King of the Fields

by Isaac Bashevis Singer

  Well, but returning to the old way of life was also impossible. In olden times the Lesniks never settled down in one spot but wandered from place to place in search of animals and fish. They usually lived in tents and they knew nothing of cooking, pots, or domestic animals. Some of the neighboring settlements were herding sheep and goats, but for the Lesniks this was a sin and an abomination. They had even heard of camps that had domesticated cows, and even horses, and exchanged them for fruit, honey, and furs, but the Lesniks never had the need or skill for all this. They never even learned to keep dogs. What for? Dogs were unclean. The Lesniks never tasted milk, except from their mothers as infants. But the last few generations of Lesniks had settled down. They stopped walking barefoot in winter and wore shoes of fur hide with soles of bark. The winters had become colder. More furs were needed for protection against the cold. Cybula often reminded the Lesniks how difficult the last winter had been in the mountains, how many of them had become ill and died. The old folks were perhaps right: the people were becoming weaker, the cold stronger, the woods sparser. Demands for comfort had grown not only among women but also among men, and this kindled the wrath of the gods.

  Now, in the summer, it was warm in the mountains. There was plenty of food. Everyone ate meat, fruit, roots, till their stomachs were full. In the evening they lit fires and talked, told stories, jokes. The number of women was small—there were at least four men for each woman. But they believed more women would manage to steal out of the valley and join them in the mountains. The Poles had destroyed the Lesniks’ former family life. Hot-blooded women could do whatever they pleased. Old people warned of bitter punishments, but belief in the gods had declined. Where was Baba Yaga, with her celestial broom? Where was Swiatawid, the four-faced god, who could see from one end of the world to the other? Where was the three-faced god hiding? Where was Pirnon, the god of thunder and lightning and storms? Where were the spirits Yedza and Nocnica and all the others when the Poles attacked the camp and spilled so much innocent blood? If there was no justice among the gods, why should the people obey their commands? Cybula had spoken openly: All beliefs were lies. As long as men lived, they should enjoy themselves as much as they could. A dead man was no better than a dead frog. No one ever came back from the hollows of the earth to tell what was going on there.

  When Cybula brought back Yagoda and her mother, Kora, he aroused the men’s envy and the women’s resentment. It was clear that he had relations with both. But he was, and he remained, the Lesniks’ leader. He had a great store of knowledge, a clear mind, and was skilled in many crafts. As Cybula spoke, people listened to his words, even if they thought him wrong. A few of the young men argued that, who knows, perhaps the Lesniks should not act hastily and set fire to the fields. If the gods did not want the earth juices to be tapped, why did they bestow power on the murderous Poles and provide them with iron swords and spears?

  The old and the weak went to sleep early that evening, as they did every evening, while the young and healthy stayed up late into the night. They sang, they danced, they made jokes and asked questions of each other. They raised their eyes to the night sky—so many stars and so many different colors. Were the stars gods? Were they fires lit by the gods to brighten up the night? The same stars could be seen in the valley and in the mountains. Wherever one went, the stars came along. When one ran, they ran, too. Sometimes it seemed that they were laughing with a heavenly laughter. They looked down on earth like sparkling puzzles, and winked so that men might solve them. The old people swore that these same stars were shining when they, the old people, were children. The stars might be as old as the world. But how far back did the chain go? They would all live out their lives, die, and fade from memory—just like the animals which they had killed and eaten. It was terrifying to think about these things. The young women begged the men to stop talking about these mysteries, which caused a chill to go up and down the spine, and also a craving to kiss, to embrace, to come close, and become as one.

  That evening Cybula, Kora, and Yagoda went to sleep early. Cybula stretched out on the pelt between the two women, and he lay first with one and then with the other. Mother and daughter discarded all feelings of shame, because this was what Cybula had asked for. Both treated Cybula as if he were a god whose every word was a sacred command. He taught Yagoda not to be jealous. It was not a stranger whom he had taken but her beloved mother. Kora’s happiness was also Yagoda’s happiness. Cybula taught them how to tease him, but Kora needed no teaching, she knew everything. She said things which kindled his desire, aroused Yagoda’s envy, and made her want both to laugh and to vomit. Kora had names for the limbs of the body which Yagoda had never heard before. She taught her daughter as a mother bear teaches her cub. She confessed that the woyaks had come to her in the night, and although she cursed them in her heart, she had submitted. There were times when Yagoda hated her mother and wanted to shout: “Get out of the cave! I am not your daughter anymore, and you are not my mother!” But Kora would quickly apologize, call herself nasty names, and regret her behavior. Sometimes she would say to Cybula, “This is the truth. If you want, kill me. It’s better for me to die by your hand than to be caressed by the hands of others. Yes, kill me and eat me up. Drink my blood!”

  Sometimes when her mother and Cybula spoke and played with each other, Yagoda pretended to sleep. She even snored from time to time. Her mother still treated her like a child, but she understood everything. Her mother had not been faithful to her father, Kostek. She had lain with him and thought of Cybula. Kostek could not satisfy her, he only whetted her appetite. Kora admitted that she was sinning against the gods with her hunger for men. Demons appeared to her in her dreams and warned her that she would turn into a vikalak, a she-wolf. She would wallow in swamps, be bitten by snakes, strangled by smoks. But her body was consumed with desire. She had hated the woyaks, had prayed to the gods for their death, but when they came to her she fell into their arms.

  That evening Yagoda heard Cybula say, “The gods are not gods and the people are not people anymore.”

  “What are they, then?” Kora asked. And Cybula answered, “Rats, spiders, lice.”

  “You, Cybula, are a god,” Kora blurted.

  “If I am a god, the gods are nothing.”

  (3)

  It was a hot day. Kora and Yagoda left at dawn to dig roots and gather fruit. Cybula had carved a new bow and ten arrows for himself and went hunting, but he seemed to have lost the lust for pursuing an animal. Why did a stag or even a hare deserve to be killed? More than once it happened that his arrow entered an animal but instead of dying, the animal trotted away, leaving behind a long trail of blood. Some wounded animals waded into a river or lake and drowned there. Did they do this because they wanted to die? Or did they think the water would heal them? The animals that fell into traps suffered even more than those that were shot. Often they were impaled on sharp poles and days would pass before they died. “What is happening to me? Am I becoming softhearted, like an old woman?” Cybula asked himself. His thoughts carried him again and again back to the field. Those who plowed and sowed harmed no one. On the contrary, they provided food to birds who could manage to steal a few grains of wheat.

  After hunting a while, Cybula knew he would have to go home empty-handed. There was enough meat in the cave for a few days. Often the other hunters asked him and his women to eat from their catch. The sun had already reached the west, the sky was glowing a purplish blue, tomorrow promised to be another bright day. Cybula walked slowly, whistling to himself an old Lesnik tune. As he approached his cave, Kora came to meet him. Something had happened. She was not smiling her usual smile but looked at him intently, like a bearer of bad news. Yagoda might have fallen off a tree and died, Cybula thought. He quickly made up his mind that, if this was true, he would put an end to his own life. He had enough of killing and death, both of animals and of people. He believed only in one god—the god of death, the healer of all pain, the liberator of all burdens. Cybu
la nodded his head at Kora, but she did not respond. He said, “I know, I know.”

  “What do you know?”

  “Nothing. Tell me what happened!”

  “Your daughter is here,” Kora answered in a low voice.

  “My daughter, Laska? Has she run away from Krol Rudy?”

  “No, Krol Rudy sent her. He wants to make peace. She arrived stealthily. She looks pregnant.” Cybula could not believe his ears. “How can this be?” he asked.

  “It’s true. He sent one of his kniezes along—Nosek. He is waiting for you by the four linden trees near the stream. Everything must remain a secret.”

  “This must be a trap, to have me killed.”

  “Your daughter would not take part in such a crime,” Kora said. “Not many Poles survived the winter. They may not be able to do the harvesting. They are lazy and drunk. Laska told me it’s not a trap to deceive you—they need us.”

  “Where is Laska?” Cybula asked.

  “With Yagoda in the cave.”

  “If our people hear of this, they may kill us all,” Cybula said. “They already call me traitor.”

  “Wait until dark. I’ll go with you. You take a spear and I’ll take a knife. Nosek is not a murderer. He is the only Pole who did not kill and did not rape. Everyone in the camp knows this. He came here unarmed.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “You must be hungry. Your sack is empty,” Kora said.

  “I could not hunt today.”

  “We prepared a meal for you.”

  Cybula slid nimbly into the cave. That Krol Rudy should ask for peace and send Laska and one of his kniezes seemed like a miracle. “Maybe it is not my time to die yet,” Cybula murmured. The cave smelled of roasting meat, the smoke of pine branches, the juices of cherries and strawberries. Some time passed, as always, before his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness. Yagoda ran to him, threw her arms around his waist, and clung to him. Laska, who sat by the fire, stood up. Cybula hardly recognized her. She looked years older. Her stomach was swollen. She gave him a kiss on the forehead. This was no longer his little girl whom he used to bounce on his knees while she covered his face with kisses. This was a grown woman, pregnant, the wife of a krol. She wore a sort of wreath on her head, like all women who had husbands. To Cybula it seemed that even her breath was different. Could it be that she drank the vodka? he asked himself.

  Kora and Yagoda brought meat, fruit, vegetables to Cybula while Laska sat and spoke to him. Her husband, Krol Rudy, was not the murderer everyone thought he was. True, he had attacked the Lesniks. He was a warrior, not a lamb. However, he had seen enough bloodshed. Now he wanted peace between the Lesniks and the Poles. What was gained by all these wars? The gods had showered their blessings on the fields, and men were needed for harvesting and thrashing.

  Cybula listened to her and gaped. Laska spoke to him as if she were older and wiser than he was. In some ways she reminded him of his mother, his grandmother. He wanted to ask his daughter about her life with Krol Rudy, how she could tolerate a man who had ordered her mother killed. But he could not ask this in the presence of Kora and Yagoda. Where did she learn to speak so seriously, Cybula wondered.

  “How are things at the camp? How do you live there?” Cybula asked.

  “Ah, Father, you know yourself. Everyone has lost someone dear. It is not good for us to be separated from each other. I miss you. Not a day goes by when I do not pray to the gods for your health.”

  Who taught her to speak like this? Cybula asked himself. Not her mother and not I. He fell silent, and Laska also spoke no more. Slowly night fell. Laska said, “We can go now, Father.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Kora said. “I’ll wait nearby. One can never know what this Pole might want to do. I’ll take my cleaver. You, Yagoda, stay in the cave and watch the fire.”

  “Yes, Mother.”

  “We’ll go out one by one,” Cybula said. “You, Laska, go first.”

  Laska kissed Yagoda and crawled through the opening. Cybula took his spear and followed her out. “Whatever happens,” he said, “they will not take me alive.”

  The sun had set behind the mountains, but a brightness remained in the sky. The stars lit up one after the other. Crickets chirped, frogs croaked. The birds had all settled down on branches of trees, except for two, which flew about squawking at each other—a couple that could not find a fitting branch on which to bed down. But why? There were so many trees and so many branches! Cybula understood these creatures’ behavior no better than he could understand the behavior of men. Some songbirds ceased singing, while others warbled and trilled. They slept in pairs close to each other, kissed each other with their little beaks, groomed each other’s feathers and plucked out vermin. Yet he saw other males attack the females, even peck them to death.

  After a while Cybula caught up with Laska, and they walked beside the stream, which spattered and splashed in the night. Water always flowed swiftly downhill, Cybula thought; the steeper the slope, the swifter the current. But why? When he was young he always had one question: Dlatshego—why? And his parents’ answer was always the same: Tak yest—this is how it is, this is what the gods want. In later years he gave the same answer to his own children, even the ones who had been massacred. In fact, Laska herself used to ask her father, “Tatele, why is the summer hot? Why is the winter cold? Why does a cow moo while a goat bleats? Why should a duck swim and a hen be afraid of water? Why does wood burn but not stone?” And Cybula would say, “This is how things were created. Now leave me alone!” But afterward he was troubled by these questions.

  (4)

  Father and daughter approached the linden trees, and by the light of the stars Cybula could see the form of a man: he was slightly built, with neither hair nor beard, and a pale face. The two men bowed to each other. Then the other said, “My name is Nosek. My krol sent me here to greet you and to urge the Lesniks to return to the valley. My krol will punish no one. He is ready to forget the wrongs you did us and those we did to you. We won the war, but we cannot fight forever and shed each other’s blood. My krol wants you Lesniks to be our brothers and the camp to be a Polish camp. The gods have blessed our fields and we need your help. We cannot and do not want to eat all the bread the fields will grow. We want your daughters to become our wives, as some have already done, and may the new Polish land increase and multiply. This is the wish of our krol, his kniezes, and his woyaks. Come down to us, all of you, and we’ll face you as brothers. The krol also sent to you, Pan Cybula, this gift.” And saying these words, Nosek handed Cybula a pretzel made of wheat flour.

  Cybula took the pretzel, thanked Nosek, and then began to speak the words he had previously prepared. “Worthy kniez, I greet you and your krol in my name and in the name of the Lesniks who fled when the woyaks fell upon us. We Lesniks never wanted war. We lived in peace for a long time. But you attacked us and killed our men and women, and you did not even spare our children. Those of us who fled to the mountains suffered through a cruel winter; many lost their lives to the cold and to hunger. We who survived would like to come home to the valley where our mothers, sisters, wives, and children still live. But what assurance have we that your peace offering is not a trap to kill us all? Without such a pledge not one of us will return, even if we do miss our homes, and even if we are ready to help you with your tasks and share in the blessing with which the gods have favored us …”

  For a long time the two men conversed, while Laska stood silent. Nosek explained to Cybula that Krol Rudy and his woyaks had nothing to gain from killing the Lesniks. Besides, the Poles were few in number, and if it was violence that Cybula feared, they were more likely to lose than the Lesniks. Peace between the two former enemies would have to be based on trust. After some time, the two men agreed that Cybula would gather his people the next day and convey Krol Rudy’s proposal to them. Meanwhile, Cybula suggested to Nosek that he spend the night in a hideout known only to Cybula himself, while Laska returned to her father’s cave. Laska wo
uld serve as proof that Krol Rudy truly meant peace, because no krol would send his queen as bait to lure an enemy into a trap.

  It struck Cybula that Nosek behaved better than the other kniezes and pans. His language was clear and honest. He mentioned rivers, cities, and names of krols and leaders of whom Cybula had never heard. How did it happen that a man like this was traveling in the company of a band of Polish robbers and murderers? He told Nosek what hiding place he had in mind: it was a hut which Cybula used for building animal traps and where he kept the necessary tools. There was a pile of pelts there which Nosek could use to cover himself. The hut was quite far and Cybula offered to escort Nosek to it. But Nosek replied that if he could not find the hut he would spend the night under the stars. At that, Laska spoke up for the first time: “Your worthiness could catch a chill by sleeping under the stars. Nights in the mountains are cold.”

  “Thank you, but men like me do not chill so easily. I like to take a stroll at night and think my thoughts.”

  What sort of thoughts? Cybula wanted to ask, but he felt he was not addressing the kniez correctly. He wished to use more fitting words, but he could not find any. Instead Cybula asked, “Was it your plan to bring peace to the Lesniks and the Poles?”

  “Yes, mine, but not mine alone. Krol Rudy thought of it first. He even spoke about it with your gracious daughter, the krolowa.”

  Cybula felt embarrassed. This learned man called his daughter gracious and krolowa. Cybula had never before heard the word “gracious” about a child of his. It would have been better had she been Nosek’s wife instead of Krol Rudy’s. He began to explain to Nosek how to reach the hut. The moon would soon appear and the night would become brighter. The two men parted, and Cybula said, “I have full trust in you, your worthiness.”