“Sleep in the barn tonight, Wikcia.”
And no dog would bark at you, the barn door wouldn’t creak, and the ladder to the hayloft would already be in place. And the hay had just been brought from the fields, so it was like the girl had made you a bed in the meadow, and she was bursting with sunlight like a meadow warmed in the sun. And her blood was buzzing inside her so loud it was like you could hear grasshoppers when you laid your head on that meadow.
Or you only had to go down to the river at noon when the girls were taking their bath. They mostly went in naked, only the odd few would keep their blouses on. The river water was so clean it sweetened their bodies, so what did they have to be embarrassed about. The horses were always watered down there and they never once got the mange. The geese and ducks would go down to the water all on their own, they didn’t need to be driven. Fish swam about almost on the surface. And the bottom glistened from all the different pebbles. You could sit on the bank and gaze at the river to your heart’s content, think about how it flowed just like your own life. It was clean as clean can be.
And all the screaming and squealing! You could hear from way off where the girls were bathing. The river only came up to their belly buttons. Not many of them could swim. So they were more splashing about than bathing. They’d splash and stumble and push each other over, and run upstream and downstream, taking the river in their arms, or lie on their backs and daydream and let it carry them. They wouldn’t even notice me standing on the bank, behind a willow tree or a bush, staring at their breasts and bellies and thighs and backsides swirling around in the water. Till one of them would snap out of it and shout:
“Hide, girls! Szymek’s behind that tree!”
“The dirty so-and-so! Has he no shame!”
“The priest’ll never forgive you for this!”
“Like he doesn’t know what girls look like! They look like this – stare all you want!”
“Come on, Szymek, get lost now.”
“Sure, I can go away, but I’m taking Zosia’s things. Come behind the bush, Zosia, I’ll let you have them.”
“Give them back, Szymek! If I tell my mother she’ll have your guts for garters! I’ll never look at you again. And for sure I’ll never dance with you again! Come on, Szymuś, give them back. At least give me my skirt, or I’ll cry.”
“Go to him, Zośka, if he only sees one of us it won’t be such a big sin.”
And Zosia pouts and fumes, but she comes to me. And once she comes behind the bush she’ll go farther.
“Come over here, Zosia, under this alder, and I’ll give you back your clothes. A little bit farther and I’ll give them back to you. Almost there. I’ll give you them over there. In that patch of sunlight. In that shade. Don’t be embarrassed, there’s no need to feel embarrassed in front of me, and the girls are out of sight. You can hear them in the river.”
And Zosia would come closer and closer.
In the winter I’d go where they were plucking feathers and husking beans. They’d all gather, the girls and young men and old folks. The evenings were long, there was nothing else to do, and you could at least hear your fill of ghosts and devils and witches, because back in the day there were all kinds of them in the village, they lived alongside the people and the livestock. Then when it got dark it’d be time to head off back home. And it was common knowledge ghosts and devils and witches only ever went around at night, and that their favorite thing was to go after young women. The ones that lived close by, it wasn’t such a problem for them. The farmer or his wife would come out in front of the house with a lantern and wait till they heard their neighbor’s door creak. But the girls who lived farther off needed to be walked home. And I’d usually choose the one that was most afraid or lived the farthest away. Actually I never had to choose. They knew me, that I’d walk to the ends of the earth in the darkest night, because I didn’t believe in any ghosts or devils or witches, though I liked hearing about how other people had seen them. So either the girl would come up to me herself:
“Say, Szymek, will you walk me back? I won’t be scared if you’re with me.”
Or the farmer’s wife would say:
“Szymek, take Magda back, she lives way over near the woods and she’s frightened to go on her own.”
And since nothing brings people closer together than fear or a long journey, it often happened that the girl would cling to me the moment we set off, squeezing against me, leaning her head on my shoulder, and me with my arm around her. The snow would be creaking underfoot. The road was quiet and deserted, not a living soul to be seen, and after a few steps she’d let herself be kissed. Also, there were more stars in the sky than pears on a pear tree, so we’d stop and look up at the stars. Which one is yours? Because that one there is mine. How do you like that, they’re right next to each other. Then we’d kiss again, like the two stars. And we’d follow the stars all the way to her house. And if her old folks were sound asleep, we’d end up under her quilt.
Though I preferred summer to winter. In the summertime the world is wide open, orchards, meadows, fields, woods, haystacks, sheaves, bushes. You didn’t have to have a house, all you needed was the sky over your head. In the summer the girls’ blood was hotter from being warmed up out in the fields. In the summer you didn’t need to chase around after them, they fell into your arms by themselves. There’d be times you were mowing barley in your own field, and she’d be cutting wheat with a sickle in the next field, and all you had to do was cross from your barley to her wheat.
“Let me give you a hand, Hania.”
Or she’d start it herself:
“Could you help me out, Szymuś? I’ve still got so much to do.”
And in a wheat field you don’t have to worry about talking her into anything. Wheat is like a turned-down bed. The wheat’s hot, the sun’s shining above it. The girl would lie down and you’d take hold of her among the spikes and seeds like you were taking bread from an oven with your bare hands.
It must’ve been the devil tempted me to sow wheat on the other side of the road. I was going to plant potatoes, but Antek Kwiecień came to lend me a spade and we got to talking, what are you sowing, what are you planting, and how it was a waste of that land across the road to plant potatoes. Potatoes you can plant any old where. Over there, that’s the perfect place for wheat. It’s flat as can be, it’ll be no work at all, and this is going to be a good year for wheat. You can tell, the storks aren’t even thinking about flying away yet. Sow wheat. If it grows well you’d have to plant twice as many potatoes to equal it. And I won’t deny it, it did grow well. The stalks were as tall as me, every spike as thick as my finger, and the grains were fat and oily. Everyone that came past would say, that’s some fine wheat you got there, you’ll have grain like gold from that. It was a pleasure to mow. Even the weather helped out, like it was trying to live up to the wheat. It only rained once, and even that was nothing to speak of. I’d already started figuring out how many sacks I’d need once I threshed it, how much I’d leave for myself and how much I’d sell. Antek Kwiecień deserved a drink. I just had to finish bringing it in.
I spent all Saturday bringing in the sheaves, till late at night, and I counted on finishing Monday. The horse could rest up on Sunday, eat its fill of oats, then on Monday he’d work like a machine. And I’d be fresher after Sunday as well.
On Sunday there happened to be a church fair because it was the Feast of the Assumption. I’ve always liked fairs ever since I was a kid, so I went. But fairs aren’t what they used to be. Two or three wagons, other than that it was all cars and motorcycles. More outsiders than locals. There was no knowing where they’d all come from or why. Pretzels with no taste, nothing but water and baking powder and flour; back then you could have any kind you wanted. And there wasn’t half the stuff for sale there used to be. Back then there’d be two or three rows of stalls around the church wall, and every one loaded with things, especially all kinds of candies. Even the grown-ups would be watering at the mo
uth. And you could buy whatever your heart desired. Every animal that ever lived under the sun. Every saint there ever was. Our Ladies, big ones, small ones, with veils or wreaths on their head, crowned, with an Infant Jesus and without. Lord Jesuses on the cross and fallen under the cross, on Golgotha, with the lamb, risen from the dead. Armfuls of rosaries, beads, all sorts of trinkets. And on every stall, piles of mouth organs, swords, trumpets, pipes, whistles, everything a child could wish for. There was bunion cream, shoe polish, whetstones. You could listen to adventures from wartime, from plagues, from the wide world. People played and sang songs about bandits and rebels and bad children who threw their parents out of the house, and about evil stepmothers. There were people prophesying what would happen in a year’s time, in ten years and a hundred, and a good few things even came true. You could play black-and-white, hoops, dice, fishing, or try the shooting gallery. You could have a tooth pulled on the spot if you had the toothache. Or get your boots patched. Or have your picture taken in an airplane, on a camel, in a general’s uniform, or with your girl in a cutout heart.
But today? Today it’s all about conning people out of their money. And people are daft as monkeys, they’ll let themselves get taken in by any old thing. They buy and buy, whatever’s put in front of them, you can barely push through to see what’s at the stalls. Though even if I wanted to buy something, who would I buy it for?
The only thing I bought was an Our Lady in a blue dress. Years ago I’d broken one like that of mother’s. She’d gotten it on a pilgrimage way back when she was still single. I’d been swatting flies, the house was so full of them they wouldn’t let you sit in peace, and they were biting especially badly, the way they do before a storm. Mother was getting dinner ready and the Our Lady was up on this little shelf. One of the flies landed on it, and I swatted at it, but I missed the fly and the Our Lady came crashing down onto the floor. I froze, and mother burst out:
“Oh my Lord, he’s broken it!” And she looked at me as if I’d done the worst thing in the world. Then she took a clean white cloth from the chest and gathered all the broken pieces in it. She might even have been crying, though I couldn’t see because she was bent over.
“I’ll buy you another one,” I said after a bit.
“You won’t buy one like this,” she answered sadly. “I always prayed to her about you. She knew everything.”
Afterwards I looked around at different fairs, but I never did find one just like it. Then the war came. After the war I went less and less to the fairs. And the fairs seemed more and more timid somehow, it was hard enough to get an Our Lady at all, let alone one like the broken one. But even after mother died I carried on looking, because the thing kept gnawing at me.
Then I went to the shooting gallery to see if I still had a good eye. Ever since I was a boy I used to like to go shooting at the fair. Turned out I hadn’t lost it. The first five shots were spot on, then the second five too. I almost didn’t even have to take aim, just bang bang bang, and hand over the flowers, because you shot at tissue-paper flowers, or rather, at the string they hung by. There was a target as well, that had a black ring like a saucer in the middle, but any idiot could hit that and you didn’t get a prize. But with the flowers, every one you shot down was yours. All the people gathered around the gallery, kids, young men, girls, adults – they were all gobstruck. And the shooting gallery guy tried to take the gun away from me.
“Come on there, mister, let the young folks try their luck.”
But just out of spite I bought five more shots. Again every one was a hit. I gave the flowers to Irka Kwiatkowska, because of all the young girls in the village I thought she was the prettiest.
“Here, Irka, take this. That young fellow of yours isn’t going to hit anything for you. That’s young men these days for you.” Irka jumped up and down she was so pleased, and she gave me a kiss on the cheek, because her and that Zbyszek of hers had been watching me shoot.
Toward the end I bought two strings of pretzels, because that afternoon I was supposed to go watch television at Stach Sobieraj’s, and his Darek called me uncle and whenever I’d go there he’d always badger me to tell about the resistance, even if it was the same stories over and over. Sometimes I’d say to him:
“Darek, I really don’t remember any more.”
“Then tell what you remember.”
Or:
“I already told you that story.”
“Then tell it again.” And he’d sit there openmouthed. It was mostly whether I’d killed anyone, and what that was like. So I had to at least take him some pretzels.
For lunch I made cabbage soup and served it with bacon. It was good. We had two helpings each, the soup in a bowl and the bacon and bread on a plate. I could tell Michał liked it too.
“You like it?” I asked him. As usual, he didn’t answer. I washed the dishes. Saw to the animals. Then I started to get ready for the television.
But I go outside and I see the farmers are starting to drive out to the fields. There’s Stach Partyka, Barański, Socha. More and more of them.
“What are you doing standing there?” says Heniek Maszczyk. “Put your work clothes on and get out into the fields. Can’t you see, there are storm clouds coming, it’s gonna rain. We can at least get a wagonload or two in.”
I look at the sky and I think, what’s he talking about, rain? The sun’s bright as anything, sky’s blue as a cornflower. There’s a little dark spot over in the west, but that can mean good weather. Or it’ll pass us by.
“What do you mean, rain,” I say. “Look at the sky.”
“Never mind the sky, they said on the radio. Gee up!” And off he went.
I stood there and thought, it’d be a pity if the crop got rained on. The wheat had come up like never before. And here you couldn’t tell if it’d just be a few drops or whether the rain would set in. If it did set in it could rain and rain. And I’d be standing there staring at the sky, looking out the window, and worrying about not having brought the wheat in. For a moment I’d think it was brightening up a bit over there. But then Maszczyk’s rooster would crow and that would mean the rain would keep up. When the chickens ruffled their feathers you could tell the rain wouldn’t stop. And if the cat stayed over in the stove corner, it would all go to hell in a handcart. And my wheat would get so wet it’d make your heart ache.
On top of everything else, recently I’d had a dream about mother. She was kneading dough to make bread, but she had this kneading-trough that was half the size of the entire room, so there was no space for anyone and we were all standing around the walls. Mother was half the age she was when she died. She was in her nightshirt, barefoot, she was so hot the sweat was pouring off her, and she knelt at that trough and kept pushing her hands up to the elbows in the dough. But for some reason the dough wouldn’t knead properly. She kneaded and kneaded, but the water and the flour were still separate.
“Maybe we should all knead together?” I said. “Then it would go quicker.”
“But it’s my punishment,” said mother.
Then father spoke:
“That’s how it is in the next world. Whatever you did down here, you do there as well. I have to go water the horse.” And he went out. Someone was standing by the window with his back to the room, and everyone thought it was Michał, though no one could see his face. We couldn’t tell if he was old or young. He was wearing a brand-new suit and patent leather shoes, and a ratty old hat father used to put on when he was threshing so the chaff wouldn’t get in his hair. And it was only the hat that made it look like Michał. But no one had the courage to ask, is that you, Michał? And he didn’t seem to know either that he was with us, he just kept staring out the window. Then finally mother spoke again:
“Take the hat off, son. Don’t hurt your mother’s heart. See, the bread’s baking.”
Then Antek said in a soft voice:
“Ask him if he likes biscuit, mother. Do you, Michał?” All of a sudden a baby wailed in its cradle. Wher
e had the cradle come from? There hadn’t been any cradle in the room. Mother stood from the kneading-trough and took the baby out of the cradle, and it was like it was Michał when he was tiny, though the figure by the window was still standing there and if it had been Michał he might have turned his head at his own crying. You know your own crying even from long, long ago.
“Oh, the poor little thing’s peed itself,” said mother, and she took a firm breast like a young girl’s from her blouse and put it in the baby’s mouth.
Right then father came back in and said:
“So, it’s Christmas Eve. We’ll need to bring the bread down from the attic. You go get it, Szymek.”
I harnessed the horse and it was, gee up!
With the first wagonload I didn’t even wait that long to get out onto the road from the field. One car came by, a second, a third, then again one, two, three, then there was a longer gap with the next cars quite a ways away. I flicked the whip and we made it up onto the blacktop. True, they honked like mad dogs because I’d gotten in their way, but you can kiss my ass, use your damn brakes, the road is for horses and wagons just the same.
Things didn’t go so well with the second load. The afternoon was getting on, there were more and more cars and the gaps between them were shorter and shorter, and here I had a wagon loaded up with sheaves. With just the one horse it was no easy matter getting out quickly from the field onto the road. The road is higher than the field, and you have to make a sharp left turn. I got down off the wagon, took the horse by the bridle and moved him forward. It was like walking in some deep place. I’d take one step, then it would be, whoa! And the cars would be zooming past, honking their horns and flashing their lights. The horse strained, he was trying to move forward but the wagon pulled him back because the rear wheels were still down in the field. I was holding him back then pulling him forward, I was bathed in sweat. The horse was foaming at the mouth. But in the end we made it across. Though if the road had been clear, in the time I waited I’d have been able to take a whole other load.
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