know that they use the rope to haul him out of the cave, not to tie him up. Shall I go on?’

  The boy nods.

  ‘Graciously Don Quixote thanked his friends. Then he regaled them with an account of all that had passed in the Cave of Montesinos. In the three days and three nights he had spent under the earth, he said, he had seen many wondrous sights, not least of them waterfalls whose cascades were not drops of water but sparkling diamonds, and processions of princesses in satin robes, and even, the greatest marvel of all, the Lady Dulcinea mounted on a white steed with a jewel-encrusted bridle, who stopped and kindly spoke to him.

  ‘But your honour, said Sancho, surely you are mistaken, for you were under the earth not three days and three nights but a mere hour at most.

  ‘No, Sancho, said Don Quixote gravely, three days and three nights I was absent; if it seemed to you a mere hour, that was because you fell into a slumber while you waited, and were oblivious of the passing of time.

  ‘Sancho was about to argue, but then thought better of himself, remembering how obstinate Don Quixote could be. Yes, your honour, he said, glancing at the learned scholar and winking, you must be right: for three whole days and three whole nights we two were in a slumber, until your return. But pray tell us more of the Lady Dulcinea and what passed between her and yourself.

  ‘Gravely Don Quixote regarded Sancho. Sancho, he said, O friend of little faith, when will you learn, when will you learn? And he fell silent.

  ‘Sancho scratched his head. Your honour, he said, I will not deny it is hard to believe you spent three days and three nights in the Cave of Montesinos when to us it seemed a mere hour; and so I will not deny it is hard to believe that there are at this very minute troops of princesses beneath our feet, and ladies prancing on snow-white steeds, and suchlike. Now if the Lady Dulcinea had bestowed on your honour some token of her troth, such as a ruby or a sapphire from the bridle of her mount, which you could show to miserable doubters like ourselves, it would be a different matter.

  ‘A ruby or a sapphire, mused Don Quixote. I should show you a ruby or a sapphire as proof I am not lying.

  ‘So to speak, said Sancho. So to speak.

  ‘And if I were to show you such a ruby or sapphire, Sancho, what then?

  ‘Then I would fall to my knees, your honour, and kiss your hand, and beg your pardon for ever doubting you. And I would be your faithful follower to the end of time.’

  He closes the book.

  ‘And?’ says the boy.

  ‘And nothing. That is the end of the chapter. Until tomorrow there is no more.’

  The boy takes the book from his hands, reopens it to the picture of Don Quixote in his rope truss, stares hard at the surrounding body of print. ‘Show me,’ he says in a small voice.

  ‘Show you what?’

  ‘Show me the end of the chapter.’

  He points to the end of the chapter. ‘See, here begins a new chapter, called Don Pedro y las marionetas, Don Pedro and the Puppets. The Cave of Montesinos is behind us.’

  ‘But did Don Quixote show Sancho the ruby?’

  ‘I don’t know. Señor Benengeli does not say. Perhaps he did, perhaps he didn’t.’

  ‘But really did he have a ruby? Really was he under the ground three days and three nights?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe for Don Quixote time is not as it is for us. Maybe what is for us the blink of an eyelid is for Don Quixote a whole aeon. But if you are convinced that Don Quixote ascended from the cave with rubies in his pockets, maybe you should write your own book saying so. Then we can return señor Benengeli’s book to the library and read yours instead. Unfortunately, however, before you can write your book you will have to learn to read.’

  ‘I can read.’

  ‘No, you can’t. You can look at the page and move your lips and make up stories in your head, but that is not reading. For real reading you have to submit to what is written on the page. You have to give up your own fantasies. You have to stop being silly. You have to stop being a baby.’

  Never before has he spoken so directly to the child, so harshly.

  ‘I don’t want to read your way,’ says the child. ‘I want to read my way. There was a man of double deed and nandynandynandy ne
ed, and when he rode he was a horse and when he walked he was a porse.’

  ‘That is nothing but nonsense. There is no such thing as a porse. Don Quixote is not nonsense. You can’t just make up nonsense and pretend you are reading about him.’

  ‘I can! It’s not nonsense and I can read! It’s not your book, it’s my book!’ And with a frown he returns to whipping furiously through the pages.

  ‘On the contrary, it’s señor Benengeli’s book that he gave to the world, therefore it belongs to all of us—to all of us in one sense, and to the library in another sense, but not to you alone in any sense. And stop tearing at the pages. Why are you handling the book so roughly?’

  ‘Because. Because if I don’t hurry a hole will open.’

  ‘Open up where?’

  ‘Between the pages.’

  ‘That’s nonsense. There is no such thing as a hole between the pages.’

  ‘There is a hole. It’s inside the page. You don’t see it because you don’t see anything.’

  ‘Stop that now!’ says Inés.

  For an instant he thinks she is addressing the child. For an instant he thinks she has at last aroused herself to rebuke him for his wilfulness. But no, it is he at whom she is glaring.

  ‘I thought you wanted him to learn to read,’ he says.

  ‘Not at the cost of all this bickering. Find another book. Find a simpler book. This Don Quixote is too difficult for a child. Take it back to the library.’

  ‘No!’ The boy clutches the book tightly. ‘You are not going to take it! It’s my book!’

  CHAPTER 20

  SINCE INÉS took over, the apartment has lost its once austere air. It has, in fact, become cluttered, and not only with her many possessions. Worst is the corner by the boy’s bed, where a cardboard box overflows with objects he has collected and brought home: pebbles, pine cones, withered flowers, bones, shells, bits of crockery and old metal.

  ‘Isn’t it time to throw out that mess?’ he suggests.

  ‘It’s not a mess,’ says the boy. ‘It’s things I am saving.’

  He gives the box a push with his foot. ‘It’s rubbish. You can’t save every last thing you come across.’