The Motion Demon

by Grabinski, Stefan

  Rastawiecki, wearied by travel, hung his head on his chest. Sinking between the plush cushions, he fell asleep. Shortly, in the quiet of the compartment, one could hear his even, calm breathing. Silence prevailed….

  Godziemba was not asleep. Stimulated erotically, burning like iron in a fire, he merely closed his eyelids in pretence. Hot currents of strongly pulsating blood coursed through his body; a delicious lethargy unravelled the elasticity of his limbs, lust’s lassitude took control of his mind.

  He delicately placed his hand on Nuna’s leg and felt her firm flesh with his fingers. A sweet giddiness misted his eyes. He moved his hand higher, imagining the silky touch of her body….

  Suddenly her hips undulated with a shiver of pleasure; she stretched out her hand and plunged it into his hair. The silent caress lasted but a moment….

  He raised his head and met the moist glance of her passionate eyes. With her finger she indicated the second half of the compartment, even darker than where they were. He understood. He got up, slid past the sleeping engineer, and, tiptoeing, went to the other half of the compartment. Here, covered by dense obscurity and a partition that reached his chest, he sat down in excited anticipation.

  But the rustling that had occurred, despite all caution, woke up Rastawiecki. He rubbed his eyes and glanced around. Nuna, nestling down momentarily in the corner of the compartment, pretended to be dozing. The place opposite him was empty.

  The engineer yawned slowly and straightened up.

  ‘Quiet, Mieciek,’ she reprimanded him with a sleepy pout. ‘It’s late.’

  ‘Sorry. Where is that—satyr?’

  ‘What satyr?’

  ‘I dreamt of a satyr who had the face of that gentleman who was sitting opposite us.’

  ‘He probably got off at some station. Now you have the space to yourself. Get comfortable and go to sleep. I’m tired.’

  ‘Good advice.’

  He yawned again, stretched himself out on the oilcloth cushions, and placed an overcoat under his head.

  ‘Good night, Nuna.’

  ‘Good night.’

  Silence fell.

  With bated breath, Godziemba had been crouching behind the partition during this brief scene, waiting for the dangerous moment to pass. From his dark corner, he saw only the engineer’s empty, still boots projecting beyond the edge of the bench, and, on the opposite seat, Nuna’s grey silhouette. Mrs Rastawiecki remained in the same position as her husband had found her after his awakening. But her open eyes glowed in the semi-darkness hungrily, wildly, provocatively. Thus passed fifteen minutes of travelling.

  Suddenly, against the background of the rattling of the coach, sharp snoring sounds came from the engineer’s open mouth. Rastawiecki was asleep for good. Then, nimble like a cat, his wife got off the cushions and found herself in Godziemba’s arms. With a silent but powerful kiss they connected their craving lips and became entangled in a long, hungry embrace. Her young, robust breasts pressed burningly against him, and she gave him the fragrant conch of her body….

  Godziemba took her. He took her like a flame in the swelter of a conflagration that destroys and consumes and burns; he took her like a gale in unbridled, unrestrained frenzy, a savage wind of the steppe. Dormant lust exploded with a red cry and tore at the bit. Pleasure, bridled at first by fear and the affectation of prudence, finally broke out triumphantly in a rich scarlet wave.

  Nuna writhed in passion; she bucked with spasms of boundless love and pain. Her body, bathed in mountain streams, swarthy from the winds of mountain pastures, smelled of herbs thick, raw, and giddy. Her young vaulted hips, soft at the buttocks, were opening up like private tufts of a rose, and they drank and sucked in love tribute. Freed from binding clips, her flaxen hair fell smoothly over her shoulders and enclosed him. Sobs shook her chest, her parched lips threw out some words and entreaties….

  Suddenly Godziemba felt a tangible pain at the back of his head, and almost simultaneously he heard Nuna’s distressed cry. Half-conscious, he turned around and at the same time received a strong blow on his cheek. Blood rushed to his head, fury twisted his lips. Like lightning he countered the next intended punch as his fist smashed his opponent between the eyes. Rastawiecki reeled, but did not fall down. A fierce fight commenced in the semi-darkness.

  The engineer was a tall, strong man, yet the frenzy of victory immediately tilted towards Godziemba. In this individual, by all appearances slender and weak, some feverish, pronounced strength had been awakened. An evil, demonic strength raised his frail arms, inflicted blows, neutralized the attack. Wild, blood-shot eyes predatorily watched the enemy’s movements, they read his thoughts, anticipated his intentions.

  The two men struggled in the quiet of a night disrupted by the rumble of the train, the noise of their feet, or the quick breathing of overworked lungs. They struggled in silence like two boars fighting over a female, who was cuddled in the niche of the compartment.

  Because of the tight confines, the fight was restricted to an extremely narrow area between the seats, moving from one part of the compartment to the other. Gradually the opponents tired each other out. Big drops of sweat flowed down from exhausted foreheads; hands, weak from punching, were lifted up ever more heavily. Already Godziemba had stumbled onto the cushions from a well-measured push; but in the next second he was up. Gathering his remaining strength, he used his knee to thrust away his opponent; then with enraged momentum he threw him to the opposite corner of the compartment. The engineer staggered like a drunk, the weight of his body broke open the door. Before he got a chance to stand up, Godziemba was shoving him towards the platform. Here was played out the final short and relentless act of the battle.

  The engineer defended himself weakly, parrying with difficulty his opponent’s frenzied fury. Blood was running down his forehead, lips, nose; it was pouring over his eyes.

  Suddenly Godziemba rammed into him with the full weight of his body. Rastawiecki lost his balance, reeled, and fell under the wheels of the train. His hoarse scream drowned out the groan of the rails and the rumble of the coaches….

  The victor breathed freely. He drew the cool night air in to his exhausted chest, rubbed the sweat from his forehead, and straightened his crumpled clothes. The draught of the rushing train streamed through his hair and cooled his hot blood. He took out his cigarette case and lit up a smoke. He felt somehow refreshed, happy.

  He calmly opened the door that had slammed shut during the fight, and with a sure step returned to the compartment. As he entered, warm, serpentine arms embraced him. In her eyes glowed the question:

  ‘Where is he? Where is my husband?’

  ‘He will never return,’ he answered indifferently.

  She cuddled against him.

  ‘You will protect me from the world. My beloved!’

  He embraced her strongly.

  ‘I don’t know what is happening to me,’ she whispered, leaning against his chest. ‘I feel such a sweet giddiness in my head. We’ve committed a great sin, but I’m not afraid beside you, my strength. Poor Mieciek!... You know it’s terrible, but I’m not sorry for him. Why, that’s horrible! He’s my husband!’

  She drew back suddenly, but looking into his eyes, intoxicated with the fire of love, she forgot everything. They started to devise plans for the future. Godziemba was a rich man and of independent means—no occupation tied him down, he could leave the country at any time and take up residence anywhere in the world. So, they will get off at the nearest station, where the rail lines cross, and go south. The connection will be excellent—the express to Trieste departs at daybreak. He’ll buy the tickets immediately, and in twelve hours they’ll reach the port. From there, a ship will take them to a land of oranges where a May sun sweetens trees, where the ocean’s deep-blue chest washes golden sand, and a pagan god’s forest garlands temples with laurel.

  He spoke in a calm voice, sure of his manly aims, indifferent towards the judgment of people. Brimming with energy, ready to contend wi
th the world, he lifted her collapsing figure.

  Nuna, who had been listening intently to the sound of his words, appeared to be dreaming some strange, singular fairy tale, some golden, wonderful story….

  The engine’s loud whistle announced the station. Godziemba trembled.

  ‘It’s time. Let’s get our things together.’

  She got up and took down her travel coat from the overhanging net. He helped her dress.

  Streaks of the station’s lamplights fell through their window. A protracted shudder once again shook Godziemba.

  The train stopped. They left the compartment and descended to the station platform. They were swept up and absorbed by the multitude, by the tumult of voices and lights.

  Suddenly, Nuna, leaning on his arm, weighed heavily on him like fate. In the twinkling of an eye, somewhere from the corner of his soul, dread crept in, an insane dread, and it made his hair stand on end. A feverishly drawn mouth cried out the danger. Horrible, base fear bared its sharp claws.

  He was just a murderer and a despicable coward.

  In the midst of the greatest throng, he freed his arm from Nuna’s embrace, stepped away from her without being noticed, and made his way through some dark corridor to the outside of the station. A maddened flight ensued along the back-streets of an unknown city….

  SIGNALS

  AT THE DEPOT STATION, in an old postal car taken out of service long ago, several off-duty railwaymen were gathered for their usual chat: three train conductors, the old ticket collector, Trzpien, and the assistant stationmaster, Haszczyc.

  Because the October night was rather chilly, they had lit a fire in a little iron stove whose pipe exited out of an opening in the roof. The group was indebted for this happy idea to the inventiveness of the conductor, Swita, who had personally brought over the rust-corroded heater, discarded from some waiting room, to adapt it so splendidly to the changed circumstances. Four wooden benches, their oilcloth covering torn, and a three-legged garden table, wide like a record turntable, completed the interior furnishings. A lantern, hanging on a hook above the heads of those who sat below, spread out along their faces a hazy, semi-obscure light.

  So looked the ‘train casino’ of the Przelecz station officials, an improvised refuge for homeless bachelors, a quiet, secluded stop for off-duty conductors. Here, in their spare moments, zapped of energy by their riding patrons, the old, grey ‘train wolves’ converged to relax after the executed tour, and chat with professional comrades. Here, in the fumes of conductors’ pipes, the tobacco smoke, the cigarettes, and cuds of chewing tobacco, wandered the echoes of tales, thousands of adventures and anecdotes: here spun out the yarn of a railwayman’s fate.

  And today the noisy meeting was also animated, the group exceptionally well-suited, just the cream of the station. A moment ago Trzpien had related an interesting episode from his own life and had managed to rivet the attention of his audience to such a degree that they forgot to feed their dying-out pipes, and they now held them in their teeth already cold and extinguished like cooled-down volcano craters.

  Silence filled the car. Through the window, damp from the drizzle outside, one could see the wet roofs of train cars, shiny like steel armour under the light of reflectors. From time to time the lantern of a trackwalker flashed by, or the blue signal of a switching engine; from time to time the green reflection of the switch signal ploughed through the darkness, or the penetrating call of a trolley was heard. From afar, beyond the black entrenchment of slumbering cars, came the muffled buzz of the main station.

  Through the gap between the cars, a portion of track was visible: several parallel strips of rail. On one of them an empty train slowly pulled in; its pistons, tired by a full day’s race, operated sluggishly, transforming their motion to the rotations of the wheels.

  At a certain moment the locomotive stopped. Under the chest of the machine whirls of vapours emerged, enfolding the rotund framework. The lantern lights at the front of the colossus began to bend in rainbow-coloured aureoles and golden rings, and became enveloped with a cloud of steam. Then came an optical illusion: the locomotive and, with it, the cars, rose above the layers of steam and remained suspended in the air. After several seconds the train returned to the rails, emitting from its organism the last puffs, to plunge itself into the reverie of a nightly repose.

  ‘A beautiful illusion,’ remarked Swita, who had been looking for a long time through the window pane. ‘Did all of you see that apparent levitation?’

  ‘Certainly,’ confirmed several voices.

  ‘It reminded me of a rail legend I heard years ago.’

  ‘Tell us about it, Swita!’ exhorted Haszczyc.

  ‘Yes, go on!’

  ‘Of course—the story isn’t long; one can sum it up in a couple of words. There circulates among railwaymen a tale of a train that disappeared.’

  ‘What do you mean “disappeared”? Did it evaporate or what?’

  ‘Well, no. It disappeared—that doesn’t mean that it stopped existing! It disappeared—that means its outward appearance is not to be seen by the human eye. In reality, it exists somewhere. Somewhere it dwells, though it’s not known where. This phenomenon was supposed to have been created by a certain stationmaster, some real character and maybe even a sorcerer. This trick was performed by a series of specially arranged signals that followed each other. The occurrence caught him off guard, as he later maintained. He had been playing around with the signals, which he had arranged in the most varied ways, changing their progression and quality; until one time, after letting out seven of such signs, the train driving up to his station suddenly, at full speed, rose parallel to the track, wavered a few times in the air, and then, tipping at an angle, vanished. Since that time no one has seen either the train or the people who were riding in it. They say that the train will appear again when someone gives the same signals but in the reverse order. Unfortunately the stationmaster went insane shortly thereafter, and all attempts to extract the truth from him proved abortive. The madman took the key to the secret with him when he died. Most probably someone will hit upon the right signs by accident and draw out the train from the fourth dimension to the earth.’

  ‘A real fuss,’ remarked Zdanski, a train conductor. ‘And when did this wonderful event occur? Does the legend fix a date for it?’

  ‘Some hundred years ago.’

  ‘Well, well. A pretty long time! In that case the passengers inside the train would be, at the present moment, older by an entire century. Please try and imagine what a spectacle it would be if today or tomorrow some lucky person were able to uncover the apocalyptic signals and remove the seven magical charms. From neither here nor there the missing train suddenly falls from the sky, suitably rested after a hundred-year hoisting, and throngs pour out stooping under the burden of a century of existence!’

  ‘You forget that in the fourth dimension people apparently do not need to eat or drink, and they don’t age.’

  ‘That’s right,’ declared Haszczyc, ‘that’s absolutely right. A beautiful legend, my friend, very beautiful.’

  Remembering something, he became silent. After a moment, referring to what Swita had related, he said thoughtfully:

  ‘Signals, signals…. I’ve something to say about them—only it’s not a legend, but a true story.’

  ‘We’re listening! Please, go ahead!’ echoed back a chorus of railwaymen.

  Haszczyc rested an elbow against the table top, filled his pipe, and, expelling a couple of milky spirals, began his story:

  One evening, around seven o’clock, an alarm went out to the Dabrowa station with the signal ‘cars unattached’: the hammer of the bell gave off four strokes by four strokes spaced apart by three seconds. Before Stationmaster Pomian could figure out from where the signal originated, a new signal flowed from the region; three strikes alternating with two, repeated four times, could be heard. The official understood; they meant ‘stop all trains’. Apparently the danger had increased.

&n
bsp; Moving along the track slope and in the direction of a strong westerly wind, the detached cars were running towards the passenger train leaving the station at that moment.

  It was necessary to stop the passenger train and back it up several kilometres and somehow cover the suspected part of the region.

  The energetic young official gave the suitable orders. The passenger train was successfully turned back from its course and at the same time an engine was sent out with people whose job was to stop the racing separated cars. The locomotive moved carefully in the direction of danger, lighting up the way with three huge reflectors. Before it, at a distance of 700 metres, went two trackwalkers with lighted torches, examining the line attentively.

  But to the amazement of the entire group, the runaway cars were not met with along the way, and, after a two-hour inspection to the end of the ride, the engine turned back to the nearest station at Glaszow. There, the stationmaster received the expedition with great surprise. Nobody knew anything about any signals, the region was absolutely clear, and no danger threatened from this side. The officials, worn-out by tracking, got on the engine and returned to Dabrowa near eleven at night.

  Here, meanwhile, the unease had increased. Ten minutes before the engine’s return, the bell sounded again, this time demanding the sending of a rescue locomotive with workers. The stationmaster was in despair. Agitated by the signals continually flowing from the direction of Glaszow, he was pacing restlessly about the platform, going out to the line to return again to the station office baffled, terrified, frightened.

  In reality, it was a sorry situation. His comrade from Glaszow, alarmed by him every dozen or so minutes, answered at first with calm that everything was in order; later, losing his patience, he started to scold fools and lunatics. To Dabrowa, meanwhile, came signal after signal, entreating ever more urgently the dispatching of workers’ cars.