The Blue Shoe

by Roderick Townley

  What would Grel do?

  He’d save her.

  He’d save her somehow, simple as that.

  Hap gave the stone a tug.

  It was fastened snugly. He tugged harder, twisting the stone with all his strength, but Grel had done his work well.

  With thumping heart, Hap ran to the workbench and grabbed his master’s shears.

  As he snipped the thread, he heard a strange sound, like a tiny moan, and the gem fell into his hand.

  A great fear swept over him then, like a cool wind— a wind from the north side of the next mountain. Hap closed his hand in a fist so he wouldn’t have to look at the stone.

  It will pay her fine, he told himself, starting back at a run. It will pay her fine.

  But what, he wondered distractedly, would he have to pay?

  Seven

  THE MAYOR GLANCED up. One eyebrow rose high as a question mark. “You again? Why do you keep tormenting us?”

  Hap looked around the crowded chamber. “I’ve come—” he began.

  “And you can go.”

  It wasn’t easy, with the mayor’s wart twitching like that, to remember what he wanted to say. Hap swallowed. “I’ve come,” he said, “to pay the fine.”

  The room fell silent.

  “Excuse me,” the mayor said. “You say you’ve come—”

  “To pay her fine, yes.”

  “And where would you get ten gold pieces?”

  “I don’t have ten gold pieces.”

  “Of course not.”

  “I was hoping this would do instead.” The boy reached out his hand and dropped the gem on the linen-covered table.

  The mayor stared at it.

  Hap stared at it.

  The stone declined to stare back. In fact, to Hap’s amazement, it had turned cloudy and gray, like a pebble you might find by the roadside.

  “What’s this?” said the mayor.

  “It’s”—Hap’s heart was beating fast—“a sapphire? Diamond, maybe?”

  The mayor of Aplanap, his gold chain of office jangling on his chest, threw back his head and laughed.

  “But it is! It was!”

  “It was! That’s rich!”

  Hap was starting to feel a little sick. “It has to be!”

  The mayor moved his face closer to the boy’s. “Why is that? Where did you get it?”

  “I found it.”

  “Tell the truth.”

  The hairs on the mayor’s wart waved like conductors’ batons. Hap couldn’t stop staring.

  “The truth!”

  Hap swallowed. “I took it from the blue shoe.”

  A gasp swept through the crowd.

  “You stole a gem from the shoe?”

  “It was only,” said Hap, “to pay the girl’s fine.”

  “I see.” The man’s eyes narrowed. “Well,” he said, “I suppose that’s to be expected—committing one crime to pay for another.”

  The boy was silent.

  “So where is it?”

  “Where is what?”

  “The gem you stole. Where is it?”

  “You’re holding it.”

  The mayor held up the dull little object. The spectators crowded closer till Hap felt their breath on his neck.

  “This is nothing!” The mayor flung the stone on the ground. “But if you’ve harmed the shoe—”

  Immediately, a small hand reached out for the stone and snatched it up. It was the beggar girl.

  “Guards!” the mayor barked.

  But the child had disappeared in the crowd.

  “Catch her!”

  There were so many legs, cloaks, elbows, and boots, it was hard for the soldiers to see. The girl was gone.

  “Never mind!” cried the mayor. “Fetch me the shoe. And the old man as well.”

  Three soldiers set off at a run. Two others held Hap’s arms. The crowd fell silent. From distant houses, cuckoo clocks began calling out the noon hour. Trees swayed outside the high windows, but inside the hall, the air was heavy and still, laden with the smells of garlic and sweat. Hap was beginning to feel faint.

  After endless minutes, the men returned, one of them holding Grel, another carrying the famous blue shoe on a pillow.

  “Ohh …,” the crowd moaned as they caught sight of it.

  The shoe was not blue anymore. It was not any particular color, unless sadness can be called a color. Before it had been amazing; now it was merely peculiar, an oddshaped, unwearable shoe, covered with knobby pebbles.

  The mayor seized it and examined it closely. “The heel!” he exclaimed. “You took it from the heel! Of all the places you could have taken it from …”

  Hap hung his head. “I thought it would be less noticeable—”

  “You destroyed it!” The mayor’s eyes rounded in outrage. “Bring me the shoemaker.”

  The guards shoved Grel forward.

  “Did you give this boy permission to take a stone from the shoe?”

  Grel had been staring at the shoe but now looked over at Hap. “Did you do this?” he said quietly.

  Hap could not lie, not to Grel. “Yes,” he said.

  Grel sighed.

  The mayor had been watching closely. “As I thought,” he concluded, giving the table a slap.

  “I’m sure he had a reason,” said Grel.

  “Of course he had a reason! He’s a thief. Thieves steal. The boy has confessed as much.” The mayor looked over the crowded room. “We’ve seen enough.”

  Grel looked up with sudden fear. “Wait.”

  “No, we will not wait. Guards, take the boy away. Tomorrow morning we’ll send him over to Mr. Slag.”

  “Who is this Slag?” said Grel.

  “Someone you’ll never meet, if you’re lucky.”

  “And what sentence have you decided on?”

  “The usual. Life at hard labor.”

  “Don’t!” Grel cried, his voice stronger.

  “It is done.”

  “He’s only a boy!”

  “That’s a temporary condition.” The mayor stood up and adjusted his vest. “Go home, old man,” he said. “We have our jobs to do. Yours is to repair the shoe. Mine is to see justice done. Court adjourned!”

  Eight

  POOR HAP! HE’D certainly got himself into a fine mess this time, and there was no one to help him. The mayor would certainly not listen to Grel. And the other citizens, much as they might like the boy personally, weren’t willing to get involved. They were afraid of the angry mayor, his angry wife, and his angry wart.

  So it was that Hap found himself crouching in a cell, awaiting deportation. Torchlight gleamed on the stones and cast shadows of jail bars across his face. From distant corridors came the echo of a shout. Then thudding boots. Then silence. Somewhere water was dripping. Hap stood and felt his way around the shadowy cell. No bed, not even a bench or basin.

  His foot found a puddle. Leaky pipe, no doubt. He knelt and scooped water in his hands. He’d had nothing to eat or drink since morning, but the water had a smell to it he didn’t trust. Better thirsty than poisoned, he thought, drying his hands on his trousers.

  He found a corner and squatted down, trying to think. But nothing came except memories: the morning’s trial and the shoe. Who would have thought taking one little stone would cause such trouble? The disappointment in his master’s eyes still haunted him. Grel’s masterpiece, destroyed. Even worse was losing his trust. Grel had taken the boy into his home, and how did Hap repay him?

  He closed his eyes, which only accentuated the sound of dripping water. He had never felt so alone.

  But then another sound reached him. A bump, or a clunk, from somewhere overhead, followed by scuffling. Rats in the air shaft? he thought. Then a louder commotion. He stood up. Whatever the thing was, it was bigger than a rat!

  He stared at the dirty ceiling. The metal vent in the middle was shaking.

  More scuffling, a dull bang, a groan of metal, and then suddenly the vent gave way and a large object
hurtled to the floor.

  Hap jumped back in panic as the thing gave out a yowl that echoed down the corridor. He waited, but whatever it was made no further sound. It lay like a lump before him.

  He stepped closer, his fists ready.

  The thing moaned.

  “What are you?” he said, as menacingly as he could.

  The creature raised its head. Even in the dark, he could see the shine of ringlets.

  “Sophia?”

  “Oooh!”

  “Sophia, are you all right?”

  She frowned, trying to see. “Hap? You mean I found you?”

  He took her by the arm to help her up. A bruise darkened her forehead. Her smock was torn.

  “How did you get here?”

  Sophia rubbed her shoulder. She’d landed pretty hard. “The, um…” She gestured vaguely. “Jon showed me where the air vents were.”

  Before she could explain further, the hallway echoed with the clatter of boots.

  Guards! They were coming in a hurry.

  “What’s going on here!” barked the first to arrive. His bare skull gleamed in the torchlight.

  Hap gestured upward. “Ceiling. Fell down and nearly killed me!”

  A second guard arrived more slowly. A heavy man in need of a shave, he shifted from side to side as he toiled along.

  “There’s a leaky pipe up there,” Hap went on. “Probably weakened the ceiling.”

  The man lifted his torch higher and peered through the bars.

  The other guard gave a grunt.

  The bald one turned narrow eyes on Hap. “You have anything to do with this?”

  “Does it look like I can reach the ceiling?”

  The man glanced around the cell and gave the bars a shake before turning away. Hap listened as the men’s footsteps diminished down the corridor.

  He’d been sitting cross-legged. Now he slowly got up.

  Sophia groaned. “You sure are heavy.” She struggled to her hands and knees.

  “I don’t think they’ll be back,” Hap said.

  “Hope not. I wouldn’t want you sitting on me again.”

  “I’m not that heavy.”

  “You’re an ox!” But she was smiling.

  It was a nice smile, and he just let it shine for a while. “Sophia, what are you doing here?”

  “I came to save you. Oh,” she said, remembering. She picked up a cloth bag she had with her.“I brought some things.”

  Out tumbled a length of rope, a round of pumpernickel, a small knife, and a pair of wool-lined boots. Hap picked up the boots. There was Grel’s little backward G on the tongue.

  “He made these for me?”

  “He worked all day on them. Just in case.”

  “In case?”

  “I couldn’t get you out of here.”

  So, Hap thought, the master has forgiven me. Relief flooded through him, even as a further thought occurred: I don’t deserve it.

  “Right now,” he said, “I’m more worried about getting you out.”

  Sophia looked up. “You were supposed to climb the rope. But now that we’re both down here…”

  “Yes.”

  She brightened. “What if I stand on your shoulders?”

  “What will that do?”

  “I could reach the ceiling and climb up. Then I could lower the rope to you.”

  “All right.”

  Climbing onto Hap’s back was easy enough, but standing on his shoulders proved a wobbly business, and Sophia kept slipping.

  “Clamp your feet around my head,” Hap whispered as she tried again.

  She stood up and pressed her ankles against his ears. That made it hard for Hap to hear, but at least Sophia didn’t fall. In a quick movement, she stepped on Hap’s head and grabbed a ceiling joist. From there, she pulled herself up.

  “Did it!” she gasped, looking down from inside the hole in the ceiling.

  “Great!” Hap was rubbing his ear where Sophia had kicked it.

  “Now grab on to the rope.”

  Hap stayed where he was. “You go on.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t want to be rescued.”

  “What! Hap, you come here right now and grab this rope! Are you crazy?”

  “Can’t do it.”

  Her face was a conflict of bewildered anger. “What are you talking about?”

  “Don’t you see?” he said. “This is perfect. They’re sending me to Mount Xexnax.”

  “You call that perfect?”

  “That’s where my father is. They’re sending me to rescue him and bring him home.”

  “You’ll just go and rescue him.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “And bring him back home.”

  “Why not?”

  “Happily ever after.”

  It occurred to Hap that Sophia wasn’t quite with him on this. But he was determined. “Sophia, you should go now.”

  “Not without you.”

  “I’ll be all right,” he said.

  “I have bread, so I won’t starve; boots, so I won’t freeze; a knife and rope—”

  “So you can stab and hang yourself. Hap, please! Think!”

  He shook his head. “I’ve got to find him.”

  “You don’t know!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You saw that turtle.”

  “You mean the one—”

  “It cut your lifeline.”

  “Sophia, it was a turtle.”

  “It was a snapping turtle. The death bringer.”

  “The what?”

  “You don’t know anything, do you? It’s right there in the book.”

  “Sophia, you got that book from your parents’ store. They sell hundreds of them to tourists. It’s not real.”

  “It’s the death bringer, and it’ll cut short your life if you go to that mountain.”

  “I don’t believe in that stuff.”

  A warm droplet landed on his wrist.

  “Come on,” he whispered, “I’ll be all right.”

  “You better be, you big lug.”

  “I will.”

  “Promise.”

  “Sure.”

  “You’ve got to say it.”

  “I promise I’ll be okay.”

  “By the power of Xexnax.”

  “Sophia—”

  “Say it!”

  “By the power of Xexnax.”

  She gave him a last look, and then her face disappeared. He listened as the rumbling in the air duct grew fainter. Finally, there was no sound at all, except the slow drip of water in the darkness.

  Nine

  NO ANNOUNCEMENT HAD been made, but dozens of townspeople gathered in the public square the next morning. They may not have come to Hap’s defense, but they did come for his send-off. You may suspect, as I do, that they felt guilty for all the times they had seen a beggar and turned their eyes away. Here was a boy who had not turned away, and he was paying for it.

  The mood in the square was so somber you’d have thought they were here for an execution. Grel was among them, and Rauf the dog, panting happily at his feet. Also Hap’s friends Jon and Rag. Rag’s parents were there, in their patched overalls. They’d gotten permission to take the morning off from quince picking.

  No sign of Sophia.

  Grel watched as a wooden cage was set in the back of the mule cart, among kegs of ale, rounds of cheese, and sacks of apples and parsnips. Finally, the boy was led out, his small satchel over his shoulder and his hands tied before him. He squinted at the knife-bright sun. The size of the crowd surprised him, and he threw them a jaunty smile.

  “God bless you!” called an old woman.

  “Don’t let them push you around!” shouted Hap’s ragged friend, Rag, waving a fist.

  “Come back to us, you hear?” cried another.

  “I will!” Hap called, stepping into the cart.

  At the sound of Hap’s voice, Rauf lifted his head. His whole hindq
uarters wiggled. “Rauf!” he said. “Rauf! Rauf!”

  Hap looked over and saw Grel. Their eyes met, and Hap mouthed the words “Thank you.”

  Grel nodded. He saw the sheepskin boots on the boy’s feet and wanted to say something, but he was slow when it came to words, and by the time he’d found them, the guards had pushed Hap into the cage and the moment was gone.

  The driver was a woman—though you might be forgiven for not realizing it right away—dressed in greasy overalls and blue work shirt, her hair held tight under a woolen cap. Broad-faced and sturdy, she was the sort you often saw in the orchards at quince-picking time. She turned and looked at the guard.

  The man snapped a padlock on the cage and stepped back. With a flick of a long stick on the mule’s back, the cart lurched into motion.

  Hap made a grab for the bars to keep his balance. He saw the town growing smaller, the faces receding. Several people waved, but he was not sure anymore who they were. It came to him that he was leaving Aplanap for the first time in his life—and perhaps the last.

  “Everybody comfy?” the driver called over her shoulder. Her voice was like dirty sand.

  Hap didn’t reply. He was slumped in the back of the cage, his head in his hands.

  “Feelin’ a little mealy, are ya?” the big woman called to him. “Happens to everybody. It’ll pass.”

  After following the paved road awhile, the driver pulled hard to the right onto a narrow wagon track that led down steep inclines and tight curves toward the wild side of the mountain. Few people took this lane, and it was not well kept up. The driver had to steer around rocks that had tumbled onto the path.

  From his cage in the back, Hap could see where they’d been, not where they were going, so he was unaware of how close they were getting to Mount Xexnax until its shadow fell across the wagon and the temperature suddenly dipped.

  He had no preparation when the cart lurched to the right, flinging him against the bars and dislodging a large sack of apples, a crate of pickaxes, and a rolled-up carpet. If it hadn’t been for the cage, he’d have been crushed.

  “Sorry ’bout that one,” shouted the driver.

  “It’s all right,” Hap called back.

  The woman grunted. With all the rocks to watch out for in the road, she had no time for talk.

  But then she gave another grunt. Or did she? It didn’t sound like her voice, and it didn’t sound like it was coming from the front.