Free Tears of the Salamander by Peter Dickinson

the kitchens—at least the silent woman brought their meals from that direction. Yes, because the third door he came to was open, and through it he could see her standing in front of a grim old iron stove. At the sound of his footstep she turned, frowning.
    “May I come in?” he said.
    She nodded and turned back to the stove. By her movement and attitude he guessed that the frown had not been for him, and as soon as he was in the room he knew what the trouble was. The chimney was drawing well enough, but the fire itself was out of balance—“unhappy,” Father would have said. He crossed the floor and knelt beside the woman. As he opened the fire door she gave a warning hiss.
    “It’s all right,” he said. “I know about ovens. My father’s a baker. Was.”
    One sniff of the curious bitter reek of the smoke told him what the problem was. Elder is a mean wood, and always has been. No careful baker will have it in his stack, or anywhere near. There was a story that a smith once refused to shoe a pilgrim’s ass for charity, and St. Martin cursed the man, saying that the timber from the trees round his smithy would never again draw true. They were elders, of course. Even Father, who had little time for saint lore, almost believed the tale. The log would reek the kitchen out if he tried to remove it now, so he rose and rummaged though the timber stack behind the stove, choosing two billets of well-dried ash, always an easy-tempered wood, and better yet, a stout piece of old olive that would burn with a steady, golden heat right to its last embers. He eased them in round the elder and closed the door. Before he had finished adjusting the dampers he could feel the fire steadying to its work. A couple minutes later the woman sensed it too, for she turned to him, smiling, and bowed her head in thanks.
    “My pleasure,” said Alfredo. He sorted through the stack, picking out the elder logs. When he’d found them all he showed one to the woman.
    “Bad wood,” he said. “Where shall I put them?”
    She pointed to a door, and he carried them out and found himself in a courtyard between the two wings, with the main house to his right, and to his left a range of stables and storage sheds. Behind these he found the log piles, so he stacked the pieces of elder neatly to one side and carried anarmful of better wood back to the kitchen to replace them. The woman smiled her thanks once more as he returned, and he settled onto one of the benches by the kitchen table. The company of the woman, however silent, was better than the emptiness of the rest of the house, and the company of a working fire almost as good.
    After a while the strange young man came in from the garden, saw Alfredo and turned to run, but the woman clucked at him and he came creeping on in and sat at the end of the other bench, as far as he could get from Alfredo. The woman ladled food from a pot and put it in front of him, with a hunk of coarse bread. He grasped her hand—for reassurance about this stranger, Alfredo guessed—and she rumpled his hair affectionately. The man ate his meal with a spoon, sitting sideways at the table, hunching protectively over his bowl and glancing at Alfredo every mouthful, like a dog fearful that its food is about to be snatched away by a bigger dog. As soon as he’d eaten he crept out.

    Uncle Giorgio brought a book to luncheon to be alone with, but after a while he half-closed it, keeping his finger in the page, and glanced inquiringly at Alfredo. Alfredo took his chance.
    “The woman—I don’t think she can talk—and the man who was working in the garden when we came…?”
    “What of them?”
    “Who are they? I mean, I don’t even know their names. …”
    “Her name is Annetta and his Toni. He is her son. She was born dumb, but otherwise healthy. He in his turn was born with his mind deformed. The true cause was a defect in the father’s seed, but the people of this island are very ignorant. Her family believed