Hunting Midnight Read Free

had been hurled so perfectly and with such righteous force that our evildoer staggered back in shock. Falling to one knee, he seemed puzzled by what had happened, until he spotted the culprit stone sitting innocently at his feet. Looking around forthe willful David who had dared to challenge him, he soon fixed me with an enraged stare. In my frilly white shirt, black-and- red-striped breeches, and buckled boots, I was a most unlikely enemy. I even had angelic bangs back then and what my father referred to as “doelike” blue-gray eyes. Nevertheless, I took several steps backward and began to hiccup – a reaction provoked by shattered nerves that I had suffered many times before.
    I intended to scurry off if he threatened me, but instead, he turned to gaze at an urchin on the other side of the street. The lad looked at least three years my senior and wore a ragged shirt and soiled breeches. So filthy were his bare feet that they looked like roots pulled from the soil. His head was shaved.
    This was the early summer of 1800, and despite the dawn of a new century, it was still a time when children never spoke to adults without first being invited to do so. A rock hurled by a miserably clothed waif at a liveried coach driver in the service of a man of riches was tantamount to heresy.
    The injured man stood up with difficulty, dabbing at his cheek with his fingertips. Staring in disbelief at the blood left on his hand, he lurched forward. “You little son of a bitch!” he sputtered. Summoning his flagging strength, he hurled the stone with a grunt.
    The weapon sailed over and past its youthful target and rebounded off the granite facade of the house belonging to Senhor Aurelio, the shoemaker. That was the last act our evildoer was going to attempt that day. His eyeballs rolled back in his head and he crumbled to the ground, his head meeting the street with a dry thud that did not sound promising.
    I was shivering with fear and anticipation. I had never felt so alive. Imagine – a rock hurled by a filthy urchin felling an ugly brute not two hundred paces from my house!
    Senhora Beatriz was sitting up now, her arms clasped around her belly as though protecting an unborn child. She was shaking her head in confusion, plainly trying to understand what had happened. Blood flowed from her bottom lip to her chin; one of her eyes was swollen shut and would later grow infected. It became a milky marble with a cloudy gray center for the rest of her days.
    Daniel rushed to her, but she waved a trembling hand to halt his advance. “Go home,” she said, wiping her mouth. “We’ll talk later. Leave before there’s more trouble. Please.”
    He shook his head. “I will not. At least, not until that shit gets swept into a dung heap,” he said, pointing to the villain.
    Daniel’s accent gave him away as a resident of one of the crumbling riverfront neighborhoods. I was jealous of the way he seemed made for Porto, a city that had its share of gentlemen’s clubs and formal gardens but had at its heart a labyrinth of dark alleyways patrolled by peddlers, waifs, and petty thieves.
    “Daniel, pay attention to me,” Senhora Beatriz replied, drawing determined breaths. “You must leave the city. Two days from now we will meet at your home. Please, before there’s trouble …”
    The senhora would have pleaded further, but neighbors were beginning to gather. Very shortly, a group of men – some still in their night clothes, a few of them bare-chested – had formed a circle around the fallen driver.
    “Is he dead?” Senhor Tomás asked his brother-in-law Tiago the roofer, who was holding the back of his hand to the man’s nose to see if he could detect breathing.
    Various neighborwomen were now rushing to the aid of Senhora Beatriz, lifting her to her feet and making inquiries about the man and what had so incensed him.
    I moved closer to the group of men. “No, he’s still alive,” said Tiago disappointedly – a perfect start to a