There was no reason to pretend. “I hope that’s normal, too.”
“Of course, of course. You are certainly interested in where you have arrived, what awaits you here, and who I am, as well.”
“Certainly,” I agreed in a faltering voice.
“There is a little difficulty in this connection. I, naturally, can answer all these questions. And many others that you might like to ask. But if I do that, I will deprive you of the possibility of going back.”
“Going back?”
“Yes. You can return. To life.”
I stared fixedly at the stranger in the other armchair. His tiny eyes returned my glance good-naturedly through his round glasses.
“But I’m dead,” I said finally, in a half-questioning voice.
“Yes, that’s clear. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
“Well, then, how . . . ”
“I can’t explain it to you. Unless you decide to stay.”
Now my throat felt not only dry, but tight. I tried to swallow, without success. As I poured water from the jug into one of the glasses, my hand trembled a bit. I hoped this clumsiness had not been too conspicuous. The water was cold, but it tasted a little stale.
“Do you mean to say I’m the one who decides—whether I go back or stay?”
“You, of course. Who else?”
“I mean, it doesn’t depend on my behavior in . . . my previous life? I might be someone really bad, for example.”
The man gave a short laugh. “Yes, you might. But it makes no difference. There is no punishment or reward here. This is not the Last Judgement.”
“So, it’s enough for me to decide to go back. Do I understand that correctly?”
“You understand correctly. You can even choose the shape in which you will return.”
I put the glass back on the coaster. Small puddles of water that had spilled from the jug sparkled in the yellow light on the silver surface of the tray. Several drops had even fallen on the book nearby. Had it not been for that, I probably would not have paid attention to the illustration on the front cover. It was a reproduction of the painting of the window on the wall next to us, and above it was the title written in slender, yellow letters—Impossible Encounters. I was not familiar with the author’s name.
“I wouldn’t change my shape,” I said. “I’m used to this one.”
The smile disappeared from the man’s lips. “I’m afraid that’s the only thing that’s impossible. Your old shape has been used up, it is no longer serviceable. You can’t go back to it. And it would not be wise. Disease has completely destroyed you, isn’t that so? But you can choose something completely new. The choice is almost unlimited.”
“Be someone else?”
“You would not be someone else, because you would have no memory of your earlier life. It would be a new beginning for you.”
“I would be born again?”
“Most assuredly. You would return to the world as a newborn child, as is fitting. To live a new life. With the characteristics that you want.”
“You mean, I can choose what I’ll look like, or how tall I’ll be?”
“And much more than that. You could change the color of your skin, your sex . . . ”
“Sex?”
The look of amazement that appeared on my face caused the stranger to smile once again. “That is one of the most frequent changes. In both directions. I think it’s not so much dissatisfaction with one’s original sex as much as curiosity about trying the opposite sex.”
I shook my head. “Well, I’m not curious.”
“I understand. Would you perhaps be interested in going back as something other than a human being? That is also possible.”
I squinted my eyes in disbelief. “What do you mean?”
“There are other forms of life on earth besides humans. There are countless numbers, in fact. They are all at your disposal.”
“What, for example?”
“Oh, anything. Of course, it all depends on the inclinations of the one going back. People usually choose an animal.”
I paused slightly before answering. “Why would someone want to be an animal, and not a human, in his new life?”
“Well, it doesn’t have to be at all as bad as you might think. The life of a pure-bred cat or thoroughbred horse, for example, could be much more comfortable and carefree than many human lives. And if you prefer excitement, there are few human experiences that can compare to what a lion, an eagle or a shark experiences every day.”
I thought it over briefly. “I still don’t think I want to be an animal.”
“Whatever you want. There are other possibilities as well. You could be a plant.”
“A plant?”
“Yes, that is not such a rare choice.”
“But plants don’t have any . . . any consciousness.”
“That’s true, but this drawback is compensated by other advantages. A long life, for example. Almost every type of tree lives considerably longer than a man. Sequoias are highly valued in this regard. They are protected, which makes them additionally attractive. But even short-lived flowers have their admirers. People sometimes decide to go back as an orchid or a rose-blossom, even though they know they will only live one short season.”
“But that’s absurd. Getting the chance for a new life and wasting it on some flower .. .”
“They don’t look at it like that. Beauty means everything to them. That is something we must accept. But there are some decisions that are truly hard to understand. Even for me. What would you say to going back as a salamander, a worm, as a sagebrush, a stinging-nettle or a spider?”
“A spider?” I repeated. My face twisted into a disgusted grimace.
“Yes, quite unpleasant, wouldn’t you say?”
“I would not change at all,” I rushed to say, shaking my head. “I would like to stay as similar as I could to myself in my previous life. If that’s possible.”
“Of course it is. The great majority choose just that. So this means you have decided to go back?”
I did not answer at once. A multitude of confusing questions swarmed inside me. Finally, one outweighed all the others. “If I returned, I would live out another lifetime, right?”
“Yes.”
“And in the end I would die again?”
“That is inevitable, unfortunately.”
“After that would I . . . come back here again?”
“No, you only come here once. After your second life all that remains is death. You are given no further choice.”
He said this in an even voice, as though it were quite banal. I looked at him for a few moments without speaking.
“But what is this choice all about, anyway? On one side there is a new life. I understand that. But what’s on the other side? What am I supposed to choose between?”
The stranger removed his glasses, took a large white handkerchief from the inside pocket of his jacket and started to wipe them. He did so patiently and with extreme care, and in the end lifted them against the table lamp to check them. Without them his face seemed somehow bare. He put them back on slowly, pressing them onto the bridge of his nose.
“They rarely get around to that question,” he said at last. “Almost all of them immediately grab the chance to return. They’re not interested in anything else.”
“What do you say to the others?”
“Nothing specific. The most I can do is give them a hint. Anything more than that would endanger their return, if they decided to go back after all.”
“A hint?”
“Yes,” replied the man. “Please come with me.”
He got up, waited for me to do the same, and then took me cordially by the arm and led me. At first I thought we were heading for the door through which he had entered, but we stopped in front of the large picture in the middle of the wall.
His voice dropped almost to a whisper. “Look at it carefully.”
My eyes were filled with the sight of the
blue heavens seen through the closed window. The moments passed by slowly. Nothing happened. When the change finally occurred, it first affected my sense of hearing and not my sight. Suddenly, as though from a great distance, I started to hear an even, steady drumming. I didn’t recognize it at first. It was only when it grew louder in the surrounding silence that I realized it was the dull ticking of the clock. I did not need to turn my eyes towards the large mahogany case in the right-hand corner to know that the pendulum was no longer motionless.
As though in answer to this awakening sound, the picture came to life. The butterfly fluttered once, sluggishly, without hope of finally breaking out, and slid down a bit lower. The shadow moved because the hand outside the frame moved. The hand entered the frame and made for the middle of the window. It tried to beat its own shadow, but they reached the handle at the same time and turned it.
The moment the window opened, I was almost stunned by a rush of dizziness. The man’s firm clasp on my arm was a welcome support without which I would have lost my balance and fallen. But the butterfly had no one to help it. The gust of wind easily whisked it off the smooth glass surface and sent it rushing into the blue infinity.
That very instant everything disappeared: the picture frame, the wall, the stranger, the entire study. I was in the middle of nothing and started to fall. I knew that I had to move my wings, that I was supposed to fly and not descend headlong, but I suddenly no longer knew how. Many flashes of an eternity filled with icy horror passed before I once again mastered this simple, instinctive skill. First my descent slowed down, then stopped, and when I finally started to climb on an ascending stream of air, I didn’t have to move my wings at all. I just kept them spread out like two enormous, colorful twin sails in the middle of the vast open sea of air that surrounded me.
Fear turned into the rapture that always accompanies flying. I could have stayed there forever, surrendering to this tide of joy. Then, at an unspecified distance ahead of me, I caught sight of something wrinkled on the uniform fabric of blue. Something had started to thin the air, to dissolve it, something that appeared from underneath. It was bright, radiant, inviting. I flapped my wings energetically, wrenching myself away from the main airstream. The call that drew me, the radiance coming from the other side of the firmament, was irresistible: the flame of a candle attracting a moth in the dark.
But I was not allowed to reach the light. The airstream suddenly changed direction. I tried to resist it feverishly, realizing in despair that I was being borne away from where I longed to go. The strength of my wings, however, was nothing compared to that powerful pull. I rushed backwards faster and faster, filled with a painful feeling of futility and helplessness. The window slammed shut after me when I flew back in, and the same moment I was swallowed up in darkness.
The darkness was not completely empty; it was filled with the beating of a colossal heart. It was a regular, uniform sound, but somehow I knew it would soon stop. That happened all at once, without any premonitory slowing. Dropping to the lowest point, the pendulum did not continue on the other side; it stopped there, having nothing else to measure. In the silence it left behind, my sight slowly returned.
I was still standing in front of the picture, staring at it, although there was no longer anything moving in it. The butterfly was drooping in one of the corners again, and the shadow was patiently waiting for the unseen hand to move. Another hand slightly increased its pressure around my arm.
“This way. You’ll feel more comfortable if you sit down again.”
I wanted to tell him that everything was all right with me, but I staggered at the very first step and was grateful for the support he offered. When we were settled in the armchairs, he poured some more water from the jug into my glass. I wasn’t thirsty, but I still took a long drink.
The man did not speak right away, just watched me with his customary grin. He was clearly giving me the chance to collect my wits. And I was grateful for that, too.
“An exceptional painting, wouldn’t you agree?” he said at last.
“Yes,” I agreed after a brief hesitation, a little hoarsely. “Exceptional.”
We stopped talking once again. Just then a thought crossed my mind, one completely inappropriate to the decisive moment at hand. The other glass was still turned upside-down on the tray, unused. I wondered if it was there incidentally, just like the multitude of other objects in the room, or if the stranger sometimes drank a little water from it.
“So? Have you chosen?” There was no impatience in his voice, and I felt under no pressure. He could have asked me something quite trivial in the same tone.
“A butterfly,” I replied softly. “I would like to be a butterfly, of course.”
He looked at me wordlessly for several moments, and then gave a brief nod. “Of course.” His smile grew broader. He motioned towards the door next to the painting. “After you.”
I got up, a little unsteadily, and headed in that direction, but after a few steps I stopped, confused. The door had no handle on this side. How could I open it? I thought about turning around to ask the man. But that very instant I realized there was no need, for there was no longer any door in front of me.
6. The Cone
I didn’t come out of the clouds until I was almost at the top of the Cone.
Although it was the middle of summer, Dark Mountain seemed buried in autumn. Down in the valley this was just an ordinary overcast day, probably muggy and humid, but here at an elevation of almost two thousand meters everything was clothed in a grayness that was less transparent than mist and somehow denser and more palpable. The sky literally touched the ground right here. The clouds were filled with minute drops, embryos of rain, that seemed to be moving in all directions, not just downward. If the temperature were to drop by just a few degrees, they would turn into crystals of snow. This actually happened now and then, though they always quickly reverted. During the summer on Dark Mountain you could go through all four seasons in one day.
In such weather it was not advisable to take long walks since you could easily lose your way. If they went out at all, people stayed close to the hotel, keeping to the asphalt paths where the lighting was on, even though it was just past noon. But I was not afraid of getting lost. I’d been coming to Dark Mountain for years, both summer and winter, and not a day would go by without a visit to the Cone. I was certain that I could find my way there even on a moonless night, though I’d never tried.
The Cone was a projection on the western slope, about two and a half kilometers from the hotel. The view from its peak was almost as fascinating as the one from the topmost craggy crest of Dark Mountain, accessible only to fully equipped mountain climbers. Owing to the Cone’s almost perfect shape, from which it derived its name, it seemed to be artificially planted there. As you approached, it didn’t give the impression of being steep, but it was. The climb to the top thus required not only agility but considerable effort as well, even though the distance to be covered was less than one hundred and fifty meters.
These difficulties discouraged most of the hotel guests from visiting the Cone. On fine days they would walk to its foot, but only a rare few would decide to undertake the climb. In any case, the small, windy plateau at the top only had room for three or four people at most. When the weather was bad, like today’s, I could count on having the Cone all to myself.
I came out of the cloud all of a sudden. I wasn’t far from the top when it started to lighten. The grayness around me didn’t thin or become more transparent, it just changed shade, turning a bright white. And then I suddenly rose above the foggy mass, squinting at the blinding radiance of the sun.
I stopped, still in cloud from the waist down, and waited for my eyes to adjust. Above me stretched the immeasurable, bright blue firmament, and as far as I could see below me was a motionless sea, its uniformity disturbed here and there by the islands of mountain peaks similar to the one I had just reached, forming a scattered archipelago in the sky. This panorama
was worth all the trouble of the climb.
“Strange to find yourself above the clouds, isn’t it?”
I started at the unexpected voice. I’d been so certain that I would be the only one at the top of the Cone that I hadn’t even turned to look around, fixing my eyes on the horizon instead. The man was sitting on a rocky outcrop, his back turned to where I stood. It must have been the sound of my steps that told him I had joined him on the plateau. He was wearing a dark green jacket that blended in with the color of the surrounding grass and low bushes. His hair was gray and longish, partially covering his ears.
“It isn’t usually crowded above the clouds,” I replied, making little effort to hide my displeasure. I wasn’t pleased at having to share the Cone with someone just then. I sat down on a patch of grass behind the stranger, feeling beforehand to see if it was wet. Among the thick tangle I found an empty can of soda pop carelessly left there. I picked it up and threw it into the depths below. I was aware that this was just as careless, but it seemed somehow more fitting for garbage to be found anywhere but here.
“No, it isn’t. I liked it best when I could be alone here, too.” He said this without any reproach in his voice, which made me feel awkward. In fact, he could consider me the intruder since he had reached the top of the Cone first. “But I won’t bother you for long. I’ll be leaving soon.”
“You don’t have to go because of me,” I said obligingly. “There’s room for both of us.”
The man did not reply, so we fell silent, gazing into the distance. The warmth I started to feel wasn’t just from the strenuous climb. It was considerably warmer here in the sun than down in the clouds. I did not unbutton my jacket, however, even though I could feel the sweat breaking out; the wind that never seemed to die down here at the top might blow through me.
“I haven’t been on the Cone for a long time,” said the man pensively, as though addressing someone invisible in front of him, rather than myself. “The last time I climbed up here I was your age.”
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