Run, Boy, Run(24)

"You've been looking for a new cowherd," the woman said. "I've brought you one."

Pan Wapielnik surveyed him. "All right," he said. "I'll try him out. What's your name?"

"Jurek Staniak."

Jurek was told to wait in the yard. Pan Wapielnik went and brought a wheelbarrow full of food for the pigs and sent Jurek to feed them. When he was done, he found the farmer sitting in front of his house.

"You can sleep in the hayloft," he told Jurek. "Tomorrow you'll take the cows to pasture."

"Yes, sir."

Pan Wapielnik took him to the hayloft and pointed to a blanket in a corner. Someone had bedded down here before him. Shaking the blanket to air it, he heard something fall. He bent down and picked up a pocket knife. He opened it. It had only one blade, the tip of which was broken. He recognized it at once. It was Yosele's. Was he the cowherd here before him? What had happened to him? He didn't dare ask Pan Wapielnik. Perhaps eventually he would.

Jozef Wapielnik was an irritable man. His small, unattractive wife was always busy. They had three grown daughters. Two worked on the farm and helped their mother with the milking. The youngest and prettiest lived in another village and sometimes visited on Sundays. There were also two younger children smaller than Jurek, a boy and a girl. Pan Wapielnik took both of them every morning on horseback to their school in a nearby town.

The next day he rode his horse alongside Jurek to the pasture. His herd numbered more than fifteen cows and Jurek had to run around a lot to keep them all in the meadow. Once the farmer saw that he knew what to do, he left him alone with them. At least twice a day, however, he came by to make sure that his cows were all right.

One day a cow calved in the meadow. Jurek knew exactly what to do. When Pan Wapielnik arrived, he received a nod of approval—the highest praise the farmer ever gave. Pan Wapielnik put the calf on his horse and rode home with the bleating mother behind him.

Jurek didn't play with the village boys. If he wasn't given extra chores after coming home with the cows, he stayed on the farm and played with his dog, a big, black-and-white spotted mongrel with a black ring around one eye, which had turned up one day. Jurek took to feeding it and the dog came to sleep with him at night in the hayloft. One morning, while he was letting the cows out of their milking stalls, one of them stepped on the dog's front foot.

The foot was broken. Pan Wapielnik went to get an ax with which to put the dog out of its misery, but Jurek carried the dog to the hayloft. He straightened the broken leg and made a splint from two pieces of wood tied with strips of cotton. The dog couldn't walk. Jurek went on feeding it and sleeping with it at night. Sometimes he brought it milk from the barn. He called it Azor.

For many days Azor hardly moved. Then he began to hobble with his bad leg in the air and tried to work the splint off. Jurek scolded him and tied it back in place. A few weeks went by. When the foot had mended enough for Azor to use it, Jurek took off the splint and massaged it. The dog walked on all four legs again, although with a limp.

Azor became Jurek's best friend and went with him everywhere. One day the farmer, who had forgotten about the incident, saw the two of them together and asked with surprise, "Where is that dog from?"

"It's the dog you wanted to kill, Pan Jozef," Jurek said.

"It limps a bit, eh? That's no reason why it can't make a good guard dog."

That night, he tied Azor with a chain outside the house. In the morning, he let Jurek free him. Only on Sundays did Azor remain chained all day. That was when Pan Wapielnik had visitors. He was proud of his big new guard dog and wanted to show him off.

Jurek's new employers never invited him into their house. After coming home with the cows, he would be brought his supper by one of the girls. Usually this was a bowl of noodles and vegetables or potatoes mashed with lard and onions. On Sundays he was given an omelet with sausage. He was hungry all the time. Although he knew Pan Wapielnik wouldn't like it if he took his mind off the cows, one day he couldn't resist hunting a grouse with his slingshot. As soon as the farmer departed after one of his visits, Jurek made a fire and put the grouse in the coals. As luck would have it, Pan Wapielnik returned unexpectedly soon afterward. Finding Jurek by the fire, he stuck him hard with his whip.

"I've got a big herd," he said. "If I ever catch you sitting by a fire again, I'll sack you at once."

"Yes, Pan Jozef."

After the farmer was gone, Jurek ate the cooked grouse. But he didn't dare hunt anymore.

***

It was high spring. One fine Sunday morning Jurek lay in the meadow playing one of his favorite games. Taking off his shirt, he hung it on a board in the sun and waited for the lice to leave it. Then, with the help of a stem, he forced them to walk in a straight line. Any louse breaking ranks was squashed at once.