Doughnuts and Street Boys

Hamid woke early the next morning, stiff and cold, and blamed himself for wanting to sleep so near the house. Yet somehow it comforted him to know that Kinza was close to him. He wondered whether she had woken yet and what she was doing. He wandered along the street and out into the deserted market, wondering what to do, where to go, and, above all, where his breakfast would come from. He was sure that Kinza was eating well, and he rather regretted having given her that last crust.

It looked like a golden city no longer. The shops were shuttered, and a few homeless beggars lay up against the temple steps, still fast asleep. Now that his mission was completed, Hamid felt horribly flat and tired, and he stood in the middle of the market longing for home.

Then he heard a familiar sound—the harsh rattle of a stork’s cry and the rush of great wings as they swooped over him, just as they used to do when he was with his goats on his own mountain. He looked up quickly and saw it flying up high to its nest in the turret of an old fort. He stared at the massive old walls and found that he was standing opposite an old gate in an archway leading into a garden.

The gate was wide open and there seemed to be no one to stop him. Hamid trotted across the cobbles, climbed the steps, and tiptoed through. He found himself standing in the most beautiful garden he had ever seen in his life. It was square in shape, and in the middle was a fountain surrounded by green lawns and colorful flower beds. But while he was enjoying it all, a keeper came through the archway and ordered him out.

The town was beginning to wake up now, and Hamid found himself standing with his back to a little stall where a man was frying doughnuts in a deep stone trough of oil. He was obviously busy, having to do everything himself, and this had put him in a bad temper, for he was muttering and growling to himself.

Hamid suddenly had an idea. Drawing as near as he could to that delicious smell, and being desperate with hunger, he boldly walked up to the man and asked him if he needed an assistant.

The man looked him up and down. His usual boy had not turned up that morning, and Sillam, the doughnut-maker, was prepared to accept help from the first boy who came along. He opened the wooden barrier and beckoned Hamid inside. Sillam did not recognize the boy and did not know whether or not he was a thief.

“Take the bellows,” he said, “and blow up this fire, and if I find you helping yourself to anything that doesn’t belong to you, the police station is across the street!”

Hamid squatted down and began to blow. He did not feel very well; it was very hot, and the leaping flames scorched his face. Many little boys before him had been unable to stand the heat. At last he heard his master’s voice say, “Enough,” and he staggered to his feet, dizzy and flushed.

“Now stand there and thread the doughnuts onto the blades of grass,” said Sillam. Hamid worked quickly enough, burning his fingers a little, but not minding much because he was too hungry to think about anything else except the pains inside his stomach. But he did notice that quite a crowd of tattered, grimy little boys were watching him closely. He realized that somehow, before long, he would have to say who he was.

He had worked for about two hours when the master suddenly said, “Have you had any breakfast?”

“No,” said Hamid, “and no supper last night, either.”

Sillam handed him a couple of hot, golden doughnuts. With a sigh of relief, Hamid bit into the first one. It was wonderful. But the dark eyes of the little boys watching him suddenly became hostile. They were hungry, too, and this stranger was taking a job they wanted.

Doughnuts were a breakfast food, and the shop shut at midmorning. The master told Hamid he had worked well and could return early the next day. Then he gave him a small coin, and Hamid, feeling like a king, strutted across the market to decide how to spend it. He noticed a pile of sticky green sweets and longed to buy one for Kinza. But Kinza probably no longer needed green sweets. Perhaps she had forgotten all about him already. He suddenly felt sad, and decided to stop thinking about it and turn his attention to the baker’s shop.

A voice at his side suddenly said, “Who are you?” He turned to see a little boy about his own age, with a shaved, spotted head, dressed in a dirty white gown. A strange little figure, but his dark eyes were bright and intelligent, and he looked at Hamid in quite a friendly way.

Hamid faced him shyly. “I’m from the country,” he replied.

“Why have you come to town?”

“To find work.”

“Where are your mother and father?”

“Dead.”

“Where do you live?”

“In the street.”

The little boy, whose name was Ayashi, nodded approvingly. “I too,” he said cheerfully, “have no mother, and my father has gone to the mountains. I too live in the streets. We all do. Now, buy us a loaf of bread with the money the master gave you, and give us each a piece. Then you shall be one of us and we will show you where we go for supper at night.”

His confident voice and cheerful acceptance of his homelessness fascinated Hamid. “You shall be one of us” were wonderful words. Hamid bought his loaf quickly and spent the change on a handful of black, bitter olives. Then he followed his new friend to the eucalyptus tree in the middle of the square, where the gang squatted in the shade. He handed over the food to be divided up, and they fell upon it eagerly.

Hamid, with his portion, sat a little apart through shyness, but although no one said thank you, the gift had done its work. From that day onward he was truly one of them.

It was a strange gang that he joined that day—they were all dirty, ignorant, and poor, dressed in rags and tatters; children who had never been loved. Tough and hardy they were, crafty and quick through living by their wits. Thieving, lying, and swearing were regular habits, yet they made the most of their pleasures. Hamid, watching silently, felt proud to be sitting among them. He had never met boys like these, and he thought they were wonderful—so tough and manly, easygoing and independent. He longed to become like them, and he wriggled nearer.

He realized that they earned their livings in lots of different ways. Some worked on looms certain days a week, and others, like himself, helped in the doughnut shops. They all begged in between and hung around the hotel on the off chance of carrying a bag for a tourist or washing a car. Some slept with their families at night in hovels they called home, while others crept into the mosques. Life was uncertain and exciting, and there seemed only one sure thing in the day—and that was their supper at the home of the English nurse.

Now they were all discussing the extraordinary things that had happened the night before. None of them had ever seen the strange little girl before, they said. No one knew where she came from. She held up her arms to the English nurse and called for her mother, but she would not say anything else. So the nurse had picked her up and taken her in, and today she was going to look for the baby’s parents.

“And what if she doesn’t find them?” asked one little boy. “Will she put her out in the street?”

Ayashi looked up quickly. “She will not,” he replied with complete confidence.

“How do you know? Why not? It is not her child!” exclaimed the other children all together.

“Because,” answered Ayashi simply, “she has a clean heart.”