As they walked, it occurred to Jonathan how little he knew about Linorio, this man he had read about, heard about, but never met.
“How old is Linorio?” he asked. Molly cringed when she heard the question.
“Well, he never knew for sure. He remembered his mother, and he knew he had spent the very early days with her. One day he was sent to the shop to buy some bread and a can of milk. He could talk and run small errands, so he must have been about four. When he returned his mother was gone!
“He waited for her, alone in the tiny shack in the shanty part of town. He waited and waited, and finally went to the neighbor to ask them to open the can of milk for him. He had slowly eaten all the bread, even the piece he had kept for his mother’s return, and now he needed help. It was several days before anyone knew she was missing.
“Everyone knew she would never have abandoned the boy. She adored him. She was from a little village, and when they found out she was pregnant, her family pushed her out and she made her way to the city. She was only 13 and under the legal age of consent. Nobody knew the full story, or who the father was. She had always maintained it had been against her will. Her own mother may have sold her for sex. There was a trade in young girls for sex with wealthy men from the capital. So sad to think about it. She was so young.
“The neighbors looked after little Linorio for a while, and tracked down a distant relative, an aunt, in a small town up the river. He was parceled off to live with them. She was the only one who remembered the little that Linorio ever knew about his past. The aunt had lost touch with the family, due to some feud or other, and had no idea where any of the rest of the family may have been. She herself had nine children and Linorio was too young to be very useful. But he learned from the others. They loved the smiling young boy. They helped him and taught him what they knew. It was a rural area on the fringes of the jungle, and it was there he gained his knowledge of the plants, trees and animals, and how to survive.
“His aunt’s husband always resented the extra mouth to feed and would savagely attack Linorio whenever nobody was watching. Linorio would have been about 12 when, after a horrible beating, he packed his few things and headed back to the city. He’d borrowed a few coins for the boat fare from a shop keeper who had befriended him. He even went back a few years later and repaid that loan, with interest mind you.
“Back in the city, he slept rough at first, but he was lucky. He always had that magnificent smile and he’s such a charmer. And he was hardworking and honest. He found work almost straightaway, helping out in a lumber mill. He slept in the mill at night. He was safe and the men each gave him a little of their food. He got strong and tough and he saved the little money he earned. He had plans.
“Linorio was short and always looked so young. No one knew his real age, and he had no birth certificate. He had no documentation so, to the officials, he didn’t exist. As there was no family trail, the only way he could claim his citizenship was by proving that he had been found abandoned as a child here.
“He never found his mother and never knew what happened to her. By the time Linorio went back to the slum where he had spent those first years there were still a few who remembered her, but one knew for sure what had happened to her.”