Blessed Child by Ted Dekker Read Free Book Online Page A

cockeyed wooden sign.
    â€œCome on, kid. You want to see the birds?”
    The boy glanced at him and returned his eyes to the cages. He suddenly stood and hopped to the ground. Without waiting for Jason, he struck out across the street.
    â€œHold on!” Jason took after the boy into the busy street. A small pale yellow Fiat honked its horn and slid to a stop three feet from the boy.
    The driver’s face puffed red with angry objections, but the Fiat’s window was up, and Caleb only looked curiously at the man’s shaking jowls. He walked past the car, fixated once again on the birds.
    Jason lifted his hand in a hasty apology to the driver and hurried after the boy. The incident had gathered some attention from pedestrians strolling along the cracked sidewalk. “Caleb . . . Caleb wait.”
    But Caleb did not wait. In fact he was suddenly running. His eyes were now wide in a look of sheer horror, and he ran right up to the merchant’s collection of thirty or so cages.
    They were the typical tubular cages which frequented markets throughout Ethiopia, holding a variety of birds, in this case mostly white-collared pigeons. The merchant had his back turned to Caleb, but at least a dozen onlookers had now stopped and focused on the boy. He was of mixed race, an unusual sight to be sure. But it was his expression, Jason thought; his face held such a blend of innocence and anguish that it would have stopped a dumb mule had one been in front of the boy.
    At the last possible moment, Jason knew what the boy intended to do, and he broke into a run. He spoke sternly but quietly, not eager to draw attention, although with the running he was beyond that. “Caleb, stop! Don’t touch the birds . . .”
    It was too late. The boy reached the first cage, flipped the gate open, and pulled a rather strange-looking bird free. A look of delight splashed across Caleb’s face as the bird flapped noisily to the sky. He giggled.
    The merchant spun around at the sound, but before either he or Jason could reach him, Caleb had repeated the process with another cage, setting free another bird of the same species. He was turning to a third cage when Jason reached him and grabbed the arm extended for the cage.
    Had Jason not been there, the merchant would have probably slapped the boy’s head from his shoulders. As it was he screamed a string of obscenities and flung his hands to the sky. A crowd was gathering, delighted at the show.
    Jason pulled Caleb back. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why he did that.”
    The merchant immediately switched to English. “You must pay! You must pay!” He looked at the sky, lifted his arms as if beseeching the sky for mercy, and swore in Amharic. “These are very rare birds, you know. Very rare! Abyssinian catbird! You will pay for these now!”
    Jason was reaching for his wallet already. “Yes, of course. I’m sorry. I don’t know what got into him. Please, how much?”
    Around them the crowd was cackling and pointing to the skyline, where the two birds had perched themselves on a three-story building.
    â€œVery rare, you know. These are very rare, very expensive birds.” The merchant now had his eyes on Jason’s wallet.
    â€œOf course, and I’m very sorry. Please how much do you want?”
    Caleb stepped away from Jason and stood looking up at the merchant. He spoke in a dialect of Amharic usually reserved for Orthodox religious ceremonies. “What will you do with these birds?”
    The sound of the language from the boy’s mouth cut through the crowd like a sword. A hush swallowed their laughter. The merchant looked from the boy to Jason and then back again.
    â€œPlease, tell me what you will do with these birds,” the boy repeated.
    â€œI will sell them.”
    â€œAnd why would you sell them?”
    â€œThey are a delicacy. What do you care, you thieving young scoundrel?”
    â€œHe’s