Knowing that he was under constant scrutiny, Pete decided to plant bushy shrubs around the garden for privacy, eager to carry out his business in peace. To his surprise, however, the fence helped only for a little while. Sooner than expected, the greenery all over the garden was tall enough to shade the fence and stun curious eyes.
The fruit trees were visible from the distance, displaying heavy branches of an abundant and colourful crop. In a corner, closely packed corn stocks, taller than the shack’s roof, proudly waved their golden bushy crests in the lightest breeze. In another corner, sunflowers as large as a car tire moved along, following the sun with their dark round eyes. It was a feast for the curious neighbours who doubled their rumours, trying to explain their fears.
The children, like everywhere else, did not pay any attention to the concerns of the adults and dealt with their doubts in a direct manner. They simply approached Pete asking questions about the multitude of flowers, the birds and other curiosities they had never seen before. Every day after school, they ran along the long dusty road and often lined up at the fence, on their tiptoes, peeking into Pete’s garden and hoping to solve the mystery.
When Pete saw a row of the tops of their heads, like puppets in carnival game, he invited them to come in. They noisily accepted and stampeded to the entrance. Once in the garden, they spent hours listening to stories, helping him move dirt, or simply playing with the squirrels and the butterflies. At the end of these incursions, the little girls went away with garlands of pretty flowers, and the boys with pockets full of delicious fruits that had fallen from the trees.
∞
One day late in summer, Pete decided to make good use of the plentiful goods the garden had provided. He got up early and picked up the most ripe fruits and the most colourful flowers. He baked cakes and made delicious juices, waiting for the children to come by after school. That day he would surprise them and pre-empt their never-ending curiosity.
Waiting for the children, he spread peanuts for the squirrels, seeds for the birds, and corn grains for the chickens gathering in a noisy assembly. It was a symphony of tunes and colours.
As if they knew what was awaiting them, the children ran directly to the garden after school. Pete welcomed them with food and drinks.
They played for hours, running from one corner of the land to the other, looking at the delicate butterflies, holding the round ladybugs in their hands, and feeding the multitude of birds landing on their heads and shoulders. It was heaven in the middle of the desert.
When they left later in the afternoon, the girls carried immense sunflowers as parasols, collars of flowers that never wilted and basket full of exotic fruits. Few had ever seen such a parade before.
The boys, always noisier and more rambunctious, decorated their heads with crowns of straw and marched, blowing instruments made from the stalks of corn and drumming on pumpkins and watermelons that they could hardly hold in one hand.
This spectacle, however, did not go unnoticed by those who had all along suspected Pete and his garden.
Such was the upheaval, that a few of the most intolerant neighbours decided to take matters into their own hands. For them, it was incomprehensible that someone could have the ability to make the children of the town so happy and cheerful. Some of them being parents and struggling to understand their own children, could not but believe that there was something evil that they could not explain.
As always happens in such circumstances, when fear of the unknown darkens the soul, they found reasons to justify their actions: they had to protect the children. It did not take long for Pete to become aware of what was going on.
∞
