Read Lamb for Free Online Page B

His answer was sullen. Michael felt another dozen lumps of sugar at least, but said nothing.
    â€˜You’re not going to huff on me, are you?’ He raised the boy’s chin with his finger. ‘So early?’
    The boy gave a shrug, then smiled. He had good teeth.
    â€˜That’s better,’ said Michael. ‘Let’s get back.’
    For hours the train charged through the countryside, through a landscape of fields, of slag-heaps and towns. Michael and Owen did not speak again, but sat opposite, their faces averted towards the window. The fat man came back, smelling of beer, and slept.
    Michael wondered if he was taking the right line with Owen and his smoking. There would be no doubt in Brother Benedict’s mind as to how to cure it. Six of the belt every time he smelt smoke on his breath. And a few times when he didn’t smell it. That would put a stop to it. But Michael’s reluctance to use the belt was one of the reasons why he had not got on with Benedict. He pictured the scene of himself strapping Owen for smoking in the john of a British Rail train half way across England. He had told the boy what it would do to his health, that it would eventually kill him, and if it didn’t kill him it would drastically shorten his life, but Owen had shrugged. He said that he didn’t care whether he died or not. Michael was taking on the task of giving him something to live for. His discipline of the boy must be positive, not negative like Brother Benedict’s. Benedict had given himself away the day he had said sourly,
    â€˜Anybody who says he loves children doesn’t understand them.’
    He seemed to take a pleasure in using the belt. His little pre-execution phrases showed someone who was savouring the moment.
    â€˜Boy, I have been wanting to do this to you for a very long time,’ or ‘Long runs the fox’ (a smile like a brittle flash of lightning), or ‘Ponder these for the next hour or so, boy’, and he’d bring the belt crashing down from a height, all his twelve wiry stone behind it. His advice to Brother Sebastian had been to make it a deterrent,
    â€˜If it is going to be of any use to you, you must do it to really hurt. Otherwise you make a fool of yourself. Discipline, Brother Sebastian, is love disguised. The strap shows we care. It’s the only thing they know. Kill and cure. Kill and cure. That’s my motto. I was belted black and blue myself and what harm did it do me?’
    Benedict seemed to enjoy his power over the boys, to make them do or say anything he wanted them to. One day, the previous winter, Benedict and Michael had been walking together. Snow had fallen and Michael was aware of the blackness of their soutanes and the fog of their breath as they strolled round the house.
    â€˜Wait till you hear this,’ said Benedict. He called a boy who was passing. ‘O’Halloran!’
    â€˜Yes, Brother.’ O’Halloran came to attention.
    â€˜You know something about birds, don’t you?’
    â€˜Yes, Brother, a bit.’
    â€˜Listen to the humility. Did you know of this expertise, Brother Sebastian?’
    â€˜No, I did not.’
    â€˜Well, Brother, O’Halloran here is our bird expert, our resident ornithologist. Am I not right, O’Halloran?’
    â€˜Yes, Brother.’
    â€˜They call him with a certain gentle irony “the Bird Man of Alcatraz”. O’Halloran, do you see those tracks there?’ He pointed to the ground and the freshly fallen snow where some bird tracks had been imprinted.
    â€˜Yes, Brother.’
    â€˜Tell Brother Sebastian what they are.’
    Michael leaned forward, interested in what the boy had to say.
    â€˜They’re sparrow tracks, Brother.’
    â€˜Mmmmm.’ Brother Benedict rubbed his chin. ‘I’m not an expert in these matters, O’Halloran, but I would say . . . mmmm . . . they were eagle