Out in the Open Read Free Page A

came to the same thing, returning to his family. He knew that by keeping on in the same direction, sooner or later he would come across someone or something. It was just a matter of time. He might walk right round the world and end up back in his village, but, by then, it wouldn’t matter. His fists would be as hard as rocks. More than that, his fists would
be
rocks. He would have wandered almost eternally and, even if he met no one else, he would have learned enough about himself and the earth for the bailiff never to be able to have him in his power again. He wondered if he would ever be capable of forgiving. If, once he had crossed the icy Pole, penetrated dense forests and traversed other wildernesses, the flame that had burned him inside would still be burning. Perhaps, by then, the desperation that had driven him from the home God had intended for him would have dissipated. It might be that distance, time and ceaseless contact with the earth would have smoothed away his rough edges and calmed him down. He remembered the cardboard globe at school. The large sphere wobbled about on its rickety wooden stand, but it was easy enough to find their village on it, because, year upon year, the fingers of several generations of children had worn away the spot, indeed, had erased the whole country and the surrounding sea.
    In the distance, he could make out what appeared to be a bonfire and he wondered how far away it was. He stopped and tried to calculate, but in the indecipherable darkness, it was impossible to judge. What he imagined to be a distant bonfire could just as easily, he thought, be the flame of a match only a few yards ahead or even a whole house ablaze miles away.
    Like an Indian dazzled by the glittering trinkets offered him by a conquistador, he headed towards that one luminous point. For more than an hour he tramped over clods of earth and over stones. The wind was in his face, which meant that if the person who had lit the fire owned dogs, they would only notice his presence if he made a noise. He had no clear objective in approaching that point of light. The fire might belong to a shepherd, a muleteer or a bandit. He hoped that, as he approached, the light from the fire would bring him the necessary information. The idea of coming face-to-face with a criminal terrified him, and who knows what mangy dogs would be sleeping around that fire? On the other hand, he did know that he was going to need food and water from whoever had lit that fire. Whether he would ask for it or be obliged to steal it was something he would decide when he knew just who it was he was dealing with. He heard a chorus of what sounded like tinkling bells coming from that direction and this reassured him. He still took extreme caution when covering the last few yards, placing his feet as gently on the ground as if he were walking on a bed of rose petals. Shortly before he reached the encampment, he found a clump of prickly pears and hid behind them to observe the scene.
    On the other side of the fire, facing the flames, a man was lying on the ground, although the boy still couldn’t tell how old he was because a blanket covered his whole body, from top to toe. A gentle glow, like a distant ember, was beginning to appear above the horizon, revealing the shapes of trees that the night had kept hidden. He thought he could make out several poplar trees and assumed that the herd of goats was there for the same reason that the trees were. A goat emerged out of the darkness and walked behind the goatherd before disappearing into the pre-dawn shadows. Its bell drew a line of sounds in the air like a piece of knotted string. To one side lay a donkey, its legs folded meekly beneath its chest. Scattered around, he could see the motionless bodies of goats, which would doubtless soon wake up. At the man’s feet lay a bag and a small dog curled up asleep.
    The now faint light from the fire made the shadows dance like black flames. The boy