Free The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier Page A

When it was all over, Bistro sat up cautiously and started to pick a few fleas out of his chest and eat them. He offered one to Jan as a peace offering.
    “Then Bistro did something to Jan that would have killed me dead of fright if I’d been in his place. He took the boy’s hand in his, lifted it to his mouth, and bit his finger. Jan stood as still as a rock. Some sixth sense which most people don’t possess must have whispered to him what the chimp was up to. It wasn’t a real bite, only a nip — and a token of friendship between the two. So the keeper explained afterwards. When Bistro gave his hand to the boy in return, Jan knew what to do. He gave it a friendly nip with his teeth.
    “Next thing I knew, Jan was leading him down the street by the chain. Only Bistro didn’t wear it like a prisoner’s chain, but with pride and glory, as if it were a chain of office.
    “That’s not quite the end of the story. Jim had fixed up the jeep and braked it properly. Now he was picking up the scattered tools, and I saw he had the boy’s wooden box, too. I strolled over to help him — or rather, to direct operations, as it doesn’t do for an officer to go down on his hands and knees. I felt a fool in front of all those people. I knew they were laughing at me.
    “Then I saw a small silver sword — sort of paper-knife — lying in the dust. It hardly looked worth bothering about, but I got Jim to pick it up.
    “Two keepers had arrived by now and were leading Bistro away. We found Jan, and Jim handed him his wooden box. Seeing the lid was loose, the boy checked through the contents in great agitation, then burst into tears. I tried to ask him what was the matter — then I remembered the silver sword and, showing it to him, asked him if he’d lost it. The cloudburst ended abruptly and out came the sun again. He seized it greedily, wrapped it up and popped it into the box amongst the other treasures. It didn’t seem to me worth all the fuss he made, but evidently he attached some importance to it.
    “I invited Jan round to my lodgings for dinner — he looked as if he hadn’t had a square meal since he was born — and he turned up promptly with three other Polish children as skinny as himself. Luckily Frau Schmidt’s larder with its army rations was equal to the occasion. One of them, a sixteen-year-old lad named Edek, with a cough like a deep-sea foghorn, spoke some German, so I learnt all about them.
    “They’re on their way to Switzerland to find their parents — started from Warsaw last month — and they don’t mind footing it all the way if they have to. Jan doesn’t really belong at all. Ruth, the eldest (about seventeen), picked him up on a slag-heap half dead and adopted him. She’s a remarkable girl, quiet and self-assured, with the most striking eyes — they have a deep serenity, a sense of purpose and moral authority quite unmistakable. No wonder they look up to her as a mother, and a leader, too.
    “Edek is brave and intelligent and looks as if he had suffered a lot — he spent nearly two years slaving for the Nazis. You can see it in his face — a kid’s face oughtn’t to be creased and pinched like his. I wonder if he’ll hold out. Switzerland’s a long way.
    “The one that took my fancy most was Bronia, the youngest. Blue eyes, very fair hair, seemed to live in a dream world — like our own Jenny, as I remember her on my last leave. I didn’t understand a word Bronia said, and she didn’t understand a word I said, but we got on fine together. If they don’t find what they’re looking for in Switzerland — and I’m afraid it may be only a mirage — I was wondering if perhaps we … But it’s no use thinking that way. I’m sure Ruth wouldn’t part with the child, and quite right, too.
    “I scrounged some clothes and army rations for them, and they left in the afternoon, singing at the top of their voices. It went right to my heart. Tomorrow they start on the next stage of their