Short Story from around the WORLD: The Red and Gold Shoe part 4/7

The Red and Gold Shoe

The Red and Gold Shoe part 4/7

"What will you buy?" asked Joseph seriously, for he knew this problem called for much thought.

Lata was quite sure what she would do. "We'll have a doll marriage too, and we'll have a feast." So what if they'd not been invited? A marriage and a feast of their own would make things equal. Well, almost equal-for it couldn't be much of a marriage when one had no dolls. The groom was the wooden handle of a chisel with the blade snapped off from Joseph's house, and the bride was the short stout stick with which Lata's grandmother beat the clothes at the pond. Both stood stiffly side by side against the fence, with eyes,a nose, and a mouth put on with a charred stick. For ten coppers the feast had to be modest indeed, with roasted peas served in silver cups made from paper out of empty cigarette boxes they found along the tracks.

They ate the peas slowly and very solemnly' It would not do to gobble them too fast, for once they were gone the feast would be over. Too soon would their pleasure become a thing of the past. The peas had to be chewed and tasted to the fullest so that they could be remembered to the fullest.

"We won't tell anybody-not anybody," said Lata, munching.

"No, we won't tell anybody," Joseph repeated, nodding his head, for there is always a certain pride in the possession of a secret of one's very own. However, the real truth was that it hadn't been much of a marriage. The others would laugh out loud, and that they could not have borne.

What with all the preparation-hunting for tinfoil, running to the station to buy the peas from the old man at the grade crossing there, and setting up the bride and bride- groom, the children were unaware of frow the time hadpassed until Lata heard her grandmother calling from the lane on the other side of the fence.

But where was the goat? "Rakhi ! Rakhi !" she cried, jumping to her feet.

"She was down that way." Joseph said, pointing along the tracks as Lata set off.

If luck were something one could be sure of, there wouldn't be any fun to it. "If Rakhi hadn't strayed so far that day, we would never have found the shoe," Lata always said later, convinced it was all because of their good luck.

She was running along the tracks, not even looking down, when the gleam caught her eye. All crimson and gold, it flashed in the afternoon sun. And when she went over and picked it up, her eyes opened wide in astonishment and delight. A child's shoe-and what a shoe ! Of soft red velvet it was, with a leather sole and worked all over from end to end with gold thread. The toe tapered to a fine golden point and then curved back on itself. What was more, it was brand- new. Perhaps its mate lies somewhere close by, thought Lata, as she searched along the tracks and among the bushes. But she didn't find it. There was only one shoe. Nevertheless, when you have never owned a pair of shoes in your life, even one is better than none.

There was nothing magical about the shoe. What magic can there be in a thing thrown out of the window of a passing train by a willful spoiled child who should have known better? But then again, what is magic if it isn't marvel and change and all the difference between the ordinary and the extraordinary?