From his hiding place near the gate, Nicolas could see carts piled with cotton, pushed by the grimy little hands of children. At the edge of the yard, an adult figure in a long coat and tight trousers stood with his hands on his hips, watching them. Every so often, he pointed, and the small figures there hurried into new positions as ordered, trembling with fear. Then another cart tipped over. The cotton piled on top scattered everywhere. The overseer immediately flew into a rage. He seized the little culprit and beat his backside with a twig broom.
There were screams. There was crying. But the beating did not stop. The other children halted and trembled before returning to work after the foreman angrily shouted at them. Nicolas could only stare. He did not understand what was happening, but his heart ached.
He had no idea how many hours he stood there. A bell rang deafeningly from inside the factory, signaling that the workday was over. Not long afterward, the main doors opened. Hundreds of people appeared, crowding out of the factory. There were plenty of adult men and women, but even more exhausted children. They were all dressed in cheap, faded cotton clothing. Every face was bleak and gloomy.
Nicolas edged away. Whenever someone looked his way, he immediately turned his face aside and pretended to be doing something else. But in truth, he was waiting.
One by one, wooden carts resembling garbage wagons began leaving the factory grounds. A dozen or so children were crammed inside each one. Their eyes were dull. Their clothes were filthy with dust. Their hands were even covered in wounds and dried blood.
The young man was still too stunned by the other reality now unfolding before his eyes. But at that very moment, he received another unexpected shock.
Another cart appeared, carrying a different group of children. Nicolas recognized someone sitting beside the driver. There was no mistaking it—it was one of the caretakers from the orphanage where Anneliese lived.
Then that meant the child was there too, right?
Nicolas studied the small heads packed together one by one, searching for the figure he had been looking for all these days. There she was! Little Anneliese was curled up, hugging her knees. Part of her face was hidden, but Nicolas recognized her perfectly. That tiny figure had a face he would never forget.
Her skin was far paler than the last time he had seen her. She was also much dirtier. Her hair was tangled, decorated with bits of cotton. Her thin body trembled. She was sobbing, but no one cared. The other children were exhausted too, suffering from the same distress. More than once, they rubbed their stomachs while moaning with hunger.
Ilona was crying! Ilona was suffering!
At that very moment, Nicolas seemed hypnotized by some nameless supernatural force. Without realizing it, his head followed the cart’s departure without pause. He slowly touched the left side of his chest. His heart lurched as if it had plunged headfirst into a bottomless abyss. His body felt as though it were shrinking in the midst of this vast world, seized by a strange, suffocating tightness. He was struck again and again by something overwhelming. Without end.
All this time, he had cursed his fate as the unluckiest person on earth. Born as the most hated of men. Living through a love story filled with tragedy. Even attempting suicide because he was tired of being a fugitive until death. But now, he was seeing suffering in another form. He was used to living without honor, but he did not know what poverty and hunger felt like. Now, those two things blended beautifully with the innocence of these tiny creatures.
In London, a spark of conscience led him toward another unexpected fate. His lips trembled. His body shook. Slowly, a little river flowed down his cheek, impossible to stop. For the first time, after years of thinking only about his own ill fortune, he began to suffer because of someone else’s grief. For the first time in so long, he wept for another person’s suffering...
Anyone but Ilona.
What would Nicolas do next? Could he heal someone else and his own wounds at the same time?