B005GEZ23A EBOK (14 page)

This man, then, so close to us and yet so dangerously a stranger, passed before me like a looming threat, and from now on everything bristled and became suppressed. I was familiar with the danger he was bringing here, and yet I couldn’t free myself from a distaste for this whole scenario—action, underground,
leader, conspiracy—as if taken from a bad novel, like a belated embodiment of a bad, youthful daydream—and I truly would have preferred to have anything but this as a spoke in our wheel, at this moment our nation and all the romanticisms connected with it were for me an unbearable concoction, as if contrived intentionally, out of spite! Yet it wouldn’t do to pick and choose and to disregard what fate was dishing out. I met “the leader” when he came down to supper. He looked like an officer, which he actually was—a cavalry officer, from eastern Poland, from the Ukraine perhaps, over forty years old, his face dark from shaving and dry, he was elegant, even gallant. He greeted everyone—it was obvious that this was not his first time here—he kissed the ladies’ little hands. “Oh, yes, I know, how unfortunate! And you gentlemen are from Warsaw? …” From time to time he half-closed his eyes, giving the appearance of someone who’s been a long time traveling, traveling by train. … They seated him at one of the farther places, supposedly he was here in the capacity of a technician, or a civil servant for cattle administration, or for planning crop planting—this was a necessary precaution because of the servants. As far as we, seated at the table, were concerned, it was at once apparent that everyone was more or less informed—though the conversation dragged sleepily and listlessly. But at the end of the table strange things were happening, namely with Karol, yes, with our (young) Karol, who had been thrown into an intense, willing obedience and eager readiness by the newcomer’s presence—and, consumed with loyalty, his wits
sharpened, suddenly he found himself close to death, a guerrilla, a soldier, a conspirator about whose hands and shoulders roamed a murderous yet quiet power, who was at Siemian’s beck and call like a dog, obediently adroit, technically skillful. He wasn’t the only one, however. I don’t know whether it was his doing, but all the paltriness, so irritating and dreamy-eyed a moment earlier, was suddenly restored to health, in our banding together we arrived at reality and power, and at this table we were like a squad awaiting orders, already thrown into the possibility of action and battle. Conspiracy, action, enemy … this became a reality more powerful than our everyday life and blew in like a refreshing wind of sorts, Henia’s and Karol’s irksome otherness disappeared, we all began to feel like comrades. And yet this fraternization was not pure! No … it was also tormenting, even disgusting! Because, in God’s truth, weren’t we, the elders, a bit comical and somewhat repulsive in this battle—as happens in the case of love at an advanced age—was this appropriate to us, to Hipolit’s bloating, to Fryderyk’s skinniness, to Madame Maria’s debility? The military unit that we formed was a unit of reservists—and our alliance was an alliance in decay—and despondency, surliness, abhorrence, and disgust hovered over our fraternization in fight and fervor. Yet at times it seemed wonderful that our fraternization, our fervor, were possible in spite of everything. But also, at times, I felt like calling out to Karol and to Henia, oh, separate from us, don’t associate with us, avoid our dirt, our farce! But they (she included) were clinging
to us—and pressing into us—and wanting to be with us—and surrendering to us, they were at our command, at our beck and call, ready to stand in our stead, for us, at the leader’s beckoning! So it went all through supper. This is how I sensed it. Was I the one who sensed it this way, or was it Fryderyk?

Who knows, perhaps one of mankind’s darkest mysteries—and the most difficult—is actually the one that pertains to this “uniting” of age groups—the manner and course by which youth suddenly becomes accessible to older age and vice versa. The key to the puzzle was in this case the officer, who, being an officer, had by this very fact a leaning toward a soldier and a young one at that … which became more apparent when, after supper, Fryderyk suggested to Siemian that he should check up on the killer in the pantry. As far as I was concerned, I didn’t believe this was a random suggestion, I knew that Józek-killer-young-fellow’s sojourn in the pantry had began to exert its pressure and became intrusive from the moment Karol surrendered to the officer. We went there—Siemian, Fryderyk, I, Henia, and Karol with the lamp. There he was, in the little room secured with bars, lying on the straw—curled up and asleep—and when we stood over him he moved, and in his sleep he covered his eyes with his hand. Childlike. Karol shone his lamp on him. Siemian signaled with his hand not to wake him. He eyed him as Madame Amelia’s murderer, and yet Karol lit him up not as a murderer—but rather as if he were showing him to the leader—not so much as a murderer but as a young soldier—as if he were showing him as a
colleague. And he was lighting him up almost as a recruit, as if this were a conscription … while Henia stood right behind Karol and watched as he was lighting him up. This struck me as something singular and on all accounts worthy of attention, that this was a soldier lighting up a soldier for an officer—there was something collegial and brotherly between them, the soldiers, yet cruel as well, yet giving him over as prey. And it seemed even more significant that it was a young one lighting up another young one for the older one—though I didn’t quite grasp its meaning. …

In the pantry with its barred window a mute explosion of those three occurred around the lamp and in its glare—they exploded noiselessly with an unknown meaning, discrete yet eager. Siemian imperceptibly encompassed them with his gaze, it was only a moment, but long enough for me to learn that all this was not entirely foreign to him.

Have I already mentioned that four small islands, separated by canals green with duckweed, made up the farther extent of the pond? Small bridges had been thrown over the canals. A lane at the very end of the garden, winding through a thicket of hazelnut bushes, jasmines, and arborvitae, allowed one to cross this archipelago, soggy with standing water. Walking there I imagined that one of the islands was not the same as the others. … Why? … a fleeting impression, but the garden had already been pulled into play too much to ignore this impression. … However … nothing. The day had been hot and it was teatime, the canal was almost dry and glistened with a crust of slime with its green eyes of water—brush was overgrowing the banks. Given our situation, any strangeness had to undergo immediate inspection, so I worked my way to the other shore. The little island breathed with heat, the grass was rampant, green and high, abundant with ants, and high above were the crowns of trees with their own, closed-off existence. I crept through the thicket and … Wait a minute. Wait! A surprise!

There was a bench. On the bench, she was sitting with her incredible legs—one of her legs was shod and in a stocking while the other was bare all the way above her knee … and this wouldn’t have been so incredible, were it not for the fact that he, lying down, lying in front of her, on the grass, also had one leg bare and his pants leg pulled up above his knee. His shoe was nearby, a sock inside it. Her face and eyes were turned sideways. He was not looking at her, his arm around his head on the grass. No, no, all this would not have been so shocking, perhaps, if it had not been so incompatible with their natural rhythm, it was frozen, strangely immobile, as if it did not belong to them … and those legs, so strangely bared, only one from each pair, shining with their corporality in the humid, hot dampness interrupted by the splashing of frogs! He with a bare leg and she with a bare leg. Perhaps they had been wading in the water … no, there was more to it, this was beyond explanation … he with a bare leg and she with a bare leg. Her leg moved slightly, then stretched. She rested her foot on his foot. Nothing more.

I watched. Suddenly my total stupidity became apparent. Oh, oh! How could I have been so naive—and Fryderyk too—to think that “there was nothing” between them … to be seduced by appearances! Here I had a flat refutation right in front of me, like a blow to the head! So it was here that they had been meeting, on the island. … A gigantic scream, liberating and satisfying, resounded silently from this place—as their contact was maintained without motion, without sound,
without even a gaze (because they weren’t looking at each other). He with a bare leg and she with a bare leg.

Well and good … But … This could not be. There was an artificiality about it, something disturbing, something perverse. … What was the origin of this torpor, as if a spell had been cast? Where did the chill in their passion come from? For a fraction of a second I had a totally crazy thought
that this is how it should be, that this is how it should be between them,
that this is more real than if … Nonsense! And right away another thought came to me, namely, there’s a funny game hiding here, a comedy, perhaps they had somehow found out that I’d be passing through here, and they were doing this on purpose—for my benefit. Because indeed this seemed to be for my benefit, exactly cut to the measure of my shame, of my daydreaming about them! For me, for me, for me! Spurred on by this thought—that it’s for me—I tore through the bushes, disregarding everything. And then the picture became complete. Fryderyk was sitting under a pine tree on a pile of needles. This was—for him!

I stopped. … He, on seeing me, said to them:

“You’ll have to repeat it once more.”

And then, even though I had not yet understood anything, the chill of young lasciviousness blew from them. Depravity. They didn’t move—their young freshness was terribly cold.

Fryderyk walked up to me, all gallantry. “Oh! How are you, my dear Mr. Witold! (The greeting was unnecessary, we had parted only an hour ago.) “What do you say about
this pantomime?” (and with a sweeping gesture he pointed in their direction). “Not a bad performance, what, ha, ha, ha!” (the laughter was also unnecessary—loud as it was). “Where there’s no fish, a crawfish is as good as fish! I don’t know if you are familiar with my weakness for directing? I was also an actor for a while, I don’t know if you are familiar with this detail of my biography?”

He took me under the arm and led me in a circle on the lawn, gesticulating in a theatrical manner. The others watched us without a word. “I have an idea … for a screenplay … a film screenplay … but some scenes are a bit risky, need work, one has to experiment with living material.

“That’s enough for today. You may get dressed.”

Not looking back at them, he led me away over the bridges, recounting loudly, with animation, his various ideas. In his opinion, the method, up to the present, for writing plays or screenplays “separate from the actor” was totally obsolete. One should begin with actors by “composing them together” in some manner, and building the theme of a play using these compositions. Because a play “should bring out only that which is already potentially inherent in the actors as living people who have their own range of possibilities.” An actor “should not personify an imaginary stage hero and pretend to be someone he is not—on the contrary, the stage persona should conform to him, be cut to his measure, like a garment.” “I’m trying,” he was saying and laughing, “to achieve something like this with those kids, I promised them a little gift,
because it’s work, after all! Hey, you know, a man gets bored in this godforsaken countryside, one has to occupy oneself with something for the sake of health, if nothing else, Mr. Witold, for health! Of course I prefer not to make a show of it because—I don’t know—perhaps it’s too daring for a good fellow like Hipolit and his Mrs., I wouldn’t want to expose myself to gossip! …” He was talking thus, loudly, so it would resound, while I, walking beside him and looking at the ground, the burning conundrum of this discovery in my head, hardly listened. The slyboots! The schemer! The fox! He was turning out such marvels—he had contrived such fun and games! … And everything was hurling down into cynicism and perversity, while the fire of this depravity was now consuming me, and, plainly, I was writhing in the throes of envy! And the glowing lights of my red-hot imagination lit up their chilly licentiousness, innocently devilish—especially hers, hers—for it was astounding that the faithful fiancee would go into the bushes for such séances … in return for the promise of a “little gift.” …

“It’s really an interesting theatrical experiment, of course,” I responded, “yes, yes, an interesting experiment!” And I left him with all haste so that I could consider this further—because the depravity was surely not theirs alone and, as it turned out, Fryderyk had been managing things more successfully than I had thought—he was even able to get at them so directly! He was on his tack, ceaselessly. And this behind my back, on his own initiative! His pathetic rhetoric, which had
unfolded with Vaclav upon Madame Amelia’s death, didn’t get in his way—he was in action—and the question was: how far had he gone on this road? And where would he still go? As far as he was concerned the problem of boundaries was becoming a burning issue—especially since he was pulling me along as well. I was scared. It was evening again—and with it the barely perceptible fading of light, the deepening and saturation of the darker hues, as well as the intensification of nooks and crannies that the night’s sauce was filling. The sun was already behind the trees. I remembered having left a book on the porch, so I went to get it. … In the book I found an envelope without an address and in it a piece of paper with a note scrawled in pencil:

I’m writing this in order to be in communication with you. I don’t want to be in this business totally alone, by myself, a lone player.

When one is alone one cannot have the certainty that, for instance, one hasn’t gone mad. When there are two people—it’s another matter. A twosome provides certainty, an objective guarantee. When there are two there’s no madness!

I’m not really afraid of this. Since I know I couldn’t go mad. Even if I wanted to. It’s impossible for me, Tm an antimadman. I want to secure myself against something else, possibly more serious, that is, I would say, against an Anomaly, a manifold increase of possibilities that comes about when man
distances himself and goes off on the only possible, permissible road. … Do you understand? I don’t have time for a more precise statement. If I were making a trip from the earth to some other planet, or merely to the moon, I would still prefer to be with someone—just in case, so that my humanity could mirror itself in something.