I remain very still, at once scared and excited.
“Cal—” It is a word, or a portion of a word. For all the howling and barking he has done, his voice sounds rusty with disuse. His lips move in an exaggerated manner as he struggles to make human sounds. “Cal … Cal…” He gives his head a sideways shake, bares his teeth, and tries again. “Cal-i-ban.”
“Cal-i-ban.” I echo him softly. “Caliban. Is that you? Is that your name? Caliban?” I can see by his frown that the name, if that’s truly what it is, is the only word he recognizes. Leaning forward, I dare myself to touch his arm with one fingertip. “Caliban?”
“Caliban.” This time the word emerges in a sigh of agreement, then is repeated more surely with a tone of rising excitement. “Caliban!”
It is at this moment that Papa emerges unexpectedly from his sanctum on the upper story and enters the gallery. We catch sight of him at the same time, the wild boy and I. I scramble to my feet, dumbstruck with fear. Oh, Papa will be sorely grieved! The wild boy gives one of his great startled leaps, landing in a crouch and covering his head with his arms. Papa’s hands grip the railing hard enough to whiten his knuckles and he scowls down at us, thunder written on his brow.
Terrified though I am, I find my voice. “He has a name, Papa!” I call up to him, hoping the news will offset his anger. “The wild boy has a name!”
“Oh, does he indeed?” Papa’s voice is dangerously quiet. “And how might you have discovered it, lass?”
Trembling, I stand my ground. “He told it to me, Papa.”
Papa is silent for a long moment. I cannot tell what he is thinking. “For all of our sakes, I pray it prove true, child,” he says at last. “But if it is so, I would hear the lad speak it himself that I may know it is the truth, and not a flight of fancy your overly tender heart has accorded to some savage utterance or bestial grunt.”
I go to the wild boy, squatting before him and ducking my head low to meet his gaze. “You must tell him,” I whisper. Even though I know he does not understand my words, I will him to grasp my meaning. “You must say it aloud or he will bespell you again, and we shall never be friends.” I touch my chest. “Miranda,” I say once more, then point at him.
Beneath the shelter of his wiry arms, the wild boy peers back at me. “Caliban,” he whispers.
Louder; it must be louder, else Papa will not hear him. I stand, tapping my chest. “Miranda.” The wild boy whines. “Please!” I beg him, my voice rising in despair. “Oh, please!”
The wild boy’s shoulders tighten, but then he lowers his arms and straightens slowly from his crouch, lifting his head to gaze toward Papa in the gallery. “Caliban.” He brushes his chest with his knuckles in unmistakable meaning and repeats the name with exaggerated care. “Cal-i-ban.”
I feel triumphant and scared.
Papa strokes his beard and looks down at us. “So it seems that youth and innocence has prevailed over wisdom and experience in the matter of taming the savage breast,” he murmurs to himself. “Curious, indeed. ’Tis a phenomenon that bears further study. Mayhap there is a correspondence of innocence and ignorance at work, the significance of which I had not fully reckoned.”
I begin to hope that Papa is so pleased with this discovery that he will not punish me.
But no, his gaze sharpens and he reaches for the amulet that binds me to him, the one that bears a lock of my hair. I look down at the floor and make my hands into fists in anticipation of the pinprick stings of correction that will follow.
“Miranda.” Papa waits until I look up again. His expression is grave and disappointed. “Even if I did not expressly forbid it, I daresay you are sensible enough to know that you defied my wishes in entering the wild boy’s cell without permission. Is this not so?”
I cannot be untruthful. “Yes, Papa.”
“Very well.” He lets go of the amulet. I slacken with relief. “Because I do not wish to agitate the lad’s sympathies and cause him to regress to a state of abject savagery, I shall spare you the immediate punishment that is merited for this transgression. Confine yourself to your chamber and meditate on the nature of your disobedience until I summon you. For a daughter to willfully disobey her father is to violate the divine order of nature itself,” he says sternly. “God in His heaven weeps.”
I look down, ashamed.
The wild boy whines, then makes his crooning sound.
“Go!” Papa orders me.
I hesitate. “Papa … you won’t work a deeper binding spell on him just yet, will you?”
Papa folds his arms and glares. “Begone, lass! To your chamber!”
I obey.
FIVE
CALIBAN
Caliban, Caliban, Ca-ca-ca-caliban!
Caliban.
Miranda.
Master.
Yes. No. Food. Water. Eat food. Drink water. Please. Yes, eat food, please. Yes, drink water, please. Thank you. Food, please, Master. Thank you, Master.
I Caliban.
She Miranda.
He Master.
Sun. Moon.
Good, bad. Yes, good. No, bad.