The Childhood of Jesus Read Online Free Page B

search for your mother. Ana will help us. Once we have found your mother, you won’t have any more thoughts about going back.’
    â€˜Is my mother here?’
    â€˜She is somewhere nearby, waiting for you. She has been waiting a long time. All will become clear as soon as you lay eyes on her. You will remember her and she will remember you. You may think you are washed clean, but you aren’t. You still have your memories, they are just buried, temporarily. Now we must get off. This is our stop.’
    The boy has befriended one of the carthorses, to whom he has given the name El Rey. Though he is tiny compared with El Rey, he is quite unafraid. Standing on tiptoe, he proffers handfuls of hay, which the huge beast bends down lazily to accept.
    Ãlvaro cuts a hole in one of the bags they have unloaded, allowing grain to trickle out. ‘Here, feed this to El Rey and his friend,’ he tells the boy. ‘But be careful not to feed them too much, otherwise their tummies will blow up like balloons and we will have to prick them with a pin.’
    El Rey and his friend are in fact mares, but Álvaro, he notes, does not correct the boy.
    His fellow stevedores are friendly enough but strangely incurious. No one asks where they come from or where they are staying. He guesses that they take him to be the boy’s father—or perhaps, like Ana at the Centre, his grandfather. El viejo. No one asks where the boy’s mother is or why he has to spend all day hanging around the docks.
    There is a small wooden shed at the quayside which the men use as a dressing room. Though the door has no lock, they seem happy to store their overalls and boots there. He asks one of the men where he can buy overalls and boots of his own. The man writes an address on a scrap of paper.
    What can one expect to pay for a pair of boots? he asks.
    â€˜Two, maybe three reals,’ says the man.
    â€˜That seems very little,’ he says. ‘By the way, my name is Simón.’
    â€˜Eugenio,’ says the man.
    â€˜May I ask, Eugenio, are you married? Do you have children?’
    Eugenio shakes his head.
    â€˜Well, you are still young,’ he says.
    â€˜Yes,’ says Eugenio non-committally.
    He waits to be asked about the boy—the boy who may seem to be his son or grandson but in fact is not. He waits to be asked the boy’s name, his age, why he is not at school. He waits in vain.
    â€˜David, the child I am looking after, is still too young to go to school,’ he says. ‘Do you know anything about schools around here? Is there’—he hunts for the term—‘ un jardin para los niños ?’
    â€˜Do you mean a playground?’
    â€˜No, a school for the younger children. A school before proper school.’
    â€˜Sorry, I can’t help you.’ Eugenio rises. ‘Time to get back to work.’
    The next day, just as the whistle blows for the lunch break, a stranger comes riding up on a bicycle. With his hat, black suit and tie he looks out of place on the quayside. He dismounts, greets Álvaro familiarly. His trouser-cuffs are pinned back with bicycle clips, which he neglects to remove.
    â€˜That’s the paymaster,’ says a voice beside him. It is Eugenio.
    The paymaster slackens the straps on his bicycle rack and removes an oilcloth, revealing a green-painted metal cashbox, which he sets down on an upended drum. Álvaro beckons the men over. One by one they step forward, speak their names, and are given their wages. He joins the end of the line, waits his turn. ‘Simón is the name,’ he says to the paymaster. ‘I am new, I may not be on your list yet.’
    â€˜Yes, here you are,’ says the paymaster, and ticks off his name. He counts out the money in coins, so many that they weigh down his pockets.
    â€˜Thank you,’ he says.
    â€˜You’re welcome. It’s your due.’
    Ãlvaro rolls the drum away. The paymaster