Messenger. Lois Lowry
they were in his mouth, too. I could see something wrapped around his tongue.”
Matty shuddered. “He was such a nice man,” he said. “He always tossed berries to us when he was out gathering. I would open my mouth wide and he would aim for it. If I caught a berry in my mouth he cheered and gave me extra.”
“Me too.” Ramon looked sad. “And his wife has a new baby. Someone said that’s why he went. He wanted to go tell her family about the baby.”
“But didn’t he know what would happen? Hadn’t he received Warnings?”
Ramon coughed suddenly. He bent over and gasped. Then he straightened up and shrugged. “His wife says not. He went once before, when their first child was born, and had no trouble. No Warning.”
Matty thought about it. Gatherer must have overlooked a Warning. The early ones were sometimes small. He felt great sadness for the gentle, happy man who had been so brutally entangled and had left two children fatherless. Forest always gave Warnings, Matty knew. He entered so often himself and always was watchful. If he had one Warning, even the smallest, he would never enter again. The blind man had entered only once, to return to his original village when it needed his wisdom. He had come back safely, but he had had a small Warning on his return: a sudden painful puncture from what had seemed a tiny twig. He couldn’t see it, of course, though later he said he had felt it come forward, had perceived it with the kind of knowledge that had made the people designate Seer as his true name. But Matty, still a young boy, had been with him then, as a guide; and Matty had seen the twig grow, expand, sharpen, aim itself, and stab. There was no question. It was a Warning. The blind man could never enter Forest again. His time for going back had ended.
Yet Matty had never been warned. Again and again he entered Forest, moved along its trails, spoke to its creatures. He understood that for some reason, he was special to Forest. He had traveled its paths for years, six years now, since that first time, when he was still very young and had left the home that had been cruel to him.
“I’m never going in,” Ramon said firmly. “Not after seeing what it did to Gatherer.”
“You don’t have a place to go back to,” Matty pointed out. “You were born in Village. It’s only those who try to go back to someplace that they left once.”
“Like you, maybe.”
“Like me, except I’m careful.”
“I’m not taking the chance. Is this a good place to fish?” Ramon asked, changing the subject. “I don’t want to walk any farther. I’m tired all the time lately.” They had been ambling toward the river, skirting the cornfield, and had reached the grassy bank where they often fished together. “We caught a lot here last time. My mother cooked some for dinner, but there were so many that I nibbled on left-overs while I was playing the Gaming Machine after dinner.”
The Gaming Machine again. Ramon mentioned it so often. Maybe Gloater would be his true name, Matty thought. He had already decided on Boaster, but now, in his mind, he decided Gloater was more appropriate. Or Bragger. He was tired of hearing about the Gaming Machine. And a little jealous, too.
“Yes, here,” Matty said. He scrambled down the slippery bank to the place where a boulder, large enough to stand on, jutted out. Both boys climbed the huge outcropping of rock and settled at the top to prepare their fishing gear and cast their lines for salmon.
Behind them, Village, quiet and peaceful, continued its daily life. Gatherer had been buried this morning. With her toddler playing on the floor by her feet, his widow now nursed her new baby on the porch of her homeplace, attended by comforting women who sat with their knitting and embroidery and spoke only of happy things.
In the schoolhouse, Mentor, the schoolteacher, gently tutored a mischievous eight-year-old named Gabe, who had neglected his studies to play and now needed help. His daughter, Jean, sold flower bouquets and loaves of fresh-baked bread in her marketplace stall while she flirted, laughing, with the gangly, self-conscious boys who stopped by.
The blind man, Seer, made his way through the lanes of Village, checking on the populace, assessing the well-being of each individual. He knew each fence post, each crossroad, each voice and smell and shadow. If anything was amiss, he would do his best to make it right.
From a window, the tall young man known as Leader looked down and watched the slow and cheerful pace of Village, of the people he loved, who had chosen him to rule and guard them. He had come here as a boy, finding his way with great difficulty. The Museum held the remains of a broken sled in a glass case, and the inscription explained that it had been Leader’s arrival vehicle. There were many relics of arrival in the Museum, because each person who had not been born in Village had his own story of coming there. The blind man’s history was told there, too: how he had been carried, near dead, from the place where enemies had left him with his eyes torn out and his future in his own place gone.
In the Museum’s glass cases there were shoes and canes and bicycles and a wheeled chair. But somehow the small red-painted sled had become a symbol of courage and hope. Leader was young but he represented those things. He had never tried to go back, never wanted to. This was his home now, these his people. As he did every afternoon, he stood at the window and watched. His eyes were a pale, piercing blue.
He watched with gratitude as the blind man moved through the lanes.
He could see beyond a porch railing to the young woman who rocked an infant and mourned her husband. Grieve gently, he thought.
He could see beyond the cornfield to where two young boys named Matty and Ramon were dangling lines into the river. Good fishing, he thought.
He could see beyond the marketplace to the cemetery where Gatherer’s ruined body had been buried. Rest in peace, he thought.
Finally he looked toward the border of Village, to the place where the path entered Forest and became shrouded in shadows. Leader could see beyond the shadows but was not certain what he saw. It was blurred, but there was something in Forest that disturbed Leader’s consciousness and made him uneasy. He could not tell whether it was good or bad. Not yet.
* * *
Deep in the thick undergrowth near the clearing, at the edge of Leader’s puzzled awareness, a small green frog ate an insect it had caught with its sticky, fast-darting tongue. Squatting, it moved its protruding eyes around, trying to sense more insects to devour. Finding nothing, it hopped away. One back leg was oddly stiff but the frog barely noticed.
IF WE HAD a Gaming Machine,” Matty commented in a studied, offhand manner, “our evenings would never be boring.”
“You think our evenings are boring, Matty? I thought you enjoyed our reading together.”
Seer laughed, and corrected himself. “Sorry. I meant your reading to me, Matty, and my listening. It’s my favorite time of day.”
Matty shrugged. “No, I like reading to you, Seer. But I meant it’s not exciting.”
“Well, we should choose a different book, perhaps. That last one — I’ve forgotten its name, Matty — was a little slow-going. Moby Dick. That was the one.”
“It was okay,” Matty conceded. “But it was too long.”
“Well, ask at the library for something that would move along more quickly.”
“Did I explain to you how a Gaming Machine works, Seer? It moves very quickly.”
The blind man chuckled. He had heard it all before, many times. “Run out to the garden and get a head of lettuce, Matty, while I finish cleaning the fish. Then you can make a salad while the fish cooks.”
“And