The Passport

THE STONE IN THE LIME

The owl flies in a circle over the apple tree. Windisch looks at the moon. He’s watching which direction the black patches are moving. The owl doesn’t close its circle.

The skinner had stuffed the last owl from the church tower two years before and given it to the priest as a gift. “This owl lives in another village,” thinks Windisch.

The unknown owl always finds its way here to the village at night. No one knows where it rests its wings by day. No one knows where it closes its beak and sleeps.

Windisch knows that the owl can smell the stuffed birds in the skinner’s loft.

The skinner had given the stuffed animals to the town museum as a gift. He didn’t receive any money for them. Two men came. Their car stood in front of the skinner’s house for a whole day. It was white and closed like a room.

The men said: “These stuffed animals are part of the wildlife population of our forests.” They packed all the birds in boxes. They threatened a heavy punishment. The skinner presented them with all his sheepskins. Then they said everything was all right.

The white, closed car drove out of the village as slowly as a room. The skinner’s wife smiled in fear and waved.

Windisch is sitting on the veranda. “The skinner applied later than we did,” he thinks. “He paid in town.”

Windisch hears a leaf on the stones in the hallway. It’s scratching on the stones. The wall is long and white. Windisch closes his eyes. He feels the wall growing on his face. The lime burns his forehead. A stone in the lime opens its mouth. The apple tree trembles. Its leaves are ears. They listen. The apple tree drenches its green apples.