Free Out in the Open by Jesús Carrasco Page B

adventurous daydreams. When the boy had finished, the old man said there was no point in hunting rabbits, because in order to cook them they would have to make a fire and that could attract the men who were looking for him. The boy felt deflated by this negative response, because he had thought that, for once, he had something to offer that man who seemed to know everything. Indeed, he was so discouraged that he didn’t even take in what the old man had just said to him.
    They spent the rest of the day apart. The goatherd with his Bible and the boy with the dog on the other side of the wall. As darkness fell, the old man used his crook to get hold of the food pouch, from which he took out a crust of bread and the last of the rancid almonds. While he was waiting for the boy to return, he tried to crack open the almonds with two stones. His hands were trembling so much, though, that he couldn’t get the shells in the right position. On one attempt he hit his own fingers and the pain made him snort with rage. When the sun had almost set, the boy returned to the old man’s side. He was carrying a stick in one hand and a rabbit in the other. The dog was scampering around him.
    Despite his aching bones, it was the old man who took charge of skinning the rabbit. He weighed it in his hands and, for a moment, seemed very pleased with the specimen. Then he made a few cuts in the creature’s legs and abdomen and pulled off the skin leaving the animal naked. He threw the innards to the dog, then asked the boy to help him to his feet. They went over to the tower and, while the old man was making a fireplace out of stones, the boy went in search of kindling. They roasted the rabbit just as they had the rat. They did not speak during supper, too busy gnawing every last scrap of meat off the bones. When they had finished, the old man rolled a cigarette and the boy took charge of dousing the fire and getting rid of the bones and skin. It was then, while he was burying the remains far from the castle, that he recalled what the old man had said about the dangers of lighting a fire. He completed his burial of the remains by scuffing up earth onto the grave with his boots, then he rejoined the goatherd. He found him standing with his back to him, a few yards away from his blanket, one hand resting on the wall while he urinated. The smoke from his cigarette wrapped about his head like a cloud of grey thoughts.
    â€˜How did you know that some men were looking for me?’
    The old man stood as still and silent as Lot’s wife watching Sodom burn. The boy waited. Without removing his hand from the wall, the goatherd finished urinating and shook his penis dry. When he turned, the boy noticed that the man’s trousers were wet and that the pink tip of his penis was protruding from his flies.
    The boy fled into the night, his subconscious drawing him back to the place where he had buried the remains of the rabbit just minutes before. He stumbled on, skidding on the stones, running as fast as he could in the direction of the well. Then he caught his foot on the stopcock next to the water tank and fell. He lay in the darkness feeling the blood throbbing in his foot. Once he had calmed down, he crept over to the water tank and sat there, his back against the brick surround. From where he was he had only a very partial view of the wall and the plain. The image of the old man turning clumsily towards him completely filled his thoughts. The moist tip of the goatherd’s penis, the skinned rabbit, the search party. He assumed that this stopping-place was merely a kind of meeting-point where he would be handed over to the bailiff. The old man, he thought, had been pretending to be in pain and had led him to those ruins so that he could be safely executed far from the village. He imagined the goatherd sitting at the foot of the wall calmly witnessing his martyrdom. He wished himself far away, wished he had been better able to bear his