A Treatise on Shelling Beans

10

What happened after that? After that it snowed. That much you know. How do you know I hid in the potato cellar? I didn’t hide, mother sent me in the morning with a basket to fetch potatoes. The zurek soup was already on the go, she’d put the potatoes in and for sure what was in the pot would have been enough. But she suddenly decided it wouldn’t do. Get the basket and bring a few more, son, I’ll peel them and pop them in. She always liked to make big amounts of everything, because you never knew who might show up hungry. And if not, it would still get eaten.

It took a while for me to fill the basket, then clamber up to the little door of the cellar, the place was deep and I wasn’t that strong, I had to go one step at a time, first lift the basket onto the next step up and only then climb after it. I’d almost reached the door, I had one more step to go, when out of the blue I heard shots. I put my eye to a crack in the door and I saw soldiers running and shouting, pouring something from canisters all around the house and the barn and cattle sheds. I let go of the basket, it crashed back into the cellar. Instead of rushing out and running back to the house, I hunched over till my head touched my knees. I shut my eyes, covered my ears with my hands, and sat there not hearing and not seeing.

Let me tell you, to this day I can’t understand my own behavior. I can’t forgive myself. No, it wasn’t what you think, it wasn’t fear. Fear would have driven me out of the cellar. Fear would have made me hear my heart, but in my case my heart stopped. I couldn’t hear the least murmur through the hands over my ears. I was all numb.

I don’t know how long I sat like that, like I’d frozen for good in that position, hugging my knees, hands pressed to my ears. I don’t even know when I fell asleep. Can you imagine that, I fell asleep. Is that normal? True, I’d never liked getting up early in the morning, I always had a hard time waking up. Even when I could hear mother leaning over me and saying, Come on son, get up, it’s time, even then I could never wake up. So more often than not it would be father who came to wake me up. He’d pull the covers off of me and say loudly, Come on, on your feet or I’ll pour cold water over you! After that I’d walk around still sleepy for the longest time. I’d wash and get dressed in a daze. We’d have breakfast and I’d still be in a daze. They’d have to keep reminding me to eat instead of falling back asleep. I’d still feel sleepy when I went to school. Often, the schoolteacher would finally wake me during the first lesson. Or in vacation time, when I led the cows down to the pasture it was more like they were leading me, and I was following behind, still asleep.

Anyway, when I woke up everything was covered with snow. I’d never seen snow like that before. You have no idea. The trees were a third buried in snow. Nearby in the orchard there was an old beehive that the bees had left. Father had been planning to set up a new bee yard, he kept promising himself. The hive was completely covered in snow. It was coming down in big flakes, it was so dense you could barely see anything at all. And it kept falling. You had to peer through it like you do with fog. We’d not had snow all winter. There’d been frosts, but not a hint of snow. When it had started I couldn’t tell you. But it was only when it stopped that you could see how thick it lay. It came up to more than half the height of the cellar door. Luckily the crack I could see out of was right at the top of the door. The snow shone so brightly it was hard to see through the crack.

Snow like that changes the world. For instance, when you walk through the woods among the trees all heaped with snow, you really feel like just lying down under one of the trees. Especially when it falls in big flakes, even if it were going to cover you up, you’d still lie down. Why not? Is it so difficult to imagine you’re lying there in bed, in the sheets, under a fluffy quilt, plus no one’s waking you up, while here over your head there’s, let say, a happy fir tree. That’s right, trees can be happy or unhappy too, it can happen. Like people, they’re not so different from us. I can see you don’t believe me. Let me tell you, when I was little I could tell at a glance which trees were happy and which ones weren’t. When I went berry-picking or mushrooming with mother, she’d be looking for berries or mushrooms, whereas me, I’d be looking at the trees and seeing which ones were happy and which were unhappy. Often I’d call her over to come take a look, she really had to see. She’d come away from her berries or mushrooms, thinking something must be wrong. But she never told me I was talking nonsense, that I’d taken her away from her berries or mushrooms for no reason. Try and imagine this: two oak trees next to each other, both of them just oaks, but one of them is happy, while the other one is kind of stock still in its distress. On the first tree the leaves are all atremble with the joy of life, on the other one they look like all they want to do is fall off.

These days I can’t tell which is which. I often walk a good ways through the woods, but I can’t figure it out. They all look the same to me, and whether a tree’s happy or unhappy, I can’t say. Often I’ll take the dogs out and watch to see if they know. But neither of them so much as sniffs at a tree. How can I get them to? What are they even supposed to sniff for — to see which trees are happy and which ones aren’t? You’d have to explain to them what that meant. The thing is, no one knows. Besides, the woods themselves may mean something different to dogs. In any case, for me they’re no longer the same woods.

When I got cold looking through the crack, I went back down to the bottom of the cellar. It was much warmer down there. I slept there, ate there. Oh, there was plenty to eat. Not just potatoes. Carrots, beets, cabbage, turnip. When I was thirsty, I drank snow. I managed to push the door open a tiny bit, just enough to reach out my hand and get a handful of snow.

I didn’t count on anyone finding me there. To be honest, I didn’t want anyone to find me. Besides, who could it have been? The whole place was deserted, silent, nothing but the snow. You’ll find this hard to believe, but I was actually beginning to feel comfortable there. I felt the way I did when I was lying in the bottom of the boat in the reeds, and they’d be calling me, father, mother, my sisters, and I’d pretend not to hear. I’d imagine them scolding me later, Where on earth were you? You’re nothing but trouble. We were calling and calling.

No animal came by, no bird flew over or perched on a tree. It was only some time later that I saw a hare, though even then I just caught a glimpse of it on top of the snow. Some time after that, I don’t know how long it could have been since I saw the hare, I wasn’t counting the days — I guess I could have put one potato aside each day, say, but what for? When you count, it means you’re counting on something. Whereas me, I wasn’t counting on anything, like I told you. Anyway, after a while a deer appeared. I didn’t think it was real. I stared and I couldn’t believe my eyes. I thought I must be dreaming, because it was standing more or less where the kitchen had been. Plus it was calm, tame, you rarely see deer that calm and trusting. It stood there like nothing could scare it away. It must have been hungry, it started grubbing in the snow with its muzzle. I thought about tossing it some potatoes, it might come even closer. But I couldn’t open the door any wider. Then suddenly, though nothing had startled it, it just vanished. You know, when you look at nothing but snow, and through a crack in a door at that, everything happens in a different way. And different things happen than when there’s no snow.

I’d glue my eye to that crack in the door, and it was like looking through a stereoscope at Christmas postcards. For instance, one time a Christmas tree decorated with candles appeared where our living room had been. The candles burned so brightly that everywhere else all around became dark as night, even though it was daytime. Or suddenly, beyond the woods a star began to fall from the sky, big and glowing, with a shining tail. I had to take my eye away from the crack, because I couldn’t stare at it for long. Then one day I looked out and the three kings were passing by. How did I know they were kings? They wore crowns. They looked lost, because they walked a ways, turned around and went off in a different direction.

One time father took me to market and we went into a store to buy notebooks. Under the glass counter top they had postcards like that, among other things the three kings walking across snow, and someone was pointing the way to them, not this way, that way. I couldn’t tear my eyes away. It was the first time I’d seen postcards. I even got up the courage to ask the clerk what you did with them.

“You send them,” he said.

I started badgering father:

“Daddy, let’s buy one and send it.”

“Who to?” He tugged me away impatiently. “We don’t have anyone to send it to. Everyone’s here.”

One time there was the sound of sleigh bells. I stuck my eye to the crack. It got louder and louder, it was clearly coming in my direction. Then, suddenly it started to move further away, till it faded completely. I never saw the sleigh, or who was driving it. Another time, carol singers appeared. They were walking in single file, one after another, they could barely lift their feet clear of the snow. In the lead was the Star, after him King Herod, the Marshal, the Jew, the Watchman, while the Devil brought up the rear. I was surprised Death wasn’t there. I thought to myself, who’s going to cut Herod’s head off? But maybe Death was there after all, it was just that Death is white, and against the snow you couldn’t tell if he was there. The way you sometimes can’t tell dreams from waking life.

Mr. Robert, ever since we first met, every Christmas he’d send me one of those cards, and I’d send one to him. We’d choose the kind I’m talking about, with Christmas trees, carolers, the three kings and so on. He’d often select one that he made fun of in what he wrote on the back. I’m sending you what’s left of our naivety, check out the other side.

One Christmas I was picking out a card for him when I saw one that was just like what I’d seen through the crack in the door. Exactly the same. A star was falling beyond some woods, and the world lay under a blanket of snow. I bought it, bought a stamp right away, addressed it almost without thinking and sent it. Not to Mr. Robert. To this place. With no message. I mean, what message could I have sent? Ever since then, every Christmas I would send a card like that. Without a message. One time only, I wondered about signing it: Yours. But what does that mean? Whose? They never came back. How could they, I never gave a return address. Pointless, you reckon? I thought so too. But Christmas would come around again and I’d send another one. You might not agree with me, but to my mind it’s only on postcards that the world is still the way we’d like it to be. That’s why we send them to one another.

No, I didn’t think about what would happen when the snow melted. I ate, I slept, I looked through the crack in the door, and when it came down to it I wasn’t sure whether I was alive. Maybe I was simply waiting, thinking I would melt along with the snow. Why wouldn’t I? When a person isn’t sure that they’re alive, maybe they could melt with the snow.

Then out of nowhere, one day a group of partisans appeared. That morning the sun was shining brightly, the woods had become transparent, it was like the trees had parted, and I could see them coming from a long way off. You might not believe me, but I wanted them to walk on by. Shout that I was there? No way. I’ll say more, it was only then that I started to be afraid. I went back down to the bottom of the cellar, I even climbed up on a pile of potatoes by the wall. To one side there were potatoes, on the other there were the carrots, beets, cabbage, turnip. In the middle was a clear space where you could stand, put your basket down and fill it.

It wasn’t that it was because of them it had all happened. Whoever it might have been, I didn’t want to be found. They often came to the village. In summer, in winter, at any time of the day or night. In wintertime they’d stay the longest. There wasn’t a house where they didn’t make themselves at home. At times there were more of them than the people who lived there. They’d sleep in attics, barns, in the regular rooms too if someone had more than one room. The officers always stayed in the houses. They had to be fed, and they’d tend to their wounds. Often a doctor had to be fetched, though I don’t remember anyone in the village ever bringing a doctor for themselves. People would make their own treatments, they had herbs and ointments, they drank infusions, gave rub-downs, did cuppings. And when that didn’t help, they died. There were all kinds of ways of treating sicknesses. For example, do you know what hare’s-tongue is? No, it’s actually fat. It’s the best thing for an infected wound. For burns, aloes. For rheumatism, you’d sting the affected place with nettles. Me too, I sometimes go and put my hands in nettles. Or you’d put bees on them. Even the worst broken bones, there were people who knew how to set them. Without plaster, they used firewood sticks. Or do you know what it means to say a child is dry? It’s when a baby’s born with a dislocated hip. Grandmother always mended hips like that. They’d bring her the child, say it wouldn’t stop crying. First she’d place the baby’s legs next to each other to see if the folds lined up. If they didn’t, it meant it was a dry child. At those times you had to leave the house, the baby would scream so much in her hands. But in our village no one limped. Not every illness could be treated. But treatment isn’t always about having a solution. It’s enough for someone to know there’s no solution and that’s why they have to die.

You know, fetching a doctor was easier said than done. It was a long way, plus not every doctor was willing to take the risk. One time they made father go, and we all prayed until he came back. Then he had to take the doctor back again, and again we prayed for his safe return. So sometimes people were sick of the partisans. Especially because on top of everything they drank, and you had to have moonshine to give them. They even organized little dances. Some of them played the harmonica, they’d gather all the unmarried girls, and the girls were raring to go. Afterwards one or another of them found herself pregnant.

Each time they came to the village, a few of them had died in the meantime. That didn’t stop them drinking and partying. When they drank they’d sometimes fire their guns in the air. The village was in the middle of the woods, far from highways and the railroad, they thought no one would hear. Honestly though, it was kind of fun when they were there. It was like a different place. Not right away. When they first arrived, their faces were always hollow-cheeked and dark. Their eyes were sleepy, bloodshot, every glance they gave seemed like suspicion. When one of them smiled it didn’t look like a human smile. They all had long beards, as if they hadn’t shaved since their last visit. A few of them would have bandages around their heads, in some cases blood was still seeping through. One had an arm in a sling. Another would be limping. Some only had one boot on, the other foot was wrapped in bloody rags. A few of them were being carried. Those were the ones they usually called the doctor for. And let me tell you, they stank to high heaven.

The first thing they did was delouse themselves. Maybe because lice itch even more than dirt. When they bite, they’re more trouble than wounds. We never had lice in our home, mother saw to that. If even one showed up, she’d launder everything at once. Then she’d iron it all with an iron so hot it hissed. Especially along the seams. That was where the lice most liked to hide. We all had to take a bath, wash our hair, comb it with the finest comb. There were special combs for when you had lice. The teeth were so close together there was barely any space between them. On top of that she’d slather us with sabadilla. You don’t know what that is? In those days it was the most effective thing for head lice. There were guys who came selling stuff around the villages, they had buttons, safety pins, snap fasteners, needles, pins, threads. They also sold hair clasps, tape for lining, ribbons to make bows for little girls. What else? All kinds of things. Shoelaces, shoe polish, bunion cream, rooster powders — that was what they called pain medication, but only for headaches. Rooster powders. They had pretty much anything that might come in handy around the house. The housewives would look forward to them coming. People rarely rode into town to market, only when they had more than usual to sell. But sabadilla was always needed. It was almost like holy water.

So the lice would appear the moment the partisans showed up. They hadn’t learned to delouse themselves. Not all of them, some of them must have been shown how to do it by their mothers or grandmothers. Because they’d find them and just throw them away. You’ve never had lice? Let me tell you, if you’ve not had lice you’ve not truly been in this world. One war after another and you’ve never had lice, that’s pretty strange. I’m just saying in general, not about you in particular. In this world you have to have had lice at least once, and you have to know how to get rid of them. Grandfather even wondered how they knew how to fight if they didn’t know how to delouse themselves. He said that the first duty of a soldier is to know how to deal with lice, then with hunger, then with the home he’s left behind. Only then is he fit to kill other soldiers or civilians. Though that didn’t stop grandfather sitting and watching them delouse themselves. He’d even point and say, look, there’s one, there’s another. It was hardly surprising that later he brought the lice home with him.

Then they’d bathe, shave, get a haircut, wash their hair, launder their clothes, dress their wounds, till they became completely unlike the men who had arrived. The ones who’d arrived were old, and these were young men. Some were still children. In many cases it was hard to believe it was the same person. They arrived barely dragging their feet, then afterwards they’d want to dance.

All of a sudden the snow crunched outside the cellar, the door creaked, and a shaft of light fell across the floor. I couldn’t be seen in it, because as I said I was sitting outside on a mound of potatoes. But I heard a girl’s shrill voice:

“Hello? Is anybody there?”

In the first moment I wondered if it could be Jagoda or Leonka. They had girlish voices.

“Hello? Is anybody there?”

It was only then that I knew it wasn’t either of them. They’d probably seen where I’d scooped out snow to drink from beside the door, and figured out there must be someone down in the cellar. She came maybe one step down, her voice got louder, though it was still girlish, it even sounded a little afraid:

“Is anybody there? Say something!”

I didn’t step out, I swear. All at once something happened that couldn’t have been predicted. The pile of potatoes I was sitting on collapsed with a crash, and I came tumbling down with them. No, it wasn’t fate. We’d been taking potatoes again and again from the pile, it was bound to tumble sooner or later. All it would need would be one more potato being taken, and the pile wouldn’t hold together anymore. The only question is, why at that particular moment, not some other time. The bough of a tree breaks off right at the second someone’s passing by. Is that fate? I heard her shout up above me:

“Oh my lord!” She scrambled out and started shouting:

“There’s someone alive in here! There’s someone alive!”

There was nothing I could do, I had to show myself alive. When you hear an almost angelic voice above you, at a moment when it seems the world doesn’t exist, and you don’t exist in it — it’s as if the voice was summoning you and the world to life. What was I supposed to do, shout out that I wasn’t there? I started to clamber towards her, the light flooded my eyes, so the first thing I saw was an armband with a red cross on her sleeve, before I saw the rest of her. She said in a shocked voice:

“Lord, you’re nothing but a child!”

I must say she cut me to the quick with that comment about being a child. I thought, damn girl. And it turned out I was right. She was really young, with such fair hair, though in her army greatcoat and forage cap she might have seemed a lot older than she was. Especially because the coat was much too big for her, the sleeves were rolled right up to here, and the cap would have also been too big if it hadn’t been for her hair. Her voice was the only indication of how old she might be. As you know, appearances can deceive but the voice, never. All the more so in uniform. In uniform the youngest soldier always looks much older than he actually is. Even children — when they’re in uniform it looks like it’d be no problem for them to kill, slaughter, burn. Besides, even aside from the uniform, when you were as young as I was then, even someone who’s just a few years more than you looks virtually old. Later it changes, the years draw closer together, and the closer you are to death the more everything evens out. In particular since death doesn’t choose among us according to age. I wouldn’t say it’s random. Death has its own wisdom.

She was a medic, you could tell from the armband with the red cross. When I came out from the cellar I saw that over her shoulder she was carrying a bag that also had a red cross. The bag was too heavy for her, her shoulder drooped. There was a whole drugstore in there. Actually, it wasn’t just the bag that was too heavy for her. She was the only medic for the whole unit, can you imagine. I never heard her complain, but it was clear that the whole thing was beyond her strength. Constantly she was washing bandages, dressing wounds, handing out pills for aches and pains and fevers, she’d wipe the men’s foreheads, clean away the blood and the dirt — often from head to foot — when one of them was too weak to stand on his own two feet and kept calling her to come here and go there, day and night.

Even today, when I think of her I find it hard to imagine that someone could be so young and work without any relief — anyone her age deserves a break. I couldn’t tell you exactly how old she was, she never mentioned her age, maybe she was embarrassed, but she put up with it all like someone much, much older.

Actually, in the depths of my soul I wanted her to be a whole lot older. Not for the reason you think. It’s only up to a certain age that you want something like that, then your desire starts to turn back. You think that from that moment we become worse people? I don’t think I agree. We’re already worse when we play in the sandbox.

Did you ever play in a sandbox when you were a child? Me neither. Why would anyone have made a sandbox for children in the village? There was sand everywhere, in abundance. Wherever the river turned, one bank would be sandy. You could roll in the sand, bury yourself, build things in sand, whatever you felt like. And not just by the Rutka. Though village kids aren’t drawn to sand the way children in the city are. You’ve got fields, meadows, woods, everything is wide open in every direction, above you, in the distance, who would want to play in sand? You could play anywhere. Like living, people lived wherever. Big houses weren’t necessary, no one needed to be apart. People lived in the yards, in the barns, in the cattle sheds, the orchards, the fields, on the meadows, under the sky, by the Rutka. The whole world was our home, while our actual home was only there so we could all come together at the end of the day. So everyone wanted to be as close as possible to the next person. In some houses there wasn’t even a separate living room, just one big room, then you were closest of all. It was only when you were tightly crammed in that you could truly feel you were together. Who would have made a sandbox for the children, when the children also wanted to feel they were part of everyone else. If it had occurred to anyone to build a sandbox like you see in the cities, do you think any child would have wanted to play in it? You could have tied them there on a chain, they would have broken free. And the sandbox would have become a home for chickens and geese and ducks, they like to play in sand, they would have made a big old mess in there and that would have been the end of the sandbox.

When I was abroad I spent a lot of time watching sandboxes. Wherever I lived, in among the apartment buildings there were always sandboxes. As I mentioned, I like children, and so whenever I had a little time I’d sit on a bench by one of the sandboxes, among the nannies and mothers and grandmothers. And let me tell you, when I watched the children playing in the sandbox, I’d sometimes be moved, but also fearful.

Believe me, a sandbox is a whole world. A couple of square yards, but it’s an entire world, humanity, future wars. Nice rosy little faces, you’d think they were all quite innocent, but you could already tell who would bury who in the sand, and who would hide from who in the sand. Which of them would one day find the sandbox too small, and which of them would soon get lost in it. Was the sandbox really to blame? Some people reckon so. But when I think about it I sometimes have the feeling that we’re all exiles from the sandbox, whatever our age. Me too, though I never played in a sandbox.

You know, when I was abroad I even saw sandboxes with colored sand. Green, blue, pink. I think it was dyed. Where could they have found sand in those colors. But can colored sand make us different? It’s true that we’re affected by colors. But not everyone is influenced to the same extent by the same colors. And we’ve no idea who is more affected by what color. Or which color fades in which person or which one grows brighter. And are the colors we see the same when they’re within us? Besides, tell me this: Can anyone come up with a wiser color for sand than the color of the sun? A wiser color for leaves than green? Or blue for the sky? White for snow? Of course colors are wise. Didn’t you know that? If it hadn’t been for the white snow back at that time, then …

What’s my favorite color? What are you, a journalist? No, that much I know for sure. You don’t even look like a journalist. What color? Oh, I don’t know. I wasn’t expecting that question. I don’t have a favorite color. Anyway, would it mean anything if I said, for instance, green? Because which green would it be? Each tree in the woods, each bush, each leaf, even moss, is a different kind of green. And in you, all of that turns into a different kind of green again. So can you say that something is green? Green is an infinity. Each color is an infinity.

As I stared through that crack in the cellar door, I was amazed to see one kind of whiteness turned into another, then a moment later into a different kind again, without ever going back to the previous one. It was like waves of whiteness rolling over the white snow. So what do you think the color white is? You’re messing with me. You’d like to see me spend my whole life in the sandbox. I’d want that too. Except that no color is forever. Color is change, like everything else.

When I was abroad I’d sometimes visit art galleries and museums. You too? Then you must have noticed that for each artist, the hardest color is the flesh of a woman. Even with the same artist, from one picture to the next. I don’t mean that the color changes, just that there’s a kind of helplessness in the face of that color. So can you say that a woman’s body is such and such a color? Since the color might depend, say, on the painter’s self-doubt? Or on his fear, his anguish, his despair? Yes, sometimes his desire as well. As I looked at the paintings I’d often have the impression that all those colors were unequal to some challenge, as it were. No, not what you think — not unequal to the model. Then what challenge? You’d have to provide the answer yourself, if you’ve been with women.

The sister wasn’t at all shy in front of me, she would bathe naked. Sister, that was what everyone called her, me too. Actually, that was the first word I spoke. Sister. Because for the longest time I didn’t talk at all. I just didn’t. It was like I didn’t know how. Like I didn’t know any words. I was simply mute. In fact, she was the one who taught me that first word. Call me sister, she said. That’s what everyone calls me. Go on, say it: sister. Say, sister. Sis-ter.

She’d always have me stand guard when she bathed.

“You can see me,” she’d say. “But make sure none of the others are watching.”

Wherever there was a little stream or creek or spring, she’d always bathe. Actually we only ever stopped at places where there was water. After all, you had to have something to drink, to clean yourself in, and there was always a lot of stuff that needed washing. Bandages for a start. I helped her with it all. Whatever needed washing I’d carry down to the water, then later hang it out on branches to dry. I didn’t speak, but I understood what was said to me, by her and by the others. Whenever she was dressing a wound I’d hold things for her, take things out of her bag, use the scissors, help her tie the bandage. When she had to wash someone because they were lying there like they were dead, I’d hold his head up, or his side if he needed to be turned on his side. I’d take his boots off, because she’d always wash his feet as well, even though his feet weren’t injured, she’d say it’d be easier for him with clean feet. You can’t imagine what state their feet were in, covered in blisters, sores, scabs, often rubbed to the point of bleeding, infected.

One time we came to a biggish lake in the woods. We stopped there for longer than usual. They said the place was untouched by humans, no one would find us there. It was true, you could even tell from the trees, they were falling over from old age. You could pick your fill of mushrooms, blackberries, wild strawberries, blueberries. And there were birds everywhere you turned, let me tell you. Birds to your heart’s content. Right from daybreak the woods echoed with birdsong. On the lake there were moorhens, ducks, swans. It was the perfect place to rest up after all that walking, catch up on some sleep, lick your wounds, and even forget about the war for a short while. The truth was that I didn’t know if it was still going on or if maybe it was over. No one said anything. We kept trekking about in the woods, avoiding the villages. I remember one time we crossed some railroad tracks, another time we went over a bridge, and one night we spent in a windmill. All I saw was them carrying out full sacks of something and putting them in a wagon. They told me to sit on the sacks. Then they walked alongside, and I rode on the wagon. In the end I fell asleep, and when someone eventually took me down from the sacks we were already back in the woods. Another time we were at some country estate, though only in the grounds. They brought out some food for us, we ate then moved on.

The sister always led me by the hand. Every so often she’d ask if I was tired. Sometimes one of the men would give me a piggyback ride for a bit. In the winter they made dugouts and we lived in them, so the war could have been over by then. At home they always used to talk about how it’d be over by Christmas, or by Easter. Here no one said anything. Not around me, in any case. Whenever they were talking about something and I came by, they’d fall silent. One time they didn’t notice me, it was evening, a bunch of them were sitting by the campfire. The only thing I caught was, Till the final victory. I might have heard more, but I trod on a dry branch and they stopped talking.

Truth be told, I didn’t particularly want it to end. I liked being with them. The sister was like a real sister to me, I grew attached to her, and I couldn’t imagine that we could ever be parted. I could have figured out one thing or another, but I preferred not to. For example, it sometimes happened that a small group of them, or a dozen or more, would all of a sudden grab their guns and head out. They’d come back in the early morning, or the following night, when I was asleep. Where they’d been, I had no idea. How could I ask when I didn’t talk? We always ate better after one of those trips. There’d be bread and lard, sometimes a bit of meat in the soup. The soup itself would be different, instead of being made from a little of everything as it seemed, we’d have for instance pea soup. When it was pea soup everyone rubbed their hands in anticipation. We also ate better when they caught something in a trap or a snare. They weren’t allowed to hunt with guns. Otherwise, we mostly just ate millet porridge. You know what millet is? No? Well, I’m not going to explain it to you, because ever since then I’ve hated millet porridge. Where they got it from I couldn’t say. Just like I couldn’t say where they went with their guns.

One time, from one of those expeditions they brought me back a tin of acid drops, another time a ball, then once it was a game of checkers, and one of them taught me how to play. Then I would always play with him. Another time a book, Andersen’s Fairy Tales. Do you know it? They said that if I started to read, maybe I’d begin to speak as well. Though when they took their guns it wasn’t so they could bring me acid drops or a ball or checkers or a book of fairy tales. I tried to read in my head, because I couldn’t do it with my mouth. I barely got to the end of the page, it was such hard work I’d rather have been shelling beans. Though like I said, I couldn’t stand shelling beans.

I basically couldn’t read, though in school I’d been the best reader. I read pretty well. I liked reading. At home, in the evenings I used to sometimes read aloud to everyone. Jagoda and Leonka were both older than me, Jagoda was two classes ahead of me and Leonka three, but they weren’t as good at reading as I was. The sister noticed one time that I was having trouble.

“Here, I’ll read to you,” she said.

From that time, not every day because she didn’t always have time during the day, and in the evenings we didn’t use lights, but when she could she’d read to me. At least a page or two. Though often her eyes would be closing from exhaustion. Sometimes one or another of the men would listen in, sometimes a few of them. Grown men listening to fairy tales, you can imagine? And partisans into the bargain.

She’d always mark her place in the book with a dry leaf. Later she’d keep the leaf, because she’d say she couldn’t bring herself to throw away such a beautiful leaf. And she’d mark the new place with another leaf. I would find the leaves for her, I’d hunt around for the nicest ones. I often went all over the woods. Then, of the best ones that I’d gathered, we’d choose the nicest one of all.

“Shall we use this one?”

I’d always want to use the one she picked.

“Where do you find such lovely leaves?” she’d ask admiringly each time.

Let me tell you, to hear that admiration of hers I would have climbed up into the trees, not just looked around on the ground underneath them. There were oaks, beeches, maples, elms, sycamores, all kinds of trees. She virtually filled the book with leaves. We only had a few tales left to read, but she didn’t manage to finish the book. Later I’ll show you the book. I have it in the living room. Don’t worry, I’m not going to read to you. The ones that are unread, let them stay that way. No, the copy with the leaves got lost. This one I bought myself.

I went to get some sheet music one time, and the store also carried books. I’d already bought the music, and I was just browsing idly among the books. All at once I see Andersen’s Fairy Tales. My heart pounded. I paid, brought it home and put it on my bedside table. I was living alone, my wife had left me not long before. I’d always read at bedtime. Whether or not I was tired, I always had to read a page or two at least. Even after just one page I’d feel myself calming down and everything resuming its place, then after five or ten more pages my eyes would start to let me know they were about to close. I didn’t need sleeping pills. But the remaining tales, the ones she didn’t manage to read, somehow I could never bring myself to read them either.

These days I supposedly have much more time, now that the season’s over. I don’t need to sleep because I don’t have to be fresh in the morning. But still I’ve never turned to those fairy tales. I do read, just not so much anymore. Nowadays not even books can make me fall asleep. Besides, I have the sense that books can no longer help me understand the things I’d like to understand here at the end.

When I was working on the electrification of the villages, in one house where we were installing the wiring I saw Andersen’s Fairy Tales lying on a windowsill. I asked the owner if I could borrow it. He said:

“You can have it. We don’t need it. It belonged to our boy. He got killed. Stepped on a mine.”

I took it back to our lodgings, four of us were rooming together, and I meant to read a bit in bed that evening. One of the other guys whose bed was next to mine noticed the book and started to laugh.

“What, are you reading fairy tales?”

Another guy piped up from another bed:

“What you need is a girl. One that’s the right shape here and here, got some flesh on her.”

I was embarrassed, I pulled my suitcase out from under my bed and stuffed the book beneath my shirt and socks and other things, right at the bottom. Then I started work at the building site, but I never reached for my suitcase to take the book out and read it. In the end I gave it to one of the guys to give to his son. He was going home one Sunday and he was worried that he didn’t have a present for his kid. I asked:

“How old is he?” I took out the Fairy Tales. “Give him this. It’s just right for his age. I was the same age.”

But why was the sister not shy in front of me? I don’t know. Maybe because I didn’t speak? Or for some other reason?

One time I was on guard to make sure no one was watching her, I was standing with my back to the lake and she was undressing on the shore. Suddenly she called out:

“Turn around! Do I make you feel uncomfortable? Come over here! When was the last time you bathed?” I didn’t know how to tell her it hadn’t been that long. “I bet it’s been ages,” she said. “All of you here like being dirty. Take your clothes off. You can wash with me.” I stood there rooted to the spot. “What are you staring at me for? Haven’t you had your fill of looking yet?” I averted my eyes. “Don’t just stand there, get undressed. Come on, I’ll help you.” Left to myself I don’t think I could have so much as unfastened a single button on my shirt. “Lift your head up. Give me your arm. Raise your foot. Have a good look, look all you like. At your age what do you know? You haven’t even got any hairs down there. So it can already get stiff? Still, you’ve got time. Though the rest of us might not be alive by then. Not me in any case, that’s for sure. Come on, hop in the water with me.”

She leaped in. Like a colorful blur, that’s how I remember her. All the colors were in her. I’ve never found her since in any painting. I don’t remember her face anymore, but I can still see the blur of her body.

“Come on, jump in!” she repeated, emerging from the water. “Let’s swim to the other side! Don’t be afraid, I’ll be right by you!”

I wasn’t afraid, I was a pretty good swimmer. I’d swum many times in the Rutka, downstream, or against the current. She swam by me, and when we got near the other side she asked:

“Are you tired? Let’s climb out and sit awhile.”

We got there, sat on the shore and gazed out.

“The lake’s even more beautiful from this side,” she said. “It would be beautiful to die in it.” She lost herself in thought, then a moment later she said: “Look at me. Don’t turn your eyes away. I want you to remember me. Will you remember me? Tell me you will. You’ll survive for certain. Because us—” She broke off. I looked at her. I thought I was seeing things, but no, tears were streaming down her cheeks. “I’m not crying,” she said, though I hadn’t said anything. “My face is wet from the water, that’s all. Yours is too. I could just as well say you’re crying.”

But I actually was crying. Not on the outside. I felt somehow as if the tears were flowing inside of me, on the other side of my eyes. Have you ever known tears like that? For me, it was only that once. And for the first time since she’d found me in the cellar, I felt words in my mouth.

“Sister …,” I said. I got stuck. Then: “I’ll …” Then: “always …”

She didn’t let me finish. She burst out in joy:

“You’re talking! You’re talking!” She wiped the tears from her cheeks. “Let’s swim back! We’ll tell everyone you’re talking!”

What was I trying to say then? I don’t recall. Perhaps it wasn’t anything important. But for me those had been the most important words of my whole life that I’d wanted to say but hadn’t said. If you sat down and thought about it, how many unspoken words like that must have disappeared forever? And they may have been more important than all the ones that were spoken. Don’t you think?

There was only one thing I couldn’t understand: why she hadn’t wanted to admit she was crying. And she was, I could have sworn she was.

At that age, there are a lot of things you maybe don’t understand, but you feel things deeper than if you’d understood them. Plus, you see everything, you see it through and through. Life can’t be concealed from anyone, least of all a child. There’s no curtain you can use to hide it. A child will even see through a curtain. Sometimes I wonder if children aren’t our conscience. Later you see less and less. The world’s no longer willing to be reflected in people’s eyes. Although a child doesn’t even have to look. The world pushes under his eyelids of its own accord. The world is still transparent at that age. Unfortunately, you grow out of it. Today I find it hard to believe I was once a child. I used to graze the cattle, but what proof is that of anything. Before that I minded the geese. Then grandfather took over the geese, and I took the cows from him. And I imagined that we’d just keep swapping like that the whole time. Grandfather would take over the cows from me, and I’d take the geese again. Then he’d mind the geese once more, and I’d mind the cows. And it would always be like that, cows to geese, geese to cows. I was convinced that since grandfather had always been grandfather from the beginning, I’d also always be a child.

Though if you ask me, geese are harder to mind. Yours get mixed up with other people’s, they’re all white, and afterwards there’s no way of telling which are yours and which aren’t. Not to mention that they often fight till they bleed, they latch onto each other so hard you can’t pull them apart, especially the ganders.

We kept a lot of geese, to have down to stuff quilts, and pillows for Jagoda and Leonka for when they got married. Mother wanted them to have down bedding, and for that you need lots and lots of geese. And you’ll be plucking away for years. It takes a huge amount of down to make a feather quilt, and there’s not that many feathers on a goose.

So I always preferred minding the cows. To make a long story short, I’ll tell you one thing. Mother would sometimes despair over me:

“You were such a good child when you minded the geese.”

The pasture was the road that led directly to adulthood. Whoever graduated from the pasture was no longer a child, even if they were called one. And the sister always treated me like a child. From the first moment of surprise when I emerged from the cellar. Lord, you’re nothing but a child! And so on till the very end. Maybe that’s why it was OK for me to look while she was bathing, whereas she was afraid of letting all the others see? I don’t know, that’s exactly what I don’t get, especially after what happened one night. So I stood there and kept guard to make sure they didn’t peep.

Oh yes, almost all of them. When one of them saw she was going down to the lake, he’d sneak off immediately and follow her at a distance, hide behind a bush or a tree, or even climb a tree if there was one nearby on the shore. Sometimes even the wounded would drag themselves down to the lake. Some of them would back off when they saw me standing guard. But not everyone. A good few of them, it made no difference whether I was standing there or not. Many of them would give me an earful. Or tell me to keep my trap shut and sit tight. One guy, he had binoculars, he’d lie down right next to me, by a bush or under a tree, and it was like I wasn’t even there. When I moved he’d say, Stay still or I’ll shoot you. He was a huge guy, with a nasty look in his eye, as if he didn’t even like himself that much. For a guy like that, shooting someone was like eating a slice of bread. I was terrified of him. So I’d stand there stock still whenever he came to watch.

One time he told me to stand and not say a word, while she had undressed on the shore and it looked like she had no intention of going into the water, she was just enjoying the sun. He lay down, put the binoculars to his eyes and watched and watched. My heart was beating harder than ever before. All of a sudden he smashed his fist against the ground, rested his head on the earth and groaned:

“Dear Christ, dear Christ.” He turned his face upwards. “What I’d give to be between her legs. A guy would know what he was fighting for.” He wiped his eyes from the binoculars. “They’re going to kill us all anyway, what difference would it make to her.” He held the binoculars out towards me. “Wanna look?” I shrugged. “Right, maybe it’s best you don’t.”

As it happened, a few days later there was a muster in the middle of the night, the men formed two lines, it was, count off, they all shouldered arms and marched off. The sister went with them. I stayed back with the wounded and some sentries. The others only came back three days later, around daybreak. They looked like a hounded pack of wolves. Several of them were wounded, two were being carried on stretchers made from branches. And the one I was so afraid of had the sister in his arms. She was dead. He himself had a head wound, his hair was caked with blood, blood was running down inside his collar. He’d refused to let anyone else carry her the whole way. They’d wanted to make another stretcher and carry her on it, but he wouldn’t allow them. Four others had died too, but they’d been left behind. He’d risked heavy rifle fire to retrieve her body. That was when he’d been injured. She’d died dressing the wounds of one of the men who had fallen. It had been pointless. The man had only been able to open his eyes and say, There’s no point, sister. Then he was dead. Who heard it? You ask like you didn’t know there’s always someone who hears. There’s no situation in which there isn’t someone who hears.

You know, she sensed that she was going to die. Or maybe she just didn’t want to live? One time I helped her take the laundry down to the lake. There was a lot of it. As she washed and rinsed the things, I took them and hung them out to dry on the branches. It was one of those days that don’t come along very often. The sky was blue as can be, without the tiniest cloud. The lindens were in bloom, you could smell honey in the air, bees were buzzing, the heat was intensifying, it was the perfect weather for washing and drying. All at once she dropped the clothes, sat down on the shore, pulled her knees up under her chin, put her arms around them, and stared and stared at the lake.

“I really don’t feel like doing the laundry today,” she said. “What I’d most like to do is go lie down on the lake, you know? Just lie there. What do you think, would I sink?”

She jumped to her feet and started to undress.

“I’m going to go bathe. You keep guard. Go stand over there.”

And she leaped into the water. I watched her swimming, and I began to choke with fear that in a moment she’d lie down on the water and stop moving. Luckily she swam for a bit and came back. She got dressed again.

“Now get on with the laundry, sister,” she said, telling herself off. In between giving me items of clothing to hang out, she said: “You know what, you should move in and live with me, would you like to? Goodness, it’s hard to even call it living in these dugouts, these pits.” When I took the next piece of clothing from her to hang it out: “None of them have tried anything with you?” I didn’t know what she meant. “What are you staring at me for? That’s why you’re going to live with me. Too bad I didn’t think of it sooner. Maybe I’ll be able to sleep better too.” I didn’t understand either why she couldn’t sleep.

She brought a litter and made a place for me next to her. She had to squeeze over a bit so there’d be room for me. After picking out all the pine cones and acorns and twigs from the litter, she covered the litter with dry grass. So it’ll be nice and soft for you, she said. Then she laid some old rags on top. Sometimes, on a cooler night she’d ask if I was warm enough and put her coat over the blanket I slept under. But I didn’t sleep that well with her. Even though neither of us snored, or smoked cigarettes, or swore, or shouted in our sleep. She slept as quiet as anything, often I couldn’t hear a thing. It was just that the silence was hard for me to bear. It was the silence itself that woke me up several times a night. I’d jerk awake, listening fearfully to see if she was asleep. If I couldn’t hear her breathing, I’d get up from the bedding and place my ear close to her. And though I’d be reassured that she was sleeping, I often couldn’t get back to sleep myself.

One night, I don’t know why, I woke terrified, I sat up and gently touched her forehead to see if it was warm. She jolted upright, equally scared:

“Oh, it’s you. I had such a fright. Don’t touch me ever when I’m sleeping. Remember, don’t touch me.”

“I just wanted —”

“I know,” she said. “Lie down and go back to sleep.”

There were also times when she would sit up from her bedding and, holding her breath, she would listen to see if I was asleep. When she was sure I was, though in fact I was pretending, she’d take her coat if she hadn’t put it over me and she’d go off somewhere. All kinds of thoughts rattled around in my brain at those times, and I’d wait till she came back. When she did, sometimes I’d pretend to have just woken up.

“Did I wake you? I’m sorry. I went to bathe. In the nighttime at least no one watches you,” she explained. “The water’s so warm. It’s a full moon. The lake is even lovelier than during the day.”

That was how it was every time. So I decided I wouldn’t wake up anymore when she came back. But one time when she returned, and I was pretending to be asleep, she lay down and all of a sudden I heard her crying.

“I know you’re not asleep,” she said. “I can’t take it anymore. It’s so hard for them. But I can’t take it any longer.”