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Back The Black Earth Save as PDF
Chapters (56)
  1. Cover
  2. THE BLACK EARTH
  3. Dedication
  4. Contents
  5. BOOK I
  6. CHAPTER ONE
  7. CHAPTER TWO
  8. CHAPTER THREE
  9. CHAPTER FOUR
  10. CHAPTER FIVE
  11. CHAPTER SIX
  12. CHAPTER SEVEN
  13. BOOK II
  14. CHAPTER EIGHT
  15. CHAPTER NINE
  16. CHAPTER TEN
  17. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  18. CHAPTER TWELVE
  19. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  20. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  21. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  22. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  23. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  24. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  25. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY
  27. BOOK III
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  42. BOOK IV
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  46. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  47. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  48. CHAPTER FORTY
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  53. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  54. About the Author
  55. By Philip Kazan
  56. Copyright

The boat stops, once, at a tiny port, just a stone jetty flung out into the sea from a featureless brown island. The jetty is seething with people. The woman shifts, and more people crowd in on either side of the girl, trapping her arms at her sides. She has almost no strength after gripping the bowsprit in the freezing cold, and though she struggles as hard as she can, she can’t free them. She starts to cry, but no one notices. Her sobs are lost in the ceaseless babble of voices speaking Greek, Armenian, Turkish, Ladino. Desperate for the lavatory, as Mama had always insisted she call it, she stands in agony until her body takes over and a warm gush runs down her legs. Still, no one notices. Then they are among other ships, and she finds herself looking for Thetis among the masts, which makes her cry again. Islands pass by, and more ships, all of them as crowded as hers. Then they pass beneath some sort of cliff, a looming shadow, and the girl, who can only lift her head, looks up to see the prow of a gigantic ship, stark black, striped with white and painted with letters bigger than her: NARKUNDA. And high up, a little white figure … He catches her eye, even though the huge ship’s rail is lined with nice-looking people, well dressed, well fed. Why? What has she seen? The bright white of his sailor suit? The flash of something shiny in his hands? She can just about tell that he is a boy, a little boy. Then he looks down, and sees their boat. Light flashes on glass around his face. And then he raises his hand. Is he waving at her? She wants so badly to wave back. It is her world, up there: clean clothes, light glinting off varnished wood and polished brass. Perhaps Mama and Papa … The big ship could have picked them up, couldn’t it? That was where they belong. It had just been a mistake that this rusty old boat had found her before they had. These thoughts, vague and desperate, make her whimper. She tries to raise her arm, but it only moves enough for the sharp edges of the paint to cut into her. So she has to watch the great ship glide past as the tears stream down her face, the woman behind her still muttering fretfully at the Virgin. When she can’t turn her head far enough to keep the boy in sight, she turns it the other way, and sees the harbour.

CHAPTER TWO