The Testament of Yves Gundron Read Online Free PDF Page A

like other people?”
    My brother, who had perhaps not yet remarked upon the nakedness of his toes, looked down.
    Ydlbert swatted his son’s arm. “You’ll learn to respect visionaries and holy men.”
    He flicked his curly hair out of his eyes. “As you say, Father. I was but asking after his shoes.”
    Wido Jungfrau said, “I don’t know why we need this thing. We always got on fine before.”
    â€œThen suit yourself,” said tall Jepho Martin, nodding vigorously to his own elder brother, Heinrik, “because I want one.”
    Said Heinrik, with reverence, “It is one of the loveliest things I have ever beheld.”
    â€œWe are all equals when we are born from our mothers’ wombs and when we return to God’s dark earth,” said Mandrik, “and we must strive always to maintain our balance in between. To market with you, for the nonce, and Godspeed.”
    The two harnesses created quite a stir among the townsmen, who as a result were more willing to pay a fair price for our goods. We were all pleased with the outcome of the day. After market, then, I traveled tothe edge of my northern fields with barley ale and a bunch of flowers to offer up at my grandmother’s cairn. The story went that when she was a young woman, my grandmother Iulia washed up in the tide with sea vegetables and fish, naked as the day God made her, with her dark auburn hair in a salty tangle behind. Some fisherman, his name long since lost, brought her the long journey inland to our village—which I am told sits in the very center of our island, a single verdant dip in the surrounding mountains—during which time she would nor speak to him nor eat. As it happened she spoke English, but in a strange, harsh voice, which made everyone think her a changeling or at best a thing of the sea; yet old Matthias Gansevöort took pity upon the poor wretch, and accepted her into his crowded house as daughter. There she surprised him with her industrious weaving and her knack for concocting dishes more varied than porridge; 7 and soon enough, she began to compose music, bending the syntax of our tired old language to her will to make the sad, syncopated songs which eventually she passed on to my brother, and with which talent my wife was also blessed. 8 Iulia never lost her memory of the sea, nor quit telling tales of a great land beyond it, nor rid herself of the peculiar frankness of demeanor that marked her when she was first dredged up, and so was always somewhat feared among the villagers, who would not have her buried in the churchyard. There she was then, looming large above my land. I thought she would be glad for ale and flowers, though wildflowers grew all around; and I asked her to bless my invention. The next day Ydlbert and I brought our neighbors to my barn and instructed them in the manufacture of harnesses, and of long reins that we might stand in the carts behind the horses. Gerald Desvres brought a jug of fermented barley to share around the threshing floor, and recited the briefest blessing:
    All saints! All saints! All saints, hear!
    Bless this measure of barley beer!
    It having thus been rendered safe, by nightfall our horses were all be-harnessed and our heads wobbly with liquor. We decided to meet thus every month on the new moon, if not to discuss inventions, then for the drink.
    At next market, my whole village—even those I disliked—had harnesses, and it became clear that our carts were now insufficient. Previously we had chosen among our weekly crops and loaded the carts tamely; now we loaded them to breaking with vegetables and fruits, and even then the horses, though tired, seemed little troubled by the journey. The carts needed to be different somehow, but every cart I had ever seen had been exactly like the one Hammadi now pulled; how was I to imagine a different way? One man cannot change everything in his lifetime.
    My brother, however, has an