Joanna Ruocco - Another Governess / The Least Blacksmith - A Diptych

Before the town became prosperous, it was common for men to lose hope. It was good that the peninsula was so close to the town, right across the waters of the bay. Men could leave the town for the peninsula. All they needed was to build a small boat. Speeding ships did not drive over small boats in the bay. The men arrived safely on the peninsula. The monks would welcome the newcomers, even though the newcomers had no hope for the future. Monks do not have sons. If the monks did not welcome newcomers, they would not be able to replace the monks who have died. The order of monks would dwindle. Nobody would inhabit the monasteries on the mountains. The monasteries would become dens for animals, the wild boars that live on the peninsula. Rose bushes would fill the lower stories, the branches would crack the panes of glass in the windows, they would grow through the windows. The windows would become bright with the hips and flowers of roses and the jagged pieces of broken glass. The monasteries are definitely inhabited. The windows are dark.

Now that the foreigners have come, every townsperson benefits from investments in his town. Men no longer lose hope. They do not build small boats to cross the bay. Only the monks cross the bay in small boats. Sometimes the monks take young boys from town back to the peninsula in their boats. By welcoming newcomers and taking young boys, the order of monks has prevented itself from dwindling. Now that there are no newcomers arriving on the peninsula, the monks must take as many young boys as they can. Luckily, the captains play games with the monks and most of the monks arrive face down by the wharves. Those monks cannot take young boys. Instead, they are taken by the doctor, taken to his office at the end of the dead end street.

I wonder if the monks can see our forge from their monasteries on the peninsula. Nothing blocks the view of the forge. The monks must be able to see the red light across the bay. We cannot see the red light of the monks' forge, but the monks' forge might be located on the other side of the monasteries, facing the ocean, or it might be located near the bottom of a ravine.

There are stories of monks taking the young boys from the town in their boats and devouring them down in the ravines of the peninsula. I do not believe these stories. The boys who are taken by the monks must be kept alive so that they can receive instruction. It is important that the next generation of monks learns how to make the jams and the talismans and the boats. If the monks devoured the boys, there would be no young monks to carry on the practices and beliefs of the order. The practices and beliefs of the monks might involve devouring boys, but I do not think the order could have lasted so long if that were the case. Beneath his hair and beard, the monk I saw by the overturned boat did not seem old. Not too long ago he may have been a boy in the town.

Today is the first of the month. If our father were alive he would go to deposit the heavy bag of money in the bank. My brother gave the heavy bag of money to the doctor. My brother has nothing to deposit in the bank. For as long as my brother can remember our father deposited money in the bank on the first of the month. This month my brother will have to take money out of the bank to buy the iron for the forge. As I work with my brother, I think about the hardware store. If my brother took just a little extra money from the bank to buy paint, I could carve handles for his axes and paint the handles. Our axes could compete with any axes sold in the hardware store.

I make more mistakes at the anvil than ever before. My brother throws down his hammer. He asks if I am thinking about a girl I saw in town. I am surprised. My brother does not throw his tools or speak about girls in town. He is in a peculiar mood. His face is pale despite the heat of the forge. His lips are dark. I tell my brother that I am thinking about the hardware store. My brother has not heard about the hardware store. He grabs my arms and shakes me while I tell him everything I remember. I do not remember the hours or the prices. I tell him about the different colored handles on the hammers. I tell him about my plan to paint different colored ax handles, bright ax handles in as many colors as the handles of the hammers. My brother shakes me hard so my teeth close on my tongue. Blood comes from between my lips. My brother rubs his shirtsleeve against my mouth. He brushes my hair from my forehead. He says it is not my fault. It is not my fault that no customers come to the forge.

The forge is not in a good location. It is strenuous to travel up the hill to the forge. The path is steep. There is no shade on the hill. Customers never minded traveling up the hill to the forge but now the town is prosperous. In a prosperous town, customers do not want to travel up the hill. By the wharves, the foreigners are building new storefronts. They have built a new district by the wharves, with stores and hotels. The foreigners stay in their district. They stay close to their ships. They do not like to walk through the town even as far as the bakery. Foreigners have been attacked on their walks to the bakery. Now the foreigners have their own bakeries in the district by the wharves. The town is not as safe as it once was. There is more theft in a prosperous town. There are more things to be thieved. The townspeople have begun to shop in the foreigner's district. The foreigners have hired soldiers to patrol their district. It is pleasant to shop without fearing the thieves.

My brother is certain that some of the new storefronts in the foreign district are still unoccupied. My brother could rent a storefront in the foreign district. If my brother could rent a storefront he could display his metalwork in a good location. Customers could purchase andirons at the storefront. They could drop off their tools for repair. I could pick up the tools each week and my brother could repair them at the forge. I could bring the repaired tools back to the storefront and collect the money from the locked box my brother would mount on a heavy piling by the storefront. The locked box and the heavy piling would be unnecessary precautions. Soldiers would protect the money we made at the storefront. Foreigners would pay the soldiers to protect my brother's investment.

My brother becomes excited by this idea. This is one way to expand, opening a storefront in the foreign district in the town. The location of the forge would no longer hinder my brother's success. My brother smiles at me and I smile at my brother. I smile with my lips closed to hide the blood on my teeth. My brother picks up his hammer. He says we can put my ax handles in the display window of the storefront. Maybe I will be good at painting handles. My brother looks thoughtful as he says this. He is wondering what I am good at. I am not a good striker. My brother does not say I am not a good striker. He spoke in a great rush uncommon for him and now he is done with speaking. He does not say anything more. Soon the sounds of hammer and sledge make conversation impossible. I know my brother is thinking I am not a good striker. My sledge hits off-center on the iron. I strike with the sledge again and again. My arms hurt. My back hurts. I cannot hit the right place. I have not grown. My improvement is too slow. I cannot strike the iron where my brother indicates. Now that business is slow my brother can fix my mistakes but when he expands the forge he will not have time to fix my mistakes. I need to improve more quickly. I am good at some things surely, but what does it matter if I am not a good striker, if I cannot do the thing my brother needs.

My brother has used up our father's bar iron and rods. My brother's metalwork is stacked against the inside walls of the forge. It is very impressive. I wish customers would come to the forge to praise my brother and buy high-quality tools for their homes and businesses. Now my brother has only scrap metal to work with. He cannot make high-quality tools from scrap iron. He must go to town to take out money from the bank. That way he will be able to purchase fresh bar iron for his high-quality products.