IV
June arrived. At about this time of the year the town my mother and I lived in livened up enormously. A multitude of ships docked at the wharf, a multitude of new faces appeared on the streets. It was then that I loved to wander along the quay, past the coffee-houses and hotels, contemplating the multifarious figures of the sailors and other people sitting under the canvas awnings at small white tables with tin mugs in front of them, brim-full of beer.
Once, when passing a certain coffee-house, I caught sight of a man who immediately riveted my whole attention. Dressed in a long, black, loose garment, with a straw hat pulled down over his eyes, he was sitting quite still, his arms crossed on his chest. Thin curling strands of black hair fell almost down to his nose; his thin lips clenched the mouthpiece of a short pipe. This man seemed so familiar to me, every line of his dark, sallow face, his whole figure was so stamped beyond doubt in my memory, that I couldn’t help coming to a halt in front of him, couldn’t help asking myself the question: who is this man? where have I seen him? Probably feeling my stare, he lifted his black, sharp eyes …. I gave an involuntary cry ….
This man was the father I had been seeking and seen in my dream!
There was no possibility of a mistake—the likeness was too striking. Even the long-skirted garment draping his thin limbs was reminiscent in its colour and the way it hung of the gown my father had appeared to me in.
“I must be asleep,” I thought …. No …. It was broad daylight; I was surrounded by the noisy crowd, the sun was shining brightly in the blue sky, and in front of me was, not a ghost, but a live man.
I went up to a table, ordered a mug of beer and a newspaper—and sat down a short distance from the enigmatic being.
V
Raising the newspaper level with my face I continued avidly to take in everything about the stranger. He made almost no movement, only occasionally lifting his downcast head. He was obviously waiting for somebody. I kept watching, watching …. It sometimes seemed to me that I had dreamt it all up, that there wasn’t really any likeness at all, that I had given in to a half-involuntary deception of the imagination … but the man would suddenly turn a little on his chair or lift his hands slightly—and again I would almost let out a cry and again see before me my “nocturnal” father! Finally he noticed my persistent attention, and at first in bafflement, and then with annoyance he glanced in my direction, made to get up—and knocked over a small cane he had leant against the table. I instantly leapt up, picked it up and gave it to him. My heart was beating hard.
He gave me a strained smile, thanked me and, bringing his face up close to mine, raised his eyebrows and parted his lips a little, as if struck by something.
“That’s very courteous of you, young man,” he said suddenly in a dry, sharp, and nasal voice. “Nowadays that’s rare. Let me congratulate you on being so well brought up.”
I don’t remember exactly how I replied; but we soon struck up a conversation. I discovered that he was a countryman of mine and that he had recently come back from America, where he had lived for many years and would soon set out for again. He called himself baron … but I didn’t catch the name properly. Just like my “nocturnal” father he finished every statement by muttering indistinctly to himself. He asked if he might know my name. When he heard it, he again appeared astounded; then he asked me if I had lived in the town for a long time and with whom. I replied that I lived with my mother.
—And what about your father?
—My father died a long time ago.
He inquired about my mother’s Christian name and immediately broke into awkward laughter—and then excused himself, saying that it was an American habit of his and that he was on the whole quite an eccentric. Then he showed some interest in knowing where our apartment was. I told him.
VI
The excitement which had gripped me at the beginning of our conversation had gradually abated. I was finding our rapprochement somewhat strange, but that was all. I did not like the little smile with which the baron questioned me; nor did I like the expression in his eyes which I felt to be stabbing into me. There was something predatory and supercilious … something horrible in them. I had not seen these eyes in my dream. The baron had a strange face! It was drained of colour, tired, and at the same time youngish, unpleasantly youngish! Neither had my “nocturnal” father had the deep scar which cut across the forehead of my new acquaintance at an angle and which I hadn’t noticed until I moved up closer to him.
I had not had time to finish telling the baron the name of the street and the number of the house where we lived, when a tall negro, wrapped in a cloak right up to his eyes, came up to him from behind and tapped him on the shoulder. The baron turned around and said: “Aha! About time!” and, giving me a slight nod, went off with the negro into the coffee-house. I stayed outside under the awning. I wanted to wait for the baron to come back out, not so much for the purpose of starting up a conversation with him again (I didn’t actually know what I could converse with him about) as for the purpose of checking again my first impression. However, half an hour went by, and then an hour …. There was no sign of the baron. I went into the coffee-house and quickly went around all the rooms—but couldn’t see the baron or the negro anywhere. They must both have left through a back door.
My head had begun to ache a little, and so, to get some fresh air, I set off along the seafront towards the spacious park outside the town, laid out some two hundred years earlier. After walking for two hours or so in the shade of the huge oaks and plane trees, I returned home.
VII
Our maid rushed to meet me, greatly alarmed, as soon as I appeared in the entrance-hall. I immediately guessed by the expression on her face that while I had been away something bad had happened in our house. And it proved to be so: I learnt that an hour earlier there had suddenly been a terrible cry from my mother’s bedroom; the maid, on rushing in, had found her on the floor unconscious. She had remained unconscious for several minutes. Eventually my mother had regained her senses, but she had been forced to take to her bed and had looked frightened and queer; she had not said a word or answered questions, she had just kept looking around her and quivering. The maid had sent the gardener for the doctor. The doctor had come and prescribed a sedative; but my mother had refused to say anything even to him. The gardener affirmed that several moments after the cry had rung out in my mother’s room, he had caught sight of an unfamiliar figure running in haste across the garden beds towards the gate into the street. (We lived in a single-storey house whose windows opened onto a fairly large garden.) The gardener had not had time to get a good look at the man’s face; but he had appeared thin, and had been wearing a low straw hat and a long overcoat …. “The baron’s clothes!” I thought in a flash. The gardener had not been able to catch up with him; besides, he had soon been called into the house and sent for the doctor. I went into my mother’s room; she was lying on her bed, paler than the pillow on which her head was resting. Recognizing me, she gave a weak smile and stretched out her hand to me. I sat down beside her and began asking her questions. At first she would not answer; however, she finally admitted that she had seen something which had very much frightened her. “Did someone come in here?” I asked. “No,” she answered hurriedly, “no one came, but I seemed to see … there appeared to me … She fell silent and covered her eyes with her hand. I was on the point of telling her what I had learnt from the gardener, and at the same time tell her of my meeting with the baron, but for some reason the words died away on my lips. However, I did venture to remark that visions don’t appear by day …. “Leave me be,” she whispered, “I beg of you. Don’t torture me now. One day you’ll know ….” She fell silent again. Her hands were cold, and her pulse was beating quickly and unevenly. I gave her some medicine to drink and moved away from her a little so as not to disturb her. She remained in bed the whole day. She lay motionless and quiet, only giving an occasional deep sigh and opening her eyes fearfully. The whole
household was baffled.
VIII
By nightfall Mother had become slightly feverish, and she sent me away. However, I didn’t go away to my own room, but lay down on a sofa in the room next to hers. Every quarter of an hour I would get up, tiptoe to her door and listen …. Everything remained silent—but my mother hardly went to sleep at all that night. When I went in to her early the next morning, her face appeared inflamed and her eyes had an unnatural gleam. In the course of the day she found some relief, but towards evening her temperature went up again. Until that time she had remained stubbornly silent, but now she suddenly began talking in a hurried, jerky voice. She was not delirious, there was sense in what she said—but she spoke disjointedly. Suddenly, not long before midnight, she sat up in bed with a convulsive movement (I was sitting beside her) and in the same hurried voice, all the time taking gulps of water from a glass, waving her arms around feebly and without once looking at me, she began to tell a story …. She would stop, make an effort and continue again …. It was all so strange, just as if she were acting it all out in her sleep, as if she herself were not there and someone else were speaking with her lips or forcing her to speak.
IX
“Listen to what I’m going to tell you,” she began, “you’re no longer a young boy, it’s time you knew everything. I had a good friend …. She married a man she loved with all her heart—and she was very happy with her husband. During the first year of their marriage, they went together to the capital to spend a few weeks there and enjoy themselves. They put up in a good hotel and went out a lot to theatres and gatherings. My friend was very good-looking—everyone noticed her and young men courted her favour—but amongst them there was a certain … officer. He was inseparable from her, following her everywhere, and wherever she was, she saw his black, evil eyes. He didn’t introduce himself to her and never once spoke to her—just kept looking at her—so insolently and strangely. All the pleasures of the capital were poisoned by his presence—she began to urge her husband to leave as soon as they could—and they were already preparing to leave. On one occasion her husband went off to the club: he had been invited by some officers—from the same regiment as the other officer—for a game of cards …. For the first time she was left alone. Her husband was away for a long time—she dismissed the maid and went to bed …. And suddenly she was gripped by such terror, that she actually went quite cold and began shaking. She thought she heard a light knocking on the other side of the wall—it sounded like a dog scratching—and began looking at the wall. In the corner a lamp was burning; the walls were all covered in silk damask …. Suddenly something over there moved, rose up, opened up …. And from right out of the wall, tall, all in black, came that terrible man with the evil eyes! She wanted to cry out but couldn’t. She froze from fright. He came up to her quickly, like a predatory animal, threw something over her head, something smothering, heavy, white …. What happened next I don’t remember …. I don’t remember! It was like death, like murder …. When the terrible fog finally cleared—when I … when my friend came to her senses, there was no one in the room. For a long time she didn’t have the strength to cry out, then at last she gave a cry …. Then once more everything became confused.
“Then she saw beside her her husband, who had been detained at the club until two o’clock in the morning. He was in a terrible state. He started to ask her questions, but she told him nothing. Then she became quite ill. However, I recall that once she was alone in the room she examined the place in the wall …. Under the damask wallcovering there turned out to be a concealed door. And from her own hand her engagement ring had disappeared. This ring had an unusual shape: there were seven gold stars on it alternating with seven silver ones; it was one of the old family valuables. Her husband asked her what had become of the ring: she could not give him an answer. Her husband thought that she had somehow dropped it, searched everywhere, but couldn’t find it anywhere. He found himself in a state of anguish, he determined to leave for home as soon as possible, and as soon as the doctor gave his permission—they left the capital …. But imagine! On the very day they left they suddenly came upon a stretcher in the street. On the stretcher lay a man who had just been killed, with his head split open—and imagine!—this man was the selfsame terrible night visitor with the evil eyes! They had killed him while they were playing cards ….
“Then my friend went away to the country … she became a mother for the first time … and lived there with her husband for several years. He never found out anything, and anyway what could she have told him? She herself knew nothing.
“But their former happiness had gone. Their life became dark and the darkness was now quite unbroken …. There were no other children, either before or after … and this son …”
My mother began trembling and covered her face with her hands ….
“But I ask you,” she went on with renewed strength, “my friend wasn’t in any way to blame, was she? What could she have reproached herself with? She was punished, but does she not have the right to declare before God Himself that the punishment which befell her was unjust? Why should the past be able to come to her after so many years in such a terrible light, as to a criminal tortured by the pangs of conscience? Macbeth killed Banquo, so it’s not surprising that he should imagine he saw … but I …”
But at this point my mother’s speech became so confused and mixed up that I could no longer understand her …. I was no longer in any doubt that she was delirious.
X
Anyone can readily understand what a staggering impression my mother’s story made on me! From the very first word she spoke I surmised that she was speaking about herself and not about some friend of hers; her slip of the tongue only confirmed my surmise. Thus it really was the father I had searched for in my dream I had seen in real life! He had not been killed, as my mother had supposed, but only wounded …. And he had come to her and then run off, alarmed by her alarm. Suddenly everything became clear to me: the feeling of involuntary revulsion towards me which was sometimes awakened in my mother, and her constant sadness, and our isolated life …. I remember how my head was going around in circles—and I grasped it in both hands as if wanting to hold it in place. But there was one thought which became firmly fixed in my mind: I determined to find that man again, without fail, cost what it may. Why? What was my purpose?—I didn’t go into that, but to find him, to find him—for me that became a matter of life and death! The next morning my mother finally became calmer … the fever went … she fell asleep. Entrusting her to the charge of our hosts and servants, I embarked on the search.
XI
First of all, naturally, I set out for the coffee-house, where I had met the baron, but in the coffee-house no one either knew or had even noticed him; he had been a casual customer there. The owners had noticed the negro—he was such a conspicuous figure; but who he was or where he was staying no one was aware, either. Leaving my address at the coffee-house just in case, I started walking about the streets and quays of the city, around the wharf, along the boulevards, looking in at all the places frequented by the public and nowhere found anyone like either the baron or his companion! Not having caught the baron’s name I was not in a position to go to the police for help; however, I quietly let two or three guardians of public order I happened to come across know (it’s true, they regarded me with astonishment and didn’t wholly trust me) that I would generously reward their diligence should they succeed in coming on the tracks of the two persons whose appearance I tried to describe as exactly as possible. Having spent the morning scouring the town in this way, I returned home exhausted. My mother rose from her bed; but her customary melancholy was now mixed with something new, a sort of pensive puzzlement, which cut into my heart like a knife. I spent the evening sitting with her. We almost didn’t speak at all: she laid out her patience and I watched her game in silence. She made not the slightest reference to her story nor to what had happened the previous day. It was as if we had a secret agre
ement not to touch on these fearful and strange happenings …. It was as if she were annoyed with herself and felt ashamed of what she had unintentionally blurted out; or perhaps she didn’t remember very well what she had said in her half-feverish ravings—and hoped that I would spare her …. And I did indeed spare her, and she was conscious of this; she avoided my eyes as she had the day before. All that night I could not go to sleep. Outside a terrible storm suddenly arose. The tearing wind howled furiously, the window-panes rang and rattled, there were shrieks and groans of despair carried on the air as if something were being torn apart on high and were flying over the quaking houses. Just before dawn I sank into a drowsy oblivion … suddenly it seemed to me that someone had come into my room and called me, pronouncing my name in a soft but firm voice. I lifted up my head and could see nobody; but strange to relate, I not only didn’t take fright—I was glad; all of a sudden I felt within myself the conviction that now I would unfailingly achieve my goal. I hastily dressed and left the house.
Fantastic Tales: Visionary and Everyday Page 37
