Primeval and Other Times (10 page)

He hated the dirt that got into the cracks in the old wooden cottage, into the floors and under his fingernails. He hated the stench of cow’s manure that permeated his clothing when he went into the barn. He hated the smell of potatoes being steamed for the pigs – it pervaded the entire house and everything inside it, his hair and skin. He hated the boorish dialect in which his parents spoke and which sometimes pushed its way onto his own tongue. He hated the cloth, the raw wood, the wooden spoons, the holy pictures from the church fête, and his sisters’ fat legs. Sometimes he managed to gather this hatred somewhere in the area of his jaws, and then he felt a great strength in himself. He knew he would have everything he desired, that he would push forwards and no one would be able to stop him.

THE TIME OF THE GAME

The labyrinth drawn on the cloth consisted of eight circles, or spheres, called Worlds. The closer to the middle, the denser the labyrinth seemed to be, and the more blind alleys and back streets leading to nowhere there were in it. And vice versa – the outer spheres gave the impression of being brighter and more spacious, and here the paths of the labyrinth seemed wider and less chaotic, as if inviting you to wander. The sphere that represented the centre of the labyrinth – the darkest and most tangled one – was called the First World. By this World someone’s unskilled hand had drawn an arrow in copying pencil and written: “Primeval.” “Why Primeval?” wondered Squire Popielski. “Why not Kotuszów, Jeszkotle, Kielce, Kraków, Paris, or London?” A complex system of little roads, intersections, forks and fields led deviously towards a single passage into the next circular zone, called the Second World. In comparison with the tangle at the centre, here there was a bit more space. Two exits led to the Third World, and Squire Popielski soon realised that in each World there would be twice as many exits as in the previous one. With the tip of his fountain pen he carefully counted all the exits from the final sphere of the labyrinth. There were 128 of them.

The small book entitled
Ignis fatuus, or an instructive game for one player
was simply an instruction manual for the game written in Latin and in Polish. The squire flicked through it page by page, and found it all very complicated. The manual described in turn each possible result of throwing the die, each move, each pawn-figurine, and each of the Eight Worlds. The description seemed incoherent and full of digressions, until finally it occurred to the squire that here he had the work of a lunatic.

The game is a sort of journey, on which now and then choices keep appearing, the first words read. The choices make themselves, but sometimes the player is under the impression that he is making them consciously. This may frighten him, because then he will feel responsible for where he ends up and what he encounters.

The player sees his journey like cracks in the ice – lines that split, turn, and change direction at a dizzy pace. Or like lightning in the sky that seeks a way for itself through the air in a manner that is impossible to predict. The player who believes in God will say: “divine judgement,” “the finger of God” – that omnipotent, powerful extremity of the Creator. But if he doesn’t believe in God, he will say: “coincidence,” “accident.” Sometimes the player will use the words “my free choice,” but he is sure to say this more quietly and without conviction.

The game is a map of escape. It starts at the centre of the labyrinth. The aim is to pass through all the spheres and break free of the fetters of the Eight Worlds.

Squire Popielski leafed through the complicated description of the pawns and opening strategies for the Game, until he came to the description of the First World. He read:

In the beginning there was no God. There was no time or space. There was just light and darkness. And it was perfect.

He had a feeling he knew those words from somewhere.

The light moved within itself and flared up. A pillar of light tore into the darkness and there it found matter that had been immobile forever. It struck it with full force, until it awoke God in it. Still unconscious, still unsure what He was, God looked around Him, and as He saw no one apart from Himself, He realised that He was God. And unnamed for Himself, incomprehensible to Himself, He felt the desire to know Himself. When He looked closely at Himself for the first time, the Word came forth – it seemed to God that knowing was naming.

And so the Word rolls from the mouth of God and breaks into a thousand pieces that become the seeds of the Worlds. From this time on the Worlds grow, and God is reflected in them as in a mirror. And as He examines His reflection in the Worlds, He sees Himself more and more, knows Himself better and better, and this knowledge enriches Him, and thus it enriches the Worlds, too.

God comes to know Himself through the passage of time, because only that which is elusive and changeable is most similar to God. He comes to know Himself through the rocks that emerge hot out of the sea, through the plants in love with the sun, through generations of animals. When man appears, God experiences a revelation, and for the first time He is able to name in Himself the fragile line of night and day, the subtle boundary, from which light starts to be dark and dark light. From then on He looks at Himself through the eyes of people. He sees thousands of His own faces and tries them on like masks and, like an actor, for a while becomes the mask. Praying to Himself through the mouths of people, He discovers contradiction in Himself, for in the mirror the reflection can be real, and reality can pass into the reflection.

“Who am I?” asks God, “God or man, or maybe both one and the other at once, or neither of them? Was it I that created people, or they Me?”

Man tempts Him, so He creeps into the beds of lovers, and there He discovers love. He creeps into the beds of old people, and there He finds transience. He creeps into the beds of the dying, and there He finds death.

“Why shouldn’t I give it a try?” thought Squire Popielski. He went back to the beginning of the book and set out the brass figurines in front of him.

THE TIME OF MISIA

Misia noticed that the tall, fair-haired boy from the Boski family was always looking at her in church. Then, when she came out after mass, he would be standing outside looking at her again, and he kept on looking. Misia could feel his gaze on her, like an uncomfortable piece of clothing. She was afraid to move freely or breathe deeply. He made her feel awkward.

So it was all winter, from Midnight Mass to Easter. When it started getting warmer, each week Misia came to church more lightly dressed, and felt Paweł Boski’s gaze on her even more strongly. At Corpus Christi this gaze touched her bare nape and exposed arms. To Misia it felt very soft and pleasant, like stroking a cat, like feathers, like dandelion fluff.

That Sunday Paweł Boski came up to Misia and asked if he could walk her home. She agreed.

He talked the entire way, and what he said amazed her. He said she was dainty, like a luxury Swiss watch. Misia had never thought of herself as dainty before. He said her hair was the colour of the dearest type of gold. Misia had always thought she had brown hair. He also said her skin had a fragrance of vanilla. Misia didn’t dare admit she had just baked a cake.

Everything in Paweł Boski’s words discovered Misia anew. Once she reached home she couldn’t get down to any work. However, she wasn’t thinking about Paweł, but about herself: “I am a pretty girl. I have small feet, like a Chinese woman. I have beautiful hair. I smile in a very feminine way. I smell of vanilla. A person might long to see me. I am a woman.”

Before the holidays Misia told her father she would no longer be going to college in Taszów and that she had no head for calculations and calligraphy. She was still friendly with Rachela Szenbert, but their conversations were different now. They walked along the Highway to the forest together. Rachela urged Misia not to drop school. She promised to help her with arithmetic. And Misia told Rachela about Paweł Boski. Rachela listened, as a friend would, but she was of a different opinion.

“I’m going to marry a doctor or someone like that. I won’t have more than two children so I won’t ruin my figure.”

“I’m only going to have a daughter.”

“Misia, do stay on until graduation.”

“I want to get married.”

Along the same road Misia went for walks with Paweł. By the forest they held hands. Paweł’s hand was big and hot. Misia’s was small and cold. They turned off the Highway down one of the forest roads, and then Paweł stopped, and with that big, strong hand he drew Misia close to him.

He smelled of soap and sunlight. At this point Misia became rather weak, submissive and limp. The man in the white starched shirt seemed enormous. She barely reached up to his chest. She stopped thinking. It was dangerous. She came to her senses once her breasts were already bare and Paweł’s lips were roaming across her belly.

“No,” she said.

“You have to marry me.”

“I know.”

“I’m going to ask for your hand.”

“Good.”

“When?”

“Soon.”

“Will he agree? Will your father agree?”

“There’s nothing to agree. I want to marry you and that’s all.”

“But …”

“I love you.”

Misia tidied her hair and they went back to the Highway, as if they had never left it.

THE TIME OF MICHAŁ

Michał did not like Paweł. He may have been good looking, but that was all. Whenever Michał looked at his broad shoulders, strong legs in breeches, and shining boots, he felt painfully old and shrunken like a dried-up apple.

Paweł came to their house very often now. He would sit at the table and fold one leg over the other. With her tail tucked under, the bitch Dolly would sniff his polished boots and their tops made of dog skin. He talked about the business he was doing with Kozienicki in the timber trade, about the school for paramedics where he had enrolled, and about his great plans for the future. He looked at Genowefa and smiled the whole time, giving a close, thorough view of his even white teeth. Genowefa was delighted. Paweł brought her small gifts. With a blush on her face she would put the flowers in a vase, as the cellophane rustled on a box of chocolates.

“How naive women are,” thought Michał.

He got the impression that his Misia had been written into Paweł Boski’s ambitious life plans, like an object. With complete calculation: because she was the only daughter, virtually an only child, because Izydor didn’t really count. Because she was going to have a fine dowry, because she was from a wealthier family, because she was so different, elegant, beautifully dressed, delicate.

As if by the way, Michał sometimes spoke in his wife’s and daughter’s presence of old Boski, who had said maybe a hundred or two hundred words in his life and spent all his time on the manor house roof, and of Paweł’s sisters, who were plain and mediocre.

“Old Boski is a decent fellow,” Genowefa would say.

“So what, no one’s responsible for his siblings,” added Misia, looking meaningfully at Izydor. “There’s someone like that in every family.”

Michał would pretend to be reading the newspaper as his daughter dressed up to go dancing with Paweł on Sunday afternoons. She would spend about an hour preening before the mirror. He saw her fill in her eyebrows with her mother’s dark pencil and carefully paint her lips in a furtive way. He saw her standing sideways before the mirror to check the effect of her brassiere, and putting a drop of violet scent behind her ear, her first perfume that she had begged for as a seventeenth birthday present. He said nothing as Genowefa and Izydor looked out of the window after her.

“Paweł has mentioned marriage to me. He said he’d like to propose now,” said Genowefa one such Sunday.

Michał refused even to hear her out.

“No. She’s still too young. Let’s send her to Kielce, to a better school than the one in Taszów.”

“She doesn’t want to study at all. She wants to get married. Can’t you see that?”

Michał shook his head.

“No, no, no. It’s still too soon. What does she want a husband and children for? She should enjoy life … Where are they going to live? Where’s Paweł going to work? He’s still at school too, isn’t he? No, they’ve got to wait.”

“Wait for what? Until they have to get married in a hurry, urgently?”

That was when Michał thought of the house, that he would build his daughter a big, comfortable house on good land. That he would plant an orchard for it and provide it with cellars and a garden. A big house, so Misia would not have to leave, so they could all live there together. There would be enough rooms in it for everyone, and their windows would look out in all four directions. And it would be a house with foundations made of sandstone and walls made of real brick, which would be kept warm from the outside by the best timber. And it would have a ground floor, a first floor, a loft and cellars, a glazed porch, and a balcony for Misia, so she could watch the procession coming across the fields at Corpus Christi from it. In this house Misia would be able to have lots of children. There would also be a servant’s room, because Misia should have domestic help.

Next day he ate his dinner early and went all round Primeval looking for a site for the house. He thought of the Hill. He thought about the common by the White River. All the way he calculated that building such a house would take at least three years, and would delay Misia’s marriage by that time.

THE TIME OF FLORENTYNKA

On Easter Saturday Florentynka went off to church with one of her dogs for the blessing of the food. Into her basket she put a jar of the milk that fed her and her dogs, because that was all she had in the house. She covered the jar in fresh horseradish leaves and periwinkles.