As Dumbrauckas said his goodbyes, he left me his desk, and because my father was an old man, he left him his old applewood cane.
‘For you Joseph, I leave my cane as a keepsake,’ said Dumbrauckas to my father.
‘Thank you, sir,’ answered my father, visibly moved. ‘I wonder if we shall ever meet again?’
My father held the cane for a long time after Dumbrauckas left. As he turned it in his hands, he smiled sadly.
Then he raised his eyes and asked us unexpectedly:
‘Do you children know what this cane reminds me of?’
We all looked up.
‘It was long ago,’ my father began in an emotional voice. ‘Long, long ago. Your mother and I were still young, most of you were not yet here on this earth – only Michael had been born. We were afflicted by many great misfortunes that year. Bread was scarce and the fields and pastures were dry. And we worked not just for our own benefit, but also for the lord’s. We had to walk two miles to get to work – all the way to Burbiskis. I drove the oxen to Burbiskis one autumn to plough the fallow land. I couldn’t take much with me: I packed some bread and salt for myself and a few handfuls of old chaff for the oxen. We had nothing else. And I had to work for three days. As I was ploughing I ran out of feed for the oxen. I had no way to get more. There was nowhere for the oxen to graze – it was forbidden. My oxen were exhausted. They were barely dragging their feet. And one more day of ploughing remained! I stopped the oxen for lunch, sat down at the edge of the field and ate the dried bread and salt that I had pulled out of my basket. My oxen watched longingly as I ate. I felt so sorry for them that I had to stop eating. Nothing but crumbs remained in my basket. I fed them to the oxen and looked around: a few feet away I spied several piles of recently raked clover belonging to the lord.
‘And a terrible thought came into my head. Yes, as it might sometimes happen to you young people today. I work for the lord, so why can’t I feed the lord’s oxen some of his own grass?
‘I got up, went over to the pile and took a small handful of clover. I brought this over to the oxen and fed them by hand. The oxen happily devoured it. Watching them made me feel better. But then I suddenly felt someone strike my back, oh so painfully, with a hard object. I staggered and collapsed. My oxen jumped and almost ran off with the plough. Dazed, I raised my eyes: standing on top of me was Dumbrauckas with a cane in his hand. ‘‘You dog! Thief! Thief!’’ yelled Dumbrauckas, who walloped me in the back with his stick.
‘Seeing that I wasn’t moving, he helped me up from the ground with his arm, then he kicked me, knocking me down yet again. As I came around, I opened my eyes and saw my oxen standing nearby, their heads turned to watch me. Half-dead, I staggered home and lay in bed for three weeks.’
My father was silent. We sat in our places, stock-still. No one uttered a word. Only my sister, with tears in her eyes, asked: ‘Father, was this the same Dumbrauckas who lived at our house?’
‘The same one,’ answered father. ‘But you mustn’t be angry with him. During the uprisings the Cossacks beat him so badly that for three months he lay soaking in his own blood…’
‘Do you know, children, which cane he used to beat me?’ asked father, now smiling. ‘This one!’
We all shuddered, our eyes wide. Father raised his hand and showed us the cane, the one Dumbrauckas had left him as a keepsake.
My oldest brother approached father and grabbed the cane from his hands. He turned it again and again, as if considering something in his mind, then he threw it onto the lumber pile, saying with a barely audible voice. ‘Let’s burn it, father!’
‘No, no, children,’ answered father pleasantly. ‘Let this cane remain amongst you. When you look at it, remember that even your parents had once been punished. As you remember, don’t be angry that your mother and I sometimes hit you with a switch. We did it for your own good…. Perhaps our lord beat us for our own good?’
‘Enough, father, enough,’ mother ended the conversation. ‘It might be this very cane that caused your illness. This is not how we teach our children.’
Father smiled sadly, and taking up his book, he settled down to read.
As far as I know, my brothers still have the cane. It remains on the shelf in the granary. And nobody touches it.
April 25, 1906
First published in Jonas Biliunas, Lazda; Ubagas; Sveciai; Brisiaus galas, Vilnius: Lietuvos ukininkas (1906).
Translated by Jura Avizienis from Jonas Biliunas, Liudna pasaka: kurybos rinktine, Vilnius: Baltos lankos (1995).
Jonas Biliunas (1879–1907) was a prose writer, poet and publicist. Over his short life, he remained faithful to his left-wing worldview and explored working class life in his literary works. His creative legacy reveals a solidarity with the oppressed and their tragic fate. In his short stories and short novels he emphasises moral self-determination, guilt and feelings of responsibility.
The Herring
Vincas Kreve
I
It was the middle of Lent, turning to spring. The days were warm and sunny; the snow was melting and the hilltops were losing their snow cover. Rivulets coursed through the valleys, roads and furrowed fields; with a roar they told the story of spring, announcing it was just around the corner.
‘Ladies, do you have any herring, chickens or eggs?’ Kuslius asked, rapping on the window one day.
He was an old Jew with a long, bushy, red beard that went right up to his eyes. His hair was all grey, his beard only partly so, but this half-greyness couldn’t hide the hair colour of his birth. He was shortsighted and couldn’t even see what was under his feet. That’s why he used his cane to feel his way like a blind man; he was especially careful when carrying eggs.
‘Why don’t you get yourself some eyeglasses?’ the people asked him on many occasions.
‘Eyeglasses? Where would I get money for eyeglasses?’ he’d say with a heavy sigh.
The village children must have caused him much suffering. Their favourite prank was to stick something under Kuslius’s feet to trip him. How funny to see him fall to his knees! But Kuslius would anticipate their tricks and was on guard whenever he saw the children playing or the farm hands nearby.
‘Why are you so unkind to an old man?’ he would ask reproachfully, using his cane to push aside the stick or the stone that had been intended to trip him. ‘Would you be happy if I fell and killed myself?’
But he never held a grudge; perhaps his heart had grown accustomed to this kind of ridicule.
Whether it was winter or summer, he dressed always the same, and would walk among the farmsteads carrying his basket and his bag – a veritable store on his shoulders. There wasn’t a farmstead he wouldn’t visit.
Now he was standing at Gerdvilius’s window, listening with his ear pressed against the glass to hear what the women were saying.
‘Do you have boar’s liver?’ teased the shepherd. He was seated on a bench outside the window whilst making a fishing net. But Kuslius, used to hearing such jibes, didn’t take his words to heart. He waited a moment. When he didn’t get a response, he knocked on the window a second time.
‘Do you need soap, needles, matches or herring?’
‘Come in, come in. We’ll see.’ Mrs. Gerdvilius invited him into the cottage after conferring with her daughter-in-law, who was leaning over the cradle nursing her child.
As Kuslius made his way through the yard to the porch, the shepherd dashed over to the oven, pulled out the thickest stick from under it and placed it in the doorway.
‘Remove that stick! Remove that stick!’ Mrs. Gerdvilius scolded. ‘Do you want to get an old man killed? You shameless boy!’
‘He doesn’t matter – he hasn’t been baptised!’ jeered the shepherd and sat down by the window. ‘These pranks are nothing compared to what we used to do to him when I worked in Silakiemis.’
Monica, Gerdvilius’s daughter, a girl of about fifteen, leaned her bundle of flax against the wall and, jumping up quickly – Kuslius
was already walking into the porch – she grabbed the stick and threw it into the fire.
‘You wicked boy! I’ll give you such a beating. Then you’ll know!’ she berated the shepherd, before returning to her place by the flax.
‘You don’t dare. Are you aching to become Kuslius’s daughter-in-law? Is that why you’re standing up for him?’ The shepherd taunted her.
‘Beast! Gloating like a dog with two tails.’
‘Whatever were you doing there in Silakiemis – there will be none of that here,’ Mrs. Gerdvilius scolded him as well. ‘Only scamps make fun of old men. Don’t laugh. You’ll be old yourself one day. It’s a sin against God to make fun of old age. God won’t let you live to see your own golden years.’
‘It’s hardly a sin against God to laugh at a Jew,’ Marcela, the hired servant, chimed in. ‘After all, they tortured our Lord and put him to death.’
And now Kuslius, sighing, walked heavily across the threshold. He seemed exhausted.
‘Blessed be the Lord,’ he said, not taking off his cap.
‘Forever and ever, amen,’ answered only Mrs. Gerdvilius.
Having come inside, Kuslius moved closer to the window. He removed the pack that contained his merchandise from his shoulders and placed it all on the table. He put the egg basket under the bench after checking the spot with his cane. He placed the bucket of herring at his side on the bench, pulling off the ragged cover to reveal the fish.
‘Come, take some herring,’ he invited the women, placing the smallest ones at the top of the bucket. ‘How many do you need? Two? Three?’
Mrs. Gerdvilius stepped away from the stove, smoothed her dress, and went over to the bench. She stuck her hand in the bucket and chose the herring that looked best to her.
‘My, oh my, you’ve taken the very best ones. Who will buy the little ones?’ Kuslius murmured.
‘Come now. They’ll take the little ones, if that’s all there is.’
Mrs. Gerdvilius chose five herring and placed them on the bench.
‘How many eggs do you want for these herring?’ she asked Kuslius.
Kuslius picked up the herring and examined them, turning them, lifting them up and down, weighing them in his hands.
‘How many eggs? Eggs are cheap these days, and you took the choice herring. Look, they’re as plump and juicy as chickens. He showed the herring to Mrs. Gerdvilius.
‘Don’t shove them in my face. I’m not blind. I can see. These herring are as thin as rails.’
‘These are good rails! I never ate better ones in my whole life. Fine. Give me fifteen. Agreed?’
‘Not a chance, you infidel! You expect me to pay that much for these rails! Take your herring. Keep them.’
She picked up the herring from the bench and threw them back in the bucket; then she turned and went back to the stove where she had left her spindle board on a small bench.
‘Well, how much will you give me? Tell me how much.’ Kuslius yelled as he pulled out the very same herring from the bucket and put them back on the bench.
Mrs. Gerdvilius wiped her hands on her apron and sat down at her spinning wheel.
‘If you’ll take eight,’ she offered to Kuslius, ‘then I’ll do it.’
‘Eight eggs for these five herring?’ Kuslius was astounded. ‘Would my worst enemy have it so good! I paid more for them myself. How about fourteen?’
‘No. Take nine if you want. Not a penny more.’
Bringing her spindle board upright, she pulled it close to her, lubricated it with a bit of spit on her hands and began spinning as if she had forgotten the herring.
‘How about a baker’s dozen?’ Kuslius asked. ‘That’s the best I can do. On my life, that’s the best,’ Kuslius swore, but he did not put the herring back into the bucket.
‘Ten is my last offer. Not a single egg more.’
‘If only the herring were quality herring,’ said her daughter-in-law, coming to her defence. She had finished nursing her baby and swaddled him. Walking to her spinning wheel, she glanced at the herring on the bench. ‘Tiny, skimpy, like roaches.’
‘On my life, I swear that they cost me more than what you’re offering.’
Kuslius put the herring back in the bucket, threw his portable store over his shoulders, attached the basket with eggs to the corner of the bag and, sighing heavily, he made his way towards the door.
‘How about twelve?’ he asked, stopping in the doorway.
‘Ten, I said. No more. Don’t waste my time haggling. I’m not a child.’
‘I can’t do it. God knows, I can’t.’
‘If you can’t do it, then don’t,’ the daughter-in-law blurted.
Out in the yard Kuslius went over to the window and asked one last time:
‘Missus, how about eleven?’
‘And still he bothers me. I said ten.’
Kuslius stood thinking for a moment: should he go home or go back? But how could he not go back – there would be profit either way: five or six cents, maybe even ten.
Kuslius went back to the cottage, returned his wares to the same spot and unpacked the herring.
‘All right, bring me your eggs and take the herring,’ he shouted, placing them on the bench.
Mrs. Gerdvilius, resting the spindle board against the wall, took a bowl for the herring down from the shelf.
‘Which herring are you giving me? Do you take me for a fool? I will not take such herring!’ Mrs. Gerdvilius was angry, sorting through the herring on the bench. These much smaller ones had been chosen by Kuslius.
‘Which herring do you want?’ Kuslius shouted. ‘This is best herring I’ve seen in my life.’
‘Take them, take them, I don’t need herring like that.’ She pushed them back into his hands. ‘Just look! He gave me the worst ones!’
‘For ten eggs you want the finest herring,’ Kuslius grumbled and switched two of the herring for better ones. ‘These are better ones. Take them and bring me my eggs.’
Mrs. Gerdvilius sat by her spinning wheel, refusing to look at the herring.
‘I don’t want them. If you can’t give me good ones, keep them all.’
The Jew was looking through the herring in the bucket again. Selecting them, smelling them, he replaced two more.
‘Will you take these, Missus? I don’t have time. Why are you wasting my time?’ Angry, the Jew yelled. ‘Here, take the ones you picked out last time.’
Mrs. Gerdvilius noticed that he had now selected the best ones for her.
‘Marcela, take the herring from him,’ she ordered her servant as she carried her bowl to the porch to the cupboard where the eggs were kept.
Marcela, without getting up from her spinning, reached for a lid used to cover up pots of hot stew and protect them from flies and placed the herring on it.
When Mrs. Gerdvilius brought the eggs, Kuslius looked each one over, lifting them up to the sun, shaking them and placing them next to his ear.
‘What kind of eggs did you give me?’ This time it was Kuslius’s turn to be demanding. ‘Who has ever seen such eggs? I wouldn’t even get two cents for them.’
‘If you don’t like them, don’t take them. I’ll sell them in Merkine.’ Mrs. Gerdvilius retorted. ‘Marcela, give him back his herring.’
‘My, oh my. Why so hasty?’ Kuslius’s voice was now softer and more obliging; he placed the eggs in his basket. ‘Just give me some fried potato. I haven’t had a thing to eat today.’
‘Monica, give him some potato.’ Mrs. Gerdvilius turned to her daughter.
Monica brought a handful of potatoes and placed them on the table. Kuslius peeled them and ate two, then a third. The rest he put into his pockets.
While the Jew was peeling and eating the potatoes, Marcela pulled out of his bucket one, two, then three herring – so slyly that nobody seemed to notice when she pulled them out and hid them behind the spindle board. But the shepherd did. As she was hiding the herring he winked at her, roaring with laughter.
‘What are you
splitting your sides about?’ Monica looked at him. ‘He’s laughing so hard he’s howling.’
‘He’s laughing at an old man. He’s laughing at the old man’s hardship,’ Kuslius lamented as he devoured his potato. ‘It’s cruel to laugh at someone’s suffering.’
Marcela glanced at the shepherd and also had a laugh. Realising that he had seen everything, she winked at him to ask him to be quiet.
Kuslius put the remaining potatoes in his pocket and explained: ‘I’m bringing them home to my wife. She’s very sick.’ He then tied up his sack, threw his bag over his shoulders and sighed deeply. ‘Missus, do you have a chicken to sell me? A chicken or a rooster?’
‘No. Nobody’s selling chickens these days.’
‘My wife is sick; she needs a chicken, but there is no chicken.’ Kuslius sought the women’s sympathy. He picked up his bags and went towards the door. The old man sighed, for his load was heavy; he was barely dragging his feet along, and yet he had to wade through the slippery muck. He was wet, muddy up to his knees. And back at home was an old lady who was sick, alone and without anyone to help her.
‘Oh, if only my enemies had a life as easy as mine,’ Kuslius exhaled noisily as he trudged along.
As soon as he crossed the threshold, the shepherd and Marcela burst out laughing.
‘You curs, what prank did you play on him?’ Mrs. Gerdvilius asked. ‘Did you steal his entire day’s wages? With a sick wife. Don’t you fear God?’
‘The devil take him!’ Trying hard not to laugh, Marcela justified herself. ‘It’s not the first time they’ve cheated one of us.’
‘It’s their job. We’ll see what the priest says when you go to confess.’
Marcela fell dead silent at the thought of the priest. It occurred to her that perhaps Kuslius and his family might actually be starving. She remembered how hungrily he had devoured the fried potato.
‘You’ll be laughing, the both of you, when you meet St. Peter with herring in your mouth, begging Kuslius to take them back from you,’ Monica threatened.
The Dedalus Book of Lithuianian Literature Page 3