94
" That settles it,” said Mr. Trapwood. “We’re going back to the pension. We’re going to pack. We’re going to be on the Bishop first thing tomorrow. Sir Aubrey will have to send someone else out. Nothing is worth another day in this hellhole.”
Mr. Low did not answer. He had caught a fever and was lying in the bottom of a large canoe owned by the Brothers of the São Gabriel Mission, who had arranged for the crows to be taken back to Manaus. His eyes were closed and he was wandering a little in his mind, mumbling about a boy with hair the color of the belly of the golden toad which squatted on the lily leaves of the Mamari River.
There had, of course, been no golden-haired boys; there hadn’t been any boys at all. What there had been was a leper colony, run by the Brothers of Saint Patrick, a group of Irish missionaries to whom the crows had been sent.
“They’re good men, the Brothers,” a man on the docks had told them as they set off on their last search for Taverner’s son. “They take in all sorts of strays--orphans, boys with no homes. If anyone knows where Taverner’s lad might be, it’ll be them.”
Then he had spat cheerfully into the river because he was a crony of the chief of police and liked the idea of Mr. Low and Mr. Trapwood spending time with the Brothers, who were very holy men indeed and slept on the hard ground, and ate porridge made from manioc roots, and got up four times in the night to pray.
The Brothers’ mission was on a swampy part of the river and very unhealthy, but the Brothers thought only about God and helping their fellowmen. They welcomed Mr. Trapwood and Mr. Low and said they could look over the leper colony to see if they could find anyone who might turn out to be the boy they were looking for.
“They’re a jolly lot, the lepers,” said Father Liam. “People who’ve suffered don’t have time to grumble.”
But the crows, turning green, thought there wouldn’t be much point. Even if there was a boy there the right age, Sir Aubrey probably wouldn’t think that a boy who was a leper could manage Westwood.
Later a group of pilgrims arrived who had been walking on foot from the Andes and were on their way to a shrine on the Madeira River, and the Brothers knelt and washed their feet.
“We know you’ll be proud to share the sleeping hut with our friends here,” they said to Mr. Low and Mr. Trapwood, and the crows spent the night on the floor with twelve snoring, grunting men--and woke to find two large and hungry-looking vultures squatting in the doorway.
By the time they returned to Manaus the crows were beaten men. They didn’t care any longer about Taverner’s son or Sir Aubrey, or even the hundred-pound bonus they had lost. All they cared about was getting onto the Bishop and steaming away as fast as it could be done. "
― Eva Ibbotson , Journey to the River Sea
95
" Knowing it was her last night on the Arabella, Maia fought against sleep. She must remember it all--the lapping of the water against the side of the boat, the white moths, the fireflies…
Finn, too, was awake. “When we’re grown up I’ll come back for you, I promise. No one can stop us then.”
But she wasn’t grown up and nor was he, and Finn was going on alone. The professor had tried to persuade him to come back with them, but Finn only said, “I promised my father I’d go and find the Xanti. I promised.”
Now, though, lying in the dark, he realized how much he hated the idea of going on by himself. He wasn’t afraid exactly; he knew he could do it--but it suddenly seemed utterly dismal to go on without his friend.
“We could still run away into the forest,” said Maia.
But Finn said no. “Minty really cares about you. The professor told me she nearly went mad when she thought you’d been killed in the fire. You can’t play tricks on her--or on him. They’re good people. It’s just…oh, why can’t grown-ups understand that we might know what is right for us just as well as they do? "
― Eva Ibbotson , Journey to the River Sea
