that primitive and incomprehensible instinct which
occasionally springs from a great joy of living, he
was always hitting at the snakes with a stick, and as
often as not he would leave them sore stricken. But
Christophe would try to snatch the stick from him,
for he could not endure to see dumb creatures suffer;
then a struggle would ensue, perhaps even a fight,
both the children being extremely tenacious.
Yet Christophe would sometimes try to reason with
Jan: They have never harmed us — why must you
torment them?5
Jan would usually answer in much the same words:
'All serpents are wicked and belong to the devil. A
serpent tempted Adam and Eve; the Cure has taught
us that from the Bible.'
So Christophe must tell his cousin about pain,
which he seemed to divine as by intuition, while Jan
listened without understanding his words, unable as
yet to envisage suffering. But one evening as Jan
struck hard at a couleuvre which his sharp young
ears had detected in a thicket, Christophe suddenly
flinched and sprang away:
'Stop, stop!' he screamed, cYou are hurting my
shoulders. . . .'
Jan ran to him: 'How have I hurt you — but how?
You know very well that I have not touched you!
Christophe, tell me quickly what I have done? I
would never, never hit you with a stick. . . .' and he
looked as though he were going to cry, 'tell me how I
have hurt you, Christophe;' he pleaded.
Very slowly Christophe pulled off his jersey, and
there on his back was a long, red wheal. Jan stared
at it, terrified and amazed — then, even while he stood
staring, it faded. The rest of that walk was very
silent; indeed there was little enough to say, since the
thing transcended their comprehension; but Jan kept
a tight hold of Christophe's hand, as though suddenly
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