drenched, after our boat sprang a leak halfway through the Lorban Mountains.
I don’t know why she took pity on us: she was tough and unsentimental and, from what I saw, a ruthless businesswoman. And yet she fed us and gave us a room in her attic, briskly refusing our poor payment. When Yuri offered to sing in her bar, as some kind of return, she shrugged and said he could if he liked. He did, and after the first night word spread, and her bar was full every evening following, which pleased her. But she gave us a room before she knew of Yuri’s talent, and called a carpenter to repair our boat, and loaded us with food supplies when we left, pooh-poohing any of our stumbling attempts at thanks or payment.
By then, we did not expect kindness from strangers. I thought of Kular sitting at our table in tears, telling us that he had forgotten that people could be kind, and reflected sadly that I now knew what he meant. I forgave those in want or fear, because I understood why they closed their faces against us, but it’s less easy to forgive those to whom a bed in a stable or a piece of bread was no trespass on their need. And yet people were kind to us, sometimes when we least expected it.
It took us two months to reach the city, and we arrived just before the coldest part of the winter. I sometimes wonder that we got here at all, although the truth is that we were never in serious danger. There was a lot of rain and discomfort and cold and hunger, but nothing that directly threatened our lives; nobody, not even Yuri, found out that I was not a boy, nobody tried to rob us of our few possessions, or to kidnap us, or to kill us. For the most part nobody noticed us at all.
We left the mountains and found ourselves in the plains that surround the city. Now the River was wide and lazy and full of traffic, and the water changed colour. We passed factories that poured out black smoke and leaked stinking liquids, red or black or sickly yellow, and wide broken drains that poured sewage and rubbish into the water. After both of us spent two days vomiting, we no longer dared to drink the water, and had to buy it in bottles.
We stayed nowhere for longer than a night. I still asked after Jane Watson, but there was no news: the presence of a foreigner was not so notable here. The hopelessness I had begun to feel in the mountains took hold inside me. I felt heavy with it, as if my bones were made of lead. Those were the worst days, when I could no longer see any point in continuing the journey, but couldn’t face returning home with empty hands.
When we finally reached the city, we felt neither relief nor gladness. Our first sight of the slums and shanties crowded at the edges shocked us. We were used to living among people who owned very little, but this was something we hadn’t seen before. Yet even there, among the filth and crowded despair and disease and hardship, we found kindness. Even there.
27
Yuri is quite famous now. He started singing in bars when we were living in the shantytown, and word spread, and then he got a regular spot at the Stray Dog. He saved up and bought his electric guitar, and then he had to save up some more so he could live in a house that had electricity so he could practise. I laughed at him for a long time when he came to me, wholly cast down because he couldn’t play his new possession: it was so typical of him. Luckily for Yuri, Mazita has taken over his business affairs, since he would be as helpless as a baby chick without someone to manage him. All he thinks about is his music: he doesn’t care for money or fame, except for the fact that they allow him to play what he wants.
I still smile when I remember the moment I finally revealed that I was really a girl, although it was so very painful. It was when we first reached the city and had no money to speak of, and were living on what we could earn through Yuri’s singing and odd jobs I picked up here and there, running errands or sorting
I don’t know why she took pity on us: she was tough and unsentimental and, from what I saw, a ruthless businesswoman. And yet she fed us and gave us a room in her attic, briskly refusing our poor payment. When Yuri offered to sing in her bar, as some kind of return, she shrugged and said he could if he liked. He did, and after the first night word spread, and her bar was full every evening following, which pleased her. But she gave us a room before she knew of Yuri’s talent, and called a carpenter to repair our boat, and loaded us with food supplies when we left, pooh-poohing any of our stumbling attempts at thanks or payment.
By then, we did not expect kindness from strangers. I thought of Kular sitting at our table in tears, telling us that he had forgotten that people could be kind, and reflected sadly that I now knew what he meant. I forgave those in want or fear, because I understood why they closed their faces against us, but it’s less easy to forgive those to whom a bed in a stable or a piece of bread was no trespass on their need. And yet people were kind to us, sometimes when we least expected it.
It took us two months to reach the city, and we arrived just before the coldest part of the winter. I sometimes wonder that we got here at all, although the truth is that we were never in serious danger. There was a lot of rain and discomfort and cold and hunger, but nothing that directly threatened our lives; nobody, not even Yuri, found out that I was not a boy, nobody tried to rob us of our few possessions, or to kidnap us, or to kill us. For the most part nobody noticed us at all.
We left the mountains and found ourselves in the plains that surround the city. Now the River was wide and lazy and full of traffic, and the water changed colour. We passed factories that poured out black smoke and leaked stinking liquids, red or black or sickly yellow, and wide broken drains that poured sewage and rubbish into the water. After both of us spent two days vomiting, we no longer dared to drink the water, and had to buy it in bottles.
We stayed nowhere for longer than a night. I still asked after Jane Watson, but there was no news: the presence of a foreigner was not so notable here. The hopelessness I had begun to feel in the mountains took hold inside me. I felt heavy with it, as if my bones were made of lead. Those were the worst days, when I could no longer see any point in continuing the journey, but couldn’t face returning home with empty hands.
When we finally reached the city, we felt neither relief nor gladness. Our first sight of the slums and shanties crowded at the edges shocked us. We were used to living among people who owned very little, but this was something we hadn’t seen before. Yet even there, among the filth and crowded despair and disease and hardship, we found kindness. Even there.
27
Yuri is quite famous now. He started singing in bars when we were living in the shantytown, and word spread, and then he got a regular spot at the Stray Dog. He saved up and bought his electric guitar, and then he had to save up some more so he could live in a house that had electricity so he could practise. I laughed at him for a long time when he came to me, wholly cast down because he couldn’t play his new possession: it was so typical of him. Luckily for Yuri, Mazita has taken over his business affairs, since he would be as helpless as a baby chick without someone to manage him. All he thinks about is his music: he doesn’t care for money or fame, except for the fact that they allow him to play what he wants.
I still smile when I remember the moment I finally revealed that I was really a girl, although it was so very painful. It was when we first reached the city and had no money to speak of, and were living on what we could earn through Yuri’s singing and odd jobs I picked up here and there, running errands or sorting
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