A Tale Without a Name Read Online Free PDF Page B

living by making themselves a burden to their fellow men. He got fed up, my son, he sold our fields for a pittance, left me the money and he too then went abroad. I used to cultivate my garden, growing my own vegetables, buying my own bread. But no one is safe any longer!”
    “What do they do to you?” asked Little Irene.
    “What don’t they do to us, you might well ask, my girl! The village has been deserted, there is no man left to protect us, they steal whatever is in our gardens, and out of spite they destroy our trees and our vegetables. Just to show you, only last night they stole the few raspberries that were ripening slowly on my bramble hedge. And that’s not all! They also hacked the entire plant to pieces and pulled it out of its roots! I am fed up, I have given up, and I too live on just any old how, till my days are spent and I may find peace from the troubles of this world. Such is my lot.”
    “And the money that your son left you?” asked Little Irene.
    “Stolen, my girl, gone, never to be seen again! You think there will be money left, when they do not even leave us our bread?”
    “How come you do not go to court?” asked the Prince outraged. “Why then do we have judges?”
    Penniless laughed.
    “The judges are not for our sort,” he said. “They are for the rich, who fill their pockets. From us, the have-nots , they can make no profit. Go, if you want, to the trial of Miserlix, as you are headed to the capital and are curious to know. There you shall hear justice being pronounced.”
    “I shall go indeed,” said the Prince. “I wish to see with my own eyes what you have said.”
    “Do go, my boy, and witness with your eyes, hear with your own ears. The trials take place in the square, under the great plane tree.”
    The two siblings bid farewell to the old man, and took the road to the capital.
    They arrived late. The sun had descended behind the mountain, the trial, at this hour, was over.
    The Judge, wrapped in his frayed red coat, which had lost its original colour with the passing of time, was getting up to go home, while two scruffy policemen were trailing behind them a shabbily dressed, pale man, hands in shackles, leading him away to prison. His head was bandaged with a scarf, and, full of grief, he held tightly in his arms his daughter, who was crying with heavy sobs.
    “Who is this man?” asked the Prince.
    “It is Miserlix, the blacksmith,” answered one of the bystanders.
    “Why are they taking him to prison?”
    “Bless me if I know! He stole, so they say, some hens. I did not understand very well, they did not say much, but they have sentenced him to two years in prison. Yet he was a fool, if ever there was one! He claimed that some palace courtier stole chickens, wine and I know not what else from him, then sent him rolling down the mountain slope where he split his head. Someone also stole from him, he says, his watch and two silver five-crown coins. You may be sure that His Excellency, Judge Faintheart, ticked him off all right, called him a liar and a thief. He then told us that not onlywas it not true that his chickens had been stolen, but that it was Miserlix himself who had stolen them, I know not where from. The Judge gave orders for him to be beaten till he confessed the truth. Miserlix then took fright, and asked them not to beat him; he would agree to go to prison, and they could say what they liked, even that it was he who had stolen the hens. Couldn’t he have stayed quietly in his corner, the fool, instead of seeking courts and justice?!”
    “But this is shameful! It is downright sinful!” the Prince cried, furious.
    “Shameful or not, sinful or not, that’s the court of justice for you,” answered the other.
    “No, this is not what the court of justice should be!” said the Prince. “Where does the Judge live?”
    They pointed out the house to him, and he ran and knocked at the door, pulling Little Irene by the hand.
    The Judge was already back