Toward the end of August they went to Požega. It was a hot day, one in a succession of hot days in late summer. There was no movement in the air; dust hovered above the trees that bordered the road, turning their tired, overabundant foliage gray. At a crawl they drove into the town, which was thronged with people, vehicles, German soldiers with bayonets on their rifles. After they delivered Waldenheim at the Military Police post, on a street off the main square, and were told the time to pick him up, Hans turned the car around and, skillfully avoiding the people walking in the middle of the road, made a circle and came out at the river Skrapež.
They looked for an isolated spot, parked the car in some bushes along the bank, undressed, and jumped into the river, which was shallow and rapid. They splashed about for some time; feeling cool, they stretched out on the stones in the sun. As usual, they were silent, except for an occasional grunt of pleasure in the sun’s heat. Sredoje propped himself up on his elbows, looked at Hans, and noticed that the soldier had a green, heart-shaped stone pendant on the gold chain he always wore around his long, muscular neck. Sredoje’s father, not long ago, had had the very same pendant displayed on the table for Waldenheim. “Hans,” he said, looking at the pendant again, to make sure he was not mistaken, “where did you get that green heart on your chain?” Hans opened one eye, gray as the sand, and looked down at the thing Sredoje had mentioned. “From a girl” was all he muttered.
After a while they went into the water again, and when they came out, Hans walked over to the car, took his wristwatch from his shirt pocket and said that it was time to go. Instead of lying in the sun again to dry, they ran around and rubbed themselves with their palms; still damp, they dressed and got into the car. Back in the town, they found the streets strangely empty, but when they neared the square they saw a crowd of people, with their horses and carts, pressed close together, all standing still and looking in the same direction. Hans sounded the horn, but no one turned around. A German soldier with a rifle and bayonet motioned him sharply to move away. Hans backed up and, taking empty side streets, approached the square on the opposite side, by the police post. Here, too, was a wall of people. Sredoje stayed in the stuffy car for a minute or two, then got out and joined the crowd to find out what was going on.
He stood on tiptoe but saw nothing, so he pushed his way between two peasants, who were craning their necks. In the center of the square was a space cordoned off on all sides by Germans and soldiers of the National Guard. There was an unusual silence, as if no one were breathing. The smell of human sweat spread from man to man, in stifling air already thick with dust. “What’s happening? Why is everyone waiting?” Sredoje asked the peasant beside him. The peasant started, glared at him, as if Sredoje had interrupted something important; then, his eyes returning to the center of the square, he said quietly, his throat tight, “You’ll see. If you’re a Serb.”
Sredoje heard a shout, distant—it sounded like an order—and on the side of the square, in front of the Town Hall, there was movement. Through a wide passage that had been left open, a squad of National Guard soldiers with rifles on their shoulders stepped briskly into the square. A second order rang out, and they halted. Sredoje could now see clearly who was shouting: a broad-shouldered young officer with short bandy legs encased in boots, standing in front of the detail with his sword drawn. The squad fanned out, pressing with their backs against the crowd, until only three figures remained in the center: two soldiers and, between them, a small, burly civilian, bareheaded, in wide gray trousers and a darker gray jacket that was too big for him.
The officer waved the gleaming sword in the sunlight, the two soldiers each pulled on a clanking chain, and the civilian was jerked first one way, then the other, as if dancing with tiny steps. This went on for some time. Impatient, the officer waved his sword and several times even helped pull. The crowd murmured. At last the ends of the chain were in the hands of the soldiers, who stood at attention as if they, too, were now chained. The civilian stood straight, his legs apart, and began to rub his wrists slowly, first one, then the other. There was an awkward silence. The officer looked around, as if searching for someone, made a sign with his sword and beckoned with his free hand. But instead of anyone stepping forward, the monotonous drone of a voice was heard, its source invisible. Now and then a whistle came from the crowd and a shout of “Louder!” but the speech went on in the same low tone. After a while Sredoje was able to make out phrases he knew by heart: “Communist hireling,” “crime against the Serbian people,” and “death by hanging.”
He broke into a sweat, even though this was really what he had expected. He thought of leaving, but a cold curiosity rooted him to the spot. The peasants next to him stared ahead without blinking, and the one Sredoje had spoken to stood with his mouth half open, showing his pointed upper teeth.
The squad moved to the right, and Sredoje now noticed, directly in front of the Town Hall, a wooden frame, a rope hanging from a crosspiece, not a thick rope, but ending in a noose. The squad came to a halt beneath the noose, the officer waved his sword, the two soldiers took hold of the civilian and lifted him up, and suddenly he was standing, higher than everyone, on a stool. The civilian’s face was plump, with high, rounded cheekbones, heavy lips, big, dark eyes, and bushy eyebrows. Those eyes expressed both fear and disbelief, but most of all, Sredoje thought, a mute, tense appetite for life.
Next to the civilian’s head a second head appeared, beneath a forage cap, with thin, drained features, and a long, bony hand took hold of the noose, hurled it up, and dropped it deftly over the civilian’s neck. Then the head with the forage cap was gone. The civilian shuddered, as if the noose burned, raised his stubby hands to his neck to pull it off, but suddenly the hands jerked out in terror. He sank, the rope went tight and began to swing, and the stool lay overturned.
The man’s legs pumped as if on an invisible bicycle, he spread his arms wide, drew them to his neck, frantically threw them out again, and his face took on an expression of childlike petulance, turned dark, then the eyes bulged, wanting to pop from their sockets. Another shudder, a shiver, and everything was suddenly still. Arms and legs hung loose, and the short trunk to which they were attached swung slowly back and forth. The head was turned to one side; the face, now purple, was longer. The jaw had dropped to show a lolling blue tongue, and the eyes, expressionless, looked like buttons sewn on in an inappropriate place.
Sredoje was staring at these dulled eyes when a hand fell on his arm, making him jump. Was it his turn next? He looked around and found himself face to face with Captain Waldenheim, whose misty eyes regarded him with tender concern. “You shouldn’t have watched that,” the captain said, shaking him as if Sredoje had been asleep. “Come. We’ve decided to stay for supper with my colleagues here. You’ll like them.” He squeezed his arm in encouragement, and Sredoje followed, not entirely grasping what was expected of him. He was still mesmerized by the sight of a simple rope transforming a live body, a body that had walked, rubbed its wrists, and looked with avidly longing eyes, into a crooked, sagging carcass.
He let Waldenheim lead him back to the Opel. A group of German officers stood behind the car, near a long blue limousine he had never seen before. Automatically, he sat in his usual place next to Hans, and Waldenheim got in behind, next to a tall young officer with a hooked nose. “Let me introduce you,” said Waldenheim, leaning forward, and Sredoje turned around and held out his hand to the cross-eyed officer, who greeted him stiffly. Above the rumbling of the engine, Sredoje heard himself described as “our young friend, who is working for us.” They drove through the streets of the town, which were once more filled with people, people hurrying home, and came out on the dusty, empty highway. The cross-eyed officer directed Hans along country roads. As they climbed into the hills, the sun disappeared for a time; when it reappeared, it lay, weary and distended, upon a low, flat ridge.
They stopped in front of a two-story building of stone and wood, which looked like a hunting lodge.
A guard with a rifle stood in front, and beyond him several soldiers, without weapons and bareheaded, ran around carrying crates and light cane furniture. Waldenheim and his companion got out and invited Sredoje to do the same. Sredoje was still unsteady on his feet. In front of the building a wire fence stretched at chest height, and beyond the fence, between it and a country well with a winch, was a yard shaded by ancient trees, beneath which the soldiers were setting out tables and chairs. Still farther back, they had a large fire going. There was the drone of an engine, and around the bend appeared the blue limousine, which parked behind the Opel. Several German officers sprang out and, with loud laughter, hustled the group that had arrived earlier through the entrance in the fence, where the sentry, standing at attention, saluted. The tables had been placed end to end and covered with white tablecloths. A soldier crouching in the grass filled kerosene lamps.
The guests sat down at the tables, the soldiers opened bottles of beer, and from the other end of the yard came the smell of grilling meat. The kerosene lamps were lit and hung on nails hammered in the trunks of the trees. As it grew dark, the officers filled their glasses, clinked, and drank. Sredoje sat at the end of the table, next to Hans, and together, in silence, they sipped their beer. The rest of the company was noisy, celebrating the birthday of the cross-eyed officer with the hooked nose, who sat next to Waldenheim. Perhaps, too, they were showing off before their superior from Belgrade. They praised the beer, praised the spot under the trees, and, when the meat arrived, praised the skill of the military cook, who in answer to the loud summons of all present appeared in a long white apron spattered with grease and blood.
Red wine in liter bottles was brought to the tables, along with clean tall glasses. A young and chubby second lieutenant stood up and toasted his colleague on the occasion of his colleague’s twenty-sixth birthday, and everyone had to empty a glass of wine. The tall, cross-eyed officer responded, announcing that it was an honor for him to celebrate his birthday in the presence of the esteemed Captain Doctor Waldenheim, at which they all again drained their glasses. Waldenheim stood up and quietly, deliberately proposed a toast, and referred to the delicate position in which they found themselves, in a foreign country where there was not yet sufficient understanding of the German aim to introduce a civilized way of life. Everyone applauded and again drank. Sredoje, this time, only wet his lips with the wine, but the chubby second lieutenant shouted across to Waldenheim that his interpreter was shirking, at which Sredoje, with a forced laugh, raised his glass and drained it. Now everyone wanted to speak, to drink, to clink glasses. Sredoje suddenly felt the wine rising in his throat; he broke into a sweat, and his stomach began to churn. He got up and rushed to the far end of the lawn, to the well, around it, and to the wire fence, where by a wooden post he vomited in one dense stream. Now he was empty, sober, but exhausted.
He stood panting, pulling himself together, wiping the sweat off his face, as the soldiers eating around the spit and the grill watched him. The officers’ wild laughter reached his ears. He had to return. He walked back in the shadows cast by the fading fire and came into the lamplight right next to his seat. A full glass was waiting for him, and the second lieutenant, the minute Sredoje sat down, clinked glasses with him, winking. Sredoje shook his head; he could not swallow another drop. The second lieutenant called across to Waldenheim, who, conversing with the cross-eyed officer, turned distractedly to Sredoje and raised his hand. Everyone fell silent. “You’re not feeling well?” he asked Sredoje across the table in a soft voice. Sredoje shook his head. At that, Waldenheim snapped his fingers, called over one of the soldiers serving at the table, and whispered in his ear. Then he turned to Sredoje with a look full of understanding. “He’ll show you to bed. Is that all right?” At Sredoje’s thankful acceptance, he turned to the other officers and said, “Our young friend is not accustomed to ordeals of this kind,” and clinked glasses with his neighbors. Everyone was now shouting, drinking. No one paid attention to Sredoje, who got up and followed the soldier.
He thought they would go to the lodge, but the soldier led him out through the gate and by the fence that went parallel to the tables. He walked at the soldier’s side, taking care not to stumble in the shadows of the tall trees. They left the circle of light, plunged into darkness, and the air was suddenly cooler, fresher. Sredoje breathed more easily. But he could see nothing until the soldier switched on a flashlight, revealing an uneven path. The sound of laughter grew fainter and, after they rounded a small hill, ceased completely. Only their own footsteps and breathing could be heard. The soldier stopped, swept the darkness with the flashlight, and its beam fell on a small house, on the door of the house. He pushed a key into the lock, and the door creaked open. When they stepped inside, Sredoje almost fainted from the hot air that hit them. But the soldier seemed not to notice. In the room, the only pieces of furniture were beds and a small white chair next to each, like the chairs on the lawn of the hunting lodge.
Turning, the soldier said over his shoulder to Sredoje, “If you need to go outside, go while I’m here.”
Sredoje was surprised. “No, I don’t need to. But why do you ask?”
“Because I’ve been ordered to lock the door.” And then, as if to justify it, he added, “We don’t mount guard here.” He waited for a moment to see if Sredoje would change his mind, then murmured “Good night” and left, taking the flashlight with him and slamming the door shut.
Sredoje heard the key turn and the soldier’s footsteps receding. In the silence, he was sorry he hadn’t asked the soldier to wait by the open door a while, for the room to air, but it was too late now. He looked for a window, though he did not remember seeing one in the brief sweep of the flashlight. He felt along the walls with his hand and came upon wooden shutters. He groped for the bolt, found it, turned it, but the shutters would not open. He pulled it, rattled it, but nothing happened. Passing his fingers along the edges of the shutters, he discovered that they had been nailed in place with large nails. He gave up with a groan. His legs shook with fatigue; his head was swimming. He walked to the middle of the room, felt around for a bed, sat down. He took off his jacket, threw it across the back of a chair. The revolver he carried in his inside pocket knocked against the seat. He took off his trousers and shoes, collapsed onto the pillow, and was instantly asleep.
He woke, dimly aware that something had disturbed his sleep. His head ached, his body was bathed in sweat, all he wanted was to sleep, but whatever it was that wouldn’t let him was fumbling between his legs. He put his hand out and caught hold of someone’s hand, pushed it away, and in the same moment, relieved, sank back to sleep. But he woke again: the hand was touching him. He pushed it away again, harder. It did not occur to him to wonder whose hand it was or why it was touching him; he only knew that it prevented him from sleeping and that he had to go back to sleep. Sleep was like an animal swallowing him. He slept and again started, bewildered: the hand was back, stubbornly pulling him out of the peace into which he had just settled. He didn’t want to move, such was his longing to return to that peace, but he had to. He found the hand and, turning from his back to his side, shoved it far away, to the neighboring bed. It must have left him alone longer after that, because it was a deep, heavy dream he came out of when the hand intruded again. Sredoje felt that he had no more strength to resist it, yet he could not allow the hand to continue, because what it was doing was something so unnatural that even in his sleep he fought it. He turned over on his back and without opening his eyes felt for his jacket, slipped the revolver out of the pocket, and, relieved that he had found a solution, slid it across his body to his other side, and pulled the trigger.
There was a deafening explosion and a flash that penetrated his eyelids, though they were shut tight. The hand jerked away, he heard a scream, and when he opened his eyes, there was complete darkness and the sound only of his own breathing. He jumped up, wide awake. He realized that he had wounded, if not killed, someone— Waldenheim, probably. He wa
lked across to switch on the light, but remembered that there was no light in the room. And did he want to see the wound, see a dying body? He must flee, he thought, trembling. He pulled on his trousers, stuffed his feet into his shoes, grabbed hold of his jacket. He rushed for the door, but collided with a wall instead; he searched back and forth until he felt wood and the lock. A huge key was sticking out of it—the first moment of relief in this nightmare. He turned the key, pushed at the door, and dove into the free cold night air.
Before him, low in the sky, hung a round white moon, showing every blade of grass. He stopped, listened, could hear only the loud music of the crickets. He started to run, crossed the path and climbed a steep hill. He continued to run blindly all through the night. At the first sign of light he crawled under some bushes at the edge of a meadow and fell asleep. He was awakened by the sun and thirst. He didn’t know where he was. In the distance he caught sight of a man reaping and debated whether or not he should go up to him and ask for water. Perhaps he could persuade the man to give him shelter and even take a message to his father in Belgrade. But the man might turn him over to the authorities, instead.
Sredoje crept out of the bushes and moved on, keeping low, hoping to come across a spring or stream. He started at the least noise, the crack of a twig, the distant bark of a dog, and kept looking over his shoulder. In the evening he came to an isolated house and well in the middle of a field. His lips were parched with thirst and his stomach ached from hunger, but he didn’t dare approach. He slept, listened, retreated from the house in panic, approached it again cautiously. He sheltered in a small knoll overgrown with brush and wild trees, where he could keep watch on the house, the well, and the surrounding area.
The Use of Man Page 24