A Secret Murder

An urchin boy comes up to a man in the midst of his business one day in the street, begging for money so he may feed his hungry father. The man becomes morally indignant and berates the boy, telling him he ought to wash and find work and earn his living. The boy spits on him and runs away.

Then that same man, about a month later, for no particular reason, decides to take a different route home. He passes by a large area of neglected land with long grass and a section of abandoned railway. He sees a filthy young boy running in the grass with no parents, and goes to investigate.

The man comes to a dilapidated house, barely standing amidst the grasses. He finds the boy inside, playing with the corpses of birds, pinching the limp wings of pigeons between his fingers in a grotesque imitation of flight. He speaks with the boy, but the boy never looks up.

Man: “If someone finds us here, we’ll be in trouble. It may have gone to shit, but it’s someone else’s house.”

Boy: “Not anymore. The man who lived here died.”

Man: “Did you kill him?”

Boy: “No.”

The man felt strongly that this was a lie, but he had no evidence. Surely the boy’s presentation sufficiently attested to his character. It reminded him of another boy he had met, not long ago.

Man: “Don’t I know you? Where is your father?”

The boy ignored that, and the man made to sieze him by the arm.

Man: “We have to go.”

Boy: “I don’t have to go anywhere!”

And the boy ran out into the grasses again. The man went out after him, but only got a little way from the house before tripping over something in the grass. He brushed off his clothes and was suddenly seized with horrified disbelief at what he found before him.

It was a corpse, a withered corpse, dressed in clothes all too like his clothes, with a face all too like his face, and starved, emaciated. The horror stopped the world, for a moment there were no thoughts, there was no time, only that dreadful face.

When he finally remembered himself, he turned to see where the boy had gone. He was nearby on the rise, sitting in the roots of a tree that had grown entangled with the train line fence and subsequently died. The man approached him, pointing at the corpse in the grass.

Man: “Who is that? Did he live here? Did you kill him?”

The boy turned up his nose in defiance.

Man: “Tell me! or I’ll have you thrown in prison.”

The boy looked at him sharply and spoke.

Boy: “I’m already in prison. You don’t remember? Can’t you recognise yourself in your acts? That is my father, whom you have killed.”