MEMORIES
Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin spent their rare free afternoon in Kyiv at the Trukhanov Ostrov, a beautiful island paradise connected to the city of Kyiv by the Trukhanov Bridge, enjoying the beautiful green scenery, trees, grass and bushes, simply strolling and looking, and breathing in the air.
Napoleon was struck by the beauty of this place, but when he turned to his friend to comment on it, he saw Illya wearing that tight, closed up expression he had learned to recognize. He stopped beside a river and suggested they sit on a log for a bit. Illya stopped and sat down without comment, but his expression did not change.
"Illya?"
"Hmmm?"
Napoleon resisted the impulse to smile at the look of childish innocence that Illya had perfected.
"Memories, my friend? It can't have been easy, being back in Kyiv this week. Especially after what happened last time."
Illya shrugged and looked away.
"I manage."
Napoleon shook his head, worriedly.
"I know my friend, you do better than I think I could in your shoes, but you were fine earlier. What has changed, my friend?"
Illya heaved a sigh that sounded very slightly shaky. He got to his feet.
"Come with me, Napoleon."
Illya led his friend back towards the bridge, and looked around. Then he pointed.
"Over there, Napoleon."
A little way away, sitting on the grassy verge a thin little boy was playing with a short piece of string and some pebbles. When the boy heard the two men approaching, he looked up and grinned at them. His face, hands and knees were grubby, his shorts looked two sized too big and his left shoe had a large hole in the toe where an equally grubby looking toe peeped out. The child's tow coloured hair looked unkempt, and his clothes were all clearly worn out hand-me-downs from someone several years older than himself.
Napoleon felt sorry for the boy, and his gaze lingered before he looked back at Illya. Illya was still sadly watching the child playing with his pebbles and string.
"That is what is wrong, Napoleon."
"Wrong? The poor kid's only playing. He looks like he could use a good meal, though."
"Exactly. Napoleon that child is begging. He is being used by his parents, or his guardian to beg for money or scraps of food…from the wealthier people who come here."
"Begging? Illya, he's just playing. Am I missing something?"
Illya smiled wanly.
"Napoleon, I have been there, where that child is now, I have been there myself. He doesn't need to sit cross-legged with a tin-cup looking pathetic. He earns your compassion simply from being a skinny, hungry-looking child. He's the type they always use. Except, he isn't hungry. Watch the boy, Napoleon and see if he acts like someone who is hungry."
Napoleon watched the boy as people passed him by. Nearby were smallholder stalls, selling hot and cold foods, fruits and vegetables, but the boy was sitting with his back to them all. Just playing his game. Napoleon watched a family of four passing by, eating something hot and delicious smelling, but although the boy watched them passing by with a look of curiosity and interest, there was no look of hunger, no desire or silent beseeching as he knew there would certainly be if the child was begging for food to simply survive. A careless passerby threw a half-eaten apple over his shoulder. Napoleon watched as it bounced once on the grass and then rolled down and come to rest close to the boy. The child glanced around, smiled and seized the apple and threw it towards the water, making it skim and bounce along the surface. When it finally went under with a plop, the boy giggled and returned to his pebbles.
Napoleon turned back to his friend and found Illya had turned away and was looking out over the expanse of the bridge. He came up beside him.
"You said you have been there, Illya. It was survival for you, wasn't it?"
Illya nodded.
"My parents had died, Uncle Dimitri had been taken away and locked up for something or other, refusing to fight or something, my sisters had all been killed, Mikhail and I were on our own. The soldiers tried to take us away, but we hid from them. They would have put us in an orphanage, but we still had our own home and Uncle Dimitri. We survived alone on the streets for almost a year until Uncle Dimitri was released from prison. When he came home, he found us waiting for him."
"How old were you, Illya?"
"Nine or ten…Napoleon, begging for help when you are truly starving and destitute is sometimes the only way to survive. Sending out a child to elicit sympathy, to beg for you for any other reason is obscene and disgusting and it should be outlawed. That little boy should be in school, getting an education."
Napoleon nodded sadly.
"You are right, my friend, and one day I am sure that it will be. Until that day you are going to have to keep looking the other way. We could take this child off the street, but they would send out another and then another."
Illya nodded.
"You are right, only it breaks my heart to see…"
Napoleon pointed once again to the boy.
"Illya, you look at him and you see yourself sitting there, starving and destitute. But you pointed out yourself that he is not starving, nor is he destitute. He actually looks happy. He is having fun. Try not to torture yourself over what should be, my friend. Just look at what is, and keep doing the job we are doing. Who knows we may one day be able to help bring about the change in the law? In the mean-time…"
"In the mean-time I am going to buy him an ice-cream!"
Illya exclaimed, walking back towards the boy. Napoleon followed, smiling.