THE EAR

THE EAR

The  people of the village where Alexander lived, with her mother and her grandparents,

 had  always called him the Prince, and he had never been able to understand why. He for himself was a shepherd, who every day took his flock of sheep to pasture. Alexander liked his life as a shepherd, and indeed life was pleasant among those mountains upon which you could see the clouds to rest_, and those green plaines crossed by gushing streams ( brooks) where the silver-blue water flowed as if it sang, as if it skipped with joy.

Alexander had not been at all  sorry to have to leave the school  when he was not yet ten years old, since he had to look after the sheep, the only source of sustenance for his family.

One day, while his sheep were grazing in a green clearing crossed by a stream , and he was looking at the colored fishes swimming , jumping in the water. suddenly he heard a shot. As soon as he had heard that____BANG___Alexander was  sure it was a shot from a fire arm.

The sky was clear, it couldn’t had been thunder.  Soon after having heard the bang of the shot, the painful yell  of Wolf, the guard dog of his flock, reached him. He turned and could see Wolf lying on the ground. His dog had been killed with a single shot on the forehead.

Afterwards many more shots had been fired, in rapid succession, a real hail of shots, which had put the sheep in flight. All the sheep ran away, bleating, in disorder, some going here, some going there. Alexander had heard the shots, but he had not seen who had fired.

After his sheep had fled, scattering across the valley, here that two hooded men appeared. They had their faces half covered by their hoods, and each of them was armed with rifle, which they kept aimed Alexander, who raised his arms in surrender. The two hooded men grabbed him, one by an arm and one by the other ( arm) and, lifting him,they  carried him away. One of the hooded man said the other: “ Well, Prince Alexander is our prisoner. Do you want to inform our queen?”

The two hooded men, armed with rifles, took  Alexander to a kind of castle, even if it was not a real castle, since it was an underground , wide building which seemed to be excavated in the rock.

When he had heard the hooded man saying : “ our queen”, Alexander couldn’t help but remember how the people of his village called him, they called him “ the little prince” So that, for a moment he imagined, or dreamed, that he could be really a prince, that perhaps he could be the son of a queen who, for some inscrutable reason, had ended up as a shepherd in a remote village. But soon he , Alexander, regretted this fantasy, thinking of his real mother. Oh, she had to be waiting for him at home and she, like his grandparents , would have worried very much, she would have been anguished, seeing he wasn’t coming  back. 

“ Who is your queen?” he had asked the two hooded men, before arriving in the underground castle. “ Our queen is called the Snow Queen” One of the hooded men answered.

“ Why did the Snow queen make I have been kidnapped?” Alexander had also asked.

“ Ah, but we haven’t kidnapped you at all…..Later you will be able to understand that…” the hooded man said-

“ That’s enough! Shut up, Tom! Not a word more! He doesn’t have to know” The other hooded man intervened harshly.

Alexander knew he was a guest, if not a prisoner, in the palace of the Snow Queen, yet (but) that vast underground mansion , where he had been taken, had nothing to do with snow, the pure, white snow which he remembered dazzling in the sun, on the mountains, over the valleys of his village.  In that kind of underground castle everything was dark. The light was that, always scarce, of the candles, which were in every room. Then she, the Snow Queen, not only had never received him, but he had almost never seen her. Only once he had happened to glimpse her, by candlelight, at a considerable distance, from a space which opened in a wall. He had only been able to see the Queen for a few moments.  She had appeared to him very tall and very thin, almost a kind of ghost, a jeweled ghost.

Alexander’s life, since he had been brought in that kind of underground palace______he kept on believing that he had been kidnapped_____although it was rather lonely, it could well be considered the life of a Prince. He was served and revered as a real prince. He ate sumptuous meals, he could have musicians who played the music he liked, he could even have attendants who read him his favorite books. He also had a personal valet who helped him get dressed.

But from none of his attendants, nor from the musicians he  had been able to find out why he had been brought there. Every time he had asked, it had seemed they all pretended not even to have heard his question.

Time passed between those stone walls , which sometimes appeared to him , in the flickering light of the candles, shining, as they were of crystal. Alexander couldn’t know how long it had been since he was there ( since he had been brought there), because there were no clocks in the underground castle. And, ah, there weren’t even mirrors, what a sin, since he would have liked  to be able to see himself dressed in regal clothes.

Alexander, who could move freely from room to room ( in the underground palace), even though he did not have access to the queen’s rooms, kept on wondering how, when he could get out of there, to come back to his mountains and his valleys, to his flock, to come back home. He was also very worried about his mother and his grandparents, ah he seemed to see them, who had to be anguished since he had not come back, they had to think he was dead.

Every day, every hour indeed he came back to ask himself how he could do to get out of that underground prison. He did not know how to do (it), but he was more and more convinced that he had to find a way to escape, since whoever held him prisoner seemed to have not at all intention to free him.

Until   one day ….that very shocking surprise, he happened to hear something which he would never have expected, never had imagined. It was his personal valet, named Peter, to let him know that incredible chance. Peter, even if until then he had exchanged only a few words with Alexander, even if he had always pretended not to even hear his recurring questions about why he had been kidnapped, yet (Peter) had to have perceived, realized that Alexander couldn’t wait to get out of that which was a prison for him. Peter said him that , if he wanted get out of that underground palace he had to agree ( to accept) to have his ear cut, that is the pavilion  of one ear.  “ How? What are you saying? Does the Snow Queen belong to the Anonymous  Kidnapping?” Alexander asked, terribly surprised, even frightened. In fact he know that the gangs of kidnappers, who kidnapped people to ask for a ransom to be paid for their release, used to send a piece of the ear of the person they had kidnapped to the family of the kidnapped, as proofs that their relative was still alive. “ I was only entrusted with the task of making you this proposal, not of answering your questions” Peter replied, at all  impassive.

“But those who are kidnapped in order to ask a ransom for their release, they all are rich people.

Instead I’m not rich! My family is of modest conditions, not to say it is poor. Who should pay the ransom for my liberation?” Alexander asked, more and more incredulous.

“ Oh, but look, I didn’t talk about any ransom. I only said you that if you want to get out of here, you must agree to have the pavilion of your ear cut off” After these words , he had spoken softly, Peter walked out of the room, with his light step. He was a boy a little older than Alexander who, standing on the opening of the room, followed him with his eyes, as he walked away in the corridor, moving with the agility of an athlete and with the grace of a dancer…..and to think that  this boy so graceful, almost delicate had just told him that if he wanted to get out of there he had to have his ear cut off.

Peter was kept on walking away in the long corridor  when a dachshund dog came into the room whimpering lamentably, painfully . Alexander approached the dog and saw that the animal’s ear had recently been cut off, the wound was bleeding. He, shouting, asked for help. None of his servants arrived, instead the orchestra came in the room and, while the musicians were sitting in their places, the first violin , standing, said: “ I think our friend Alexander  need to listen to Mozart’s music, doesn’t he?”And the orchestra, without waiting what Alexander would have answered, started to play a Night Serenade by Mozart.

 Alexander had been from first terrified at the thought to have his ear cut off , and he continued to be terrified. But he wanted very much to come back to his life as a shepherd. He asked to Peter what would have happened ( to him) if he didn’t accept to have his ear cut off. Peter said him: “ Then you’ll remain ( stay) here”

Ah, Alexander had thought he had to find a way to escape that underground dungeon. He remembered that when he had arrived there, brought by the two hooded men, he had come down a steep wall, which had points of support, even if it was not a real stair. So, he could have tried to climb that wall, if he could have found it again. But that wall seemed to be gone.

One night Wolf, the guard dog of his flock, which had been killed the day when Alexander had been kidnapped, appeared to him in a dream.  Wolf did not speak, but it was as if the dog were saying him that he would soon have come out of that underground palace, which was a prison for him.  He didn’t have to worry, he would soon have been free.  Alexander had felt comforted and relieved by that dream, he had hoped again to be able to come back to be free, without his ear being cut off.

But days passed and he was still a prisoner.

Then the unbelievable  happened. A very strong earthquake shook the earth, destroying the mountain under which   there was the caste of the Snow Queen.  Alexander was catapulted out of the underground castle. The earth was still shaking under him, but he was free.