King of the Fields

by Isaac Bashevis Singer

  She approached Cybula in a kind of dance, then began to bend and kneel as if seized with some pain in her belly. Cybula, Nosek, Ben Dosa, and Kosoka all watched her with amazement. Even the horses shook their heads from side to side and glanced backward. Nosek and Ben Dosa tightened their grip on the reins. Cybula asked Kora, his voice mocking, “What happened? Did the sky fall?”

  “Krol Rudy lost his mind. The woyaks had another bloodbath. They killed your mother-in-law, Mala. They raped and killed her.”

  “Raped old Mala?”

  “Yes. Raped, then stabbed her. Can someone tell in the dark who is young and who is old? Some of the woyaks wanted to leave. They rose up against Krol Rudy. They did not allow us to sow the fields; they seized the wheat and wanted to brew spirits from it. They tried to kill Krol Rudy, but Kniez Kulak was loyal and killed several of them. When our people in the mountains heard this, they came down and fought the woyaks. Yagoda and I ran to the woods and hid, otherwise we, too, would have been killed. They would have killed you, too, if you were here. In the darkness it was impossible to know who was killing whom. Suddenly the rains came and the floods. Then the frosts—and it was no longer possible to sow. Only twenty or so woyaks remained in the camp, and they called themselves pans and kniezes. They took all the land for themselves, and we became their slaves. The few of our Lesnik men who survived are forced to chop down trees in the forests so that the woyaks will have more land. We were all forced to build huts for them. Someone said that you, Kniez Nosek, stole Krol Rudy’s gold and that you were not coming back. Yagoda cries day and night.”

  “Where is Yagoda?” Cybula asked.

  “She is not in the camp.”

  “Where is she?”

  Kora did not answer.

  “What happened to her? Tell me!” Cybula shouted.

  Kora began to look to her left and her right, behind her, as if to make sure that no one was listening. Then she said in a low voice, “Yagoda is hiding.”

  “Why?”

  “Krol Rudy wants her. He is always drunk. He slaps Laska’s face, although she is the mother of his child. He shouts that if you do not return, he will have her head cut off.”

  “When did Laska deliver her child? What did she have?” Cybula asked.

  “A red-haired boy. His eyes are yours, but the hair is Krol Rudy’s. At first, when he heard it was a boy, he hopped and danced and distributed drinks and pretzels to everyone. The mother named the boy Ptashek, and Krol Rudy calls him Ptashek Rudy. Then the fights and the mutiny began, and Krol Rudy became completely unsettled. He struck his own kniezes. He ordered the young women seized and given to him as wives. Six woyaks guard him day and night. When he remembered Yagoda, he wanted her to take your daughter’s place. That is why Yagoda ran and hid.”

  “Where is she hiding?”

  “I cannot tell you.”

  “Where is she? These people here are my friends, you can trust them.”

  “I’ll whisper the place in your ear. Bend down.”

  Cybula lowered his head, and Kora began to hiss and spit until his ear was wet with her saliva. He could barely catch a word in the torrent that poured from her mouth. She mentioned a rock, a tree, and added that she, Kora, brought Yagoda her food.

  “We will all be killed if we stay here!” Nosek snapped.

  “What should we do, then?” Cybula asked.

  “We should turn back.”

  “Masters, kniezes, don’t leave us,” Kora began to wail. “They’ll kill us all. They have all gone mad. Yagoda is sick, she doesn’t speak, she doesn’t eat. No sooner do I put a morsel of food to her mouth than she spits it out. All day long she asks, ‘Where is he? Where is he?’ A curse is upon us, a dismal curse. Our own Lesniks have gone mad. Ah, the wrath of the gods is upon us! We did not sacrifice to Baba Yaga this year, and this is her revenge. Some say that new woyaks are coming and will slaughter us all. We have no more men to protect us. Those in the mountains treated us like enemies and even killed each other. So few of us are left now.”

  “We brought back seeds with us,” Cybula said.

  Ben Dosa, who had stood silent until that moment, now spoke up. “May I say something, kniezes?” he asked.

  “Yes, you may speak,” Cybula answered.

  “Worthy kniezes, you are my masters and I am your slave. But I belong to a nation that does not permit its people to become enslaved. Even if one of us is sold into bondage, he serves six years and in the seventh must be set free. We are God’s slaves, not slaves to other slaves. I have heard and understood what was said here, and I would like to offer some advice.”

  “What is your advice? Be brief!” Cybula interrupted.

  “My lords, neither you nor I nor the horses have the strength to undertake the long journey back to town. We have escaped many dangers and this is proof that God Almighty wants us to live not die.”

  “What is your advice. Be brief!” Cybula interrupted.

  “My advice is that one of you go to your krol and tell him we have arrived with seeds, with horses, with gifts, and that no one has robbed him of his gold. I suggest that you, Pan Nosek, speak to the krol, because you speak his language best. I can accompany Pan Nosek as his servant. Should the krol fly into a rage, one of us will run and inform you, Pan Cybula. If we both do not return, then you’ll know that you must flee. Yet I know that we will not be harmed.”

  “How do you know?” Cybula asked.

  “It is said in the Mishnah that when one of our great masters prayed and the words flowed from his mouth smoothly, he knew that his prayers were accepted in heaven. I prayed to God for all of us while we traveled together. Since the words flowed from my mouth smoothly and rapidly, I know that your krol will receive us with favor.”

  “What do you think, Nosek?” Cybula asked.

  “He could be right,” Nosek answered, but he added, “If Krol Rudy is truly mad, the devil knows what will please him!”

  “If you are afraid to go to him, I’ll gladly take your place,” Cybula said. “My daughter is his wife, and I don’t believe he’d harm his father-in-law.”

  “Don’t go to him, Cybula!” Kora shrieked. “He tried to kill your daughter even when she was nine months pregnant. He is always drunk and yells so loudly that his voice carries all over the camp! He has a house full of women, but he comes to them only to curse and abuse them. At night you can hear him howling and grunting and whipping their bare flesh with his whip. Your daughter …”

  “Enough!” Cybula shouted. “I want to hear no more! Where is Yagoda?”

  “Do you want me to take you to her?”

  “Yes. If we are meant to die, then let us die together,” Cybula said.

  “Do you want to go now?” Kora asked.

  “Soon.”

  “My god! My husband! Son-in-law, father, master, redeemer!” Kora was once again sobbing. “I thought the ravens had plucked out your sweet eyes, and here, suddenly …” Kora tottered and swayed while she moaned. But now they heard a great noise and realized at once that it was no longer possible for Nosek to see Krol Rudy in advance. The matter was no longer in their hands.

  (2)

  Someone had evidently seen the newcomers and run to inform the camp. There was loud shouting and cheering, and crowds of people came running from every direction. Women wept, children shouted, old men shook their walking sticks and waved their arms. When Krol Rudy arrived, he was surrounded by kniezes and woyaks. He wore a long zupan, a fox-skin hat with tails dangling on both sides of his face, and at his hips hung two swords. His right hand held a dagger. He seemed to have aged during these last months and his red beard was streaked with gray. Among the kniezes Cybula recognized only Kulak. No sooner did the krol see Nosek and Cybula—before they had time to kneel before him and greet him—than he began to wave his dagger and shout. His voice had changed; it was hoarse now, sometimes shrill. His nose had a strange red color and was crisscrossed with blue veins. It was hard to understand what Krol Rudy said, as he cursed, th
reatened, gesticulated wildly. Nosek bowed his head, waiting for the royal wrath to subside, then he spoke in a loud and clear voice:

  “Our king, forgive us for tarrying longer than you had ordered. Our journey was an arduous one, both the journey out and the return home. Several objects we wanted to purchase for you could not be readied in time and we waited days, even weeks. But all obstacles were finally overcome, and now we are here, ready again to serve you faithfully.”

  He had apparently prepared his speech beforehand. Krol Rudy fixed on him a pair of bloodshot eyes under disheveled red eyebrows. “Where were you? I was sure you were devoured by wolves or hidden in some cave with the other rebels. And who is this?” Krol Rudy pointed to Cybula with the tip of his dagger.

  “My krol, don’t you recognize him? This is Kniez Cybula,” Nosek answered. “He is the one who made peace with you and came down from the mountains with his Lesniks.”

  “Cybula, huh? And who is the dark one with the sack on his back, a prisoner?”

  “He is no prisoner, Krol, he is a shoemaker who sews shoes for men and women. He is also a furrier and has other skills as well. Kniez Cybula brought him here to work for you.”

  “From what do you make shoes—from snow?” Krol Rudy asked and chuckled at his own wit. Out of his throat burst a roar and a whinny which seemed hardly to be human. Kulak, known in the camp for imitating his master, parroting his speech, aping his mannerisms and quirks, immediately began to bellow with a voice which issued out of his immense belly and sounded like some giant hiccup.

  Ben Dosa, his hand clutching the white horse’s bridle, approached Krol Rudy, bowed down low, and said, “Allow me, krol, to offer you a benediction. When we encounter a king we say: ‘Praised be God who granted a part of his honor to flesh and blood.’ It is true, king, that my wanderings took me to a town where I became a shoemaker. But in my home, Sura, which is in the land of Babylon, I was a merchant. Wicked men kidnapped me, carried me over the great sea to distant lands, and sold me as a slave. Your kniezes, Pan Cybula and Pan Nosek, were kind to me. They treated me not as a prisoner but as a friend.”

  “Huh? We need shoes,” Krol Rudy spoke both to Ben Dosa and to the others. “But shoes are made of leather and leather is made from animal skins and animals must be killed before they can be skinned. Is this not true, Kulak?”

  “Yes, my krol, true,” Kulak thundered.

  “But there are few of us men left now,” Krol Rudy continued. “And women cannot hunt or shoot. We Poles brought seeds and plows to this region. We wanted to give the Lesniks the best fruits of the earth. But those whom we wanted to help fought us, shed our blood and the blood of innocent women and children, and caused so much mischief that we could not sow the fields this fall.”

  “My king, we have brought with us seeds of wheat, corn, barley, and oats,” Cybula said. “We can sow them early in the spring, and if we have a good harvest, all is not lost.”

  “No, not lost. What is your name?”

  “Cybula.”

  “Is it you, Laska’s father?”

  “Yes, my king.”

  “What is the matter with me?” Krol Rudy slapped himself on the forehead. “We have had such calamities here that I would not recognize my own father. You are my father! Why are you standing there like a stranger? Come here and let me kiss you, Father-in-law. Your daughter bore me a son, my Ptashek Rudy is your grandson. Forgive me for being so confused. We’ve had such mishaps here that it is a miracle from the gods that I am still alive. My own brothers betrayed me and became my sworn enemies. They tried to set my house on fire and burn me alive. If it were not for my true and loyal friend Kulak, I would have long ago descended to the dark hollows of the earth. Because of all this, my thoughts became unsettled. When weeks and months went by and you, Cybula, did not return, wicked people planted the thought that you and my old friend Nosek had joined the rebels. They even made false accusations against your daughter, and I was ready to send her where I sent the others, to the devils for whom death is bread and blood is wine. But wait, who is this dark little man?”

  “His name is Ben Dosa,” Cybula answered.

  “What an odd name! Brothers, sisters, today is a day of celebration for us. Look at the fine horses our kniezes bought for us. We have among us woyaks who want to rise above the others, to become pans, to snatch all the land for themselves. But I, Krol Rudy, will not permit it. The earth belongs to the gods, not to men! Is this not true, Kulak?”

  “True, my krol.”

  “My father was not a pan but a poor soil tiller,” Krol Rudy began. “We served a landowner, a kniez, a pan—the devil knows what he was. And when the spirit moved him he ordered my father to drop his trousers and be whipped. When I saw this, I picked up a heavy stone and smashed the man’s skull. This is why I took to the road to plunder and loot. What else could a poor soil tiller do? I left behind a mother, brothers, sisters. I became a wild youth, a bandit. But I never forgot where I came from. Who is the girl with the high cheekbones and the slanted eyes? The shoemaker’s daughter?”

  “No, krol. She is not his daughter. She is yours.”

  “Bring her to me, Nosek, Bring her to my house. Hey, you shoemaker! Make her a pair of shoes. You, Kulak, give him a hut where he can live and do his work.”

  (3)

  Nosek and Kulak took charge of the horses, the sacks of seeds, the load which the horses had carried on their backs. There were some new kniezes in the camp, former woyaks whom Krol Rudy had named to replace those he had beheaded or who had fled. The “palace” that was planned for him so many months ago had still not been constructed. One room had been added to his house—for Laska and for his other wives or concubines. Although Cybula longed to see his daughter and his newborn grandson, he postponed it for later. First he had to see Yagoda. Nosek had brought back a sack full of stale loaves of bread and rolls, and he now divided them among the hungry Lesniks—women and children, and a few old men. In the midst of the crush and the struggle to grab bits of food, Cybula picked up the satchel containing Yagoda’s gifts and set off with Kora.

  She led him away from the camp, back to the forest from which they had just come. All the while, as she led him to Yagoda’s hiding place, Kora spoke of the misfortunes which fell upon the camp while he was away. “Dear Cybula,” she said, “master, protector, it is not the same camp! So many evils and afflictions have we endured! As long as strangers raided our camp and spilled our blood, we knew that enemies were enemies. But when our own Lesniks attacked us—then nothing remained for us but death. The Poles only came together against us; they wanted to slaughter us all, to dig one large grave and bury us in it. But the gods foiled their plans. Many of us died of terror, hunger, illness. Krol Rudy, our great protector, completely lost his mind. Today he spoke with some sense, but most of the time he rants and raves. In the midst of all our trouble he remembered Yagoda, and now he wants her as well.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Here in the forest. I found an old oak, not the one that is a god, but another. It was hollowed out by lightning. Yagoda came to me weeping and begging, ‘Mother, I want to be no one’s but Cybula’s. If he is dead, I want to be with him in the hollows of the earth.’ I bring her food, and she sets traps and catches what she can. Small as she is, she is nimble and strong. She scampers up the trees like a squirrel. Perhaps Krol Rudy has forgotten her by now, the old goat, but at any time he may remember again. Oh, Cybulla, my love, what will become of us?”

  “It will not end well,” Cybula said.

  “Why do you say this?”

  “We have no men. Any day may see the coming of a new enemy.”

  “Then what should we do?”

  “We should be ready for death.”

  “My own life means nothing to me. I have lived enough—too much. But I grieve for you and Yagoda. She is so young, and has not even borne a child. Why don’t you make her conceive?”

  “What for? I spill my seed on her thigh.”

  “
Why are you doing this? You sin against the gods!”

  “I do it because we are doomed. I saw this immediately after the first massacre.”

  “You can predict things long before they happen. But a young girl is like a tree. It wants to bear fruit, and does not know that tomorrow someone may cut it down or that a windstorm may blow it over. I would like to have a child of your seed, Cybula. I am too old to have children, but I can love stronger than a young woman. Even Yagoda does not love you as much as I do. But I know men desire younger women.”

  “Are you jealous of your own daughter?” Cybula asked.

  “As long as we share you, I am satisfied.”

  “Where is the oak?” Cybula asked.

  “We will be there soon. Let me carry your bag, your arm must be free to receive Yagoda.”

  Cybula gave the bag to Kora. They stood and faced one another with the silence that comes from great lust. Kora asked, “You found others to take our place, huh?”

  Cybula finally answered, “A girl who cooked at the inn.”

  “Was she better than us?” Kora asked.

  “No one could be better. Don’t tell your daughter.”

  “Was she young?”

  “Younger than you but older than Yagoda.”

  “We remained faithful to you. The woyaks chased me, but I fled from them. I did not know that I could run so fast. One woyak threw his spear at me and it missed me by a hair. Our former neighbors threw themselves at me, but I tore myself out of their arms.” Kora had suddenly changed her tone. “How much time have we left to live?”

  “Not long.”

  “What should we do, then?”

  “Serve Shmiercz, the god of death.”

  “How do we serve him?”

  “By drinking the juices of life,” Cybula said, puzzled at his own words. A thought like this had never occurred to him before. It was as if some unseen spirit spoke through his mouth. Kora bent down to kiss his feet. “You are not a man, you are a god.”

  “No, Kora, only a man.”