The farmer’s wife held on to the child and watched the horo.

Say, the young woman from the city asked her, is it a boy or a girl?

No! A boy!

How old?

Already close to two years.

Does he walk?

Oh no, still not yet.

The woman from the city looks at his pale little face, which moans: still not yet, I am so sick!

Fidelfideldidilum!

Look at that one over there, how she dances, the one with the golden glittering dress, that is my daughter!

But your little boy?

Isn’t she beautiful and white and blossoming?

My dear city woman, my sister drinks my blood, she sucks the marrow from my bones, she buys gold sequins with my flesh, and my mother holds on to me, too, so that I can’t get away.

The dress cost a lot, a cow and a calf.

Madam, your little child is pale.

And, quietly, something releases itself from her soul and warmly envelopes the child’s soul.

Then the little boy lifts his painfully indifferent little face.

The head, which the emaciated, unnaturally pale neck could not carry, rested weak on her shoulders.

But now he felt at ease. And his wise eyes, marked by death, looked at the city woman.

The woman shuddered.

A twitching soul flapped upward out of the skinny body and, with a soft shiver, enveloped her being.

And something spoke to her—but not with poor human words, rather something infinitely more beautiful, more divine, flew to her like a fervent gratitude, like a tender understanding, moaning about early death and lonesome dying. And a voice, even more secretly, resounded underneath: you suffer too, you too!

The city woman trembled. Is it possible? Reason says no!

But saying no cannot undo it!

The child’s eyes suddenly opened up, a brightness blossomed within them, which radiated toward her.

I finally found you after all, a part of me, my being, my soul! Now, nothing can cause harm.

Am I dreaming? the woman thought.

And her eyes sank into those of the child, into depths, shallows, infinities.

How vast your soul is, she thought.