by A. J. Cronin
Left alone, Nicholas stretched himself with a groan of pleasure, then rolled about the big bed, overcome by his good luck, hugging the thought of the precious hours he would spend with José, quite undisturbed, without surveillance.…
“And tomorrow too!” he shouted to the woolly dog. “ Perhaps even Monday!”
Leaping up, he finished his breakfast, while dressing, in little snatches, glancing from time to time through the window towards the myrtle grove where José had already begun his steady round. Then, with commendable control, he sat down at his little writing table and dashed off a few lines.
Dear José,—Father has gone to Madrid for at least three days. Garcia is away also. Isn’t it wonderful? I won’t be disobedient. No working or talking—but I mean to be with you all the time. Hurrah!
Your own , Nicco.
A moment later he was beside José, proffering the note, accepting with a breathless smile his friend’s answering pantomime of delight.
All that morning they were together. Most of the rocks had now been moved and the work of filling the crevices of this foundation with soil was not too arduous. When José trundled the wheelbarrow, Nicholas trotted at his heels. While he spaded out the soft earth the little boy sat on a stone, watching, with his chin in his hands, waiting for that heart-warming smile which he knew would come to him. Occasionally José made him laugh outrageously by pretending to talk, moving his lips extravagantly but entirely without words, and ending by blowing out his cheeks in a loud, explosive ‘pop.’
As the day advanced, however, José’s manner became increasingly preoccupied—something important and mysterious was in his mind. Finally, he put aside the spade, sat down, fumbled for his pencil stub and, while Nicholas looked eagerly over his shoulder, moistened the lead and wrote these splendid words:
Why not come fishing with me tomorrow? I can arrange it with Magdalena.
Even as the little boy gasped in startled rapture, José got up and went through the laurel bushes to the back door. Presently Nicholas heard their voices, Magdalena’s and the gardener’s, in animated conversation, then came laughter, and more pleasant, friendly talk. How good José was at getting on with people! Everyone liked him, Nicholas reflected, except, unfortunately, Garcia and his father. He was certainly a favourite with Magdalena, who rewarded him for emptying her refuse-cans—a duty that was Garcia’s—by handing him a hunk of pastelena when nobody was looking. But could he win her round now? With straining ears, Nicholas listened. The door had closed, José was now returning, with unhurried step … and yes, it was all right, he had done it … one look at his friend’s face revealed the happy tidings.
Oh joy, oh inexplicable bliss of this sunlit day and of the greater promise of to-morrow. The happy somnolence of the afternoon was imperishable. The sun drew up the colour of the garden, drenched him with its brightness and its fragrance. Valerian, peonies and lilac made even the shadows glow. A swarm of bees hummed about the honeyed trumpets of a purple creeper that hung from the old catalpa tree. The mountains, in the crystal distance, were blue as flashing steel. This feeling, this warmth in his childish heart—he could not grasp its meaning, but wished only to lose himself, with breathless longing, in its innocent radiance.
Next morning, at eight o’clock, a handful of gravel rattled against his shutters. Only lightly asleep, he sprang out of bed, threw on his clothes, all arranged ready to his hand upon a chair, and went bounding downstairs. In the dim hall he found the wicker basket, covered by a white napkin, which Magdalena had packed for him the night before. Seizing it under his arm, he drew back the heavy bolts, tugged the front door open and, rushing out, dazzled by the level sunshine, almost fell into his friend’s arms.
José carried two long bamboo rods and a home-made knapsack upon his shoulder and wore, besides his big garden boots, an old poncho fashioned of sailcloth. As they set out together along the lane which led to the main road, he made a little smiling sign to Nicholas that they must hurry. And indeed, they were only just in time for, when they reached the corner, a wheezing chatter of ancient machinery fell upon the ears and immediately the Torrido country bus came in sight.
The bus, which jerked to a halt at José’s summons, was extremely crowded, but a place was made for them at the back into which they squeezed, amidst much laughter. They were a gay company in this Sunday bus. Many were going to visit relatives at the little hill farms—working men in flat hats and stiff black boleros accompanied by their wives, swathed in innumerable petticoats, with coloured handkerchiefs bound about their heads and many packages at their feet, bottles of manzanilla wrapped in pink paper, wicker baskets of eggs, ripe apricots and pomegranates, fresh-made quesadilla. Others, like José, had rods and fishing bags beside them. Some carried queer little cages in which they were going to catch crickets. One, a long lean fellow, a bit of a clown, draped in a great plaid cape, who was eating a sausage with hungry bites, had a gun with a tremendous barrel. An old man with a goatskin of wine was already beginning to make fiesta.
José had been recognised at once, received, in fact, with general acclaim, and immediately he was the centre of an animated conversation. The prospects for the next pelota game were discussed. Some thought that Jaime, the veteran, should be replaced, but José staunchly supported his partner. Then the goatskin was passed round. Each man raised it up and, throwing back his head, spirited a thin red stream expertly into the deep recesses of his throat. After that, the laughter increased, and many jokes were made, especially against the man with the long gun, who also had a long nose. But the raillery was jovial and good-natured, and the little boy who had never been allowed to mix with ‘common people’ could not help reflecting how different it was from what he had believed, how jolly and free. Nor could he altogether suppress the thought of how changed all this would have been had his father been here, how the Consul would have chilled this friendly warmth with his grave and formal presence.
By this time they had left the sandy vineyards and the quiet lowland groves where the docile olives stood in rows, and were amongst the wilder stretches of the Torrida foothills. Slowly, in its lowest gear, the bus began to climb the steeper gradients, passing slower, plodding donkeys jingling with ornament, winding round the shoulders of hills lighted by yellow broom. Every now and then it stopped to allow some of the passengers to descend at a wayside posada or a little farm, which, Nicholas decided, was a lucky thing since it gave the old machine a chance to recover its breath. He was very excited now, perched on the edge of the seat, peering through the grey beeches and cork oaks for his first sight of the river. Occasionally, as they went grinding up, higher and higher into the mountains, he glanced at the half-dozen passengers remaining in the bus, all of them anglers, wondering, a little jealously, if there would be space for everyone on the bank. But José, interpreting that look, shook his head gently to indicate that he need not worry. And indeed, at the next village, opposite the inn, all the others got off, with many hearty farewells, leaving the two of them alone.
When the bus restarted José gazed at his companion in a manner peculiarly direct and, with a start of intuition, Nicholas sensed that he was about to break the bond of silence which lay between them.
“Nicco,” said José, nodding reassuringly as the little boy drew back., “ Yes … I am speaking to you. Not to do so would be childish. And dangerous too. We are going to the river. I must tell you what to do.” He smiled. “ I don’t want you to fall in. Your father would blame me more for that than for talking. But you … you need not speak a word.”
Wide-eyed, Nicholas stared back at his friend. Suddenly a responsive wave, poignant with affection, overcame him.
“I will speak, José.” The words came tumbling hotly out. “If you speak, I’ll speak too.”
“Well then,” said José with a deepening of his gentle smile, “we shall be like men and not like timid children. Also we shall enjoy ourselves much better. Come now, this is where we descend.”
He gathered up h
is rods and knapsack, and helped Nicholas to the front of the bus where, leaning forward, he tapped on the cracked glass partition. As they drew up, he leaped out and the next instant, reaching up a long arm, had his companion beside him. They waved to the driver who looked out of his wooden box to shout “ Good luck!” then, as the vehicle lurched away, turned off the dusty road into a meadow overgrown with pale new bracken.
Although the sun shone brilliantly, the air was cool and crisp, spicy with the scent of thyme and resin. Ahead of them were those peaks which from below had appeared to offer themselves but which now, though sharp and clear, seamed with the silver threads of waterfalls, withdrew as they advanced, remained majestic and inaccessible, their grey flanks and hollow cheeks caressed cautiously by the sunlight, yielding to no one and to nothing save where, high, high amidst the naked boulders, the pines had made a retreat in solitude for themselves.
The purity of the light was dazzling. Looking back across his shoulder Nicholas could see on a ridge to the left a tiny village which seemed cut out of air, then, further down, the little square patches of fields and vineyards and, beyond, a different haze which was the sea, so far below him that he felt himself on the summit of the world.
Tramping through the mitred bracken which brushed and tickled his bare knees, Nicholas took a long, full breath of the delicious freshness.
“It’s a wonderful day, José.”
“Yes,” José agreed, with a little twist to his lips. “ But I think too bright for fishing. However, we shall see.”
They were in a wood now and going downhill through beech trees that grew large and wide apart on rough grassland where some goats were grazing, incurious of their approach. But suddenly they came through this belt into the open, and there, stretching out almost at their feet, was a green valley, with the broad river swirling past an old greystone watermill, and foaming over the dam into a wide pool beyond.
“This is the place,” José said in an off-hand voice, yet with secret pride.
“Oh, José!” Nicholas exclaimed. “ It’s the nicest ever. Why don’t the others come here?”
“Too far from the inn.” José laughed. “They wish to drink as well as fish.”
He set the pace down the path to the mill, hurrying slightly from his own excitement, Nicholas leaping, skipping on his toes, beside him. It was warmer in the valley, and clumps of wild blue irises, with cowslips, yellow as butter, grew on the grassy slopes. The mill, Nicholas could now see, was a ruin, with no roof, beyond a few stark rafters, and a motionless moss-covered wheel, but this merely increased the splendid sense of privacy which lay upon the valley.
On the stone steps of the mill, facing the river, José laid down his gear and began to thread a light line through each of the bamboos. They were the cheapest kind of rods, with wooden reels, but José treated them with loving care, although his fingers trembled with eagerness as he tied on the long gut leaders.
“You like to fish, don’t you, José?” Nicholas asked.
“Most emphatically, amigo,” José nodded, blithely. “Don’t you?”
“I love it,” Nicholas answered. “Only I’ve never had the chance.”
“You will now.” José smiled. “Look, Nicco, my friend, you are not yet large enough to throw a fly, so you will fish with bait.… Wait now.… I shall show you something which the trout are crazy about.”
He drew from his knapsack a smooth round tin, removed the lid, and shook into his palm a fat meal maggot which, with solicitude, he baited on the hook. Then, taking Nicholas by the hand, he led him a short way out on the stone dam, seated him comfortably, with his legs dangling, threw the leaded line into the pool and gave him the rod.
“There,” he said. “If you feel a bite, pull hard.”
“You won’t go far away?”
“No, no, amigo.” He pointed to the broken water above the dam. “Only up there.”
At first Nicholas sat stiff and tense, holding the rod tight with both hands, his head giddy with the rush of white water over the weir, a little fearful that he might fall in. Gradually, however, a glow of confidence stole over him. How wonderful it was to be treated as a boy, an ordinary boy, and not as a puny, ailing child. Carefully, so as not to lose his balance, he turned his head and looked upstream where, knee-deep in the foaming current, José stood working his long rod, the line curving in a graceful sweep as it rose and fell in the clear air. Once he thought he saw a trout leap high in the rapids. He could not tell. The crumbling mortar on the wall was warm beneath him. Ferns were growing from the cracks, and a rough grey lichen encrusted the old stones.
Suddenly he started. He had not felt the trout bite, but all at once his rod had come alive, bending and quivering in a lively arc, imparting to him from beneath the surface of the pool a delirious sense of weight and motion.
“I’ve got one,” he gasped, turning white to the lips. Instinctively, in a flurry of panic, he gazed towards José, now with his back turned about a hundred yards away, separated by a roaring waste of water. Impossible to call for help. He must do it all himself. Desperately, he clung to the rod while the clumsy wooden reel whirred and bumped against his chest. The trout was fighting like mad, tearing about in wild rushes in the foamy cataract, then burrowing deep down towards the sandy bottom, as though at any second it might break loose. Suddenly it jumped clean out of the water, landing back with a smack, which brought the little boy’s heart into his throat.
“Oh, what a beauty,” he panted to himself. “ Oh, please God, don’t let him get away.”
Carefully, carefully, he began to wind up the reel. The trout was tiring now. Nicholas could see the thick, thrilling curve of its speckled body just beneath the surface. Trembling all over, he got to his feet and stumbled back along the dam to the bank which, a few paces downstream, sloped gently into the pool. Here, winding in still more, he towed the trout towards the shallows, then, with a final convulsive tug, brought it safely to the shingle.
He had done it, he had caught this splendid trout all by himself. His first impulse was to run feverishly to José, to tell him the great news. But a new sense of self-mastery withheld him. Steeling himself, he knelt and unhooked the trout, stilled it with a hard bang on the head, then laid it amongst some ferns in the shadow of the mill steps. A moment later he was back on the dam, his line rebaited, waiting, with sparkling eyes, for the next trout to strike.
When José came down after one o’clock, Nicholas had two more fish neatly placed beside the first, not quite so large perhaps, but good trout all the same.
“Any luck?” asked José.
Then the little boy’s restraint broke down. He wound in his line, rushed to the bank and, seizing José by the arm, dragged him bodily towards his catch.
“Look, José, look! Aren’t they beauties? I got the biggest first. Oh, it was tremendous! I was scared to death. But I did it. Took the hook out and everything. I tell you I’ve never had such fun in all my life. But I’m sorry, José. I quite forgot. Did you get any?”
It turned out that José had four in his knapsack, but he did not make a show of them. He seemed too happy at Nicholas’ success. His trousers were wringing wet, and his face streaked with sweat.
“Now,” he smiled, “it is time for us to eat. I hope your appetite is as great as mine.”
He sat down on the steps, took some coarse bread, a wedge of cheese wrapped in newspaper, and a raw onion from his knapsack, then, opening his big clasp-knife with a flourish, made a quick sign of the Cross. Nicholas, recollecting he had eaten no breakfast, suddenly discovered that he was starving. He took his place beside José and uncovered the wicker basket, shamed a little by the spotless white napkin, and by all the good things Magdalena had packed for him—the hard-boiled eggs and cold chicken, with rolls and butter, fresh fruits, and a section of comb honey—yet rejoicing, too, that he would be able to offer them to his dear friend.
At first José refused to touch these unusual delicacies but, seeing the hurt disappointment
in Nicholas’s eyes, he laughed a little awkwardly, and gave in, suggesting that they share their food. It was a good meal, eaten in the warm sun, close to the earth, with the sound of the river in their ears. Nicholas found the black bread and onion much tastier than he had expected and he could see, from the manner in which he polished the bone with his white teeth, that José enjoyed the chicken. Every now and then he cast glances at his trout, lying cool in the fern. They talked about fishing and José explained where the trout lay at various seasons of the year, sometimes in fast water, sometimes in slack, and how one must tempt them with the proper lure, a tiny fly in the dry weather, a spinning minnow in the flood. He told of past expeditions, of setting night-lines, and how once he had hooked a huge cannibal pike, the grandfather of them all, played him for an hour, then lost him in the weeds.
Nicholas could have listened to this entrancing talk for ever, but José, discerning with a shrewd glance signs of tiredness in the child’s face, suddenly stood up.
“Mustn’t forget that you rose very early, amigo. It is time for your siesta.”
Waving aside all protests, he cut an armful of the soft bracken with his knife, spread this in the shadow of the mill, and covered it with his poncho.
“There,” he said. “See if it is comfortable … little one who pretends to be sick.”
Obediently, Nicholas stretched out his limbs, which were stinging and glowing with healthy tiredness. Placing his hands under his head, he watched José go to the river, wash the plates and cutlery, and replace them in Magdalena’s basket. Then he saw him pluck fresh fern and some stalks of wild mint and pack in the trout as well. The beech trees and the cork oaks had taken on their midday silver glitter. Languor and stillness enclosed the valley. A bird called lazily in the golden air. The sound was warm and drowsy. He closed his eyes.
When José came back, Nicholas, flat on his back, was fast asleep. And as he gazed at that supine form, so fragile and defenceless, José, who had meant to take his rod and try the streams below the weir, abruptly changed his mind. Instead, as though under a strange compulsion, he settled down, silently, on the ground, close to the little boy, while his dark, gentle eyes, made darker by a deep compassion, remained fixed upon that unconscious face, a trifle pale beneath its freckles, the soft cheeks shadowed by long curly lashes, the milky teeth showing beneath the short upper lip.
