excerpt
The market was busy. A row of carts stretched all along the north side of the wide Ardross Street, from the Church of Ireland church to the town hall, their shafts lowered onto the street, their horses led to Massey’s Stables to be fed and watered. The street was thronged with country people and their dogs, with rich farmers on horseback and poor farmers and farm labourers on their own weary feet, wending between the splatters of freshly dropped dung and the panicky scatter of hens. Rackety carts rattled by on the cobbles. Cattle bellowed and sheep bleated in their makeshift pens. Almost deafened by the noise and bruised by the crush, Michael pushed his way through the crowds, pausing now and then to look at the produce for sale or to ask if anyone needed a hired hand. No one wanted him. He grew hungry and tired. He shouldered a path out of the throng and walked across the cobbles to the church. It was quiet there. He sat on the grass with his back to the wall behind the churchyard and turned his face to the sun. For several minutes he kept his eyes closed, feeling the warmth of the sun on his face, listening to the commercial throb of the market. Then he opened his bag, took out bread and cheese and ate hungrily.
“You look as though you haven’t seen food for a week,” said a friendly female voice.
Michael squinted into the sun and saw a tall girl with long, black hair. She smiled and sat down beside him. “You don’t mind, do you?” she asked.
“No, not at all,” Michael replied in a voice full of surprise and bemusement.
“You look shy,” said the girl. She opened a sally-rod basket and drew out two russet apples.
She offered one to Michael. “Here. It will go nicely with your cheese. Or are you shocked?”
“Shocked?” Michael accepted her apple politely.
She smiled. “Have you heard the story that the first woman seduced the first man with an apple?”
“Seduced?”
The girl giggled. She bit into her apple without losing the smile on her face, without taking her eyes from his. Her eyes were laughing too. Brown eyes, dark as turf. His were blue, and the brow above them puckered in a puzzled frown. He felt delightfully confused.
“Don’t you know what seduction is?” the girl asked.
Michael had never heard of it, and he did not know if it was something he should pretend to know about or not. “I’ve more bread and cheese here if you’d like some,” he said, avoiding the issue.
Libros Libertad 