A child's story

There was a boy once: all he wanted was a loaf, a loaf of bread. He had no care in the world: the loaf was the world to him. The azure of the sky when it met the sea in his boat meant nothing to him. The pink of the tulips that abounded in his farm meant nothing to him. The cold breeze coming from another world meant nothing to him. All he wanted was the loaf.

And yet, he never knew where to find it. He searched in the sunbeams that finally broke through and fixed his boat in their trance, and he did not find it. He searched in the drop of dew which came sliding to his palm as he fingered the tulip in his quest, and he did not find it. He searched in the moisture that came laden on the breeze, and it certainly seemed so pregnant with meaning, and yet he did not find it.

The boy was now a marked boy. Everybody knew what he was searching for, though nobody knew why he was searching for it. They were all generous souls there, they would have sacrificed their last loaves for him, the bonny boy. But no, the boy was intent on only his loaf, loaf no one knew where it was. All tried to help him, but they looked in the granaries, and cellars, and hot ovens, and locked shops. Then they whispered that the boy looked for the loaf at strange places; why would he paddle off the boat in the middle of the sea and sit there, brooding always, looking up in the sky with the light of phosphorescence above in his eyes? Why would he roam away from all boys, go with a lonely goat to a hillock, and look keen-eyed from there? Why would he look so expectant when the storm came along, as if the beating rain and sleet was going to bring him his loaf as well? And then, they whispered, it's a charmed loaf, a loaf that would bring curse upon the town, a loaf that would give its possessor strange power over rain and hail and sea and sun and mountains and clouds and day and night; they asked then whose boy it was? They found that he was no one's - they couldn't remember when did he come in their midst, from where? Was he born there, or was he a gypsy? Why had they grown to love him and look for his loaf - that was certainly a charm used by the boy on them. And then, they decided to take the matter in their hands.

When the child was sleeping in his boat, and the storm was heavy, they cut loose the anchor, and let the boy adrift in the sea. The boy was never to be seen. The next day, they were afraid a little, they remained quiet among themselves, the town tried to show its usual bustle but was very quiet. But as the sun kept on shining as before and the storms continued battering as before, there was relief, then forgetfulness, then callousness.

Nobody knows what happened of the boy? And if he is still there on the sea today, is he still searching for the loaf? Or is that loaf the same as the baker's loaf that he rejects - but how could a mere boy, a boy frail and hair slouching over his eyes and with persistent cold, how could a mere boy still be on the seas if he is not really after his loaf? No, I think, the boy is still there, and his loaf is certainly there, and lost, and he will find it, any moment...