Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

^XIV THE FALL

Early in the morning they came for me and said I must make a statement. I replied that I’d do my best to drop in during the week.

‘You don’t understand,’ replied a young policeman, the one who used to work with the Commandant. Since his death he’d been promoted and was now in charge of the police station in town. ‘You’re coming with us now, to Kłodzko.’

In view of his tone of voice, I did not protest. I merely locked the house and took a toothbrush and my pills with me just in case. The last thing I needed was to have an Attack and fall ill there.

As it had been pouring with rain for two weeks and there was a flood, we drove the long way round, on the asphalt, where it was safer. When we were descending into the valley from the Plateau, I saw a herd of Deer; they were standing still, gazing without fear at the police jeep. Joyfully I realised that I didn’t recognize them – it must be a new herd that had come across from the Czech Republic to graze on our luscious green mountain pasture. The Policemen weren’t interested in the Deer. They didn’t speak, either to me or to each other.

I was given a mug of instant coffee with powdered cream and the interview began.

‘You were going to drive the President home? Is that right? Please tell us in detail, moment by moment – what exactly did you see?’

And plenty more questions of this kind.

There wasn’t much to tell, but I tried my best to be precise about every detail. I said I had decided to wait for the President outside because inside it was noisy. Nobody was bothering with the buffer zone any more, and everyone was smoking inside, which was having a very bad effect on me. So I sat down on the steps and gazed at the sky.

After the rain Sirius had appeared, and the shaft of the Plough had risen… I wondered whether the stars can see us. And if they can, what might they think of us? Do they really know our future? Do they feel sorry for us? For being stuck in the present time, with no chance to move? But it also crossed my mind that in spite of all, in spite of our fragility and ignorance, we have an incredible advantage over the stars – it is for us that time works, giving us a major opportunity to transform the suffering, aching world into a happy and peaceful one. It’s the stars that are imprisoned in their own power, and they cannot really help us. They merely design the nets, and on cosmic looms they weave the warp thread that we must complete with our own weft. And then a curious Hypothesis occurred to me – maybe the stars see us in the same way as we see our Dogs, for example – having greater awareness than they do, at some points in time we know better what’s good for them; we walk them on leads so they won’t get lost, we sterilise them so they won’t senselessly reproduce, we take them to the vet for medical treatment. They don’t understand where this comes from, why it happens, for what purpose. Yet they yield to us. So maybe we too should yield to the influence of the stars, but in the process we should arouse our human sensitivity. That’s what I was pondering as I sat on those steps in the dark. And when I saw that most of the people were coming out, and either on foot or in cars were heading off, I went inside to remind the President that I was going to drive him home. But he wasn’t there, or anywhere else. I checked the toilets and walked around the firehouse. I also asked all the inebriated mushroom pickers where he’d got to, but nobody was capable of giving me a sensible answer. Some were still humming ‘Hey, Falcons’, others were finishing off the beer, flouting the rules by drinking it outside. So I assumed someone must have taken him home already, but I simply hadn’t noticed. And I’m still sure it was a reasonable supposition. What harm could possibly come to him? Even if he’d fallen asleep in a drunken state among the burdocks, the Night was warm and he wasn’t in any danger. Nothing suspicious occurred to me, so I fetched the Samurai and we went home.

‘Who is the Samurai?’ asked the policeman.

‘A friend,’ I replied, in keeping with the truth.

‘Surname, please.’

‘Samurai Suzuki.’

He was put out, but the other one smiled to himself.

‘Please tell us, Mrs Duszeńko…’

‘Duszejko,’ I corrected him.

‘…Duszejko. Do you have any suspicions as to who might have had a reason to do harm to the President?’

I was surprised. ‘You don’t read my letters. I explained it all in there.’ They exchanged glances. ‘No, but we’re asking a serious question.’

‘And I am giving you a serious reply. I wrote to you. In fact, I still haven’t received an answer. It’s bad manners not to answer letters. According to article 171, paragraph one of the Penal Code, persons under interrogation should be allowed to express themselves freely within the defined limits for the purpose of the task in hand, and only then may one pose questions aimed at supplementing, explaining or verifying their statements.’

‘You’re right,’ said the first one.

‘Is it true that he was entirely covered in Beetles?’ I asked.

‘We cannot answer that question. For the good of the enquiry.’

‘But how did he die?’

‘We’re asking the questions, not you,’ said the first one, and the second added: ‘The witnesses who saw you talking to the President during the party said you were standing on the steps.’

‘That’s right, I was reminding him that I’d be taking him home because his wife had asked me to. But he didn’t seem fully able to focus on what I was saying. So I thought I’d better simply wait until the ball ended and he was ready to leave.’

‘Were you familiar with the Commandant?’

‘Of course I was. You know that perfectly well,’ I said to the young one. ‘Why on earth ask, if you know? Isn’t it a waste of time?’

‘What about Anzelm Innerd?’

‘His name was Anzelm? I never would have guessed. I met him once, near here, on the little bridge. He was with his girlfriend. That was a while back, about three years ago. We had a brief conversation.’

‘What about?’

‘Just a general chat, I can’t remember. That woman was there, she can confirm it all.’

I knew that the Police like to have everything confirmed.

‘Is it true that you behaved aggressively during the hunting here, in the locality?’

‘I would say that I behaved angrily, not aggressively. There’s a difference. I expressed my Anger because they were killing Animals.’

‘Did you make death threats?’

‘Anger can prompt one to utter various words, but it can also make one fail to remember them afterwards.’

‘There are witnesses who have stated that you shouted, and I quote’ – at this point he glanced at the papers spread on the desk – ‘“I’ll kill you, you (obscenity), you’ll be punished for these crimes. You have no shame, you’re not afraid of anything. I’ll beat your brains out.”’

He read it dispassionately, which I found amusing.

‘Why are you smiling?’ asked the second one in a wounded tone.

‘I find it comical that I could have said such things. I’m a peaceful person. Perhaps your witness is exaggerating?’

‘Do you deny that you appeared before the magistrate’s court on a charge of overturning and destroying hunting pulpits?’

‘No, I wouldn’t dream of denying it. I paid a fine in court. There are documents to prove it.’

‘What aren’t there documents for?’ asked one of them, imagining he was posing a trick question, but I think I evaded it quite cleverly by saying: ‘For many things, sir. In my life and in yours. It’s impossible to record everything in words, let alone official documents.’

‘Why did you do it?’

I gave him a look as if he had fallen from the moon. ‘Why are you asking me about something you know perfectly well?’

‘Please answer the questions. It must be included in the transcript.’

By now I was entirely relaxed.

‘Aha. So, once again: I did it so that no one would shoot at Animals from them.’

‘How come you have such precise knowledge of certain details of the murders?’

‘Such as?’

‘To do with the President, for instance. How did you know the insect was’ – he looked at his notes – ‘Cucujus haematodes? That’s what you told the Writer.’

‘Oh, did I? It’s a common Beetle in these parts.’

‘So how do you know that? From that ento… the insect fellow who stayed with you in the spring?’

‘Perhaps. But above all from Horoscopes, as I have already explained. Horoscopes contain everything. All the smallest details. Even how you’re feeling today, or your favourite colour for underwear. You just have to know how to read it all. The President had very bad aspects in the third house, which is the house of small Animals. Including Insects.’

The Policemen couldn’t stop themselves from exchanging meaningful looks, which to my mind was impolite. In their line of work nothing should surprise them. I continued with complete self-confidence; by now I knew they were a pair of bunglers.

‘I have been practising Astrology for many years, and I have extensive experience. Everything is connected with everything else, and we are all caught in a net of correspondences of every kind. They should teach you that at Police training college. It’s a solid, old tradition. From Swedenborg.’

‘From whom?’ they asked in unison.

‘Swedenborg. A Swede.’

I saw that one of them noted the name down.

They talked to me like this for two more hours, and that afternoon they presented me with a forty-eight-hour detention order and a warrant to search my house. Feverishly I wondered if I had left any dirty underwear out on view.

That evening I was handed a carrier bag, and I guessed it was from Dizzy and Good News. There were two toothbrushes in it (why two? For morning and evening perhaps?), a nightdress, very luxurious and sexy (Good News must have dug it out of the new stock), some sweets and a volume of Blake translated by someone called Fostowicz. Dearest Dizzy.

For the first time in my life I ended up in a purely physical prison, and it was a very difficult experience. The cell was clean, poor and dismal. When the door was locked behind me, I was seized with panic. My heart thumped in my chest and I was afraid I’d start to scream. I sat down on the bunk bed and was afraid to move. At this point it occurred to me that I would rather die than spend the rest of my life in a place like this. Oh yes, without a doubt. I didn’t sleep all Night – I didn’t even lie down. I just sat in the same position until morning. I was sweaty and dirty. I felt as if the words I had spoken that day had soiled my tongue and mouth.

Sparks come from the very source of light and are made of the purest brightness – so say the oldest legends. When a human Being is to be born, a spark begins to fall. First it flies through the darkness of outer space, then through galaxies, and finally, before it falls here, to Earth, the poor thing bumps into the orbits of planets. Each of them contaminates the spark with some Properties, while it darkens and fades.

First Pluto draws the frame for this cosmic experiment and reveals its basic principles – life is a fleeting incident, followed by death, which will one day let the spark escape from the trap; there’s no other way out. Life is like an extremely demanding testing ground. From now on everything you do will count, every thought and every deed, but not for you to be punished or rewarded afterwards, but because it is they that build your world. This is how the machine works. As it continues to fall, the spark crosses Neptune’s belt and is lost in its foggy vapours. As consolation, Neptune gives it all sorts of illusions, a sleepy memory of its exodus, dreams about flying, fantasy, narcotics and books. Uranus equips it with the capacity for rebellion; from now on that will be proof of the memory of where the spark is from. As the spark passes the rings of Saturn, it becomes clear that waiting for it at the bottom is a prison. A labour camp, a hospital, rules and forms, a sickly body, fatal illness, the death of a loved one. But Jupiter gives it consolation, dignity and optimism, a splendid gift: things-will-work-out. Mars adds strength and aggression, which are sure to be of use. As it flies past the Sun, it is blinded, and all that it has left of its former, far-reaching consciousness is a small, stunted Self, separated from the rest, and so it will remain. I imagine it like this: a small torso, a crippled being with its wings torn off, a Fly tormented by cruel children; who knows how it will survive in the Gloom. Praise the Goddesses, now Venus stands in the way of its Fall. From her the spark gains the gift of love, the purest sympathy, the only thing that can save it and other sparks; thanks to the gifts of Venus, they will be able to unite and support each other. Just before the Fall it catches on a small, strange planet that resembles a hypnotised Rabbit, and doesn’t turn on its own axis, but moves rapidly, staring at the Sun. This is Mercury, who gives it language, the capacity to communicate. As it passes the Moon, it gains something as intangible as the soul.

Only then does it fall to Earth, and is immediately clothed in a body. Human, animal or vegetable.

That’s the way it is.

I was released the next day, before those unfortunate forty-eight hours had elapsed. All three of them came to fetch me, and I threw myself into their arms as if I had been in another world for years and years. Dizzy had a cry, while Good News and Oddball sat stiffly in the back of the car. They were plainly horrified by what had happened, far more than I was, and in the end I was the one who had to comfort them. I asked Dizzy to stop at the shop, and we bought ice cream.

But on the whole, from the time of my brief stay in custody I became very absent-minded. I couldn’t come to terms with the fact that the policemen had searched my house, and from then on I sensed their presence everywhere – they’d rummaged in the drawers, in the wardrobes and the desk. They hadn’t found anything, for what could they have found? But order had been disturbed, peace destroyed. I drifted about the house, incapable of any work. I kept talking to myself, and realised that there was something wrong with me. My large windows attracted me – I stood in them, unable to tear my gaze from what I could see – rippling russet grasses, their dance in the invisible wind, the instigators of that motion. And shimmering patches of green in all shades too. I’d become pensive and would be lost in thought for hours at a time. I put down my keys in the garage, for instance, and couldn’t find them for a week. I burned the kettle. I’d take vegetables out of the freezer and only rediscover them once they were shrivelled and past their best. From the corner of my eye I could see how much movement there was in my house – people coming and going, from the boiler room upstairs and into the garden, then back again. My Little Girls running joyfully through the hall. Mummy sitting on the terrace drinking tea. I could hear the clink of the teaspoon striking the cup and her long, sad sighs. It only went quiet when Dizzy came; and he was almost always with Good News, as long as she didn’t have a delivery of goods the next day.

When my pains intensified, one day Dizzy called for an ambulance. Apparently I had to go to hospital. It was a good time for an ambulance to come – August, the road was hard and dry, the weather was beautiful and – praise the planets – I had had my morning shower and my feet were nice and clean.

Now I was lying in the ward, strangely empty, with open windows, through which came aromas from the allotments – of ripe tomatoes, dry grasses, burning stalks. The Sun had entered Virgo, who was starting her autumn tidying and was already stocking up for the winter.

They came to see me, of course, but nothing makes me feel more uncomfortable than being visited in hospital. I really don’t know what to do with myself. Every conversation in this unpleasant place becomes unnatural and forced. I hope they didn’t think badly of me for telling them to go home.

Ali the dermatologist often came and sat on my bed. He’d drop in from the next ward, bringing me well-thumbed magazines. I told him about my bridge in Syria (I wonder if it’s still there?), and he told me about his work with itinerant tribes in the desert. For some time he had been a doctor for nomads, and had travelled with them, examining and treating them. Always on the move. He himself was a nomad. He had never stayed at any hospital for more than two years before something had suddenly started to make him itch and feel restless, so he’d try for another job in another place. The patients who had overcome all sorts of prejudices and finally come to trust him would be abandoned – one day a sign would appear on the door of his consulting room to say that Doctor Ali was no longer there. Naturally, his roving lifestyle and his ethnic origin doomed him to the interest of various special services – as a result his phone was always bugged. Or so at least he claimed.

‘Do you have any Ailments of your own?’ I once asked him.

Oh yes, he did. Every winter he suffered from depression, and the room at the workers’ hostel that the local authority had assigned him deepened his melancholy even more. He had one valuable object that he had acquired through years of work – it was a large lamp that emitted rays similar to sunlight, and was thus designed to raise the spirits. He often spent the evening exposing his face to this artificial Sun, while mentally wandering the deserts of Libya or Syria, or perhaps Iraq.

I wondered what his Horoscope was like. But I was too sick to do the calculations. This time I was in a bad way. I lay in a darkened room, suffering from a severe light allergy; my skin was red and blistered, stinging as if it were being slashed by tiny scalpels.

‘You must avoid Sunlight,’ he warned me. ‘I’ve never seen skin like yours before – you are crated for life underground.’

He laughed, because for him it was unimaginable – he was entirely geared towards the Sun, like a sunflower. Whereas I was like white chicory, a potato sprout – I should spend the rest of my life in the boiler room.

I admired him for the fact that – so he said – he only ever owned as many things as he could pack into two cases at the drop of a hat, in less than an hour. I resolved to learn this skill from him. I promised myself that as soon as I came out, I’d practise. A backpack and a laptop, that should suffice for any Person. Like this, wherever he ended up, Ali was at home.

This drifter physician reminded me that we should never make ourselves too comfortable in any particular place, in which case I had probably gone too far with my house. Doctor Ali gave me a jalabiya – a white ankle-length shirt, with long sleeves, that buttoned up to the neck. He said the white colour acts as a mirror, reflecting rays of light.

In the second half of August my condition grew so much worse that I was taken to Wrocław for tests, which didn’t really bother me. In a semi-conscious state for days on end, I anxiously fantasised about my sweet peas, worrying that I should be tending the sixth generation, or else the results of my research would cease to be valid and once again we would assume that we don’t inherit our life experience, that all the sciences in the world are a waste of time, and that we’re incapable of learning anything from history. I dreamed that I called Dizzy, but he didn’t answer the phone because my Little Girls had just given birth to children, and there were lots and lots of them on the floor in the hall and the kitchen. They were people, a completely new race of people brought forth by Animals. They were still blind – they hadn’t yet opened their eyes. And I dreamed I was looking for my Little Girls in the big city; in the dream I still had hope, but it was a stupid hope, so painful.

One day the Writer came to see me at the hospital in Wrocław to comfort me politely and to gently inform me that she was selling her house.

‘The place has changed,’ she said, offering me some mushroom pancakes from Agata.

She said she felt bad vibes there, she was afraid at night, and had lost her appetite.

‘It’s impossible to live in a place where things like that happen. Those dreadful murders have brought various minor deceptions and improprieties to light. It turns out I’ve been living among monsters,’ she said fretfully. ‘You are the only honest person in the whole place.’

‘You know what, I was planning to give up caring for the houses next winter anyway,’ I said, confused by the compliment.

‘A wise decision. You’d be better off in a warm country…’

‘Without the Sun,’ I added. ‘Do you know of any such place, apart from the bathroom?’

She ignored my question.

‘There’s already a “for sale” announcement in the paper for my house,’ she said, and paused for thought. ‘Anyway, it was too windy there. I couldn’t bear the constant howling of the wind. It’s impossible to concentrate with something rustling, whistling and murmuring in your ear all the time. Have you noticed how much noise the leaves make on the trees? Especially on the poplars – frankly it’s intolerable. They start in June and they go on shaking until November. It’s a nightmare.’

I had never thought about it.

‘They interrogated me, did you know?’ she said indignantly, suddenly changing the subject.

I wasn’t at all surprised, because they had interrogated everyone. This case was now their priority. What a ghastly word.

‘And? Were you any help to them?’

‘You know what, sometimes it seems to me we’re living in a world that we fabricate for ourselves. We decide what’s good and what isn’t, we draw maps of meanings for ourselves… And then we spend our whole lives struggling with what we have invented for ourselves. The problem is that each of us has our own version of it, so people find it hard to understand each other.’

There was some truth in what she said.

As she was saying goodbye, I rummaged in my things and handed her a deer hoof. As she took off the paper wrapping, her face twisted into a scowl of revulsion.

‘What on earth is this? For the love of God, Mrs Duszejko, what are you giving me?’

‘Please take it. It’s a bit like the Finger of God. It has entirely dehydrated, it doesn’t smell.’

‘What am I supposed to do with it?’ she asked in dismay.

‘Put it to good use.’

She wrapped the trotter up again, hesitated in the doorway, and was gone.

I spent ages pondering what the Grey Lady had said. And I think it tallies with one of my Theories – my belief that the human psyche evolved in order to defend us against seeing the truth. To prevent us from catching sight of the mechanism. The psyche is our defence system – it makes sure we’ll never understand what’s going on around us. Its main task is to filter information, even though the capabilities of our brains are enormous. For it would be impossible to carry the weight of this knowledge. Because every tiny particle of the world is made of suffering.

So first I came out of prison. Then I came out of hospital. There can be no doubt I was battling with the influences of Saturn. Yet in August it moved far enough to cease to create a negative aspect, and so we spent the rest of the year like a good family. I lay in a darkened room, Oddball tidied and ran the house, while Dizzy and Good News cooked and did the shopping. Once I was feeling better, we made another trip to the Czech Republic, to the extraordinary shop where we visited Honza and his books. We had dinner with him twice, and held our own miniature conference on Blake, without any EU grants or support.

Dizzy found a short video on the internet. It lasts no more than a minute. A handsome Stag attacks a hunter. We see it standing on its hind legs, striking the Man with its front hooves. The hunter falls over, but the Animal doesn’t stop, it stamps on him in a fury, it doesn’t give him a chance to crawl away on his knees. The Man tries to protect his head and to escape from the enraged Animal, but the Stag keeps knocking him down again.

The scene has no end – we don’t know what happened afterwards, either to the hunter or the Stag.

Lying in my dark room, in the middle of the summer, I watched this video over and over again.