He sat in my lap like a loaf fresh from the oven and I could hear the mice playing inside him. He must have had a good bellyful, because I could feel beneath my hand how they were stirring in him, jostling about, running amok. His big stomach was just swelling and settling, swelling and settling. And he was purring somewhere deep down. You could have been forgiven for thinking his stomach was the only living part of him, while the rest of him lay in my lap, lifeless and contented. And the hand I was stroking him with was like the sky over that dead contentment of his.
He even stank of mice. Maybe he’d had so many of them for my benefit, to make up for all his years of idleness. And I felt bad that when I was in the hospital, whenever anyone asked if I had a cat I’d said I used to, but it was so lazy I’d put it down.
Though there wasn’t that much talk about cats. What kind of a creature is a cat that you’d want to talk about it. It’s gray or black, a hunter or a lazybones, that’s it. There’s more to say about dogs, or pigeons. And most of all about horses. When it came to horses, if one person started talking about them, all of a sudden everyone was talking. This kind and that kind, old ones, young ones, workhorses, horses gone bad, black ones, grays, bays, sorrels, chestnuts, tows, dapples, roans. Sometimes we’d talk all day about horses. Because everyone had more to say about horses than about themselves, more than about their own children and their wives and their farms, more than about the rest of the world. Made no difference whether it was all true or not. You didn’t have to believe it, you listened along with everyone else. Because when you’re stuck in bed, and in some cases you’ve got one foot in the next life, it makes no difference whether you believe what you’re hearing or not. There were times they’d turn the lights out for bedtime and people would carry on talking about horses in the dark, as if the horses were lying down for the night between the beds, each one by his owner.
There was one guy that was a lawyer on the ward with us, other than him it was all farmers from the country. But he liked listening too. Not just about horses, about any animals. Even if he was reading his book, when someone started talking he’d set it aside and listen as if what was being said was more interesting than what was in the book. His bed was next to mine, to the left. He had something wrong with his spine, and he was visibly going downhill. But he never complained of being in pain. It was just that he couldn’t sleep much, and he’d wake up way early in the morning. Then he’d wait for me to wake up as well. If I so much as reached my hand out of the sheets in my sleep, I’d hear a whisper, muffled like it was coming from inside the earth:
“Are you awake, Mr. Szymon?”
Ever since I was in the resistance I’ve been a light sleeper, plus I had plenty of sleep in the hospital, so I would have heard a mouse. Besides, I used to wake up early myself, before everyone else. I’d just lie there with my eyes closed, but my head would already be full of thoughts. I sometimes even thought about him, how his breathing was so shallow, how that was death breathing inside him.
“Did I wake you up?”
“Not at all. At home I’d be up and about already.”
“What would you be doing?”
“There’s no shortage of things to do. The animals will need feeding. They’ll all be squealing and lowing and neighing and cackling so loud you never know who to see to first. The worst are the pigs, they won’t eat things raw so you have to cook it for them, and they’re the biggest eaters of all. On a farm, Mr. Kazimierz” – because that was his name, Kazimierz – “the day doesn’t begin with the sunrise but with the animals being hungry. The sun’s only just starting to come up when the animals have already been fed. In here, we don’t do anything but laze around. It’s neither living nor dying. There’s no telling why we need to go to sleep, or why we have to get up.”
I knew that he liked hearing about the animals, and I often brought the subject up deliberately, because I felt it helped him. So he would ask right away:
“Do you have a lot of pigs?”
“There’s a good few of them, Mr. Kazimierz. Sows, I’ve got two of them. With a good litter there can be as many as twenty from one of them and twenty from the other, and I don’t sell any of them, I raise them all myself. When you go in to feed them there’s no room to even put your feet. It’s all white as can be, like the floor was covered with lilac. And once they latch on to the teats, all you can hear is sucking, suck suck suck. Sounds like someone was threshing corn far off, or like rain dripping down the walls. And the sow just lies there in the middle of all that lilac doing nothing, you’d think she was dead. Her belly’s wide open, her eyes are half closed, and she’s barely breathing. And the young ones, they’re squealing and scrambling all over her and jockeying around her teats. They’re stubborner than puppies. But you need to know that not all teats are alike, even though they all belong to the same mother. Some have more milk, some less. Some are firm, others are limp. And the piglets aren’t born equal either, there are sickly ones, fussy ones, greedy ones. The greedy ones can feed from three teats in one sitting. And they fight for the teats like no one’s business. It’s just as well they don’t have claws, cause they’d be covered in blood. And the sow is just a big heap of flesh, meekness itself. The most she’ll do is kick one of them if it tickles her too much, but otherwise she’ll just lie there till they’ve sucked every last drop out of her.”
“Do you have much in the way of poultry?”
“Sure I do. Chickens, geese, ducks, other things. Loads of them. But I like poultry. In the early morning, before you even open the door of the coop they set up a racket, as soon as they know it’s you. Then when I open the door for them it’s like opening a sluice-gate in a water mill. They rush past you, under you, over you. One big cloud of feathers. The whole yard is filled with feathers, earth and sky. If the dog tries to bark it’s choked by feathers and it sounds like it’s barking behind a wall. And even more than the feathers, there’s all the cackling and quacking and honking and gobbling. And once they all start pecking at the ground, the whole place quakes like in a hailstorm. If the calf pokes its head out from the cattle shed, it hurries back in again right away. If you need to harness the horse, you have to drag him by force through all the hullabaloo. I’ve got turkeys, guinea fowl. But guinea fowl are something else. They’re calm as anything, timid, it’s like they’re lost among all the other birds. They’re not pushy, they don’t get in the way. Because chickens, they’re ragtag and bobtail. All they’re good for is laying eggs. Though come wintertime, eggs are expensive and things even out. I even have two peacocks. I hold on to them because people in the village have gotten used to saying, the house with the two peacocks. Sometimes one of them will spread its tail, and I have my own rainbow. It’s lovely to look at. The truth is, though, I don’t know how many birds I have. I don’t count. Besides, how could you count even if you wanted to? They’re always moving around, hopping and pecking and fighting, you’d need a hundred eyes to keep track. Plus, when the sun comes out in the yard everything’s all glittery. Sometimes, if I get to a hundred I can’t be bothered to keep on counting. What’s the point, I ask myself? Will there be more of them if I count them? Let them live uncounted. If I knew how many I had, I’d need to worry whenever one of my geese or ducks or chickens went missing. Though when that happens, try searching other people’s farms and orchards, in their yards and behind their barns, try asking if they haven’t seen anything anywhere. In the village there isn’t even anywhere to look. There’s one house next to another, all in a row. You’d have to look to the neighbors, because when something goes missing, they’re the likeliest suspects. Though maybe that’s why people are neighbors? And if you’re at odds with your neighbors, then all the more they’re the likeliest. Or you could set traps for polecats, and catch a neighbor in one of them from time to time. Though polecats can do their fair share of damage too.”
It was a Monday, and he asked me right away if I could give him a shave along with the other guys. Because Monday was market day, and f
rom early morning everyone on the ward would start getting ready for visiting hours. Dawn would barely be lighting the windows, and already they’d be whispering and sighing and saying their prayers. Some of them woke up much earlier even, as if it was time to feed the animals. So if anybody felt like sleeping in, Monday wasn’t the day to do it. One bed would creak, and right away every bed in the place would start creaking. Though whoever woke up first generally woke everyone else up right off:
“Hey everybody, wake up! Today’s Monday!”
Right away there’d be a commotion and comings and goings. Even when someone was stuck in bed because of illness or injury, and they couldn’t get up, on a Monday it was like they were expecting a miracle to happen and they’d get ready as well. Everyone washed, shaved, combed their hair, and those that couldn’t do it by themselves, someone else would shave them and comb their hair and wash them. Eventually, when I could get up myself, I was the one that shaved everyone. I had my work cut out for me on Mondays. Because every man jack of them needed something special doing. One of them had to at least have his sideburns evened up, someone else wanted his mustache trimmed so everybody would know he was expecting someone. And though some of them never had visitors, Monday was the kind of day when you might finally get one. They might come to town to buy a horse or sell some suckling pigs, and while they were at it they’d come visit.
That was all people talked about from the early morning, will they come or won’t they. Will they come or won’t they. They might come, they’ve got a bullock they need to sell, why keep it any longer than necessary. It’ll eat more than their cow, and it’s not going to give them any milk. They’ve already plowed and sowed, what else do they have to do. They don’t have that many apples in the orchard, no, not like last year, the branches were almost breaking under the weight. I told them they ought to spray one more time. Damn aphids ate all the blossom. So I think they’ll come. They didn’t sow any beet or carrots this year, they only had to lift the potatoes, so they probably already did it. Why should they need to do the threshing now? It can wait till winter. I’ll do it when I get back. Working the fields with only one leg would be harder, but you can do the threshing as long as your arms are healthy. Really you can, though it’d be easier with a threshing machine. I told her, just get a hired hand if you can’t manage on your own. I bet she did. With me, whatever I say, goes. Though where am I going to get a hired hand these days? You think it’s like it was before the war? She might not have found anyone. They were supposed to come right after the harvest festival. They didn’t come last time, or the time before that, or the time before that either, ever since you’ve all been in here. Because the land won’t let them go. In the winter they’d come for sure. What work is there in the winter? You feed the animals and then you sit and warm yourself in the kitchen. What, you don’t know what the land is like? It’ll grab you by the legs or the arms or round the waist and hold on. If it ever popped into that head of hers to collect a few eggs, some cream, even just a little cheese, she’d have something to bring to market. A bit more money never goes amiss. To buy salt, or sugar, or vinegar. The bus comes to the village now, they’ve surfaced the road, all you have to do is sit and stare out the window and you’re there. Maybe they’ll at least come let me know whether it’s a bull calf or a heifer. Ask me if I think they should keep it or not. I mean, the priest isn’t going to give them any advice, what does he know about calves. I’m telling you, it’s a poor story when the head of the house is gone, that’s for sure. I even said to them, the moment I’m gone, then you’ll cry. Who’s going to drive the geese down to the pond, who’ll look after the grandson, who’ll put the water on to boil when you come back from the fields. Who? I won’t be able to hear you anymore. Cry all you like. They’ll come, they’ll come. Why wouldn’t they? She was going to buy herself a new pair of shoes, and an overcoat for Jaś. She sure dresses up a lot. When he married her she was dirt poor, now she’s the lady of the village. They’re wanting to build a new house but they can’t get sheet metal for the roof anywhere, maybe they’ll come buy it in town. They’ve promised to give me my own room, with curtains in the window and a carpet on the floor. They’re going to paint flowers on the walls. What do you think, will flowers look nice? My whole life I lived with whitewashed walls, I’m worried flowers’ll give me asthma. Maybe they’ll come to buy wedding rings. Christmas is on its way, and at Christmas they’re planning to get married. They could get my blessing at the same time. Cause there’s no telling if I’ll ever make it back home. And without a blessing life can go wrong. Last Monday I sent word by the neighbor, come as soon as you can, me, I could wait, but death might not be willing to. Death’s like an emperor. However much you beg him, he won’t wait even just one more week, till the next market day at least, because something must have held them up. He’s actually not that bad of a farmer, but man does he drink. If he wasn’t drinking yesterday, he’ll for sure come today. He needs to pick up supplies for the cooperative. They canned him three times already, but they don’t have anyone else to give the job to. I told him, I said, it’s my land, my inheritance, my everything, the mutt and the rake and the stork on the roof. And you, you Johnny-come-lately, what’s your contribution? Ten lazy fingers and a lazy arm. And those glazed eyes of yours that are only interested in sleeping the whole time. And on top of that you disrespect me? I’m not giving you a thing. I’ll give to the church, I’ll give to the poor, but you, you’re not getting one red cent from me. So he beat me up so bad the dog was yowling over me. You old fart, you belong in the cemetery. That’s where your land is, your inheritance, your everything. And all she says is, Miecio, don’t hit daddy. Daddy! Daddy! But I guess I’ll forgive them if they come. Why not. I can’t take it with me after I’m gone. So maybe they’ll come. God’ll tip them the wink and they’ll come. I never was much of a one for revenge. It’s all because of the land. The land’s run wild. The land isn’t what it used to be. Evidently the land’s going to die with us, Wojciech. You’ll have enough of it in your hands, in your feet, under your back, in your eyes, in your gray hair. Last year I had a dream that I was standing on a field boundary and the land was coming toward me. There were oats and barley and wheat and rye coming, and fallow fields. There were farmers’ fields coming alongside the squire’s. They were coming from somewhere on the other side of the sky and marching like regiments, armies, battalions, companies, one field after another was marching past me and going on, moving away then disappearing. There were the neighbors’ fields, my brother-in-law’s, mine. I recognized them all from far away, of course I knew my own fields, they were all blue with cornflowers. I spread my arms. Where do you think you’re going? Stop! Stay there! I shouted. I grabbed fistfuls of crop, but it slipped out of my grip like eels. I fell to my knees. Come back! But they passed by and they vanished, and then I woke up. Why shouldn’t they come today. I bought them a car, all they need to do is hop in, vroom vroom, and they’re here. If the Lord would just send some rain, then they’d come. When it rains people remember the most forgotten things. And when the rain really sets in, it rains and rains and you keep remembering things. Long rains, people call it. You can’t send the cows out in weather like that. You can’t go plow. You sit at home, the windows are running with rain, it’s pouring down like it was coming from the sky to the earth and then back from the earth to the sky. All the houses are in a row but every one of them’s apart, every person’s apart. Course, you could mend the chair, the one that the leg fell off of. Or visit your neighbor. But it’s raining over there just the same, it’s raining everywhere in the village. And it’s raining in Sąśnice, in Walencice, the whole world. Cut it out, what’s gotten into you with that rain. If it’s potato lifting time let folks dig their potatoes in peace. The thing is, when it rains it gets at you inside so bad you’d even make up with your worst enemy. One time I actually did make up with my enemy when it was raining. For twenty years we’d been at each other’s throats. But I’m sitting at home, I couldn�
��t even go look outside cause it was cats and dogs the whole time, and my conscience started nagging me. I’ll go see him, I thought, why should we be angry with each other. I go by there, and he says, I’m surprised you could be bothered in this weather. I would’ve made up with you anyway before I died. Sit yourself down, since you’re here. Look how misty it is over the way. Take a look, your eyes are better than mine. Mine don’t see too good anymore. In the village I’d be able to tell. There’d be smoke lingering on the rooftops, and my bones’d be aching. This could be my last Monday? Lord, let it rain.
It had never happened that anyone had died on a Monday. They died on a Tuesday, a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, sometimes even on a Sunday, but on Monday they were always alive. The afternoon passed. The market was at its busiest.
“Are you not reading your book today, Mr. Kazimierz?” I asked. There was a book lying open on the bedside table and I was a bit surprised he wasn’t reading, because a day didn’t go by without him reading. His cupboard was full of books, there were even some on the windowsill. Often he’d read a whole book in a single day. When he lost himself in his reading he didn’t hear what people said to him. We couldn’t get over the fact that he kept wanting to read. Because on the whole ward he was the only one that read. Didn’t it hurt his eyes? Didn’t it give him a headache? And after all, what was the point? You read and read, and in the end it all went into the ground with you anyway. With the land it was another matter. You worked and worked the land, but the land remained afterwards. With reading, not even a line, not a single word, was left behind.
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