Island of The World

by Michael D. O'Brien

  “If the third brother allows himself to become Cain in turn, then evil wins.”

  “Go away.”

  “Do not give in to it, Josip.”

  Josip rolls onto his side, his back to Tata.

  Now he is planning his escape in earnest. The east side of the island would be best because it is closest to the mainland. To go into the water there would cut the journey down by a kilometer or two, at least a third of the distance. However, the hills and cliffs are also highest there. To dive into the sea from such heights would mean self-destruction. Even so, there may be gradations of the terrain close to the shore—inlets or even small coves, as there are on the south side of the island.

  He will escape, find his wife and child, and they will flee to freedom. This is his primary objective. Yet he has new motivation also, for he fully intends to track down Snake and Cockroach at some point in his life and kill them. It will be justice, not the vengeance of Cain—so he tells himself. He broods on this dark and delicious dream, savors it, imagines it endlessly. Plans it and replans it according to the variations that might evolve with the passage of time and circumstance. The day will come, maybe after the Communists have fallen, when he will find one of the killers, will spot him at a café in Split, or Zagreb, or Dubrovnik, anywhere, and he will stalk him to his home. Later, in the middle of the night, he will knock on his door, and, when it opens, he will point a pistol at the killer’s head. “I am from Goli Otok”, he will say. “This is for what you did to Krunošlav Bošnjaković.” Bang. Blow the top of his head off. Then the other killer: he will knock on the door, and, when it opens, he will point the pistol and say, “I am from Goli Otok. This is for Budala.” Bang. And they will both be as dead as Uncle Jure.

  He wracks his memory, searching for Budala’s true name. What was it? Did the boy ever tell? Of the original conspirators, only he and Tata, Sova, Propo, and Prof remain. They no longer engage in dialogues—none of them—but with Prof there are still some whispered exchanges. Prof has been changed by the boys’ deaths. He seems the most stricken, withdrawn; and something is harder in his demeanor.

  “Do you desire to avenge their deaths?” Josip whispers in the dark.

  “Yes.”

  “How would you do it?”

  “We need not discuss this. If we survive, you will one day, perhaps twenty or thirty years from now, read in the newspaper about the unsolved murder of a former officer of the prison administration.”

  He will say no more on the matter.

  “Did you ever learn Budala’s name?”

  “No. Go to sleep.”

  Every day for weeks, the snake and the cockroach hover above the quarry. Six hours a day—half a workday. Josip never glances in their direction, though he knows at all times where they are. If one of them crosses his line of sight, he memorizes and re-memorizes their facial features without appearing to. They pay him no attention. There are other brutal moments during this period, but no more deaths, at least not in this quarry, not in this crew of prisoners. Then they are transferred to a pit lower in the hills, and for a time the snake and the cockroach are seen no more.

  “Your hatred is understandable,” whispers Tata in the dark, “but it must be overcome.”

  “Why must it be overcome?” Josip replies in a voice as cold as death.

  “What have you suffered in your life, I wonder?” Tata asks. “It seems to me that there is anger in you so deep that it is fathomless.”

  “Are you not angry?”

  “Yes, very angry.”

  “Well, then, you have answered your own question.”

  “I do not think so. Your anger is different. Krunošlav’s death has opened a deep hole of anger in you. I ask myself: What have you suffered? And did you run from that suffering, whatever it was? And now, because you can run no longer, does every evil blow you have received return to you?”

  “You are no help! If what you say is true, the fact remains—there is no place to run on this island.”

  “Neither from the killers nor from oneself.”

  “So, I will release my hate. It will have its day, and then the killers will suffer.”

  “You would kill your oppressors if given the chance?”

  “With pleasure”, says Josip.

  “Your vengeance will destroy you.”

  “Oh? Tell me, Tata, how does a man remain wise in hell?”

  The priest does not respond to this. Instead he says: “A man suffers injustice. He resents it, and his resentment grows and grows and becomes anger. Anger, if it is fed, then becomes hatred. Hatred, if fed, opens the soul to evil spirits. And when they possess a man, he becomes capable of any atrocity. Afterward, he will not know how or why he became like that.”

  “I will know why. Go away!”

  It is late autumn now, or perhaps early winter. Their trousers are longer versions of the canvas shorts, and their shirts have longer arms. Otherwise, it’s much the same. In order to keep from shivering away one’s energy, one must work harder. Cold winds sometimes blow down out of the Dinarics. The first snow has fallen on the peaks, though at sea level there are still days when the sun shines warmly on their backs and they sweat. Coughing and hacking are more common. A body can be sweating one moment, but in the next the sun drops behind the distant shadow of the island of Cres and the chill descends swiftly. Then a prisoner’s sweat becomes his enemy. Three men in the barracks have died of pneumonia this month. Since summer, Josip has suffered three colds but has thrown them off.

  Today they are in a natural ravine, not very deep, and the path up to the truck is a wide gentle slope.

  As Josip carries a slab up, Tata passes him coming down.

  “Budala’s—” whispers the old man.

  On the next pass: “name is—”

  The next: “Dalibor—”

  And finally: “Kovač”

  Josip meets Tata’s eyes when they pass again. Dalibor Kovač. He is grateful for the information but makes no reply. Dalibor, I will not forget you!

  At lunch break, they sprawl in the dust, the prisoners huddling close to each other for warmth. The guards permit it today.

  “I heard his confession”, whispers Tata, “the night before he died.”

  For this Josip has no reply. What difference did it make?

  “He was a good boy,” says the priest, “a good, good boy, though not wise.”

  On the homeward trek, shivering in their thin clothing, Tata says, “Krunošlav came to me the week before. A clean heart, a strong heart, wiser than Dalibor but—”

  “But not wise enough.”

  The guard barks, a whistle blows, they are locked into the compound for the night.

  In the dark, Tata approaches. “Josip.”

  “Go away.”

  “Josip, your heart is not at rest.”

  “That is true. I will not rest until the killers are slain.”

  “Do not become Cain.”

  “I am already Cain.”

  “Not true. Let us pray together. Death can come at any time.”

  “Go away.”

  “If only the jugo would blow”, whispers Sova. They are in a small ravine, working with fine, pure-white limestone. The blocks are smaller, thinner, not so heavy. Some friend of the regime will enjoy excellent stone floors. Or perhaps these are being shipped to America—Propo overheard one guard telling another that the best stone is sold to the West. Money is flowing into Yugoslavia. The guards are fewer today, only four for the thirty or so prisoners in this crew. The path is steep and narrow, but it affords a little room for dialogue.

  The jugo is the unpredictable sirocco that blows up from the south bringing African warmth to the North Adriatic. It is damp too and often causes rain—long overdue now. If it comes, they will walk to and from work with their heads tilted up, mouths open, drinking fresh water poured from the sky. Moreover, they will feel warm as they do it. For the moment, their bodies are cold, and their tongues are like parchment.

  The
jugo does not come—week after week it does not come. Instead, each day brings a new variation of torment, for the first winds of the bura are blowing. They come in the mornings, usually after a big cloud appears over the mountains to the northeast, wailing down the slopes and ripping up the channel into a frenzy of whitecaps, then racing over the islands and out to sea. Though such gusts are unpredictable, so far they have lasted no more than a few hours at a time, chilling, but leaving the atmosphere cleansed and sunny.

  A bura can be a passing squall, but one of the prisoners warns that it can rise to the level of a tempest, and then to hurricane force, raging down from the northern Dinarics and roaring seaward for days at a time, bitterly cold, destroying men and ships. He says that it is often worst near Senj in the Kvarner region. Senj is only a few kilometers northeast of Goli Otok.

  The increasing winds do not provide an excuse for letting up on work, though guards now sit in the cab of the truck with the engine running, two at a time. Two others stand on the crest in their heavy jackets and thick trousers and gloves, stamping their feet and hunching inside their collars, while keeping an unsteady eye on the prisoners.

  Propo—clever engineer that he is—has shown the other conspirators how to slice pieces of canvas from the underside of their pallets. Using a sharp piece of scavenged stone, he makes pads that are worn next to the skin, doubling the wind-block. If the mutilation of pallets is discovered, it will mean punishment, but freezing to death is punishment, too, argues Propo. Several of the crew are hacking and coughing as they work. This past week, two others developed pneumonia and were taken away to the infirmary. The administration does not waste penicillin on donkeys, so it is probable that the missing will not recover.

  “What month is it?” Josip whispers to Prof in the dark.

  “December.”

  “The day?”

  “I’m not sure. I gave up counting. Tata will know.” Josip crawls across the floor to the old man’s pallet. “What day is it?” he whispers.

  “The seventh of December”, whispers Tata, rising on his elbows. “Josip, we must pray—” Josip hastily crawls away.

  By morning a fierce bura is blowing, so cold that all prisoners simultaneously begin groaning aloud as they get up. Whistles are shrilling but as yet no guard has entered their barracks.

  The conspirators stand at the narrow windows, watching what is happening outside. A malevolent hand is ripping clouds across the sky and tearing up small bushes near the rim of the compound. The wind whistling through the glassless windows is lighter, for the compound is low in the shelter of the hills, near the west end of the island.

  “Up there it’s a devil’s dance”, says Propo, jerking his thumb in the direction of the quarries. “It’s a bad one. My guess is there will be no work today because the guards will want to stay inside.”

  This provokes hopeful looks all around. Rare is the day without hard labor. Even so, if they are to remain in barracks, they will need to huddle together for body warmth.

  Later than the usual hour, a guard enters the room and grunts at them to line up and begin the usual trek into the hills. No one dares groan, though dismay is on every face: not even the masks will hide it.

  The guards are in a nasty mood, for they do not want to work either. The prisoners file through the open gate and climb up out of the compound, then quail as the full force of the wind hits them. The guards, like a pack of snarling dogs, shout at them, warning that if they want some shelter they had better get moving. No one is beaten, but there are plenty of insults and backhand blows to the train of donkeys that winds its way too slowly toward the hills.

  They work in the small ravine again, the source of fine slabs for American floors. It is hard not to resent them—the foreigners, that is—the wealthy, warm, well-fed foreigners with fine homes and more freedom than they know what to do with. It is hard not to spit on this luxury stone, curse it, and send an invisible message across the Atlantic embedded in it. But few are the men who would waste their spit today.

  Up and down, up and down, endure this day, endure it—to hell with dialogues!

  There is less wind in the ravine because it runs north and south on the flanks of a bulge in Glavina, at right angles to the path of the bura. The wind’s roar is still deafening, with leaves and branches flying overhead. Once, a gull catapults past with feathers bending the wrong way. The water-break at mid-morning is longer than usual because the four guards have crammed themselves into the cab of the truck and are reluctant to emerge. To their amazement, the prisoners find themselves alone, though doubtless someone is keeping an eye on them from above. They are free to talk, as long as their mouths are out of sight and their body language expresses only fatigue. The water is like ice. Josip can feel every tooth in his upper jaw—half are gone, and as many are absent from the lower jaw. Sometimes he forgets this, but not today.

  “Now is our time for escape”, he says to Prof, who is lying inches from his mouth.

  It is interesting to hear the sound of his own voice, loud and deep. Yes, he still has a man’s voice! Yet he hates the garbled pronunciation that his tongue makes because of the missing teeth.

  “How?” says Prof doubtfully. “There is no path out except past the truck.”

  “Not now, later.”

  “You’re mistaken. They know what we’re thinking. They will have extra guards and spotlights on the compound tonight. You can be sure of that. I’ve seen more than one fool die on days exactly like this.”

  Whistles blow. A single guard points his rifle into the ravine. “Get to work!” The other guards remain in the truck.

  So it goes. At lunchtime the soup is cold; the wind has sucked all heat from the iron drum during its ride from the compound.

  In the afternoon, another truck drives up, and the morning shift drives away. Now only two guards are watching them, yet both have machine guns. One gets back into the cab and stays there, while the other struts around the perimeter, scowling. Bundled in winter clothes, cap low on his forehead, this guard is not at first recognizable. From time to time, he pulls a bottle from his jacket pocket and drinks from it.

  “Zmija”, says Propo.

  The snake is not happy. Though he makes no trouble, he bestows a look of hatred on every prisoner arriving at the top with a stone in hand. Up and down, up and down continues for a while. He keeps sipping and sipping until the bottle is empty. Then he starts on another one pulled from somewhere inside his uniform.

  With each stone deposited on the carry platform, Josip notices that the snake’s eyes are red, wandering, unfocused. The snake mutters to himself and smashes the empty bottle on a stone, kicks away the pieces, then pops the cork on a full one.

  At one point, he shouts down into the ravine, “Don’t try anything!” Then he points the machine gun up toward the bura and gives it a few bursts. Instinctively, the prisoners duck, then slowly rise and resume their tasks.

  The other guard leaps from the cab of the truck to see what is the matter. The snake growls at him and takes his place inside. The new guard is younger and not threatening. He paces back and forth with only cursory attention to the prisoners. His face seems absorbed in private thoughts. Two hours later, he rouses Zmija from his dormant inebriated state, and they change posts. Zmija is staggering now, still sipping from a bottle. How many of those little bottles does he have?

  Then it happens: He steps too close to the edge, and, with a cry that is blown away on the wind, he tumbles to the bottom of the ravine. All prisoners are paralyzed, staring at the body lying at their feet. The snake has knocked his head on a stone and is semiconscious, groaning with closed eyes. His leg is broken, the jagged femur jutting from a torn pant leg.

  Pausing only for an instant, Josip picks up a large stone and hastens over. His lips are parted in a savage grin as he lifts the stone high and is about to drop it onto the snake’s head.

  Suddenly, he is grabbed from behind and yanked backward. The stone topples sideways, narrowly missing t
he snake, and Josip trips and falls. Tata and Prof land on him, holding him down.

  “Let me go, let me go!” he roars.

  They will not let him go. He is stronger than any other man in the crew and is close to throwing them off, when Propo and Sova also pile on and keep him down.

  With the palm of his hand, Prof hits Josip hard on the cheek. “Enough!” he bellows into his ear.

  While the others restrain Josip, Prof stands and galvanizes the prisoners. As yet, the other guard has not noticed the commotion. If he does, they might all be gunned down. Prof gives hurried commands; then he and three other prisoners carry Zmija up the trail and deposit the body on a heap of rocks behind the truck. He is breathing but unconscious. Prof jams the broken leg between two rocks, then takes a bottle from the snake’s pocket and sprinkles alcohol over the jacket, in the hair, in the mouth. Commanding everyone to go back down into the ravine, he tells them to gather stones and get busy. Prof then waits a minute until the up-and-down procedure has resumed. He walks slowly to the cab and raps on the side window. He raps again, and again.

  The door swings open, and a surprised guard pushes his way out, unslinging his machine gun.

  “Sir,” says Prof, bowing at the waist, “there has been an accident. The other guard has fallen down and does not get up. Come quickly.”

  Prof leads the way at gunpoint. Behind the truck the guard comes upon Zmija, and startles.

  “Drunk!” he shouts, and breaks into curses. “Broke your leg, you swine! Well, you deserve it!”

  Turning to Prof he says, “Get back to work!” Prof retreats down into the ravine. The guard blows his whistle again and again, and shoots burst after burst of gunfire into the air. A few minutes later another truck roars to a halt and several guards jump out, pointing their weapons down into the ravine.

  “No, no, it’s not the donkeys, it’s him!”

  They load the snake onto the back of one of the trucks, and it drives away. Well guarded for the remainder of the day, the crew completes its work and trudges back to the prison compound under a darkening sky, their bodies bending before the wind.