You’re here to buy beans, sir? From me? I mean, you can get beans in a store, any store. But please, come on in. Don’t let the dogs scare you. They’ll just sniff at you a bit. Whenever anyone visits for the first time they have to sniff them. For my benefit. I didn’t teach them that, they just do it of their own accord. Dogs are as much of a puzzle as people. Do you have a dog? You ought to get one. You can learn a lot from a dog. All right, sit, Rex, sit, Paws. Knock it off.
Out of curiosity, how did you find the place? I’m not that easy to find. Especially now, in the off-season. There isn’t even anyone around to ask. You saw for yourself, there’s not a living soul in the cabins. They’re all long gone. Not many people even know I live here. And here you come asking about beans. It’s true, I do grow some beans, but only enough for my own needs, which are pretty modest. Like with everything else. Carrots, beets, onions, garlic, parsnip, just so I have a little. And truth be told, I don’t even like beans that much. I mean, I’ll eat them, because I’ll eat almost anything. But I’m not wild about them. Once in a while I’ll make bean soup or bean stew, but not that often. And dogs don’t eat beans.
Back in the day, sure, a lot of people grew beans around here. Because as you might know, at one time beans used to take the place of meat. And when you work as hard as the folks hereabouts would work, from dawn till nighttime, you need your meat. Not to mention that the shopkeepers often used to come out here to stock up on beans. Not beans alone, but that’s what they’d buy most of. That’s right, during the war, when there was a village here. At that time, in the towns people were starving, as you know. Almost every day the locals would drive out to the station in their horse and cart to pick them up. The station’s a couple of miles away. Then afterwards they’d drive them back with what they’d bought. It was around this time of year, late fall, that they’d come most often. Or in any case more of them would come about now, when the harvest was all done. They’d take all the beans that anyone had had time to shell, down to the last bean. Often the pods hadn’t even dried out properly but already people would be shelling away in all the houses so as to finish in time. Whole families would be shelling together. From early morning till late at night. Sometimes you’d go outside at midnight and there’d still be a light in a window here and there. Especially when there’d been a good crop. Because beans are like everything else, sometimes they grow well, other times not. It has to be a good year weather-wise. Beans don’t like too much sun. When there’s too much sun there’s not enough rain, and they get parched. Whereas if there’s too much rain, they rot before they can grow. Even so, it can be a good weather year but still every other pod will be empty or the beans’ll be bad. And no one knows why. Simple thing like beans, but they have their secrets.
Did you used to come out here back then, as a shopkeeper? No, I think I’d have recognized you. I knew almost all the people that used to come to buy beans. We grew a lot of beans, and all kinds of merchants would come buy them. Ever since I was a kid I’ve had a good memory for faces. And everyone knows that what you remember in your childhood, you remember for good. Course, you’d have been young back then, and dressed differently. In those days the shopkeepers would wear any old clothes, however rich or poor they were, they’d dress down so as not to draw attention to themselves. In the trains they’d be searched, have their belongings confiscated. Shopkeepers was just our name for them. While now I see you’re wearing an overcoat, hat, scarf. I used to have a brown felt hat like that, and a coat like yours. And I’d wear a scarf, silk or cashmere. I liked to dress well.
But why don’t you take your coat off? Hang it on the back of the door, there’s a hook there. And please, sit yourself down. Either on a chair or on a bench, as you prefer. I’ll just finish this nameplate, I’m almost done. It wouldn’t take me so long, but my hands aren’t what they used to be. No, it’s rheumatism. Though it’s better than it used to be. I can do almost anything. I just can’t play the saxophone. That’s right, I used to play. But aside from that, anything. Even repainting these nameplates, as you see. And that needs concentration in your hands also. The worst is with the smallest letters. If the brush slips you have to wipe the whole letter off with benzine and start over.
Why did I think you maybe used to come here as a shopkeeper? Well, you just appeared out of nowhere wanting to buy beans. You must have known people used to grow beans around here and you thought they still did. People often think, what could possibly have changed in a place where they’ve grown beans since forever. But how did you manage to hold on to the conviction that there are timeless places like that? That I can’t understand. Didn’t you know that places like to mislead us? Everything misleads us, it’s true. But places more than anything. If it weren’t for these nameplates I myself wouldn’t know that this was the place.
You’ve never been here before? Not even as a shopkeeper back then? Then I’m sorry I took you for one. Evidently I’ve been sitting too long staring at these nameplates. What are they? First and last names, dates, God rest their souls. Every year at this time I take them from the gravestones and repaint them. It’s pretty time-consuming. The first name and last name alone’s a lot of letters. And I have to mind every letter so the deceased won’t think I repainted his nameplate any old how because, for instance, he was from the other side of the river. Folks here were always divided into this side and the other side of the river. When people can be divided by something they always will be. It doesn’t have to be a river.
Why do I think the dead have thoughts? Because we don’t know that they don’t. What do we know? Sometimes, after only two or three letters, especially the littlest ones, my eyes hurt and my hand starts to shake, and I have to break off. You need a lot of patience with those dead letters. I barely finish one lot when the paint starts peeling on the ones I did last year. It comes off faster in the woods. It’s damp there, you only get sunlight in the clearings, so I’m always having to repaint. If I didn’t do it, by now you wouldn’t know whose nameplate was whose. I’ve tried different kinds of paints, including foreign ones. They all peel. You don’t know any kind of paint that doesn’t peel? You’re right. It’s not in anyone’s interest that something should be permanent. Especially paint. Things are always being painted over with something else.
That I don’t know. Maybe someone used to repaint them before, though not for long probably, because I could barely read what was written on them. Whoever it was must have decided that either way no one can be guaranteed anything in perpetuity in this world, so they just stopped. Plus there are the costs, the paint alone, then the brushes, labor. It’s just as well I used to know everyone in these parts. Even so, I still had to scour my memory in some cases. It was worst with the children. Some of them I felt I was only now christening.
This here is Zenon Kużdżał. I’m almost done with him. He was the youngest of the Kużdżałs. Neighbors. Here on this side, a bit further into the woods. That was why they only had a fence on the side where the road was, the other three sides were woods, so they’d say they had no need of a fence. The woods are the best fence you can have. What danger could come from the woods? Who could come to the house through the woods? At most some animal. So they set snares and traps in their yard. Often their own chickens and geese and ducks would get caught if they forgot to remove the traps during the day. Though in the evening they never could count up all those chickens and ducks and what have you properly. And every evening they’d suspect their neighbors.
They only ever let the neighbors in through the wicket gate on the road. The wicket gate was in one side of the main gateway, and the gateway wasn’t just an ordinary gateway. It was twice as high as the fence, and it had a shingled roof and two figures on either side. I don’t remember which particular saints they were. The fence itself was tall. The tallest person in the village was Uncle Jan, and he couldn’t touch the top even when he went up on tiptoe and stretched out his hand. A rattle hung on the wicket gate, you had to rattle it and someone would come down from the house and let you in. But try getting in through the woods and right away they’d be coming at you with crowbars, sicking their dogs on you. You’d have to go back to the wicket gate and shake the rattle.
You wouldn’t have gotten any beans from them, though, because they were all carvers. The grandfather made carvings, he was old as the hills, he had cataracts but if you could have seen him carving away you’d never have believed he couldn’t see. How he did it I have no idea. Maybe he made his hands look? His three grandsons, Stach, Mietek, and Zenek, they were all carvers. All strapping guys, though you’d never see them out with young ladies. You only ever saw them carving. The only one who wasn’t a carver was their father. He’d cut blocks of wood for them to make their carvings out of, rough-hew them. He probably would have made carvings as well but he was missing these three fingers here on this hand, they were blown off in the war before the last war. But he somehow managed with chopping and hewing. Word was the great-grandfather had been a carver, and the great-great-grandfather, and there was no telling how far back in time you’d have to go with those carver ancestors, because from what they said everyone in their family had made carvings since time immemorial. Even on Sundays, after the service or high mass they’d come back from church and right away they’d start carving what they’d heard from the Gospel so as not to forget it. They had plans to carve the whole Gospel, because as the grandfather put it, the world was the way God described it, not the way people saw it.
Their whole yard was littered with those carvings of theirs, they stood them all the way up into the woods. They went further and further. That may have been another reason they didn’t build a fence on the side of the woods. You couldn’t turn a wagon round in their yard, you had to back up. When they’d lead the cows out to pasture they had to mind they didn’t knock the carvings over. Cats would lie about on them sunning themselves. Sometimes their dog would start yapping out of the blue, they’d rush out of the house thinking someone must have come in from the woods, but it would turn out the dog was only barking at one of the carvings. Just as well he was on a short leash. Mrs. Kużdżał would go out to throw grain down for her poultry and people would laugh and say she was feeding the carvings, because they were getting bigger and bigger.
They weren’t regular carvings like you might imagine. I can see you’re a decent height yourself, but those carvings were way bigger than either you or me. “The Last Supper,” for instance, when they started carving that they made a clearing in the woods. The table alone was like several of these tables of mine, the benches were several times the size of my benches. And even so, the apostles were sitting so close to each other that it seemed there wasn’t any room for Jesus. He was squashed between one apostle who stood with a glass in his outstretched hand, and another one who was already asleep with his head on the table, and he was a lot smaller than the others. If they’d all stood up next to one another he wouldn’t even have come up to their waists. He was already wearing his crown of thorns, and he seemed worried about something; his head rested on his hand. From the other side of the table another one of the apostles was reaching out toward the crown of thorns as if he wanted to lift it off his head because it was too soon for it, but he couldn’t reach it. On the table there were pitchers of wine, and each one of them, I don’t own anything to compare with it. That big jug over there, or that bucket, they’d be too small. As for the bread, I don’t recall ever seeing such huge loaves being baked anywhere. And back then people would bake loaves that weighed over twenty pounds. They were going to add a roof over the scene, but they didn’t manage to.
I couldn’t tell you what those carvings were worth. Back then I was simply afraid of them. But can fear be a measure for carvings? Especially when you’re the age I was then. When mother sent me over there on some errand, to ask about something or borrow something, I’d tell her they didn’t have any or that nobody had been home. Did you shake the rattle? I did, but no one came out. Actually I don’t think she believed me, because a short while later she’d send over one of my sisters, Jagoda or Leonka, but she’d do it so I wouldn’t see.
You never heard of them trying to sell any of their carvings. Who would they have sold them to? Take them to market? What an idea. And who would come all the way out here to the village to buy carvings? People came for foodstuffs, like I said, beans, flour, kasha. Though one time the grandfather, that’s right, the blind one, he went to ask the priest for permission to put one or two of the carvings up in the church. But the priest wouldn’t allow it because none of them had gone to any school to learn to carve.
Sometimes I’d have dreams about those carvings. I’d jerk awake in the middle of the night with a shout, bathed in sweat. Mother would think I was coming down with something. I’d have to drink herbs and eat honey because I was afraid to tell her it was the carvings. I don’t know why. Maybe I was afraid that I was afraid. And of carvings on top of everything. Every fear has different levels, as you know. One kind of fear tears you from your sleep, another kind makes you fall asleep. And yet another kind … But there’s no point talking about it. The carvings are gone, the Kużdżałs are gone. Besides, I actually liked honey, though the herbs made me scrunch up my face. But mother would stand over me, drink it all up, it’ll do you good.
Do you like herbs? Then you’re like me. But I bet you like honey? I’ll give you a jar to take with you. At least you won’t be mad at yourself for making a wasted trip. I have my own, not store-bought. Here at the edge of the woods, maybe you noticed, there’s a handful of hives, they’re mine. There aren’t that many of them but when it’s a good year I get oodles of honey. I couldn’t eat it all myself. I’ve got some from a couple of years ago, the best kind is when it’s left to stand awhile. When someone does a favor for me I’ll thank them with honey if they won’t let me pay them. Or like now, in the off-season, whenever anyone comes to visit they won’t leave without a jar of honey. Or if someone has a name day party in one of the cabins, I’ll go wish them all the best and at least take a jar of honey as a gift. Or where there are children, I always remember children even without any special occasion. Children ought to eat honey.
But honey’s best when it’s drunk. How? You put a teaspoon of honey in half a glass of lukewarm water. Let it stand till the next morning. Squeeze in a half or a quarter of lemon, stir it, and drink it on an empty stomach at least half an hour before breakfast. If it’s too cold, add just a dash of hot water. It’s pure goodness. Good for your heart, for rheumatism. Honey’s good for everything. It’ll keep you from catching cold. When I was young and I worked on building sites, one time we roomed at the house of this one beekeeper and he taught me all that. But back then who gave a thought to drinking honey? There was never the time. And if you were going to drink anything it would be vodka. In those days vodka was the best for everything, not honey.
What kind do you prefer, heather or honey-dew? The honey-dew is from conifers, not deciduous trees, it’s virtually black, it’s much better. In that case I’ll give you a jar of each. My favorite is buckwheat honey. There used to be a guy here grew a lot of buckwheat. Three days ago I repainted his nameplate. The buckwheat hadn’t even begun to flower and already he’d be putting up hives in it. I used to go watch him collecting honey from those hives of his. He’d be wearing a hood with a net over his face, and I’d just be there. And you won’t believe it, but I never got stung by a bee. They’d land on me, but they never did a thing. He couldn’t get over it. You’re a strange kid, that you are. I’m the beekeeper here … Go bring a pot. And he’d pour me some honey straight from the hive.
These days, who’d grow buckwheat around here, and where? You saw for yourself, there’s the lake they made, the cabins around the lake, and the woods. The woods were always there. They’re the only thing that was there then and is here now. Except that the woods were mostly on this side. Now they’ve spread to the other side, where the fields used to be. If you don’t hold woods back they’ll grow everywhere, into your yard. They overgrew where the farmyards used to be. When I say the other side, I mean the other side of the Rutka. The Rutka? That was the river that used to run through here, I told you how it split the village in two. How could they have made an artificial lake if there hadn’t been a river? The name comes from ruta, rue, not from ruda, iron ore. Do you know what rue is? You’re not the only one. Here in the cabins hardly anyone knows anything about herbs. At most mint, chamomile. They don’t know their trees, can’t tell an oak from a beech. Not to even mention hornbeams, sycamores. They can’t tell rye from wheat, wheat from barley. They call it all grain. I wonder if they’d even recognize millet. I don’t see many people growing millet these days.
Rue was used to treat different illnesses, on its own or with other herbs. They used it for eyes, for nerves, cuts and bruises, to prevent infection. You could drink it or make a compress. It could break spells. And most important of all, young women wove their garlands out of rue. It was like a magnet for young men. A lot of it grew around here, maybe that’s where the Rutka got its name? You can’t imagine what that river was like. It wasn’t especially big, rivers that run through villages never are. It came down a broad valley where there were meadows, then after the valley the fields began. It was wider at some points, narrower in others. In some places, when it hadn’t rained for a long time you could get across by stepping from one rock to another. When you stood at the edge of the valley and the sun would come out from behind the clouds, it looked like the Rutka was flowing across the entire width of the valley. Course, there were times it actually was that wide, when the ice melted, or when it just kept raining and raining. At those times you wouldn’t believe it was the same Rutka, it was so wild. It didn’t just cover the valley, the fields flooded as well. Anyone that lived close to the river had to move to higher ground. At those times people swore revenge on the Rutka, they wept over it. But then the waters would fall and it’d go back to being calm and good-natured. It would flow in its leisurely way. You could throw a stick into the water and walk alongside on the bank to see who was faster, you or the Rutka. Even if you only walked slowly, you’d always win. It twisted and turned, and in the places where it meandered it got overgrown with sweet rush, bulrushes, water lilies, white lotuses. When it all bloomed you can’t imagine what it was like. Or if you could only have heard the nightingales in May.
It wasn’t all shallow. Most places it was shallow. But it had its deep moments too. One of them was the deepest of all. People went there to drown themselves. Mostly young folks, when their parents wouldn’t agree to them getting married. They said most of the ones that had drowned there, it was for that reason. That people had always gone there to drown themselves, because that was where it was deepest. Though they did it for different reasons. And not just young people. Though they didn’t always choose drowning, some people hung themselves. And the Rutka just flowed on.
You might find it hard to believe, but to me it seemed the biggest river on earth. I was even convinced that all rivers were called Rutka and that they all came from the Rutka, like from a single mother. I’d already started at school but I still couldn’t believe there were much bigger rivers in the world, and that they each had their own name.
We had a boat. Sometimes I’d drag it into the densest rushes, everyone would be calling me, mother, father, but I wouldn’t answer. I’d just lie there in the bottom of the boat feeling like I was nowhere at all. And if you were to ask me whether I’d ever been happy, it was only ever then. You’d rather not ask me that? I understand. Or I’d take the boat out into the middle of the stream, lie down in it and float and float, and the river would carry me. What do you think, do rivers like that disappear? I really don’t know. Sometimes I go and stand down by the lake and look out there wondering where it must flow now. And you know, one time I managed to make out one of its banks. Which one? To know that, I’d have to have known which one I was standing on.
I couldn’t tell you where it came from or where it finished up. Back then no one went that far. It was scary to walk such a distance, the woods in these parts stretch on and on. Nowadays I don’t go walking that far either, because why would I. Besides, you go into the woods on this side or the other, and right by the edge you have everything you could need. Blueberries, wild strawberries, blackberries, mushrooms. Not at this time of year, of course. You’re too late for that. Now there’s only cranberries. But you’d need to wait till the frosts set in, because they mostly grow in the bogs. The bogs aren’t far from here. I could give you a jug, you could go pick yourself some. Cranberries are delicious with pâté. Especially when you add pears as well, and if it’s pâté made from hare.
I don’t go picking. I don’t have time, I have to mind things here. Now for example, in the off-season, aside from me and the dogs, there’s not a soul here. Once in a while someone’ll come by to check on their cabin. Though in fact they don’t need to. Everyone knows that it’ll all be OK. It couldn’t not be, because I’m here looking after things. They’ve had many an opportunity to see that for themselves. But I’ve no right to stop them if they want to come and see what’s what. They belong to them. But that’s usually in the morning. This time of day no one’s likely to show up. At this time nothing happens. And dusk is starting to fall a lot earlier. A month ago I wouldn’t have needed to turn on the lights. I could see the letters perfectly well, even the tiniest ones. And I wouldn’t have needed my glasses. Whereas now, like you saw, it’s dusk, and there isn’t even the faintest ripple on the lake. You’d be forgiven for thinking the water had hardened into solid ground. Especially on a day like today, when there’s no wind, someone might imagine they could cross from one shore to the other without getting their feet wet.
So you’re staying in Mr. Robert’s cabin? I don’t think you arrived in the night, I would have heard you. I didn’t sleep at all in the night, I’d have heard. In the night the faintest sound carries across the lake. I only got to sleep in the morning. The dawn was already starting to break, I looked out the window, but you weren’t there then. After that I dropped off, I don’t even know when. The fog held you up on the way? We didn’t have any fog here. True, in the fall you get fog that’s so dense you can barely drive through it. You’re driving along and all of a sudden there’s this white wall.
When I was still living abroad, one time in the fall, round about this time of year, I decided to come for a visit. In fall, when no one would be here. And I stayed in Mr. Robert’s cabin, like you. Mr. Robert had told me where to find the key. Under the deck, hanging on a nail in the beam. That’s where you found it too? There you go. Before that I’d only ever been here once, one Sunday during the season. Mr. Robert and I arrived together then. This time Mr. Robert couldn’t make it. Of course I could have the use of his cabin, he said when I phoned him, but unfortunately he wouldn’t be able to join me. He told me where things would be, and where I’d find the key.
The sun had already set by the time I crossed the border. I figured I’d arrive in the night and maybe even get a decent night’s sleep. As long as I was on the highway everything went OK, it was a starry night, the moon was out, I could see clearly. But I turned off onto a side road, then onto another, and the fog started. To begin with it was sparse, and it only appeared here and there, I’d just drive through strips of mist lying in places across the road. My fog lamps worked just fine. I was even driving pretty fast for the time of day. But with every mile the strips of mist grew thicker. After a bit, it seemed like barriers of fog were starting to rise up in the road. You could only see anything in the towns, where there were lights. But as I’d leave each town I’d find myself in even thicker fog. It got denser and denser. The fog was in front of me, on top of me, to the sides, behind. It was like the world had gone away and there was only fog. I tried turning on all the lights I had, but nothing did any good. I was well aware that full beams are the worst in a situation like that. You turn them on and immediately you have a white screen in front of you. You can only use your sidelights and fog lamps. Best of all is if someone’s with you in the car, they can crack the door open and watch the road surface, tell the guy at the wheel which way to go. But I was on my own. On top of that, there were no other cars either in front of me or behind. Because you can agree with another driver to take turns at leading, him for a bit, then you for a bit. In fog, the best way to know where to go is to follow someone else’s red tail lights. At moments I almost lost confidence in whether I was even on the road, I was scared I’d drive into the ditch or hit a road sign or a tree. Honestly, I’d never driven in fog that bad before. Every now and then I’d stop and get out to take a breather. I’d stretch a bit, climb back in and drive on.
All of a sudden I see these strange faint little lights along the sides of the road. What could it be? To start off they were only here and there. But you could see they were in people’s windows, even though the windows themselves were barely visible, let alone the houses, which were no more than faint outlines in the fog. I guessed I must be driving through some town, especially since there were more and more of the lights, they came closer together, and soon they formed a shining chain on either side of the road so it was like driving down a kind of avenue. Well, I wasn’t exactly driving, more like inching along. The fog in front of me was still as dense as before.
Then, out of the blue two figures emerged from the fog right in front of the hood. It looked like two men. I didn’t have time to hit the horn, I just slammed on the brakes. I broke out in a sweat and my heart pounded so loud it almost made the car shake. I was convinced they’d go for me, start hammering on the car windows, pull the door open, start calling me all kinds of names. And they’d have been right, because what of it that they’d been walking in the middle of the road? But can you imagine, they didn’t even notice the car. I think they were arguing, I could hear hoarse raised voices. They were waving their arms, pushing at one another. It looked like on top of everything else I was about to witness a scrap in the middle of all the fog.
I wound the window down a bit and turned the radio up to the max. There was some booming music playing, I thought maybe they’d hear and get out of the way. Not a bit of it. They stood there swaying every which way, then all at once they threw their arms around one another, hugged affectionately, and kissed each other on the cheek. They were so drunk they each had to take turns holding the other guy up when he started to slip to the ground.
In the end I sounded the horn once and twice, and to my surprise they patted each other’s arm and one moved to one side of the road, one to the other. My foot was already poised over the gas pedal when they suddenly came back and started hugging each other again. And this time they stayed there, holding on to each other and rocking, as if they’d vowed that they’d never part, they’d simply lie down and sleep where they were, on the road. But luckily they put their arms around each other and set off into the fog, taking up the whole width of the road. I crawled after them, hoping I might be able to get around them when one of them pulled the other to one side of the road. But whenever one of them pulled his companion toward one side, the second man would pull him back the other way. They zigzagged forward, plus they’d come to a halt every so often, clapping each other on the back, shaking the other guy or tugging at his hand. And I had to stop with them.
At a certain moment a gateway loomed up out of the fog over the road. Actually, it shone there. A chain of faint little lights, like the ones in the windows, marked it out from the roadside on one side. The lights climbed up then broke off in the middle over the roadway, probably the bulbs in the other half were burned out or there’d been a short circuit. On the half that was lit up, one word could be seen: Welcome. The message for sure was longer, but the other half of it had gone out.
They stopped in the gateway. They weren’t hugging anymore, or shaking one another, or slapping each other on the back. They just shook hands, and I started to hope that maybe they’d finally go their separate ways. They couldn’t let go of each other’s hands, as if they weren’t sure they could stand on their own two feet. In the end, though, they managed to pull apart, and one disappeared on one side of the road, the other one on the other.
I breathed a sigh of relief. But I didn’t move off right away. I got out of the car and stood there for a while to calm down. The chill of the fog did me good. Only then did I get back in the car and move off very slowly. I’d gone maybe a few dozen yards, and here they appeared out of the fog again, in the middle of the road. I didn’t know what to do. I pulled up. But they must have noticed the car, because they turned around clumsily to face me, still arm in arm. I rolled the window down and leaned out.
“Good evening, gentlemen. Do you think you could …?”
They gestured as if to tell me they’d get out of the road right away. And in fact, a moment later they staggered forward. I decided to wait a while. I found some music on the radio and listened for a bit before I set off again. I drove with my heart in my mouth, my eyes peeled, worried they might loom up yet again out of the fog in the middle of the road. You may find it hard to believe, but it was like I’d grown attached to them. I’d even begun to miss them.
The lights came to an end and I sped up a little. A few miles further on I suddenly felt so tired that when I saw a lighted sign saying “Inn” I decided to stop.
The place was quiet and the owner polite. He advised me against driving in the fog. Fog like this, you’ve no business driving in it. Get some sleep, some rest, let the fog clear. Our rooms are comfy, reasonable. Would you like something hot to eat? We can make it right away. Will you have a beer? These days you can get any kind of beer you want. Imported even. Or would you prefer something a little stronger? We’ll have a room ready for you in no time. We’ve had a busy day today.
“What were all those lights in the windows? And the gateway?” I asked without thinking. “Was it because of the fog?”
He gave me a distrustful look.
“Where are you from?”
“I live abroad.”
It was only then he softened:
“There was a procession with a holy picture.”
But you know, I didn’t sleep a wink all night. I was even weighing up whether I should keep going or turn back. You got a decent night’s sleep, though, right? Because when I woke up, or rather when the dogs woke me, and I glanced out the window a couple of times, there was still no sign of you. The car was there so I gathered someone must have arrived. I only wondered who it could possibly be this time of year, in the fall. Especially as it was a different car, no one around here has a car like that. What kind is it? Thought so. I used to have one of those. Went like greased lightning. And never a problem. I’d take off from the lights and be half way down the street before the other drivers had even moved. I’d step on it and the thing would almost leap under me. Hardly anyone ever overtook me on the open road. I liked to drive fast. Drive fast, live fast. I used to think that if I lived fast, life would last shorter. Was I afraid? Of what? It was no big deal. There really isn’t that much of a reason to respect life. My life at least. Oh yes, I got plenty of speeding tickets. One time my license was suspended for a year. Accidents? Can anyone drive without having accidents? Just like you can’t live without having accidents. Once I broke my leg, right here, in this place. Once I had a broken collar bone, once three ribs, another time I had a concussion. One time they had to cut me out of the car. But can you imagine it, I was all in one piece. Just a few scrapes and bruises, nothing more. I was lucky? Perhaps. Though I don’t know what luck is. It was only when I came down with rheumatism that I didn’t drive at all for three years. Then after that I drove much slower.
What’s your license plate number? I didn’t see it, and I have to note it down. I write down every car that comes here. Not just the number. Make, model, color. Not the owners of the cabins. I’ve had their cars written down from the beginning. Except when someone gets a new car. But otherwise I already have them all. During the season all kinds of friends of the different owners come to visit. Often I have them show me their auto registration document, and I check to see whether the car has any dings or scratches. You can never be sure with friends. He’s a friend, but he could turn out to be anyone. And you can’t count on witnesses if something were to happen. Ten witnesses and there’ll be ten colors, ten makes and ten different models, not to mention all the license plate numbers. I don’t trust witnesses. I even write down when they arrive and the time they leave. I have a separate notebook for cars. I’ve a different one for the cabins, who and when, for how long, how many people. And a third one for other business. You can’t keep proper order with just one notebook.
I didn’t realize at first that you were staying in Mr. Robert’s cabin. It was only when you opened the curtains. Could it be Mr. Robert? I thought to myself. I couldn’t believe it. It’s been such a long while since he was last here, but here he is after all this time, how about that. It must have been after midday when you came out, right? You stood on the deck, took a look around and it was then that I saw it wasn’t Mr. Robert. Though not right away. You’re the same height as him and you’re both slim. Also, your hat was covering your face. The dogs started pawing at the door to be let out, and that was when I knew it wasn’t Mr. Robert. But I wouldn’t let them out on their own with a stranger. I decided to wait till you came over to my place, you’d tell me who you are, why you’re here, how long for.
What puzzled me the most was how you knew where to find the key. Aside from Mr. Robert and me, no one knows it’s on a nail in the beam under the deck. I even thought you must be a close friend of Mr. Robert, so all the more I won’t go over there, especially with the dogs, asking you questions and checking on you like with other visitors. You’re sure to come see me, tell me what’s going on with Mr. Robert, where he’s living, how he’s doing. I once tried to find out where on earth he’d moved to, but even his closest neighbors on the same floor didn’t know. He didn’t leave a forwarding address with anyone. He sends me the money regularly. In an envelope, not by money order. But he never even includes a note, just money folded in a blank sheet of paper. And the postmark’s so faint I can never read where it’s from. He must have a friend at the post office. If it’s not from him, who could it be from? Why would some stranger keep sending me money? I don’t get it. He might at least visit just once. To see how things are here. Or at the very least send me his address so I can write and tell him everything’s fine. The cabin’s still there. I’m looking after it. So he needn’t worry.
I look after all of the cabins, so I look after his also. I sometimes go inside as well, make sure everything’s all right. Air the place out, dust, make repairs if I see something’s broken. That’s not part of my duties, but since I have the keys I see to it all. That’s right, I have keys to all the cabins. Soon as they all leave I go around, check the cabins one by one, make sure the doors and windows are shut and locked, because you never know. When something needs fixing I make a note, then over the fall or winter I see to it. There’s always something needs repairing after the season. I can’t just leave it. I can’t stand to see when something’s broken. It hurts to look at it. If only it were just those kind of things. Sometimes I’ll go into a cabin and it’s like they fled the place in panic. The refrigerator’s still running, the TV’s playing. The stove is on, water’s not been shut off, bed’s unmade. One time I went into one of the cabins and there was an iron plugged in, standing on a blanket on the table, and the blanket was smoking. A moment later and the whole place would have gone up in flames. The neighboring cabins as well, because it was a windy day. Ever since that time with the iron I watch for when they move out.
Sometimes they even leave unfinished food on their plates. Dirty dishes. Empty bottles and beer cans on the table, empty vodka glasses, trash cans overflowing, used tampons or condoms on the floor. Someone just took it off and dropped it. It’s partly my fault, I’ve gotten them all used to the fact that I see to everything. But I couldn’t do otherwise. I won’t deny that there are some cabins it’s a pleasure to go into. Sometimes I’ll even sit down and listen awhile. What to? You can hear all kinds of things if you’re inclined to listen.
Usually, twice during the day and at least once in the night, I do the rounds of all the cabins on both sides of the lake. Early morning, soon as the sun’s up I check all the windows and doors in every cabin, make sure nothing’s been smashed or broken into. If something doesn’t look right I’ll go peek inside. Actually, the dogs are always the first to sense when something’s amiss. They run around each cabin and they give a short bark to say everything’s fine. Then they run to the next one. If there’s something wrong they wait for me, barking like there’s no tomorrow.
And again in the evening. At that time I look in on every cabin, turn the lights on. Inside, on the deck. I leave the lights on and move to the next one. Cabin after cabin, it all gets brighter and brighter as I go. It’s like a chain of lights round the lake. The whole place glows, as if the lake was shining, and the sky above it, and the woods. You have no idea how much the dogs love it then. I’d never have imagined dogs could enjoy something so much. Most of the time they’re real quiet, alert, they don’t bark unless they have a reason. They never howl like some dogs do. Not even to the moon. Or one time someone died in one of the cabins, not even then. Unless they’re imagining something to themselves, when that’s the case there doesn’t even need to be anything happening. You wouldn’t believe what they’re capable of imagining. So maybe when all those lights are lit, they imagine it’s their paradise? I mean, dogs don’t have to see paradise as a flowering garden that contains everything there is. All that matters to them is that there aren’t any people. What about me? Maybe they think I’m the one that looks after paradise for them.
Then we go back to the first cabin and switch off all the lights in each one in turn. What is it that you found surprising? About the dogs’ paradise? Well if you ask me, human beings are the worst creatures for dogs. I have my reasons for saying that. Rex there, I found him in the woods. He’d been tied to a tree with a steel cord. I probably wouldn’t have even noticed him, I was staring at the ground looking for wild strawberries, then all of a sudden I heard something whimpering like a child. It never even occurred to me it could be a dog. With a deer for instance, when it’s caught in a trap and dying, when you hear it you know right away it’s a deer. I’ve found dying deer like that once in a while. But this time it sounded like a kid. I stood still and held my breath. Could someone’s child have gotten lost in the woods? It must have been tiny, because only tiny ones whimper that way. Except that a baby couldn’t have made its way into the woods on its own. The sound stopped. I looked around, couldn’t see anything. I went back to looking for wild strawberries. Then a moment later I hear the whimpering again. It’s faint as anything, but I can hear it. I have good ears. There was this warehouse keeper used to teach me the saxophone, he’d always say, you’ve a long way to go with your playing, but you’ve got a good pair of ears. Just keep at it.
I started wondering which of the people in the cabins could have a newborn baby. Let me tell you, nothing could surprise me anymore, even if someone had left a baby in the woods. I started checking one bush after another, all the nearby trees. All at once I see him, Rex, under a beech tree. He must have smelled me and whined, even though he was half dead. You should know that the sense of smell is the last thing to go in a dog. When he saw me he even tried to get up from the ground. But he didn’t have the strength. Then he whimpered again like a baby. Are you going to make it or not, I started wondering. If not I’ll have to bring a spade and bury you. One more grave in the woods won’t make any difference. I repaint everyone’s nameplates, I can do yours too. That was when I gave him the name Rex. Here lies Rex. May he rest in peace just the same. I won’t put a cross up for you, though you deserve a cross after what you’ve been through. He tried again to get up. He scratched at the earth with his claws and looked at me like he was begging me not to leave him there.
So I put my hands under his belly and stood him up. I thought to myself, if he can stand upright maybe he’ll pull through. I didn’t believe he’d be able to. And guess what, he stayed on his feet. Skin and bone. He was getting verminous. His neck was all bloody from the cord, and vermin had gotten into the wound. Into his eyes. Bloody foam was coming from his mouth. He swayed and he trembled, but he stayed on his feet. All right then, come on, I said, let’s try and live. I untied the cord from his neck and I urged him, come on, take one step and you’ll be able to walk. The first step is the most important. He did take one step, but then he collapsed. What was I to do? I picked him up and carried him. But my arms began to get tired. You can see what a huge animal he is, even though then he didn’t weigh half what he does now. I wished I’d had my penknife with me, I could have cut a few branches, made a stretcher and pulled him behind me somehow or other. Luckily I was wearing a jacket. I took it off, took off my shirt, tied them together, fastened them with the cord, put him into the whole thing, sat down, and somehow hoisted him onto my back, then I managed to struggle to my feet. And that was how I brought him home.
After that I asked around at the cabins whether anyone had lost a dog. No one had. I fed him up, brought him back to health, you see what he’s like now. The only thing that made me think was that the folks from one of the cabins left immediately afterwards and they didn’t come back the next season, then they sold their cabin. It’s belonged to someone else for a good few years now, but whenever we do our rounds Rex always lies down outside that cabin, by the door to the deck. I always have to take him away from there, the new owner can’t understand why this dog always has to pick his doorway.
The other one, Paws, I saved him from drowning. One evening, it was also late autumn, the off-season, I was listening to music. When I listen to music I usually leave the lights off. All of a sudden I thought I heard someone driving up to the far shore of the lake in a car. You see, I can be listening to music and still hear everything. I went outside, didn’t see any lights, I thought I’d been mistaken. Then I heard a faint thud like a trunk being shut. Who on earth could it be at that time? Being so quiet, without lights? I thought, I’ll go see. And I snuck over there, stepping softly so whoever it was wouldn’t hear me coming and drive away. I was still some ways away when I recognized him. It was a guy from one of the cabins.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him.
“Nothing really,” he said evasively. “I just came to pick up some stuff from my place, I didn’t mean to wake you up. Your lights were off, I figured you must be asleep.”
“I wasn’t asleep.” Then I hear a squealing sound. I look around, and in the dark I see what looks like a sack. And something’s clearly moving inside it. “What’s with the sack?” I ask.
“I took a few rocks,” he says. “I’ve got a yard at home. It looks nice when you put rocks around the flower beds, so my wife asked me while I’m here …”
“Rocks,” I say, “and they’re moving and squealing?”
In fact there were also rocks in the sack, but he couldn’t explain the movement and the squealing. In the end he couldn’t keep it up:
“Forgive me. It’s a little dog, a puppy. I came here to drown it. I bought it for my grandson. He was crazy about having a dog. But he doesn’t want it anymore.”
Ever since then, whenever he comes here he always brings something for my dogs. Dog chow, or canned dog food with beef or turkey or salmon. And not just during the season, in the off-season as well, he often visits in the winter and brings them something. I tell him he needn’t bother, they have plenty to eat. All he’ll do is spoil them. But one time he says to me:
“You saved my soul.”
I was taken aback — all he’d been intending to do was drown a dog, and here he was talking about his soul. All the more because if you ask me, these days the soul is a commodity like anything else. You can buy it and sell it, and the prices aren’t high. Maybe it was always that way. I read in some book that centuries ago someone said the human soul is a piece of bread. Do you think bread could have been so very expensive back then? If so, it’s hardly surprising things are the way they are. Sorry for asking, but I imagine you must know what a human soul might cost these days, even just thinking about my dogs here. Or the graves in the woods.
You didn’t know there were graves in the woods? I was convinced you’d gone into the woods to look for them. I even wondered how you knew about them. Could Mr. Robert have told you? He let you stay in his cabin, said where to find the key, so maybe he told you about the graves as well. That was why I didn’t want to bother you. It’s always awkward to go ask someone who they are, why they’re here, how long for. Some folks I have to ask to show ID, because not everyone can be taken at their word. Or I even ask to see written permission that they can stay in someone’s cabin, especially if I’ve never seen them here before. But since it’s Mr. Robert …
Tell me at least how his health is. You don’t know Mr. Robert? Really? I bet you just don’t want to let on. Mr. Robert must have told you to say that. I was even thinking he must have sent you to let me know what’s going on with him. I thought maybe he’s ill and he couldn’t make it himself. So I waited till you’d had a good night’s sleep and came to see me. But you went off into the woods. To begin with I thought you’d gone for a walk, to relax a bit after the drive, get some fresh forest air, but that you’d be back soon. I kept looking out the window, I even went outside a couple of times and stood there, but there was no sign of you. Everything started to get dark, the lake, the cabins, the woods. Soon it’d be night, then how would you find your way back? I was worried. It’s your first time here, you don’t know the woods, you could get lost. I’d have to take the dogs out and go looking for you. I turned a light on just in case, thinking that the light might lead you back. You saw it? There you are. It’s not hard to get lost out there, especially this time of year, in the fall. Right now nothing is what it is.
I almost got lost there myself. Yeah, that time the fog held me up on the way. It was all quiet and deserted, and just like you I went into the woods to find where the graves are. That was basically why I’d come in the first place. I didn’t know exactly where they were, only that they were in the woods. When Mr. Robert told me about them, he just waved toward the woods in general, as if to say, over that way. But the woods go on and on, where are you supposed to start? And if they were at least together, but no, they’re all over the place. I walked about the whole day, I don’t even remember how many of them I found that day. I didn’t notice it had started to get dark. Especially because the darkness doesn’t come all at once, as you know. For a long time you think you can see fine. And since you can see … I knew the woods, so I somehow managed to find my way back in the dark. But imagine this, it was only when I came out by the lake that I no longer knew where I was. On this shore or the other one. I remembered which direction the Rutka flowed, but now it seemed to me it was the opposite. The cabins could just about be made out in the darkness, but which one was Mr. Robert’s, I couldn’t have said. So I just stood there, I was completely unable to get my bearings. I even started to doubt whether it was me standing where I was standing.
All of a sudden, I saw a tiny light in the distance. At first it was ever so faint. I thought someone must be walking, lighting their way with a flashlight. But I didn’t know how I could call to them, whether they’d hear me at that distance, since I myself didn’t know where I was. All at once the light grew brighter, it stopped moving, and it came much closer. It was like I was standing on this side of the Rutka and it was shining on the other side. At that moment you know what I thought? That they must be shelling beans at our place. And imagine this, they actually were.
Bean shelling always began with a light. Mother would wash the dishes after dinner, sweep up, then till dusk she’d disappear between the bed and the dresser with a rosary in her hands. Grandmother usually dozed off. Granddad would go out into the yard to check that everything was in its place. It was like everyone was waiting for the dusk, when we were going to shell beans. Father would sit on the bench by the window and smoke one cigarette after another, and stare out the window like he was expecting someone. Dusk gradually crept in everywhere, and he would just keep staring and staring out the window. You might have thought it was the dusk he was watching. But can you ever tell what a person’s staring at? You think they’re staring at one thing or another, but they may be staring inside themselves. People have things to look at inside themselves, that’s for sure. But perhaps he was also staring at the dusk as it settled in. What could have been so interesting about the dusk? Let me tell you, I often stare myself as dusk is falling, and at those times, I wonder whether it’s the same dusk my father used to stare at. That means something. From time to time he’d sort of accompany his staring with a running commentary:
“The days are really getting shorter. They really are. There’s barely room for people in them. They’re hardly over, and here it’s night. Why does there have to be so much night? What’s it for?” And as he put out yet another cigarette he’d turn to mother and say: “Light the lamp.”
Mother would get up from her rosary. She’d take the lamp down from the nail on the wall and check there was enough kerosene in it for the shelling. Sometimes she asked father:
“Should I top it up?”
To which he would usually say:
“Sure.” And he’d never fail to remind her to trim the wick, because it was probably burned hard, or to clean the glass because it had gotten sooty the day before.
He didn’t need to. Mother would have done those things anyway. Getting the lamp ready was like the crowning moment of the day for her. A kind of thanksgiving even, that the day had been gotten through. So she put all of her care into those preparations, as if surviving the next day depended on it. When she brought the match to the wick her hand would tremble and her face would be intent. After she put the glass back on the lamp she’d keep watching to make sure the flame caught. Only then would she turn the wick up a little. Her eyes behind their wire-rimmed glasses were lit up from underneath, and her expression would show she couldn’t quite believe that the miracle of light had happened by her own hand.
You may not believe me, but I couldn’t wait for the moment when mother would light the lamp. As soon as it started to get dark outside, I’d beg her: “Light the lamp, Mama, light the lamp.” I can’t explain it, but I wanted the light in our window to be the first one in the village. Father would hold her back, say it’s still too early, we can still see each other. Grandfather and grandmother would agree, they’d say it was a waste of kerosene. Uncle Jan would get up for a drink of water, which perhaps meant he had no need of light in general. And in my mother’s eyes there’d be a sort of indulgent smile as if she understood why I was so anxious for her to light the lamp.
Whenever she’d reach for the lamp on its nail on the wall, I’d rush out of the house, run down to the Rutka and wait there till the miracle of light by mother’s hand appeared in our window. When the first light in the whole village came on in our window, it was like the first light in the entire world. Let me tell you, the first light is completely different than when there are already lights here and there, in all the other windows, in all the other houses. It shines differently, and it’s immaterial whether it comes from a kerosene lamp or an electric bulb. It can be faint, like from a kerosene lamp, but you still have the impression it’s not just shining. It’s alive. Because the way I see it, there are living lights and dead lights. The kind that only shine, and the kind that remember. Ones that repel you, and ones that invite you. Ones that see, and ones that don’t know you. Ones that it’s all the same to them who they’re shining for, and ones that know who they shine for. Ones that however bright they shine, they’re still blind. And ones that even if they’re barely glowing, still they can see all the way to the end of life. They’d break through any darkness. The deepest shadows will surrender to them. For them there are no boundaries, there’s no time or space. They’re capable of summoning the most ancient memory, however eroded it is, even if a person’s been cut off from it. I don’t know if you agree, but in my view memory is like light that’s streaming toward us from a long-dead star. Or even just from a kerosene lamp. Except it’s not always able to reach us during our lifetime. It depends how far it has to travel and how far away from it we are. Because those two things aren’t the same. Actually, it may be that everything in general is memory. The whole of this world of ours ever since it’s existed. Including the two of us here, these dogs. Whose memory? That I don’t know.
In any case, when I saw the light I knew right away where I was. The more so because when we shelled beans in our house, mother would always turn up the lamp to almost the full wick. Before she did it she’d always remember to ask father whether she should make the flame bigger. Though she knew full well he’d say: “Yes, turn it up. It’d be fine like it is for everyone else, but for your eyes it needs to be brighter.” Then she’d spread a canvas sheet on the floor, put a stool in the middle of it, stand the lamp on the stool, and father would go bring the bundles of beans.
So when I saw the light get brighter and come to a stop, I knew mother had put it on the stool and father had gone to fetch the beans. Though I paused a moment outside the door, because I didn’t know what to say when I went in. So many years had passed, no one expects you anymore, what should I say, what had I come for? I kept weighing it up, whether to go in or not, and what I should say when I crossed the threshold. As you know, crossing the threshold is the hardest part. In the end I thought to myself, it’s best if I just go right on in and ask whether they might have any beans for sale.
They were all sitting in the circle of the kerosene lamp, father, mother, granddad, grandmother, my two sisters Jagoda and Leonka, and Uncle Jan, who was still living. He was the only one who got up when I came in, he went to get a drink of water. He drank a lot of water before he died. The rest of them, the bean pods were motionless in their hands. I stood beyond the circle of light, just inside the door, while they sat in the ring made by the light, I could see them all clearly. But no one smiled or showed surprise or even frowned. They looked at me, but their eyes already seemed dead, it’s just there hadn’t been anyone to close their eyelids. It was only the pods in their hands that showed they were shelling beans. And they didn’t know me.
Did you want a lot in the way of beans? That much I think I might have. Though they’re unshelled. But if you helped me we could shell them. You’ve never shelled beans before? It’s not so hard. I’ll show you. After a couple of pods you’ll figure it out. I’ll go fetch some.