CHAPTER XV: SCARCITY

   A drowsy and clueless ray, for which surely I was not its goal, woke me again, inviting me to open my eyes in the morning. August was already burned bread smelling of seeds and cereal. The smell of the Kilmourne seemed to reach my canvas and even the river, as my life, fermented. The tent was a furnace where suddenly I noticed an unexpected loaf of bread. When lifting the blankets I saw that they had introduced a new book: Great Expectations. I had never read Dickens, but I knew the argument. I would have surely seen it in the movies. I didn’t open it then because the heat now came to settle and the day was intensely hot. Mentally, I had put myself the date of 6 August to return, and already the days escaped my fingers. I knew I was going to miss them much and started to meditate how I would continue without them. But at 8 came to me coffee and something much more expected: Luke’s face.

− "Good morning, Nike" –he said while searching for a place to put the cup of coffee. Moreover, the same smile, the same clothes and the same smell woke me up with more intensity than caffeine. While I finished the coffee I thought if he would also be, in essence, the same Luke from two days earlier. But already asleep my naivety and awake my senses, I had no strength to oppose the certainty that he had come into my life forever. And he seemed the same. Or perhaps more willing to show me that friendship had been the first childbirth in those days and that it would not die before becoming a child.

− "Good morning, Luke. You wake up early."

− "Yes. Sometimes Lucy and I like to get up and look at the dawn. You should see it: the first fire of day is rocking with the same hue of her reddish hair. Both are then separated. The star of life turns skies yellow; in her head the bonfire is out and the ashes become earth. And she says that my hair is the mantle in which fields dress. Well, maybe we are fools, but I do not think that I should apologize to you."

− "Please, Luke. It is a joy for me that you express your love –I said with pain. And I added unsure−. I'd like to know your wife. All have named her to me."

− "First I want to excuse me –he confessed− I didn’t come yesterday to your tent –all of them spoke now of my tent. And even Bruce was used to saying that improper possessive−. Today we have seen the dawn, and she is ok, but yesterday I hardly dared to go to the street and leave her alone. Frequent vomiting and appearance of contractions made me think that finally our child had preferred to be born in July."

−"Then, Luke, please don't leave her alone. Kirsten or Paul will come in time, but she claims you beside her to get the baby healthy. I'm not important."

− 'No. You're not important –he told me with irony, with a face that betrayed a contrary opinion-. Only you are my new friend Nike."


 

-It was very reassuring to hear him say that. But sorry, Protch, what time is it?

−It is half past two, Nike. You didn’t say anything, but I was already going to tell you. You have to go, right? I guess that it would be no good to beg you to stay to eat.

−Have patience. I assure you one of these days I'll stay. But not today. And it is late now. I have to go to the street.

-All right, Nike. And I will not stop you. But let me ask you a question. This town is not big enough, I heard you say the first day. Maybe we meet. What do you think that it is more correct to me if I suddenly see you in the Basilica or somewhere else?

−All your questions are relevant, even those of which you know the answer. But you do well to ask me. What will you do? I don't think that you like sitting on the floor, which is perhaps still wet by the rain of the previous days, but of course if you want, you can greet me, stay and chat, even hug me, which also would give me the joy of doing it. But above all, you know what not to do, right?

−Give you charity.

−Exactly. Thank you for your understanding. I will myself get the coat in the lobby, but you can come with me there. See you tomorrow, Protch.

   The next day I came back about 8 and already he was waiting for me in the garden. Before moving on to the living room, I stopped a few seconds to look at Jupiter, because I seemed to notice a unique detail. It was another delirium, but I would swear that his eyes had changed.

− What happens? –Protch asked me unexpectedly.

−I must be going crazy, but I would swear that now he is looking in a different way. These days he looked with frank opposition. Now he is watching me with curiosity. Maybe from here he can hear my story. The living room is close and you don’t usually shut the door. I'm sorry, Protch, but you must think I'm absolutely crazy.

−You feel things in a different way, Nike. And after all Jupiter can be your God-Fate. All he sees, all he knows. As you can see, if you have deliriums, I do not lag behind.

−It is true that he is God of Gods. In these years I have learned to recognize him in the skies. It looks as big as Venus, but the latter is closer to the Earth.

−When you have finished your story, Nike, I hope that you keep coming. And that one day you come at night, or you let me go to your outskirt. I want to learn your stars.

−They aren’t my stars, Protch, although it is true that they gave me two. It is possible that I have time to tell you that today. Come on, let's go.


 

   It was very reassuring to hear him say that. As I could I also assured him that he could still have my friendship. Until then, perhaps because I was still the awkward apprentice of the not poisoned blood, only I had dealt with accepting what my heart had already seen. And with that new clarity that day I was already willing to acknowledge things as they were. Luke was a beggar, but his misery was telling me about happiness extracted to the streets, by dint of love and effort; he was male, but my beats were unaware of any exclusion, didn’t know that the snake could have tempted Adam with the beauty of Adam. But then I started to first think that he was a man in love with his wife, a married man who never lacked courage to express his love for her; a man who was going to be a father very soon, and who talked about a happy horizon accompanying his creature:

− "I shudder at the thought that in a few days I'll be listening to his babbling while he wants me to give him games or claims to be taken to see the river. It will be either our empress, if it is a girl, or our little king, if it is a boy. I will watch it to see if it looks like its mother or if it is alike me; what must I do to educate it and take it away from my path of errors; think if I will have time to see it grow and be next to it when its father is more necessary. "

   We never got to talk then of the prophecy, but I sensed that for Luke to decipher it was vital, that life could play a trick when more happy he was. But I wanted to discern that dying in complete happiness was better than languidly perishing without horizons. He would also end discovering it or meekly resigning. And I... didn't want to think about it.

   At that time, I began to suspect what I could only later distinguish. He was a calm man, who had built his happiness with the woman he loved, waiting for the fruit of their love that would soon come. And I thought I had to depart from every thought that did not respect his life to "say a prayer of gratitude for his friendship". It hurt knowing him foreign, but it hurt more not to have his respect. From that hour I had clear two things: I loved him, but his friendship was more important. If scarcity is all the children of the whore misery, not having necessary things at your side, at that time a good shower or new clothes, it would also be to renounce the indispensable. Love was not urgent; friendship was imperative and in my loving chest, a desperate need.

   He interrupted my long agony to ask me:

− "I would like you to know my wife. But the others have all already come here. I would like to know honestly what you think of us."

  He always asked me difficult questions, but a friendship is not built swallowing your own opinions, and although what I thought could match his own vision, he forced me to find the right words so he did not feel offended. As I was wondering what to say, I asked him a question:

− "You want to know my opinion about the six people I've already known, Luke?"

− "Yes, please."

− "But what chronological order would you like me to follow? Yours? Or that by which I’ve been getting to know you?"

− "Disordered it would also be good to me.  You choose."

− "I choose yours then. Let's see, Mistress Oakes has impressed me. You cannot know her and be unscathed. The word mistress suits her, but it is insufficient. I don't know if lady may be closer. She has a lot of common sense, and having known her I understand you all better. But I don't know, Luke. She disguises her reason in the middle of a mist. Her light is so bright that she knows she can blind, and then perhaps she gets into the skin of a visionary, to give calm in the darkness of her words. But perhaps you think it is all nonsense."

− "I agree with you –that sentence encouraged me. And it was easy: I just had to be sincere−. You've described her perfectly. But the blind light, the appearance of darkness, the mist. All that has a name that goes with her, although you may not yet understand. We call it shade. Let's go with Olivia."

− "It is difficult to describe her. She is all goodness, and may not know that she is happy: the winds prevent her to see it. And years ago she seems to be at their mercy, as if she was at their service. Forgive me, Luke, she is your mother-in-law and perhaps you believe that I have not loved her or that I have failed to interpret her."

− "It is difficult to describe her. She is all goodness. She may not know that she is happy. Enough words so that you know that so I also see my mother-in-law. The beginning of her path was horror. It is difficult to start there and achieve happiness and know it. You are pretty good, Nike. And she is also a part of my happiness, because she never, that night of November of my Verôme, when she could see the old bald man, who she was able to see in his entire monstrosity, rejected the idea that I slept that night with her daughter. Have no fear, continue."

− "The third of you is Lucy but you know that I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting her. Let’s go then with Bruce. I want you to know, first and foremost, I have appreciated him so much, and I think I was lucky that he also has liked me. But I believe that it was not easy for him, and not because he had met this moron. They described him to me as shy but I have not seen him so. Leave me a second to think: Yes, you see, it is as if for years he had shared his heart with many people who have hurt him. And now he seems to be much more careful, selecting whom he is willing to love without conditions. And I am happy that he has wanted to share with me something of all the good he has. I'm afraid that loving him unconditionally is reciprocal, Luke. I don't know how I can do it, but I feel that after now I will never want to stray from his path. Although I could say that for everyone. I don't know what I am going to do now."

− "Oh, my God –he seemed really impressed and said another one of his favourite sentences−! Again you're my twin, Nike. Everything you tell me matches with how I see them, but in addition I also was there one day. To understand you, I just have to remember myself. I do not know if you see my fellow mates such as they are, but your opinion matches mine. And what's more, it coincides with Lucy’s. You really have to meet her. Finally, let us follow the order. Let's go with Miguel."

− "Well, I've seen him more often, but that doesn't make me know him better. I will say that if John made the miracle, Miguel prepared the wizardry, and some sentences that he has told me participate in that same dreaming, a magical and sublime preparation to bring me closer to you, a preparation that has made me willing to know you without prejudice, or at least more willing to love you."

− "About John –I continued, livelier by his tender glance− perhaps I play with advantage, because I met him years ago. He has saved my life and now he speaks to me nicely. But I guess that is what he is like. Here I have started to know him in his new condition. Not only he has not taken into account my past, and I don't really know how to thank him, but I cannot get rid of the way he looked at me when I arrived. It's as if after saving my life, he would have rescued me again."

− "Nike... when I asked forgiveness to one of the men that I hurt –he told me−, he did not grant it at that moment. Then I saw him on numerous occasions, and he looked at me with hostility. One day he approached me to say that I already had asked forgiveness once, that I should not do it again, he now had to think if he could ever grant it. Yes, Nike −he confirmed as answering a question that I never made−, finally he forgave me. I mean that as far as I know you've already apologized to John and you have thanked him. And he, like that man, Walter he is called, will not want you to be your whole life doing both things. But if you don't mind, I would like to know more about the way in which, as you say, he looked at you."

   I spoke to him of what had been my great wound the first night. I told him that the snake had failed to kill me but that John’s eyes had killed Nicholas Siddeley, or had at least put him to sleep for a few days. With that look he not only forgave my life, but he also justified my poisonous darts when he understood from what dark source of bitter loneliness they came. I was telling Luke that his eyes were my first mirror in their outskirt, but I stopped suddenly because I started to find myself wrong. The reappearance of the heat returned my latest nausea. And in the midst of that fire in August I felt cold. I was also afraid to love and not having. I had seen him again, but I trembled for having accepted to depart respectfully from his light. Whether it was or wasn’t a fantasy, I believed in friendship as something that we could build. I had to make an effort, and his following words were a challenge, but they helped.

− "Nike, you know that after John, comes I. I'd honestly want to know your opinion."

− "You seriously want me to also talk about you? Is it not enough for you to know that I would, indeed, have your friendship"?

− "Friends we are already –he seemed to perceive my tremors, and with his words he managed to calm me down−, but true friendship demands criticism, if any. A friend should tell a friend what is good and bad, should guide him on the north, but also on the south of his mistakes. Nothing will change the good opinion I have of my friend Nike."

   With those words, now it was me who had to return them, but I didn't know how he could take me on a sentence several times heard.

− "Let me think, Luke. Because in addition to my own deductions and to the fact that everyone has praised your wife, almost all have told me about you. And for good –and I couldn’t help dropping the tag−, I guess."

− "You don’t seem to agree. Come on, Nike: I will no longer take you, at least today, into more difficult blind alleys. Sincerity is the square that usually leads to the end of the board. You said that everyone speaks well of me. But you just guess it. What did you mean?"

− "See –I believe I began to blush−, I've heard at least twice a sentence upon you: Luke is adorable."

-"They often tell me. And don't you think it is ok? –In that moment he looked at me with frank curiosity, but with a bit of irony, as if he didn’t like it too much either.

− "It is, apparently, a complimentary phrase −I had to continue along the alley that I had gotten into, busily seeking a way out which I did not know if there would be−. But to me I think you are diminished. I don't know how I can dare to say this. It is as if your fellow mates didn't know you or wanted to close their eyes to what they are seeing −he looked at me with curiosity, but no hostility. And I could no longer withdraw−. Somehow it gives you little knowledge, it makes you a child, let's say it does not do you real justice. You're an already formed, solid, man of clear judgment. Finally, Luke, forgive me if I offended you."

− "You haven’t offended me. You're my twin, Nike. Because it is true that they see me like that. As if the evolution of a son of a bitch has to become the babbling of an infant. And there may be some of that. I am not one to judge this image. But I can tell that Lucy sees me as you've seen me, and that again my opinion matches yours. In my early days here everything impressed me, all their words were lessons and I should give them the impression that I was a collector of deities, an idolater, who yesterday was a bald man, today I am a beggar and tomorrow I can be, what do I know? a Tibetan monk. But what do you think?"

− "I cannot imagine you as Tibetan monk –I answered with some fun−. I think that you have reached a fertile land and here you have built your home and your beliefs. And if you have a home and friends, a woman who loves you and a child to come, all this clay is faith and becomes solid. And when you have so concrete a religion, idols bother and leave by the dung heap of unnecessary aesthetics. This is your ground, Luke."

− "Oh, my God –he exclaimed really moved−! Two days ago you thought you had no heart and your burning blood, my friend, purifies and erects altars to friendship. Never be afraid to speak. Don't be afraid of your heart, Nike. Its red liquid does not sail in stormy waters. It swims without being noticed from a sterile shade to a vault of bright skies, nude of prejudices. And if your blood gives you news you don't expect, allow it to swim to the rhythm of your heartbeat –more than once I wondered if those words would not have a double meaning−. Never be afraid of your heart. It is beating with harmonic chords."

   For me the rhapsodist of the calm summer, of the nights of fire light from the distant stars, a light in my chiaroscuro. He never feared to speak with all that he had learned; a neophyte sailor on crystal clear waters. On my face there must still be reflected a doubt which was muffled, but which had been booming in previous days, because suddenly he said to me:

− "I am not illiterate, Nike."

   My face was now a real shaking; terrified that it could have annoyed him that I believed such a thing.

− "Don't be afraid. I know that you do not think so now. But you may have believed it. I am sure that it is not your case, and if you will allow me, I just want to inform you. Many people have strange ideas about beggars, they believe that we are all of the same characteristics, but this street, Nike, is reached by people from all districts; also the more prosperous or educated; I have even seen some old University Professor. Different people, you see. For us, each one is son of their circumstances, but I would tell you with certainty that the seven of us like reading very much; or maybe you have seen in Bruce that he doesn’t love reading, the only one of us, but he likes to be informed."

− "As for me, you know that I love my wife, that I owe Olivia the serenity of the coast where Lucy and I sail, that Miguel was the teacher who taught me to treasure the new notebooks where I was writing his teachings. Mistress Oakes has been like the kind grandma that instead of scolding you shows you the straight road with paths carved in gold for all; Bruce is the loyal man that I'd like to be even more friend. I have a lot to learn from him. In John I've seen how fidelity to what one is, when one is beautiful, has a lantern which illuminates the path dimly lit, but then burning, of friendship. Nike, you have already spoken of us one by one, but how do you see us as a whole?"

− "I still need a piece to fit the entire puzzle, Luke. But let me dare to say –I said to earn time− I see that you've named the seven in another chronological order. But surely this is not inflexible −with a look he said I was right−, and can go in another sequence, as well as my chronological order has been John, Miguel, you, Mistress Oakes, Olivia, Bruce, and I hope that one day your wife."

− "So it is. Lucy, Olivia and Miguel did, according to your words, the wizardry with which the bald man was transformed in a single night. The other three I have named in their chronological order. And you can follow our order, yours, or disorder us."

− "As long as I am here, Luke, I will respect your order. And if by mistake I do change it, correct me. How do I see you as a whole? That was your question. Not knowing yet all of you, I would say that a single cog that falls off of the chain would break the gear. It is nonsense, but I would say that you are one by one, but you are a seven. And I have come into –I said with a sad voice− the best of possible swarms. Here I've been fed and loved: I feel that I am at home."

− “Be careful, my dear brother. Because these last words John mentioned them in his day. And some time later I mentioned them too. And you know where they lead –it seemed that part of my story was already written. But I had no fear yet. I fancied in what would have happened if my life had been different and I would have ended there, in peace, with so many dear faces. But my life was another. I felt a gust of cold−. Always, always my twin."

− "So your hopes are placed in your magical seven –I still had not heard of the eight, except in a murmur of Mistress Oakes I wasn't sure to have understood−, in friendship, which lights up your present and your future, in love, freedom and mutual respect, in the cradle of your offspring who will be born soon... By the way, Luke, do you have a crib for your child?"

− "Yes, Nike. My brother has commissioned a few carpenters, friends of my maternal grandfather, who once made me a cradle of wood. I've seen it. A small bassinet that will fit in our tent with a small canopy with tulle. I liked it more like that so that he does not sleep among bars. May him be born in our freedom and later choose any road; provided that it is not unworthy, as the one which one day his father chose. Well, Nike, I see in your face that you respect the decisions that Lucy and I have taken, and that not everyone has understood. And about the seven, you have spoken of our hopes, would you say anything about our misadventures?"

− "I will then say that all life has misadventures, but yours are flavoured by a constant work of every one towards everybody. Bruce said, one of his many teachings, that he also sought food in case anyone needed some. When the friendship is solid, there is no misery. I get the impression –I ventured− that the seven, and not only you, have chosen it. Or some of you, at least."

− "It has been chosen by the last three. And from now on if I need to find an oracle to know who we are, I will consult my brother Nike. Believe in your orientation: you don’t usually err."

   But suddenly my compass erred in the most unforgivable moment. The fear to lose his friendship, the taste of bile of not being one of them, thinking that I could lose his respect at the time when I met his wife and betrayed myself, if I had not betrayed already before him, the premature furnace of that unheard of August in the city... all of that together did burn the walls of my weaknesses and the volcano of my tides apparently dormant, erupted without warning, leaving me in the mouth a bitter memory of whisky. A last retching made me shake without time enough to get to the bowl, barely spotting me, faintly touching the blankets among which I lay, but leaving a trail of unforgivable dirt in Luke’s shirt. Suddenly I felt sickened and terrified. It was like paying his sincere friendship with a river of ignominy. That was my last unrest and, from then on, my health returned and overwhelmed me. But it would only be valid when I could hide that embarrassed dead man that I turned in those seconds.

   But he looked at me amicably and not minding what had just happened.

− "Luke −I asked, more dead than alive−, do you have more shirts?"

− "Calm down, my friend –more than ever he insisted on calling me my friend in those moments−. I have two more shirts. I'm going to get another. Wait for me here. Because also I must clean you."

   I now know that after going to his tent, he went to the river. That quarter of an hour when he was outside was a slow torture for me, and it was not only his absence. I could live without his love, but not without his friendship, and I had just crossed the line that separates respect of the unseemly. It was the first time, but not the last one, that I thought that for him to know me would be a stain.

   At last he returned with a yellow or perhaps white shirt that so dirty looked yellow. But he had it not on and he returned to Bruce’s tent in his sympathy and his nudity. And I... with no magnetic compass set eyes on his depopulated land, on his chest palimpsest where I could read the information my uneducated mind sought. I wanted to know about his life; it was not the outburst of desire. But as he talked to me of his outskirt, tenderly calling it the "camp", I wondered what he would be thinking about me in those moments. Camp... I had already imagined them as somewhat hippies, and they were perhaps like that: Bohemians who were camping. Their beautiful words did not deny realities; they illuminated their universe with other lights so that it could not be seen only perfidious misery, but also its bastard daughter, beauty. Thus, they took refuge in their tents and next to epicurean hearts they were established, and whether it was a permanent or temporary way of life, under the canvas their feet rested of fatigue. But sheepishly I started to read what I was seeing.

    His chest was a scroll of two readings, where the first inspirations overlapped in a new index that did not have a clear end, where you still could write. It was a map showing only two countries. And then there was the border. The old country spoke of a history of bitter, internal, vain, childish wars, shaken its territory by moldy scars, wounds and old stigmas of violent passions and sterile brawls. These were borders of a territory more readable and glowing, a fertile time in the friendly land where, less neat body, more clean soul, he had inhabited, shaken Phoenix that had turned his ashes into waters where to wash his road of iniquities. Thus, the new country would be guessed in its ancient mountain ranges. And amid them a Kilmourne of creative misery which regurgitated mud, builder of love, friendships and faiths, freedoms and arcanes who supplied hunger and scarcity with inexperienced demiurges of new hope. Old ghosts and new horizons with which to build limpidly the fatherhood that he assumed to give in a few days to a little one who would be born proud in its new country, which was already the territory where his father had decided to settle.

   My clumsy reading only took me five minutes, at the end of which he got dressed. And he seemed satisfied of what he had seen in me. But I, who had already had the fear to betray myself, then I had almost the security I had, and could only pray to the priest raising the chalice of life that he could not have read me.

   From somewhere he had brought a sponge and a towel with children motifs which I guessed would be a part of the dowry of his future son; and he had soaked it in the river. With it he cleaned the blankets and was about to wash what little I had, some insignificant atoms at the waist. Friendship smiled candid in his tenderness. But I interrupted him:

− "Luke, please –I told him embarrassed−, that, at least, I can do it myself. I don't know if I can walk or if I could accompany you in many of your works or stress. But I am able to wash myself, and I don't want to look like a gentleman of beggars."

− "Far you remind me of him. But two days ago we talked about friendship and I am sure that you would do the same for me. In this game for two, the first turn has been for me. If you really see me as a friend, you cannot prevent me of it."

   And I could not oppose. Only I had to accept that the following turns would be for me, or perhaps the first move in this chess I was already doing: to retire from his love and shelter in his friendship. I imagined him walking happy with his son, returning the smile to the love of his wife. Perhaps I should know her. Perhaps I should love her, but was this possible? At least to love her for him. Meanwhile, I was being cleaned by a dirty beggar, and his tenderness turned then into a photograph, one more taken in those days that completed my album. And to that scarcity, as a seismic movement, there came the fullness.

− "Ready –he said−. Our bodies are already clean, but surely it will not be so easy to delete it from your memories. Today I stay longer. Neither Olivia nor I will go to the street as long as Kirsten or Paul are not born. Mistress Oakes will be responsible for her part and Lucy’s, and Bruce, Miguel and John for yours and mine."

− "Ah –I said for the first time. I used to throw this interjection as an anathema against the scarcity of their lives. I squeezed my jaw strongly, not wanting to throw a curse to the world for not having sat the conditions so a parent could comfortably wait for the arrival of his child. But he stayed longer and something we had to talk about. So I asked −: have you ever had some criticism for having dodged two days ago the chronological order?"

− "That also has been worrying you? –he inquired− you see: I had some question among angry looks. But when I told them that I had heard you screaming and had gone in, they seemed to understand me"−he didn’t look, however, very quiet.

− "But others are my concerns –and he noticed my anxiety and added−. "The birth, of course, and some other fatal thoughts."

− "Are you thinking about the prophecy?" −I ventured.

− "I didn't know that you knew it."

− "Bruce –I said, also restless−, has told me. First it will be Bruce, next Luke and then I. That said Mistress Oakes, isn't it?"

− "Those are her words, Nike. And she does not usually fail. Bruce seems to have found some solace. I... I fear that not yet."

− "I do not know if Mistress Oakes often fails, but I, who am surely only in passing, may not feel more unhappy. It is short since I know you but I have learned to love you very much, all three. Luke... Bruce and you are young, healthy and robust. And I see Mistress Oakes strong and brave. And I... can't believe it. Something will happen but maybe the words have not been correctly interpreted."

− "Once more Lucy thinks as you do. And my wife is also, say, very capable of seeing. And she is not scared. She doesn't think that anything happens to us. We will see who is right. If only I had time to see my child. But I would like to accompany him, at least half of his journey. But that reminds me that I want to see how Lucy is. I'm leaving, Nike, but I hope to return today again, if she has not worsened. In any case, I will come to give you news. I will tell my mother-in-law to come to see you also."

  I had come in the most inopportune days. And they had enough with the birth to think about my hunger. But I don't want to be unfair. At the end of half an hour came Olivia with half a plum cake and a large loaf of bread to satiate my hunger at any time. After all, they cared for me wonderfully. In that half an hour I had temporarily parked Moby Dick and had begun Great Expectations. Olivia found me when Estella had just been presented:

− "It has been me who has inserted it this morning, Nike. I get up very early and you were still asleep. I saw Great Expectations in the Salvation Army and for years I wanted to read it, after having read David Copperfield and A Tale of two Cities. And I was very curious about this book where the protagonist is called as the mother of my mistress. This tent is the one that has more hours of clarity and I thought that, without a doubt Great Expectations would be more enjoyable, Nike. The light will help; you will not be alone.

   While Olivia recited, listening to her, a novice I observed:

−“An impressive boy, this Pip: devout, truly in love with Estella. Thank you, Olivia; this novel will entertain me. But before anything, how is your daughter?"

− "Today she seems to be quite well, but she is somewhat rebellious. For Luke and me it is difficult to convince her that the best thing to do is to stay in her tent. She is not a good convalescent and argues, surely rightly, that walking she strengthens her health, and therefore that of the creature she has inside. And she wants to persuade me that her psychological health will also benefit my granddaughter. Finally, Nike, I hope that you understand that the circumstances are not the best to make me stay longer. I just wanted to bring you something to eat. They will soon come all and there will be someone else around here."

   I calmed her down and told her that I understood it. I could be alone, but her granddaughter, as she said, couldn’t. I expected to recover soon too and also go a little for a walk. In fact I accompanied her to the door. Bruce already was there, and Luke seemed to take water from the river to his tent, I assumed, the central tent, almost opposite mine, Bruce’s.

   I spent an hour reading and Pip continued attending Miss Havisham and Estella’s home, and they continued playing with his feelings. I was being attracted by this novel. Everything, even what I read, talked to me about impossible love. I stopped to ponder in what could Pip and I be alike when someone walked in the tent. It was Miguel.

   He said that he noticed me with a best color and asked me if I had already found Nike and if I had gotten to like me.

− "Not at all, Miguel. My problem is still that I don't know who I am. And I cannot forget the words you told me the other night. I know that I have allowed myself to be seduced by ambition; and I do not know what name to give to some of the devils that tempt me. "Free man prefers to stay naked of all that ties him and begin without anything”. I think that those were your words. And right now I don't know what I'm dressed of or if I am naked. Or undressing. I'll have to ponder much more."

− "Maybe. But don't let your thoughts lead you to misery. Nor pay much attention to my words. You had better think of who you want to be, and if you don't find the causes, as I never found them, meditate only on the path that you would like to continue and not on the one you've walked. To think about the past is sterile a thousand times. Only your present will lead you to any future you choose. Or don’t think and let your heart speak. Your blood will know how to find the way."

   Miguel already thought that I would follow the same path that he, John and Luke had followed and at that time he had much confidence in me. Only time would say if he was right or wrong, or perhaps a little of every thing.

   Luke returned rather late in the afternoon, and confirmed what Olivia had told me: Lucy was fine, but she did not want to stay alone in her tent all day. Possibly it was foolish, but I ended up liking her. He brought me a new sandwich, but I had enough food and so I let him know.

− "Get it anyway –he recommended− in case the days became scarce, now that we are three of us inactive −and abruptly he changed the subject−: Nike, forgive me, but what is your name?"

   I realized that perhaps John would have been telling him something about me or my life. I wanted that it was me who told him something else:

− "I would like that my only name was Nike. But my name is Nicholas Martin Siddeley −I kept silent awaiting the inevitable reply, but he said nothing−. It is a relief, Luke. You will not understand, but almost all my life, once I said my name, they always added the tagline: one of the Gloucester Siddeley, of course."

− "Perhaps I should ask for forgiveness, but I do not know who are the Gloucester Siddeley".

− "Perhaps any time –I said hesitantly, looking at his rags− you have worn a Siddeley wool jersey –and I added, seeing that he now saw clearly−. Yes, Luke, I'm one of those Siddeley.  And what's more, now that industry is part of my heritage."

   They had bequeathed me loneliness of wool and arrogance with which to fasten my emptiness, a cradle of ambition and a desert of unexplained bitterness. Fortunately, Luke didn’t insist and did not return to that old sheepfold. I languished in my livestock revenues and he talked about his hopes for the trip that he was about to start. In his suitcases he had only taken love and responsibility, and closed them with warm lullabies. I listened to him tenderly and almost felt with him the arrival of the fruit of his love. And finally he left when that fruitful August closed the box office of its first day. And so that my loneliness was not scarcity, I took pleasure in the golden loaf of his memory. That day I could no longer read. Neither I was Pip nor did my life have great expectations. I had to have enough with the restless sleep of my first days of sober navigation. I closed my eyes to the clarity of an August 2 where I had to give birth to new rivers.