Bouquets of trees forming graceful curving and curling paths, the garden was rolling gently beyond the linden trees where one could sense the hidden surface of a pond—oh, the greenery in the dappled, sun-sparkled dew! However, when we went out after breakfast into the courtyard—the white house, two-storied with dormer windows, framed by spruce trees and firs and arborvitae, footpaths and flowerbeds—the house overwhelmed us like an unspoiled vision from the now distant, prewar time … and in its untouched bygone state it seemed more real than our present time … while at the same moment the awareness that there was no truth to it, that it was inconsistent with reality, turned it into something akin to a stage set … so then this house, the park, the sky and the fields became both theater and truth. But here comes the lord of the manor, powerful, edematous, in a green jacket over his close-to-bursting body, and indeed he arrives as in the days gone by, greeting us from afar with his hand and he’s asking if we slept well? Chatting lazily, without haste, we went through the gate, onto a field, and with a wide sweep of our eyes we took in the swelling and undulating land, all the while Hipolit prattling to Fryderyk about something, about the harvest, about the good crops, while crushing clods of dirt with his boot. We were now walking in the direction of the house. Madame Maria appeared on the porch and called out: good morning, while a little brat ran across the lawn, perhaps the cook’s son? And so we moved about that morning—yet it was not so simple … because a kind of debility was creeping into the landscape, and again it seemed to me that everything, though still the same, was entirely different. What a disorienting thought, what an unpleasant, masked thought! Fryderyk walked next to me, in the light of this bright day, his body so real that one could count the hairs sticking out of his ears and all the flakes of his skin as pale as if he lived in a cellar—Fryderyk, I repeat, hunched, sickly, with sunken chest, with pince-nez, with the mouth of an excitable man, hands in his pockets—a typical city intellectual in a robust countryside … yet in this disparity the countryside was not the winner, the trees lost their self-confidence, the sky was blurry, the cow was not duly recalcitrant, the age-long past of the countryside was disconcerted, unsure of itself, as if tripped up … and Fryderyk was perhaps more real than the grass. More real? An irksome thought, disturbing, sordid, a bit hysterical, even provocative, insistent, destructive … and I didn’t know whether it came from him, this thought, from Fryderyk, or was it the result of war, revolution, enemy occupation … perhaps one as well as the other, perhaps both together? But he was behaving impeccably when asking about the farm, conversing in the way one would have expected, and suddenly we saw Henia coming toward us across the lawn. The sun burned our skin. Our eyes were dry, our lips chapped. She said:
“Mother is ready. I ordered the horses harnessed.”
“To church, to Mass, because it’s Sunday,” Hipolit explained. And he said softly to himself: “To church, to Mass.”
He announced:
“If you gentlemen would like to come with us, you are most welcome, no pressure, merely broad-mindedness, ha, right?! I’m going because as long as I’m here, I’ll go! While there is a church I’ll go to church! And with the wife, the daughter, in the carriage—because I don’t need to hide from anyone. Let them look at me. Let them gawk—as if I’m on camera … let them take photos!”
And he whispered: “Let them take photos!”
Fryderyk was already most obligingly offering our readiness to take part in the holy service. We are riding in the carriage whose wheels, sinking into the sandy tracks, are groaning dully—and when we ascended a hill, the expanse of the land appeared gradually, spreading low at its very bottom, below the tremendous heights of the sky, and it became solidified in immobile undulation. There, far away, was the railroad. I wanted to laugh. The carriage, horses, coachman, the hot aroma of leather and lacquer, the dust, the sun, the tiresome fly at my face and the groan of the rubber tires grinding into the sand—ah yes, familiar from time immemorial, and nothing, nothing at all has changed! But when we found ourselves at the top of the hill and felt the breath of the expanse at whose perimeter loomed the Swiętokrzyskie Mountains, this journey’s duplicity almost struck me in the chest—because we appeared as if in a lithograph—like a lifeless photograph from an old family album—where a long-dead vehicle could be seen on this hill even from the farthest limits—and, as a result, the land became maliciously derisive, heartlessly disdainful. Thus the duplicity of this lifeless journey spread to the black-and-blue topography, passing us by almost imperceptibly under the influence and pressure of this very journey of ours. On the backseat next to Madame Maria, Fryderyk looked around and admired the colors, riding to church as if he were actually riding to church—he’s probably never been so sociable and courteous! We drove down into the Grocholicki ravine where the village begins, where it’s always muddy …
I remember (and this is not insignificant in terms of the events to be told later) that my dominant feeling was futility—and again, just as on the previous night, I would have leaned to look the coachman in the face, but this was not the proper thing to do … so we both stayed behind his inscrutable back, and our journey continued behind his back. We drove into the village of Grocholice, a little river on the left, while on the right, still sparsely set, were peasants’ cottages and fences, a hen and a goose, a trough and a mud hole, a dog, a peasant or an old woman decked out for Sunday, strutting along a footpath to the church … the calm and sleepiness of this village … But it was as if our death was bending over a sheet of water, evoking its own image, our entry’s past was reflecting itself in this eternal village and rumbling with frenzy—a frenzy that was merely a mask—that only served to hide something else … But what? Whatever the meaning … of war, of revolution, violence, debauchery, degradation, despair, hope, struggle, fury, screaming, murder, slavery, disgrace, lousy dying, of cursing or of blessing … whatever was the meaning, I say, it was too weak to break through the crystal of this idyll, and this little scene, long after its time, remained untouched, it was only a facade. … Fryderyk chatted with Madame Maria most courteously—or was he keeping up the conversation so as not to say anything else? We arrived at a wall surrounding the church and we began to dismount … but I no longer know what’s what, what’s it like … are the steps that we’re climbing to the square at the front of the church ordinary steps or are they perhaps … ? Fryderyk gave Madame Maria his arm and, taking off his hat, he led her to the church entrance as people watched—but perhaps he did this so as not to do anything else?—while Hipolit rolled behind him and pushed forward with his big body, unwavering, steadfast, knowing full well that tomorrow they might slaughter him like a pig—he pushed with all his force, in spite of all their hatred, grim and resigned. The lord of the manor! However, was he, he too, the lord of the manor in order not to be something else?
But when the semidarkness, pierced with burning candles, engulfed us, the semidarkness that was filled with the stuffy air of a chant, plaintive, murmuring and resounding with this body of peasants, unleavened and stooping … then the lurking multiplicity of meanings vanished—as if a hand, more powerful than we were, had reestablished the dominant order of the holy service. Hipolit, until now the lord of the manor with his concealed rage and vehemence, anything but to give in, now soothed and noble, sat down in the patrons’ bench and with a nod of his head greeted the land steward’s family from Ikan sitting across from him. This was the moment before the Mass, people without their priest, the populace left to itself with its mawkish chanting, humble, thin, and awkward, yet holding itself in check—and so it was like a mongrel on a leash, harmless. What restraint, what soothing effect, what blissful relief, here, in this bygone era turned to stone, when a peasant became a peasant again, the lord—a lord, the Mass—a Mass, a stone—a stone, and everything was becoming itself again!
However, Fryderyk, who had seated himself next to Hipolit in the patrons’ bench, slid to his knees … and this spoiled my peace somewhat, because he was perhaps exaggerating it a bit … and it was hard for me not to think that perhaps he slid onto his knees so as not to commit something that would not be sliding onto his knees. … But now the bells, the priest comes out with the chalice and, placing it on the altar, executes a bow. Bells. Suddenly a decisive element struck my being with such a force that I—exhausted, semiconscious—knelt down, this was a close call and—in my wild abandon—I would have prayed … But Fryderyk! I thought, I suspected, that Fryderyk, who after all had also knelt, would also be “praying”—I was even sure that, yes, knowing his terrors, he was not pretending but really “praying”—in the sense that he wanted not only to deceive others but to deceive himself as well. He was “praying” in relation to others and in relation to himself, but his prayer was only a screen covering up the immensity of his non-prayer … so this was an ejecting, an “eccentric” act that was taking him outside the church, into the boundless territory of total nonbelief—a refutation to the very core. So what was going on? What was about to happen? I had never experienced anything like it. I would never have believed that anything like this was possible. But—what happened? In fact—nothing. What actually happened was that a hand had removed all the content, all the meaning from the Mass—and here was the priest moving, genuflecting, walking from one end of the altar to the other, while the altar boys were hitting the bells and the smoke of the incense was rising, but the meaning was escaping from it all like gas from a balloon, and the Mass was collapsing in a terrible impotence … it was flagging … no longer capable of begetting life! And this loss of meaning was a murder committed on the periphery, outside ourselves, outside the Mass, by way of a voiceless yet lethal commentary delivered by someone looking on from the side. And the Mass could not defend itself against it, because it happened owing to some tangential interpretation, in fact no one in this church opposed the Mass, even Fryderyk connected with it most correctly … but if he was killing it, it was, so to speak, from the other side of the medal. His incidental commentary, his killing glossa, was a work of cruelty—the work of a harsh consciousness, cold, utterly penetrating, relentless … and I realized that introducing this man into the church was sheer madness, one should have kept him away from it all, for God’s sake! The church was the most terrible place for him to be!
But what happened, happened. The process that had taken place arrived at reality in crudo … first and foremost it was the ruin of salvation and, as a result, nothing could save these boorish, fusty mugs, now extracted from any sanctifying mode and served up raw, like offal. This was no longer a “populace,” these were no longer “peasants,” these were not even “people,” these were creatures such as … such as they were … and their dirt had been deprived of grace. But the unbridled anarchy of this fair-haired multihead was like the no less insolent shamelessness of our faces that had ceased to be “lordly” or “cultured” or “refined” and had become something glaringly themselves—caricatures that had been deprived of a model, no longer caricatures of “something,” they were just themselves, and bare as an ass! And the mutual explosion of grotesqueness, of both the lordly and the boorish, converged in the gesture of the priest who was celebrating … what? What? Nothing. But that was not all …
The church ceased to be a church. A space had intruded, but a space that was cosmic, black, and this wasn’t even happening on earth, but rather, the earth had transformed itself into a planet suspended in the universe, cosmos was here, this was happening somewhere on its territory, to such a degree that the light of the candles, and even the light of day penetrating the stained-glass windows, became as dark as night. Thus we were no longer in church, in this village, not even on earth, but instead—and in keeping with reality, yes, in keeping with the truth—we were somewhere in the cosmos, suspended with our candles and our glitter, and somewhere in that vastness we were performing these strange things with ourselves and among ourselves, like a monkey making faces in a vacuum. It was our particular teasing, somewhere, in a galaxy, a human provocation in darkness, a performance of bizarre movements in an abyss, grimacing in boundless immensity. And our drowning in space was accompanied by a horrible intensification of the concrete nature of things, we were in the cosmos, yet we were like something terrifyingly known, defined in every detail. The bells rang for the Elevation. Fryderyk kneeled.
This time his kneeling had a crushing effect, like killing a hen, and the Mass rolled on, though struck mortally and babbling like a madman. Ite missa est. And … oh, what triumph! What victory over the Mass! What pride! As if its abolition was, for me, a longed-for ending of sorts: finally I was alone, by myself, without anyone or anything but me, alone in absolute darkness … so I have reached my limit and attained darkness! The bitter end, the bitter taste of arriving and the bitter finish line! Yet it was all lofty, giddy, marked by the relentless maturity of the spirit, finally autonomous. But it was also terrible and, devoid of any resistance, I felt within that I was in the hands of a monster, and that I was capable of doing anything with myself, anything, anything! The insensitivity of pride. The chill of the outer limits. Severity and emptiness. What then? The holy service was coming to an end, I looked around sleepily, I was tired, oh, we’ll have to leave, ride home, to Poworna, on the sandy road … but all of a sudden my gaze … my eyes … my eyes, panicky and heavy. Yes, something was pulling at me … eyes … and eyes. Captivatingly, temptingly—yes. But what? What was attracting and luring me? A marvel, as in a dream, shrouded places that we desire yet are unable to discern, and we circle around them with a mute cry, with an all-consuming longing that is heartbreaking, exultant, enchanted.
I circled around like this, still flustered, hesitant … yet already deliciously permeated by a lithe subjugation that was captivating me—enchanting—charming—tempting and conquering me—it sparkled—and the contrast between that night’s cosmic chill and the gushing spring of bliss was so immeasurable that I thought dimly—it’s God, and a miracle! God and a miracle!
What was it, though?
It was … part of a cheek and the nape of a neck … it belonged to someone standing in front of us, in the crowd, a few steps away …
Oh, I almost choked! It was …
(a boy)
(a boy)
And realizing that it was just (a boy), I began to rapidly retreat from my ecstasy. Because in fact I barely saw him, just a little ordinary skin—on the back of the neck and on the cheek. Then he moved abruptly, and this movement, imperceptible, pierced me through and through, like an extraordinary attraction!
And indeed (a boy).
And nothing but (a boy).
How embarrassing! An ordinary sixteen-year-old nape of a neck, with cropped hair, and the ordinary skin (of a boy), somewhat chapped, and (a youthful) position of the head—most ordinary—so what was the origin of my inner trembling? Oh … and now I saw the contour of the nose, the mouth, for he turned his face slightly to the left—there was nothing special, I saw in this slant the slanting face (of a boy)—an ordinary face! He was not a peasant. A student? An apprentice? An ordinary (young) face, untroubled, somewhat willful, friendly, meant for chewing pencils with his teeth, or for playing football, playing billiards, and the collar of the jacket was over the shirt collar, his nape was suntanned. Yet my heart was beating fast. And he exuded godliness, wonderfully enchanting and engaging as he was in the boundless emptiness of this night, he was a source of a breathing warmth and light. Grace. Unfathomable miracle: why did this insignificance become significant?
Fryderyk? Did Fryderyk know about it, or see it, did his eye catch it too? … But all at once people began moving, the Mass came to an end, a slow crowding toward the door ensued. And I with the others. Henia walked ahead of me, her back and her little nape still a schoolgirl’s, and this is what came to mind, and when it did, it took hold of me so strongly—it linked up with the other neck so efficiently … that I suddenly understood, easily and without effort: this neck and the other neck. These two necks. The two necks were …
How so? What’s this? It was as if the nape of her neck (the girl’s) was taking a run for and uniting itself with (the boy’s) neck, this neck as if taken by the scruff was taking the other neck by the scruff of the neck! Please forgive the awkwardness of these metaphors. I feel a little awkward talking about this—and also at some point I’ll have to explain why I’m putting the words (boy) and (girl) in parentheses, yes, this too needs explaining. Her movement, as they walked ahead of me in the crowd, in the heated crush of people, was also somehow “relating” to him, and it was an ardent enhancement, a whisper added to his movement so close by, so close in this crowd. Really? Wasn’t it an illusion? But suddenly I saw her hand hanging by her body, pressed into her body by the push of the crowd, and this pressed hand of hers was surrendering itself to his hands in intimacy and in the thicket of all those bodies glued together. Indeed, everything within her was “for him”! While he, farther on, calmly walking along with other people, was yet straining toward her, tensed by her. Oh, such a disinterested falling into love and desire, unheeding, blind, and moving on so calmly with the others! So! That’s why!—I now knew the secret within him that, from the first moment, had carried me away.
We emerged from the church onto the sunlit square and people dispersed, while they—he and she—appeared before me in the fullness of their nature. She—in a light-colored blouse with a little white collar, in a navy blue skirt, standing to one side, waiting for her parents, closing her prayer book with a clasp. He … he went up to a wall and, standing on his toes, looked over to the other side—I didn’t know why. Did they know each other? Yet, even though they each were separate, once again and now even more so, their passionate congruence hit the eye: they were here for each other. I narrowed my eyes—the square looked white, green, blue, warm—I narrowed my eyes. He was for her, she for him, even as they thus stood at a distance, not at all interested in each other—and this was so strong that his mouth matched not only her mouth but her whole body—and her body was subject to his legs!
I’m worried that perhaps I have truly gone too far in my last sentence … Shouldn’t one rather say calmly that this was an exceptional casus of a good match … though perhaps not only sexual? It sometimes happens that when we see a couple we say: well, these two are. quite a match—but in this case the match, if I may say so, was even more intense because it was not grown-up. … I really don’t know if this is clear … and yet this juvenile sensuality was radiant with the treasure of a higher nature, namely, they were each other’s happiness, they were precious and most significant to one another! And in this square, under this sun, muddleheaded and stupefied, I couldn’t understand, it was beyond my comprehension, how it could be that they were not paying attention to one another, they were not striving toward each other! She was separate from him and he from her.
Sunday, the village, the heat, sleepy languor, the church, no one in a hurry, little groups formed, Madame Maria touching her face with the tip of her finger as if checking her complexion—Hipolit talking with the land steward about quotas—next to him Fryderyk, courteous, his hands in his jacket pockets, a guest … oh, this scene swept away the recent black abyss in which there had suddenly appeared such a hot little flame … but only one thing troubled me: had Fryderyk noticed it? Did he know?
Fryderyk?
Hipolit asked the land steward:
“And what about the potatoes? What shall we do?”
“We can give them half a meter.”
The (boy) approached us. “And this is my Karol,” said the steward and pushed him toward Fryderyk, who extended his hand. Karol greeted everyone, Henia said to her mother: “Look, Mrs. Gałecka has recovered!”
“Well, how about visiting the parish priest?” Hipolit asked and immediately mumbled: “What for?” Then he bellowed: “On with it, ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to go home!” We say our good-byes to the steward. We mount the carriage and Karol, who has taken his place next to the coachman, is with us (what’s this?), we’re riding on, the rubber tires slipping into the ruts sound a dull groan, here is the sandy road in the trembling and lazy air, a golden fly is hovering—and when we have climbed a hill, rectangles of fields and a railroad track appear in the distance where the forest begins. We’re riding on. Fryderyk, sitting next to Henia, hovers above the bluish-golden reflection of light typical of the local colors, the reflection—he explains—comes from particles of loess in the air. We’re riding on.