He spent his final years in reclusion, in a monastery. But the persecution had had the expected effect: thenceforth the people regarded him as a martyr and a saint, and they willingly gave themselves up to the nastavnik, who rid them of the key to hell. The women too sometimes cut off their nipples, so that they would no longer be able to breastfeed and as a sign that they would bear no more children. After that, the men and the women lived without meat, without wine, without tobacco, without carnal sin, and they worshipped the icon of their saint. Yevdoshka had a little icon of St Selivanov at his house on Strada Birjarilor. But he had not relinquished foul language; he sinned with his tongue worse than those whose bodies held the key to hell. Leon Margulis also knew that fortunately his own key was in very good working order, and Agatha had no reason for complaint.
They were making slow progress; there was a traffic jam and the horses moved at a walk, while the cabmen chatted among themselves, side by side, pulling on the reins without looking ahead. If the snow had not already deteriorated into filth, many passengers would have rather walked. Those who had taken the horse-drawn tram were at an advantage, since it had a separate lane, and Dr Margulis was sorry he had not chosen that mode of transport. But it was almost inappropriate for a doctor to take the tram: what would his patients say?
The whole of Bucharest had come into town today, on Strada Batiștei he espied the young Livezeanu coming in the opposite direction, in his open carriage, despite the snow outside. His hat was white with snowflakes, but he did not seem to care. He was driving the horse by himself, faster than would have been advisable in such a crowd, and overtaking everything in his path. God forbid there be an accident! More and more young men were causing or falling victims to accidents these days. In the last year, four had been brought to his surgery. But somehow he had arrived safely at Strada Teilor. He took note of the splendid houses at the intersection with Strada Sfântul Spiridon, knowing that they had been renovating them for a long time: now, having been completed, they looked dazzling. Inside there were lit chandeliers and through the windows could be seen a throng of people. At that moment, a young man with a slinky, undulating gait emerged from the courtyard and quickly hopped onto the tram whose horses had stopped at the station.
‘Here we are, sir!’ announced Yevdoshka, and his customer placed his foot on the small iron rung that served as a step. Margulis remembered that on Saturdays Rosenberg did not come to the Hospice of Health, and so he asked at reception after the unknown young man who had been brought from the Police Station the day before and a nurse wearing a white apron and a white headscarf knotted at the back conducted him to a rather narrow room with four iron beds, of which only two were occupied. The air was stale and smelled of sweat and disinfectant. In one of the beds he recognized the young, blond man; his eyes were closed, as they had been when he saw him the previous day. The doctor was downcast to ascertain that the patient’s chances were slim. Should he have accompanied him yesterday, or perhaps the injection of oil of camphor had been a mistake? Sometimes, alas, medicine is not a science, but more a case of trial and error. Perhaps in a hundred years the sick would no longer suffer and a panacea other than death would be discovered, he pondered.
In the other bed dozed a sturdy, ruddy-cheeked young man with his leg in plaster. As he had been about to enter the room, a corpulent rather uncouth man in uniform had rushed through the door in front of him, and the doctor, although he was the elder one, had politely stepped aside.
‘I’m from the Police,’ said the man brusquely, ‘wait outside!’
The doctor felt the blood rise to his face, but restrained himself and answered in an even voice: ‘I don’t know what police station you are from, maybe you are a night watchman from Ciorogârla, but in any event I kindly ask that you wait outside until I finish consulting with my patient.’
Taken by surprise, the man glared biliously at the intruder and just as he was about to yell, he recognized him. All of a sudden he became ingratiating.
‘Forgive me, doctor, sir, I’m sergeant Budacu, Mr Costache from the Prefecture of Police sent me to see how this young man is and ordered me to come back with an answer as quick as I can.’ He then added, lowering his voice and with a complicit air: ‘My wife is waiting for me to come back and slaughter the pig. I’m more afraid of her than I am of the boss. You know what it’s like when you have a bad-tempered wife.’
‘Before we do anything else, I have to have a look at the patient’s condition,’ said the doctor, rather grudgingly. ‘I don’t think he can talk.’
The young man with the broken leg was listening to them with interest. He was the type of person who respects the winner in a fight, no matter who it might be, and consequently he addressed Margulis: ‘After they brought him he kept groaning, until just now, but nobody paid any attention to him. You could be dying and nobody would come. She gave him some water –’ here he pointed at the woman with the white headscarf ‘– but he couldn’t drink it, and it spilled down his chin and on the bed.’
The doctor twisted the little wheel to turn up the gas lamp, took the moribund man’s left wrist, took the watch out of his waistcoat pocket, and began to count.
‘His pulse is irregular. I think we are going to lose him. Tell Mr Costache Boerescu from me that he should come straight away,’ he said to the policeman. ‘Usually a patient in his death throes will have a moment of lucidity. But let him know that he might come all this way for nothing, because there is no absolute rule. I don’t think he will last even until five o’clock this afternoon.’
Then he turned to the nurse and told her to send for a priest.
4.
‘Do you believe in God?’
Nicu had entered the so-called painters’ house without knocking and without being surprised at the mess inside. His house was no palace either, but in any event, when his mother was well, she tidied up, cleaned and washed, for she was a washerwoman by day. In summer, she went to wash down at the embankment, where all the women bathed, stark naked, alongside the men, without embarrassment. In winter of course, it was harder; and she went only to houses that had running water. The poor woman had ‘washerwoman’s hands’, all red and swollen. On the rare occasions when she caressed him, he could feel the calluses on her palms; it was as if she were applying a cheese grater to his face.
Inside, the stranger, resting his head on some rags and wrapped in a light-brown blanket, was looking towards the window, through which the light was beginning to dissipate, and whenever a gust blew through the broken pane a few snowflakes entered, only to perish. The stranger didn’t look as well as he had the evening before; he had sprouted a stubbly beard, making his cheeks look dirty. He no longer looked anything like Iulia. His face seemed more sunken. Nicu very much liked the question about God and it was a sign of great friendship on his part when he asked it; for it was his latest discovery. In any event, his range of conversation was limited, although the teacher used to say that his tongue could never stop wagging and sometimes clipped his ears or caned his hands for it: ‘You’ve got an itchy tongue!’ he would say, or: ‘You can’t sit still, you’d think you’ve got worms!’ Nicu had indeed had worms, but Dr Margulis had treated him with garlic and celery root and sweetmeats. He wanted to befriend the stranger, because it was obvious from a mile off how helpless he was. He was not expecting to receive an answer to his question about God, and so he went on, in his teacher’s tone of voice: ‘I believe in electricity. But I also believe in God, when I’m in a tight spot. Today I believe.’
‘Today you’re in a tight spot? What day is today?’
Look how the stranger is talking to him and look how he understands what he means, said Nicu to himself. He isn’t stupid, or ill in the head: he’d noticed that all too well yesterday. But Nicu did not feel in his element and so he answered: ‘Today is Saturday and I’m out of sorts.’
‘So am I,’ observed the stranger, drily, still looking at the windowpane, hoping for a ray of sunlight. But the sun wa
s cold and broken.
Nicu would have preferred it if he had asked: ‘Why?’ Then, he would have told him about the wallet he had been seeking in vain all that morning. He felt he could tell the stranger that. And if the man was a Martian, maybe he would know where it was, without having to look for it, and he would know whether there was a lottery ticket in it and whether the numbers were the winning ones, because otherwise there was no point bothering with it.
‘What’s your name?’ asked Nicu. He knew what it was, but the stranger didn’t know he knew.
‘Dan Crețu.’
‘Mine’s Nicu, but at school the teacher calls me Niculae, Stanciu Niculae. Do you know Kretzu the pharmacist, the ginger one? His hair isn’t curly at all. Sometimes he sends me to fetch all kinds of ointments, tablets and powders that cure you. I’m an errand boy,’ said the lad, trying to sound modest, although he was very proud.
‘What are you doing here?’
Nicu didn’t know what to say, and so he saw to the fire.
‘I’m going to the Stork’s Nest to buy a candle. It’s a nice name, isn’t it?’
‘Nicu?’
‘No, the Stork’s Nest! The cantor told me that a long time ago the storks used to build their nests on the roof. It was a shingle roof. I’d be really glad if they came again, I like all birds, even crows, and Jacques, who’s my friend, likes seagulls a lot. We look at them because they fly... I’d like to fly. I’ve even dreamed that I was flying. And Jacques sometimes dreams the same thing, poor thing. Have you ever dreamed you were flying?’
‘I’ve done more than that. I have flown,’ said the man, and Nicu could hardly believe that his suspicion was being confirmed: the man was from the planet Mars and had fallen to Earth. Disturbed, he did not dare ask him anything else.
He vanished for a few minutes and came back with a thick, lighted candle, sheltering the flame with his cupped hand. He gathered some sticks from amongst the rubbish lying around the room and lit them with ease. Then he ran back outside. This time he came back with some water in a chipped enamel cup.
‘I couldn’t find any tea. If you like, I’ll heat it up over the fire. I’ve brought some bread, they were preparing it for the service, because tomorrow’s Sunday. They didn’t want to give me any wine, because they thought I’d drink it, but I’ve never drunk win in my life. Aren’t you hungry? Eat.’
And he emptied the pockets of his coat.
‘Have you ever spoken on the telephone?’
The man nodded, chewing.
‘I have too, three times already, at Universu’. Mr Cazzavillan the director let me. It’s difficult to hear, what with all the crackling and popping, but you’d think the other person was right there, in the horn of the receiver, as small as a doll, except you can’t see him. Some look like their voices, but others you can’t recognize, you’d think they’d got the wrong voice, like it wasn’t tailored to fit them. Would you like us to be brothers?’
Nicu received no answer. He said nothing for a while and then sighed. He took the cow from his pocket and fiddled with its legs.
‘Now she’s called Fira, you know... Look, I came to help you,’ he said, looking from the corner of his eye at the bread that was vanishing into the stranger’s mouth. The stranger was now sitting up, on the edge of the bed. ‘I’ll help you and maybe you can help me, I mean, maybe you’ll be just as kind, sometime. But I’ll help you anyway, for free.’
Nicu looked as if he had swallowed something and it had stuck half way down his gullet.
‘Who sent you?’
The question sounded rather harsh, and the lad pondered for a short moment.
‘My gran said that God sends us and He knows everybody’s path... They wrote about you in Universu’, old man Cercel read it to me. I know how to read too, a little, especially when it’s in capitals. Capitals are the big letters; that’s what we call them at our newspaper. And if you’re a newspaperman, as it says there, I’ll take you to Universu’, because Mr Procopiu needs a man who knows his letters and who can write nicely. Mr Procopiu is a kind of boss; Mr Cazzavillan the director is the only boss bigger than him. He’s been looking for a man ever since the feast of St Demetrios, when three editors left at the same time, and he still hasn’t found anybody. You know how to write, don’t you? Are you really a newspaperman?’
The man had either not heard or did not want to answer. Nicu examined his coloured footwear. Now he could see the lilac stripes against the green ones more clearly. The shoes didn’t look at all solid and they were still damp from the night before. He had slept with his clothes on, like a tramp.
‘Maybe they’ll give you a pair of galoshes at Universu’. The best ones are the St Petersburg brand; all the young people wear them. They’ve got a double sole.’
Nicu took him by the hand, as he used to do with his mother when she didn’t really know what was going on. He picked his bowler hat out of the bucket and wiped it on the sleeve of his coat, wondering where it had come from. As he had told Jacques, he knew for sure that the man was bareheaded. The Margulis family’s cook had told the boys about people who walk in their sleep, when there is a full moon, as if they were wide-awake. They walk along the rooftops and if you call out to them, they fall, but otherwise ‘nothing happens to them.’ Might there have been a full moon last night? He hadn’t noticed. He gave the stranger a critical look. You’ll be embarrassed by him on the street dressed like that, he thought, what with that overly large greatcoat and him looking like he’s just fallen out of the sky. Obviously, he for one would have liked to be in a roofed carriage, with a gleaming equipage, seated next to a well-dressed, cheerful and healthy man, smelling of patchouli, rather than a Martian who smelled of poverty. But there’s no choosing your family. It was just like the lottery: some people win, some lose. Nicu had already adopted him as a member of his not very large family; this man Dan Crețu, who in the light of day looked gentle and ill. But what if, he now thought, what if it really was like that, if he had an unknown brother who had grown up far away, as happened in the family of that vendor from the fish market? When the brothers met, they both sensed it, like an electric current that passed through them both and made them burst into tears. It was as if he had felt the same current, when he saw the stranger for the first time, except that there had been no tears. But if you don’t feel like crying, does it still mean you’re brothers?
5.
They entered Universul and old man Cercel, who had lately been having stabbing pains in his belly, stood up with a groan. While the stranger brushed the snow off himself, the doorman, surprise, surprise, communicated to the boy in a low voice that he at last had the lottery ticket: 98, 38 and 51. In other words, the coming year, as Nicu had advised, the year of his birth, and the year of his wife’s birth. They looked each other in the eyes, with excitement, the same as they always did when they put fate to the test. Old man Cercel, whose face was a little more congested than usual, conducted the two of them to Peppin Mirto. Nicu was unsurprised to discover that Mr Peppin was inclined to help with regard to the stranger; he was a man who filled any gap anytime and entered anywhere it was difficult. On the other hand, he had not understood very well why Mr Costache wanted to help the stranger, but nor did he trouble his head about it. He decided he must have his reasons.
He found Peppin working on a translation. He had just written: Second Part. The Genius of Evil... and was about to dip his nib in the inkwell when the motley group made up of the doorman, Nicu and a strange, mild-looking man, appeared in the doorway. The doorman explained what was what, Mr Mirto put his pen down, pressed a piece of blotting paper to the splendidly handwritten title, and in a booming voice invited Dan to sit down. He was surprised to notice that the man did not remove his bowler hat, which was pulled down rather too far over his ears.
‘Has Mr Neculai Procopiu arrived yet?’ he asked the doorman.
‘Not yet,’ said Nicu and old man Cercel both at the same time. ‘But he should be here any minute now. I’ll t
ell him to come up...’ added the doorman.
‘I’ll tell him too,’ Nicu made a point of saying and then withdrew along with the doorman, but not before giving his adopted brother a wink. It was a habit he had picked up at school from the older boys, who were always finding occasions to encourage each other, just as they were always finding occasions to niggle each other. Nicu they preferred to niggle, but he did not care; he took everything as it came.
Peppin did not know how to tell the stranger that he had forgotten to take his hat off and finally abandoned the subject, so as not to make him feel embarrassed. He sought a subject of conversation suitable for two men who did not know each other and had just said, in his melodious voice: ‘The snow has started coming down heavily! But fair weather has been announced for tomorrow, I think it must be the mildest winter since–’ when he heard, with relief, faint voices in the corridor. It was indeed Neculai Procopiu, who entered wearing a top hat far too elegant for an ordinary working day. Perhaps he will be going from here straight to the opera, thought Peppin, who was always yearning for music.
‘Good day, you must be –’ the editor-in-chief began to say, but then he faltered, his eyes fixed on the hat atop the stranger’s head.
Life Begins On Friday Page 7