Chronicle in Stone Read Free Page A

our reservoir.
    The raindrops spent tedious days and months below, until my mother, bucket in hand, would draw them out, disoriented and dazed from the darkness, to wash our clothes, the stairs, the floor.
    But for the moment they knew nothing of their fate. They ran happily and noisily across the slates, and I felt sorry for them as I listened to their wild chattering.
    When it rained three or four days in a row, my father would push the gutter-pipe aside to keep the cistern from overflowing. It was a very large cistern, extending under most of our house, and if it ever overflowed, it could flood the cellar and wreck the foundation. As our city was all askew, anything could happen then.
    As I lay wondering whether people or water suffered more in captivity, I heard footsteps and then the voice of my grandmother in the next room.
    “Hurry, get up. You forgot to shift the down pipe.”
    My father and mother leapt from their bed in alarm. Papa, in his long white drawers, ran down the dark hallway, opened the little window, and pushed the pipe aside with a long stick. Now we could hear the water splattering into the yard.
    Mamma lit the kerosene lamp and led Papa and Grandmother downstairs. I went to the window and tried to see out. The wind was furious, dashing the rain against the windowpanes, making the eaves groan.
    I was too curious to stay in bed and I ran downstairs to see what was happening. All three grown-ups looked worried. They did not even notice I was there. They had taken the cover off the cistern and were trying to see how high the water had risen. Mamma was holding the lamp while Papa leaned over the side and peered in.
    I shivered all over and caught hold of Grandmother’s dress. She put her hand on my head affectionately. The wind shook the doors inside and out.
    “What a downpour,” Grandmother said.
    Papa, bent over, was still trying to see inside the cistern.
    “Get a newspaper,” he told my mother.
    She did. He crumpled it up, lit it, and dropped it into the cistern.
    “The water’s almost up to the rim,” Papa said.
    Grandmother started murmuring prayers.
    “Quick,” my father cried, “the lantern.”
    Mamma, pale as wax, her hands trembling, lit the lamp. Papa threw a black raincoat over his head, took the lamp, and headed for the door. Mamma tossed an old dress over her head and went after him.
    “Where did they go, Grandmother?” I asked, frightened.
    “Don’t be scared,” she replied. “Neighbours will come to help with bailing out, and then the cistern will calm down . . .” Her voice became rhythmical, as if she was whispering an old tale: “In this world, each ill has its cure. Only death, my dear boy, has no remedy.”
    Muffled knocks at a door sounded through the rumbling of rain. Then again, and yet again.
    “How can we lower the water, Grandmother?”
    “With buckets, dear boy.”
    I went to the opening and looked down. Darkness. Darkness and a feeling of terror.
    “A-oo,” I said softly. But the cistern didn’t answer. It was the first time it had refused to answer me. I liked the cistern a lot and often leaned over its rim and had long talks with it. It had always been quick to answer me in its deep, cavernous voice.
    “A-oo,” I said again, but still it was silent. I thought it must have been very angry.
    I thought about how the countless raindrops were gathering their rage down below, the old ones that had been languishing there so long getting together with the newcomers, the drops unleashed by tonight’s storm, plotting something evil. Too bad Papa had forgotten to move the pipe. The waters of the storm never should have been let into our well-behaved cistern to stir up rebellion.
    There was a noise at the door. Xhexho, Mane Voco and Nazo came in, with Nazo’s daughter-in-law in tow. Then Papa came in, and Mamma, shivering with cold. The door creaked open again. This time it was Javer and Maksut, Nazo’s son, carrying a big bucket.
    I was glad to see so many