Osterland Takes Duckling in as His Son

Mr Auslander’s adoption of Duckling begins with a child’s first attempt to name the bond between them. After Duckling comes to him day after day in silence, one word changes their relationship: Mr Auslander takes him into the Pear Garden, where the boy grows up among the blossoms.

Before the Adoption

Duckling was born in the Rong mansion to a mysterious woman who died after giving birth. Though the baby resembled the Killer, the Rong family did not recognize him as one of their own; for a long time, people called him the Grim Reaper. Elderly servants were assigned to care for him. His place in the household was therefore precarious: he had shelter and caretakers, but no secure recognition as a member of the family.

The child began visiting Mr Auslander beneath the pear trees. He came every day, standing quietly and watching, timidly and without speaking. He had learned to walk relatively early after practising standing in a wooden crate, but speech came slowly. Past the age of two, while other children were beginning to form sentences, Duckling could make only one sound. Those visits established a connection before either of them could put it into words.

The First Word and Mr Auslander's Decision

One day, while Mr Auslander was resting on a rattan chaise longue, he heard Duckling trying to call him Daddy. The boy stood beside him, tugging at his jacket, with tears in his eyes. It was the first time Duckling had called out to anyone. Mr Auslander understood that the child regarded him as a father; in the boy’s own understanding, his father had seemed dead, and crying as he called for him was a way of bringing him back.

Mr Auslander acted on that recognition immediately. That same day, he took Duckling into the Pear Garden to live with him. The adoption is presented not as a formal arrangement but as a response to a relationship the child has already made visible: Duckling names Mr Auslander as his father, and Mr Auslander answers by making a home for him.

A Home Among the Pear Trees

A few days later, Mr Auslander climbed one of the pear trees to hang a swing as a present for Duckling’s third birthday. He was eighty years old, and the small, practical gesture made the new family bond tangible: he was not merely taking the child in, but preparing a place for him in his daily life.

Duckling grew up surrounded by pear blossoms. The garden that had offered Mr Auslander privacy became the setting of the boy’s childhood, and the adoption gave Duckling a home beyond the uncertain care and rejection that had marked his first years. The change is quiet but decisive: a child who had approached in silence is received as a son, and the place of that welcome becomes the landscape of his growing up.

Narrative Significance

The scene makes kinship an act of recognition as well as a matter of birth. Duckling’s biological origins leave him exposed to suspicion and exclusion, while his first spoken address creates a different kind of belonging. Mr Auslander’s answer is concrete—he takes the boy home and hangs a swing for him—so the passage locates fatherhood in care and response rather than in lineage alone.