Chapter  38

Yango ate a helping of lamb stew in the canteen, at the end of the long corridor. He was hungry as a wolf. When he emerged, he saw that the three strangers were gone. On the bench where they had been sitting was a little boy. He was crying because the police had confiscated the tray he used to sell koulouria. A policeman had chased him, thrown his koulouria to the ground, grabbed him by the collar, and dragged him to the police station along with the empty tray. Then they had taken his tray and thrown it into the room where they kept all the trays of unlicensed peddlers. Wiping his runny nose, he pointed to a closed door. He had been at the meeting, but he hadn’t sold much there, so he went over to the theater, where he expected to sell all the koulouria he had. Instead, that policeman had pinched him. Why? He was still crying. Yango’s fingers slipped gently through the child’s blond hair. For a long while he caressed his head.