The Season of Migration by Nellie Hermann Page A

You lined up the next group of swimmers for the next race. Your face was radiant, and the lake stretched out before us.
    Nathen laughed at something Alard said; I saw him throw back his head and fall to the grass, his mouth open with glee. The look on Alard’s face was pure surprise for a moment—he was amazed that he amused his brother enough for such a response—and then pure joy. They were two brothers, laughing.
    I thought of you while I watched the two boys, thought of you embarked on a career at Goupil’s selling art, just as I once did; you now treading the same floors and galleries, but getting commendations, raises, and promotions rather than scoldings, rebukes, and transfers from one place to another.
    Do you remember when Mother used to paint those canvases in the garden in the back of the parsonage, canvas after canvas of blooming flowers, never anything else? So many afternoons the group of us would sit back there with her, sitting or playing quietly lest we disturb her. And when her mood turned dark, as it inevitably did, and she set aside her painting and went inside, she closed her bedroom door behind her and we could all hear her cries through the wood. None of us knew what to do, not even Father, to comfort her, except for you. Knocking gently, you let yourself in and after a few minutes the crying always ceased. It was the same if you were ever upset—you were the one she thought worthy of comforting. She never once held me the way she did you.
    I punished you more than you deserved for this, for being my brother, for being younger and more at ease, for being the one with father’s name, rather than the name of Uncle Cent and of that baby in the cemetery out back. I made you sleep on the floor, when I was angry and feeling spiteful; I made you do things that I wouldn’t dare to do: sneak coins from Pa’s coat pockets, steal milk from farmers’ pails, or just-sheared wool from local barns. And you did these things for me, bringing me your loot like a dog bringing his master a bone, and I turned on you, showing the proof to our parents, standing before you like an accuser, like a man who knew righteousness. And though both of us were punished, you never turned on me as I did on you.
    I can easily conjure up the strange pleasure that came from punishing you: peering down at you from the bed while you slept on the floor, feeling a curious mixture of guilt and pride and rage.
    I repent for all of this, now. I think of it and I don’t understand it. I wish to tell you I am sorry for it, but then I think of what you said to me when you came to visit, that all I’ve been doing in the Borinage is “idling,” and I fear I would do it all over again.
    And do you remember this? One day when we were boys, maybe eleven and seven, we were playing by a canal somewhere near home. I had stolen Pa’s pocketknife and showed you how to whittle small branches torn off elm trees into little spears; we were using the spears to fish in the canal. Lying on our stomachs on the bank, leaning out as far as we could over the water, peering into the darkness to see a fish swim by. I thought I saw one—a shadow turned in the water, something dark turned darker, and I thrust my spear as fast as I could into the depths. Nothing. The spear floated back to the surface and I had to reach quickly to stop it from drifting away. It happened like that over and over again: nothing, nothing, nothing, the fish effortlessly slipping away.
    I looked up at you, whom I had forgotten in my concentration. You had your face in the water, your spear poised above your head. Why hadn’t I thought of that? All of a sudden your spear went down, you were lightning fast, and you sat up with a fish. Your face and arm dripping, you grinned at me and held it up. It was a little fish, not as big as your forearm. “I did it!” you squealed.
    Anger and jealousy flooded me; the sight of your grinning