Free Foe by J.M. Coetzee

respond?
    'I
brought out my second sketch. Again there was depicted little Friday,
his arms stretched behind him, his mouth wide open; but now the man
with the knife was a slave-trader, a tall black man clad in a
burnous, and the knife was sickle-shaped. Behind this Moor waved the
palm-trees of Africa. "Slave-trader," I said, pointing to
the man. "Man who catches boys and sells them as slaves. Did a
slave-trader cut out your tongue, Friday? Was it a slave-trader or
Master Cruso?"
    'But
Friday's gaze remained vacant, and I began to grow disheartened. Who,
after all, was to say he did not lose his tongue at the age when
boy-children among the Jews are cut; and, if so, how could he
remember the loss? Who was to say there do not exist entire tribes in
Africa among whom the men are mute and speech is reserved to women?
Why should it not be so? The world is more various than we ever give
it credit for -that is one of the lessons I was taught by Bahia. Why
should such tribes not exist, and procreate, and flourish, and be
content?
    'Or
if there was indeed a slave-trader, a Moorish slave-trader with a
hooked knife, was my picture of him at all like the Moor Friday
remembered? Are Moors all tall and clad in white burnouses? Perhaps
the Moor gave orders to a trusty slave to cut out the tongues of the
captives, a wizened black slave in a loin-cloth. "Is this a
faithful representation of the man who cut out your tongue?"-was
that what Friday, in his way, understood me to be asking? If so, what
answer could he give but No? And even if it was a Moor who cut out
his tongue, his Moor was likely an inch taller than mine, or an inch
shorter; wore black or blue, not white; was bearded, not dean-shaven;
had a straight knife, not a curved one; and so forth.
    'So,
standing before Friday, I slowly tore up my pictures. A long silence
fell. For the 6rst time I noted how long Friday's 6ngers were, folded
on the shaft of the spade. "Ah, Friday!" I said. "Shipwreck
is a great leveller, and so is destitution, but we_ are not. level
enough yet." And then, though no reply came nor ever would, I
went on, giving voice to all that lay in my heart. "I am wasting
my life on you, Friday, on you and your foolish story. I mean no
hurt, but it is true. When I am an old woman I will look back on this
as a great waste of time, a time of being wasted by time. What are we
doing here, you and I, among the sober burgesses of Newington,
waiting for a man who will never come back?"
    'If
Friday had been anyone else, I would have wished him to take me in
his arms and comfort me, for seldom had I felt so miserable. But
Friday stood like a statue. I have no doubt that amongst Africans the
human sympathies move as readily as amongst us. But the unnatural
years Friday had spent with Cruso had deadened his bean, making him
cold, incurious, like an animal wrapt entirely in itself. •
    'June 1st
    'During
the reign of the bailiffs, as you will understand, the neighbours
shunned your house. But today a gentleman who introduced himself as
Mr Summers called. I thought it prudent to tell him I was the new
housekeeper and Friday the gardener. I was plausible enough, I
believe, to convince him we are not gipsies who have chanced on an
empty house and settled in. The house itself is clean and neat, even
the library, and Friday was at work in the garden, so the lie did not
seem too great.
    'I
wonder sometimes whether you do not wait impatiently in your quarter
of London for tidings that the castaways are at last flitten and you
are free to come home. Do you have spies who peer in at the windows
to see whether we are still in occupation? Do you pass by the house
yourself daily in thick disguise? Is the truth that your hiding-place
is not in the back alleys of Shoreditch or Whitechapel, as we all
surmise, but in this sunny village itself? Is Mr Summers of your
party? Have you taken up residence in his attic, where you pass the
time perusing through a spyglass the life we lead? If so, you