Island of The World

by Michael D. O'Brien

  The current subsides simultaneously for both of them. He reaches out his hand to hers, which is planted in the grass and supports her body. They take each other’s hands for a second or two as they struggle to rise. Then, with no more said, she turns from him and goes back down into the valley.

  Time always returns. It does. You can forget it, but it never forgets you. Now the entire world, which has been sleeping in the sunshine, begins to move again. The sheep drift across the meadows, the smoke once more rises from the kitchen fires, and the branches of the oaks resume their sighing. And he, after watching her descent, turns and ascends the mountain. The climbing is now effortless, and he sees nothing of the ground beneath his feet. He is silent, without thought, borne aloft by the current, even as it slowly fades. Later, as he sits on the wall of the fort, he discovers that he will not forget her, that he no longer wants to. He knows he has been captured, and that this imprisonment is the most free thing in the world. When the sun begins to fall into the mountains like a ball of red fire, he too returns to the valley below.

  4

  The Italians are gone, but Josip’s father is more worried than ever. He always tries to hide it. When caught unawares, his eyes are haunted with the look of fear that Josip has now come to recognize but does not fully understand. His father is often to be seen in the evenings with head in hand at the kitchen table, staring blankly at a book open before him, or out of the window at nothing. His favorite books, reread so often that he practically has them memorized, are the poems and tales of Matija Divkovič and the spiritual writings of Marko Marulič. But even these no longer hold his attention.

  Josip knows that confusion and danger have increased throughout the country. Countless men of Yugoslavia have left their homes to join bands of fighters struggling to push out the Germans. At the same time they are killing each other. From his father, Josip learns of these matters only in the vaguest terms, with many reassurances. From his friends in the schoolyard, he gets the details, with horrifying speculations.

  Even so, the general feeling in the village is that the valley is strategically important neither to the Germans, who are retreating step by step to the north, nor to the various factions that are trying to destroy each other as they fight for supremacy over the Yugoslavia that will remain when the invaders are gone.

  Josip’s father has a map of southern Herzegovina that he brings out and pores over endlessly, sometimes with Fra Anto, talking together in low murmurs. Mamica goes to bed by herself most nights, leaving father with Fra Anto, or with his more constant companion, sleeplessness. Month after month the situation grows worse, and the villagers learn of it mostly through word of mouth, occasionally through a newspaper. But few if any newspapers arrive in the village, and none can be wholly trusted; everyone is taking sides. Fear is now always in father’s eyes; he can no longer hide it.

  Infrequently, aircraft cross over the valley, going ever northward, never releasing their bombs. Josip’s father believes that this occurs when the antiaircraft guns along the coast, or the weather, make it difficult for the Allies to travel their normal bombing routes to industrial centers where the Germans are still in control. They are driving the Germans back, so it is generally considered among the people of Rajska Polja that the Allies will soon be the victors. Still, not everything is clear.

  Josip overhears a conversation between his father and Fra Anto one night when they think he is asleep in the loft. He has slipped silently from his bed and is lying on the floor. He removes a loose knot from a plank, and the hole permits a beam of lamplight and a flow of information to rise upward. He covers the hole with his ear.

  “. . . the Allies have turned all their support to the Partisans”, says the voice of Fra Anto.

  “But surely Churchill realizes . . .”

  “Yes, he knows that the Partisans are dominated by Communists. It’s my guess that the Allied command believe that a little loss to the left will purchase a great advance against the right.”

  “They are naive.”

  “Yes, but who can tell them anything? Certainly we cannot. They have no sympathy for the Home-Guard because they worked with the Fascists. They do not understand that the Domobrani are at heart only for our homeland and want neither Fascism nor Communism.”

  “Still they did collaborate. Are you really saying, Fra Anto, that the Home-Guard would give us a free and democratic Croatia?”

  “They are our best hope at this time. They are the army of Yugoslavia. Even if they compromised in the past, it was because they had no choice and did as little harm as they could under the Italians. For the most part, they are ordinary Croats, and ordinary Croats want freedom and independence. The Ustashe Croats want Fascism, the Chetniks want Serbian imperialism and the absorption of Croatia into their total control. With them we would be a puppet state, or worse, a slave state.”

  “But the Partisans.”

  “Dominated by Serbs—Communist Serbs. Though they permit Croats and Slovenes to help for a time, it will be turned against us if they ever come to power.”

  “It doesn’t seem likely they could come to power.”

  “It is hard to know for certain what will happen. Churchill and Stalin are not enemies. If Churchill were to reject Communist anti-Fascists, it would create tension between the Allies. At the same time, Churchill knows that if the Soviet army penetrates south and takes Serbia, and perhaps even more than Serbia, they may never leave. Britain, and America, would not be happy about it.”

  “So, you’re saying they’ve chosen a lesser evil.”

  “Yes. They will accept a Balkan Communism, less powerful, less oppressive than Stalin’s Russia. I think they foresee a buffer zone in the new world that will materialize in the wake of this war.”

  “They underestimate the Soviets.”

  “They are counting on the ferocity of our nationalists—even our Communist nationalists. More and more Chetniks are joining them, and some of their worst chiefs have become high ranking officers in the Partisan brigades. What does this tell us about the future? I think the Communists will soon rule from Belgrade.”

  “But a Communist Yugoslavia! Surely Britain and America do not want that!”

  “They want peace. They want the defeat of Germany.”

  “The Allies see us only in black and white!” declares Miro in a tone of dismay. “If they were to support the Home Guard instead of the Partisans, they would obtain more than a buffer zone. They would have friends—democratic friends.”

  “Don’t forget, the Serbs are masters of propaganda. They have convinced the Allies that only the Partisans are big enough and sufficiently organized and disciplined to rid the land of the invaders.”

  “Let us pray they turn their guns only on invaders.” After which the men get up and go out to stroll under the stars.

  Though all this is, of course, quite fascinating, there is something more important taking place in the world. His love for Josipa has become the light within his soul. He does not for a moment assume that this is the beginning of the usual sort of thing between boys and girls. He rejects the very thought of courtship. He is ten years old! He is a child! So he reminds himself. He is not interested in those things that seem to obsess the older youths and maidens of the village. He knows that it is how love comes into the world and families are begun. He read the booklet about it that his father gave him, and he remembers also their conversation about it, though vaguely. It does not apply to him, all that. He is sure it never will.

  No, it is the flame itself that is important, moving silently between the heart of Josipa and his own heart, and back again. She feels this too, he is sure she does, for she glances at no other boys in the way she looks at him. Since their first meeting on the mountainside, they have not exchanged words, though they are continuously speaking with the eyes of the swallows.

  Who are you? Where have you come from? Where are you going? Her eyes ask this of him, his eyes ask this of her, and both of them smile with the knowledge
that the answers are not what they really seek. The union between them is their great secret, their great treasure. Both of them know it. Moreover, they know that they know, and they seem to know as one.

  Strangely, they do not seek to be alone together. For a time it is enough to cross paths in the schoolyard and for their glances to meet. Or at Mass, or when children and parents gather by chance at the pool in the creek beside the church, dipping their wooden buckets into the water that is needed for cooking or drinking or washing. Whenever they meet in this way, the world begins anew. It is enough to keep them alive for days.

  In time the language of union seeks other forms from which the radiant core may expand. He is the first to move. Before dawn one morning, he walks silently down the lane to the pool of water. He has learned that she comes at a certain hour to fill a bucket. By the big stone on which women and children stand to lean out over the pool, he lines up seven of the round white stones from the sea. He arranges them into the letter J, then he swiftly retreats to his home. From the kitchen window, he observes her in the pale light of dawn, emerging from the front door of her house with bucket in hand. She strolls along the lane swinging it, looking up at the sky. She is wearing the blue dress, which against the rose background of dawn strikes all breath from his chest and sets his heart hammering. She sees the white stones and glances toward his house. Though the daylight is not yet strong, he is sure she is smiling. She stoops, gathers up the stones, and pockets them. She fills her bucket with water and returns to her home.

  Later that day, Josip barges out the kitchen door and around to the back of the house. He intends to do nothing, perhaps lie on the grass beneath the oak tree and see if chance or an angel will drop a nut on his forehead. Fra Anto says that angels guide all the forces of nature on earth and all the motions in the heavens, the sun, the moon, and the planets—from the smallest seed to the mightiest star. If an acorn falls on his forehead, will it hurt? He is curious to know. Is gravity as strong as throwing?

  When Petar is not around to help test such ideas, you can figure out things in other ways. He sits down on the grass beside the rock. From the corner of his eye, he sees a flash of blue on the flat top of the rock. Looking closer he finds the blue flowers that grow only on the forest floor up the slopes. They are arranged in the letter J. A tiny blue feather caps the letter. It has not blown away, because one of his stones from the sea weights its stem.

  A letter arrives from Sister Katarina of the Holy Angels. After months of disruption, the mail is running again between Dalmatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. There is no clear government anymore. The entire land is riddled with zones dominated by this or that faction: pockets, islands, fortresses of power, their borderlines ever shifting with the movements of roving brigades—paklensko polje, the fields of hell, his father calls them. Some people on the coast have been wise enough to send their mail to a religious community in Mostar, a house they know is reliable. The priests and brothers move about the countryside without too much interference. They are weaponless and usually on foot. A Franciscan brother from Mostar has brought a bag of mail. Fra Anto distributes the letters to homes throughout the village.

  Mamica dances around the kitchen with her most joyful expression, rips open the envelope, pockets the wax seal with the impression of the baby Jesus pressed into it, and reads aloud to father and Josip.

  Beloved Marija, Miro, and Josip,

  May the Holy Family bless and protect you all.

  It is a great risk to write what I must say in this letter, and a greater risk to send it by our courier, who is leaving later in the day for Herzegovina. I pray it will remain unseen by those of ill will. After you have read it, please hide it carefully, for if it were to fall into the wrong hands, the hammer of Satan would fall on our Sisters.

  It has been so long since I have received any word from you. I have sent three letters and a small gift (chocolate) since your visit last year. Did they arrive?

  We are reasonably well, and our house has not been harmed by the Anglo-American bombers that have hit cities along the coastline and in the interior as well. Though we are close to the center of Split and the naval ships in the harbor, we have so far remained untouched. Food is more scarce than ever, however. Country folk have been generous to us, yet it is never enough. We share what we can with the poorest, among whom are growing numbers of women and children who have fled from the mountains, those whose husbands have been killed or are missing. It is not the Germans who are doing this, it is the Chetniks and Partisans. The stories these women tell us are too horrible for words. I increase my prayers for you every day.

  The people of the city are courageous. We feel some relief since the withdrawal of the Italians, but we are not at all happy with the arrival of the Germans, who are much stricter in control and capable of greater cruelty. The Jews have been taken away, though we have helped to hide some of them.

  In addition, this spring we harbored two Allied airmen who had fallen into the sea by Trogir. They are now gone, taken in secret to a place where it is hoped they will be returned to the Allies. Few would consider turning these pilots over to the Germans, even though they have bombed our cities and there have been deaths. The heart is often torn by conflicting loyalties. In our prayers we continuously plead for divine mercy, for a swift end to this war and a just government to be established. I am sure that the Allies will assist us in making a new and democratic Croatia.

  The pilots told us that the Allies have bombed the whole region of Yugoslavia and all of Croatia this year and last, from the time they landed in Italy near Anzio, between Rome and Naples. After they conquered southern Italy they constructed a large air base near Bari. From there they strike wherever the Germans have positions of strength.

  Word has reached us that in February the Allies bombed the Dominican seminary in Zagreb. Seven religious died, buried under the ruins. The seminary is located beside the railroad shunting yards in the eastern side of the city, from which German troops and weapons are sent southeastward. Seminaries in Dubrovnik, Split, Trogir, and Sibenek were also struck. Of course, they were located alongside the port facilities of these cities. Perhaps young Catholic men were flying those bombers. Such is the horror of war that decent men are turned to the purposes of evil, often without knowing the consequences of their actions.

  Three months ago I received word from our sister Eva. The situation in Sarajevo is not good, because the city is deeper in the mountains and in the path of much fighting between Chetniks and Partisans. Many Chetniks are defecting to the Partisans, and it is our hope that this will bring them under military discipline and cause them to cease perpetrating their horrors upon our own people. Yet the Partisans themselves are not innocent. They too have done much evil. For the most part, they are commanded by men who are not God-fearers, many of whom are Communists. Eva’s husband has joined them. Since last summer she has received no word from him, though she knows he is somewhere north of Herzegovina. She is very worried that he may have been killed. Killed by Germans? Killed by the rival parties in Bosnia or Serbia? There is no way of knowing, since the fighting is intense on many fronts and everything is confused. A friend one day is an enemy the next. Oh, what has brought this tide of evil upon us!

  We must pray to have confidence in the ultimate victory of Christ. We must pray for the grace never to lose heart. This is my prayer for you all.

  I long to see your faces.

  I kiss each of you.

  your Sister Katarina of the Holy Angels

  It is a warm evening, midsummer. Fra Anto has a little talk with the boys who serve at the altar, not the youngest, just those who are ages eleven to fifteen. Josip is only ten, though he will soon be eleven. Perhaps he is included because he is advanced in his studies and is unusually tall for his age—taller than some of the boys whose voices have cracked.

  A dozen village lads are seated in the front pews. Fra Anto has prayed silently, kneeling before the tabernacle, and now he gets to his feet. He has dres
sed himself in his brown habit. His feet are bare and need a wash. He needs a shave too. They have all just finished a hearty game of soccer in the churchyard and are still sweating. The bread he gave them has been devoured, the water downed, the satisfied feeling after a great game settles on them all.

  It is a talk about purity. Josip remembers the booklet Tata gave him, and the conversation that followed. He recalls what happens when boys become youths. They go crazy. They lose all sense. They stop playing enjoyable games. They abandon their contempt for girls. They throw their shoulders back and walk about like cockerels half the time. It is inevitable. It is a force of nature. Perhaps the angels guide this too.

  Fra Anto tells them that the changes in their bodies are good. These are new powers, the powers of life itself. But they must be used only in a holy way. The strength of these powers is such that a young man can easily be ruled by them, if he does not grow strong in his character.

  “You study to train your mind”, he says. “You work hard to build up your muscles when you work with your fathers in the field. You don’t always like it. It’s easier to read no books and remain uneducated. It’s easier not to strain your mind and body with labor, easier to lie on the ground all day and let the birds drop boiled eggs into your mouths.”

  Everyone laughs.

  He goes on: “So, boys, if you don’t want to be a slave of your body’s desires, you must be masters of your bodies. Then, when you are married someday, you will give to your wife a beautiful gift that has been saved for her alone. It will be a thousand times better than if you had already given it away. She will love you and you will love her, and from your gift to each other children will come into the world. You and she and God will give to the world its most precious treasure, a new soul for eternity.”