Primeval and Other Times

THE TIME OF MRS PAPUGA

Old Boski had built a house, but he hadn’t dug a well, and so Stasia Papuga had to go next door to her brother for water. She put a wooden yoke on her shoulders and attached buckets to it. As she walked along, the buckets creaked steadily.

Mrs Papuga drew water from the well and took a furtive look around the yard. She saw bedding hung out to air – the limp bodies of plump eiderdowns cast across poles. “I’d hate to have eiderdowns like that,” she thought. “They’re too warm and the feathers fall to the bottom. I prefer my nice light blankets with the linen covers.” Cold water spilled from the buckets onto her bare feet. “I wouldn’t like to have such large windows either. How much cleaning they must need! Or net curtains – you can’t see anything through them. I wouldn’t want that many children, and high-heeled shoes are bad for your feet.”

Misia must have heard the yoke creaking, because she came out onto the steps and invited Stasia inside. Stasia put the buckets down on the concrete and went into the Boskis’ kitchen, where it always smelled of burnt milk and dinner. She sat on a small table by the stove, never on a chair. Misia shooed away the children and ran under the stairs.

She always brought something useful out of there: trousers for Janek, a little sweater or some shoes Antek had grown out of. Stasia had to alter Misia’s hand-me-downs, because they were too small for her. But she liked sewing in bed when she woke up. So she added gores, gussets, and frills, and unstitched all the tucks.

Misia treated Stasia to Turkish coffee.

The coffee was well made and had a thick skin on which the sugar sat for a moment before sinking to the bottom. Stasia couldn’t take her eyes off Misia’s nimble fingers as she tipped coffee beans into the grinder and then turned the handle. Finally the grinder’s little drawer was full, and the aroma of freshly ground coffee floated about the kitchen. She liked the smell, but she found the actual coffee bitter and unpalatable. So she tipped a few spoonfuls of sugar into her glass until the sweetness overcame the bitterness. From the corner of her eye she watched the way Misia savoured the coffee, stirred it with her spoon, picked up the glass in two fingers and raised it to her lips. And then she did the same.

They talked about children, kitchen gardens and cooking. But there were times when Misia was inquisitive, too.

“How do you live without a man?”

“I’ve got Janek, haven’t I?”

“You know what I mean.”

Stasia didn’t know what to say. She stirred her coffee.

“Living without a man is bad,” she thought that evening in bed. Stasia’s breasts and belly wanted to cuddle up to a man’s body, solid and smelling of work in the sunshine. Stasia rolled up a pillow and hugged it as if it were another body, and fell asleep like that.

There were no shops in Primeval. All the shopping was done in Jeszkotle, and Stasia had an idea. She borrowed a hundred zlotys from Misia and bought several bottles of vodka and some chocolate. And then it just took off on its own. There was always someone needing a half litre in the evening. Sometimes on a Sunday someone felt like having a drink with a neighbour under a lime tree. The people from Primeval soon learned that Stasia Papuga had a bottle or two, and would sell it for not much more than in the shop. They would also buy some chocolate for the wife, so she wouldn’t be annoyed.

In this way Stasia got a business going. At first Paweł resented her for it, but then he started sending Witek to her for vodka himself.

“You know what the penalty for that is?” he asked her, frowning, but Stasia was sure that if, God forbid, something were to happen, her brother had acquaintances, and he wouldn’t let her come to harm.

She soon started going to Jeszkotle for goods two or three times a week. She also widened the range. She had baking powder and vanilla – things any housewife might suddenly run out of while doing the Saturday baking. She had various brands of cigarettes, oil and vinegar, and after a year when she bought herself a refrigerator, she started bringing home butter and margarine, too. She kept it all in the annex which, like everything, her father had built. There stood the refrigerator, and a couch on which Stasia slept, a tiled stove, a table, and some shelves behind a curtain of faded calico. Ever since Janek left to go to school in Silesia she hadn’t used the main room.

The illicit sale of alcohol, as Stasia’s business was called in official language, greatly enriched her social life. Various people came to see her, sometimes even from Jeszkotle and Wola. On Sunday mornings, hung-over forestry workers came on bicycles. Some bought whole half-litre bottles of vodka, others bought quarters, and others asked for a hundred grams on the spot. So Stasia would pour it for them and offer them pickled gherkins for free as a chaser.

One day a young forester turned up at Stasia’s place in search of vodka. There was a heatwave, so she invited him to sit down and have some fruit juice. He thanked her and immediately downed two glasses.

“What delicious juice. Do you make it yourself?”

Stasia said yes, and for some reason her heart began to pound. The forester was a handsome man, though still very young. Too young. He wasn’t tall but he was burly. He had a fine black moustache and lively hazel eyes. She carefully wrapped a bottle for him in newspaper. After that the forester came by again, and once again she gave him some fruit juice. They chatted for a while. And later on, one evening, he knocked as she was getting undressed for bed. He was tipsy. She quickly put on her dress. This time he didn’t want a bottle to take away. He wanted to drink. She poured him a glass of vodka, sat on the edge of the couch and watched him knock it back. He lit a cigarette and looked around the annex. He cleared his throat, as if wanting to say something. Stasia sensed it was an unusual moment. She fetched another glass and filled both to the brim. They picked up the glasses and clinked them together. The forester drank, and shook the last few drops from his glass onto the floor in the traditional way. Then he suddenly put his hand on Stasia’s knee. His mere touch was enough to make her feel so weak that she leaned back and lay supine on the couch. The forester fell on top of her and started kissing her neck. Just then it occurred to Stasia that she was wearing an old, patched and extended bra and some baggy knickers, so as he was kissing her she slipped them both off herself. The forester violently forced his way into her, and those were the finest minutes in Stasia’s life.

Once it was all over, she was afraid to move underneath him. He got up without looking at her and buttoned his trousers. He muttered something and headed straight for the door. She watched as he struggled with the lock. He left, without even closing the door behind him.