Sylvia by Bryce Courtenay Page A

not I who promised the miracle,’ I protested.
    â€˜Oh sweet Jesus!’ he exclaimed, bringing both hands up to his head.
    â€˜Do not blaspheme or we shall be the worse for it and more!’ I hissed.
    â€˜Miracle! Miracle! Miracle!’ the crowd began to chant.
    â€˜Come, lad, are you not made of stouter stuff?’ Red the Belly called out. Then addressing the crowd, ‘Last night when the cider talked, he promised to make puppy dogs fly and turn cats into tigers, turtles into turtle-doves!’
    â€˜Miracle! Miracle! Miracle!’ the crowd continued to chant.
    Reinhardt turned green before my eyes and rushing behind the oak tree brought up all of Frau Red the Belly’s splendid repast, so that the men present clapped and cheered and the woman turned their heads away and cried out in disgust.
    Then came the word ‘Trickster!’ followed by ‘Buffoon!’ – this from Red the Belly, now turned leader and the ratcatcher’s tormentor.
    The angry crowd started to draw closer. I could bear it no longer and as had happened with the Miracle of the Gloria I was not aware of my next action. Putting up my hand to command their silence I stepped forward and from my mouth came the coarse mating call of the jay; this I followed with all the mating calls of the birds I could so clearly hear in yonder woods. Soon enough they came in flocks, until the bare-leafed oak tree was clothed anew with the fresh colour and brightness of every bird that flew in the heavens. Some came to sit upon my head and shoulders, others perched along my outstretched arms, and all did sing so that no one in the crowd could hear themselves if they should speak. Then the miracle occurred. Reinhardt the Ratcatcher, all the better for the contents of his stomach missing, came to stand beside me, no doubt to accept some part of the unexpected glory of the birds. A crow flew down from a branch above and landed, wings flapping, upon his head and shat, crow shit running between his eyes and down his pretty nose. Whereupon I sang a single soprano note and the birds all rose to the sky in a vast cloud and flew away.
    The shatting of the crow was a happy coincidence but the crowd immediately took it to be two miracles of my making. The summoning of the birds the first miracle, and the crow sent by God to demonstrate that pride comes before a fall and that vanity and vaingloriousness is a sin to be punished with the shame of humiliation the second one. There is more that I shall tell of later, but the telling of the two miracles was to spread from one village to another over the ensuing months, although this time no priest or bishop was asked to verify the miracle. The village shared a church with two nearby villages and there was a great deal of jealousy between them. The folk had seen with their own eyes the birds called from the woods to clothe the naked winter oak with bright new feathered raiment and they cared not to argue the veracity of the miracle with priests and bishops when there was no other simple explanation some doubting cleric might conjure up to thwart their miracle.
    But now let me tell of the moments following the crow landing on the ratcatcher’s head. It had the immediate result of causing laughter and ridicule among the more callow folk in the crowd and so divided their attention. But the widow Johanna, who I now perceived carried some influence in the village, spoke out. ‘God has paid the piper for his male vanity! He wished to accept the credit for the miracle of the birds, when none was due to him! Let it be a lesson for all men to note that God rewards pious women with gifts of wonder just as he punishes the boastful and vainglorious man!’ With this admonition to the men and lads present she looked sternly at Reinhardt the Ratcatcher, who had found a rag in his pocket and was attempting to wipe his face. To the delight of the crowd this served only to spread the bird droppings across