I Am David (11 page)

The food was all brought in by the servants and cleared away before the next course arrived and you were given clean plates and knives. And the children said they ate like that every day, and several times a day.

The next day he would enjoy it all again.

David thought living in a house was very difficult. It was not the house itself — that was lovely to be in — but the people. They constantly seemed to expect him to say and do things he would never have thought of, and what appeared sensible and natural to him seemed to surprise them …

Otherwise being in a house was lovely — quite wonderful. David contemplated the two words with satisfaction, repeating them several times to himself. He had been in the house many days now and was learning all the time. He had learned, for example, to use those two words — they meant something that was good. It was satisfying to know several words for the same thing for then he could describe exactly to what degree a thing was good. It was just the same with the word “beautiful”. You could divide it into three: if something were only a little beautiful, it was “nice”; if it were more beautiful, you said “lovely” and finally “beautiful”.

Being able to use words properly was a great advantage, for the more words you knew the meaning of, the better you could think. And besides, people were not so surprised at what you said if you used the right words. The children’s mother had laughed when he saw the bathroom and said it was “beautiful and good”. He should have said it was “lovely”, of course.

He would always remember the bathroom with its gleaming pale-green bath and all that clear, clean water that came when you just turned a tap. You could have as much hot water as you liked and sit in it right up to your neck. And there was soap, large pieces of it, that smelled much better than the two cakes he had bought himself. It rubbed into a beautiful soft lather that made you quite, quite clean. And when you had finished, there were large, soft, clean towels to dry yourself on. And there were little sticks to clean your nails with, and you could brush your teeth. David had never tried that before, and the first time he made his mouth sore doing it. But it was wonderful to be so clean.

There were books in a house, too — not just one, but many. When he had first arrived, the children’s father had asked him if there were anything he particularly wanted. David had considered carefully and then said, “I think most of all I’d like a book to read”. He wanted to hear music again, too, but the book was more important. He said it must be a book published before 1917. The children’s father had smiled and asked why, but David had not dared to tell him it was because he wanted to be sure that what was in it was true and not something they had made up.

The meals he had in the house delighted him, both because there was so much to eat and it all tasted so good, and even more because the table looked so beautiful with the glasses and the silver and the white cloth, and with a fine plate for everybody.

But people he found difficult. They seemed to have no idea of what was good. The children’s mother was quite pleased that he liked the bathroom, but the children themselves hated it — at least, the boys did. Perhaps he was wrong, but no matter how hard he tried, he could not help liking it himself. He had nothing against being dirty: you got dirty in the course of the day. You just could not avoid it. But to be free to wash the dirt off whenever you wanted to — yes, that was wonderful! And yet the children did not seem to understand that, and he dared not tell them how disgusting it was when men who had been clean with clean shiny hair and clean teeth grew so matted and ingrained with dirt that everything about them smelt repulsive and looked loathsome.

For if he told them that, then of course they might discover where he came from, and then they would be obliged to send for them.

The children could not understand either why he was so anxious to read books. They always wanted him to go out with them, though he longed to be left alone to sit and read the books. There was no end to what you could learn from books if only you had time enough. He could read more rapidly now, but not really quickly. He had first to choose his books. If only he could read all of them! But David knew he had not very much time: he must go on before winter came. And so it was important for him to read books where he would find information that would be useful to him.

It was because of the books that he had already stayed there for many days. The people, the children especially, made him nervous — and he hated being in the same place with Carlo. The house he could leave, though not without regret.

He had learned that he could never become an ordinary boy. The knowledge was painful, but there was no point in deceiving himself. He would like to have learned to be a proper boy, to be as a boy should be outside the concentration camp.

And yet … the children were so stupid David did not understand them at all. He did not understand why they did not like washing. He did not understand why they preferred to live without knowing anything. They did not seem to think it was necessary, as if there were no difference between a donkey and a human being. David was very fond of donkeys: they were — he sought for the right word — nice. But it was very much better to be a human being able to learn things.

He did not understand either why they did not regard mealtimes as gracious occasions. They would often spill things on the white cloth, and sit so restlessly and be so clumsy and awkward with their knives and forks that they soon brought disorder to the beautifully arranged table.

But the most dangerous thing about them was that you could not follow what they were thinking about. They always wanted to be playing, and David had particularly wanted to learn how to play. And he could play a little now. He knew how to play ball. A ball was round and satisfying to hold, and it had colours, good bright colours. He liked throwing it to Andrea and catching it again. Racing with Andrea was good, too, and climbing trees and jumping over a rope, higher and higher … He liked the sort of games that made him aware how well his body would obey him. And the sort where you had to make something, turning a few bits of wood into things you could use.

But the children often wanted to play at being other people. One would pretend to be the grocer and another would come and buy from him. Or they would be a mother and father and children; or they might be pirates. When they said David could choose first what he wanted to be, he always answered that he would be David, who had come to watch them.

Once they wanted to play a game where some of them had to be soldiers and take the others prisoner.

“And I’ll be captain over the soldiers!” shouted Carlo, hastily adding, “That’s if you don’t want to be, David.”

David looked straight at him. “I will not play anything evil and horrible,” he replied.

Maria said at once that if David would not play, she would not either, but Andrea said with some irritation, “You’re a strange chap, David. What’s wicked about that?”

David waited until he was sure his voice would not tremble. “I’m not very good at playing, but I can see when you play you try to imitate what’s real, and I won’t have anything to do with pretending to take people prisoner … it’s horrible and evil. No one has any right to take other people prisoner. Everybody has a right to his life and freedom.”

“Yes, but, David” — Andrea’s voice was no longer irritated, only interested — “what if there’s a murderer, shouldn’t he be put in prison either? Or a thief, or something like that?”

David frowned. “I don’t know. Yes, a murderer, he should go to prison to stop him murdering more people; but no one should lay hands on him or starve him. No one has any right over other people.”

“Yes, but Father and Mother have a right over us,” Andrea said.

“No, it’s not a right — at least, I don’t think so. It’s more of a … a duty. I mean, since they’re your parents, they must give you food and clothes, and teach you all the things you don’t know, so that you can manage for yourselves when you’re grown up. What they do is something good. That’s not what I mean by right over people. Having right over others is something shameful. It’s using force.”

At that point the two little boys began yawning. “Aren’t we going to do anything?” they asked impatiently. “David can decide what to play if he wants to.”

David felt relieved. He had to answer Andrea, of course, and try to explain things to him. But Andrea still did not seem to understand what he was driving at, and David was always afraid that if he talked too much he might be led into saying something he should not. And anyway he did not care to talk when Carlo was there.

The first day or two, Carlo had tried to wheedle himself into David’s good books, but David was only too familiar with that kind of approach. He spoke to Carlo politely whenever it was necessary, just as he had always done to them, but Carlo had by now realized that he could not expect any more of him.

Nevertheless it was unpleasant. Carlo was so good at deception that you could hardly credit he was only a boy. He had made such an effort to convince David that he was not bad, and when he had realized that David was not going to let himself be impressed, he pretended to be hurt by it. It was a good thing David had seen so much deception in the camp that he was not taken in, as Andrea and the two little boys and Maria were. They did not know Carlo was evil. Because of that David felt uncomfortable in his presence.

David liked the two little boys. He did not understand them, and he felt quite sure he had never been so small himself. But they were nice, rather like two little animals tumbling about noisily and never still for a moment. He knew, too, that if he had been a proper ordinary boy, he would have liked Andrea very much indeed. He was friendly and fair, and when you pointed out that something was beautiful, he could see it was. He did not ruin things the way Carlo and the two younger ones did. But it would be dangerous to be too friendly with him — David might forget to be careful what he said, and then Andrea would think him odd and begin to ask questions.

It was only with Maria that David felt quite at ease. She never left him, and she could always guess when anyone said something to make him uneasy. At such moments she would divert attention from him by saying something herself, or she would answer for him so that all he had to say was, “Yes, that’s what I meant.”

Yet he never felt ignorant when he was with her. She wanted to know what he thought about everything and she never seemed to think him strange. There were many things he could help her with, too, for she was not very strong. And then she was so pretty to look at, and everything about her was so gentle and delicate, that he felt he had to take care of her.

When he wanted to listen to music, she would put the gramophone on for him, and she was always ready to go round the house with him and tell him about it.

Most of the things in it were very old — two or three or even four hundred years old, and the children’s father and mother had had them from their father and mother, and they in turn had had them from their father and mother, and so right back to the time the things were new. And they had always been there in the one place. He could talk for hours with Maria about the people who had lived there long ago — about what they had looked like, what clothes they had worn and what food they had eaten, and what they had thought about.

Sometimes Maria would tell him about school, and then David would again be reminded of how different he was. Maria did not care much about going to school, and David thought it sounded wonderful. to think that there were people whose only work in life was to teach children the things they did not know! To be able to ask about everything you wanted to know without appearing odd and suspicious! It was quite plain that it was not one of their schools, since he gathered from Maria that the children were not told what they were to think. They learnt proper things — about history and the countries of the world — and they were taught to read quickly and write without making mistakes.

David now began to wish he had invented a different story about himself, for his tale of a circus had led the children and their parents to believe he was familiar with many countries. If he had chosen another story, he would have been able to ask them about other countries, where they lay and what they were like. Now he could not and it was difficult to find out what he wanted to know from books.

And it was now growing chilly of an evening: it was the time of the vine harvest — time for him to hurry on his way.

Then one day he saw the globe. It stood in Andrea’s room, inside a cupboard. David did not know at first what it was. He saw a big ball fastened to a rod. He was curious and asked why it was fastened like that.

“It’s a globe, of course!” Andrea replied in surprise. “It’s the world. Look, you can turn it round so that you can see everything.”

David’s heart began to beat with excitement. Andrea had the whole world drawn on a ball — with all the countries!

But there were no boundaries marked on it: you could only see where the mountains and valleys and rivers were. David felt quite sick with disappointment. But Andrea was always ready to talk whenever David wanted to discuss something. “There’s Italy,” he said, pointing to a long strip of land jutting out into the sea. “And there’s France,” added Maria, pointing in her turn. When they saw how interested David was, they pointed to Spain and Germany, Austria, Switzerland and England.

But they went through them so quickly! David wondered if he could possibly remember all they told him and wished he could see how far each country stretched.

“Can you see Denmark?” he asked.

It was quite a little patch of land, and David saw it was a long way from Italy. He could never go so far before winter set in, before they found him again.

But he would have to leave. David lay in his soft warm bed and knew that he must go the next day, or at least within a day or two. The house belonged to the family and he had no part in it.

They were still all very grateful that he had rescued Maria from the fire. And he was sure they were kind, all except Carlo, that is. But something was sure to happen soon which would make them realize how different he was. The children’s mother sometimes looked at him questioningly, and she no longer attempted to caress him. She would touch his hair lightly when they were going to bed, but David knew it was no longer because she wanted to. She did it only out of kindness so that he should not feel too different from her own children. David was not at all clear how he knew this: he just knew it.