Ismail Kadare - Three Arched Bridge

It was said that the old archives described precisely, even with the help of a sketch, the gesture of the curse. The palms of the hand were opened and moved forward, as if to launch the portentous curse on its flight. This gesture was repeated three times, and then the curser’s back was turned on the direction in which the curse was headed.

Their chronicles told of the cursing of castles and the domains of rebellious pashas, and even whole states, before an attack began; but there was no case of an entire continent being cursed. It was perhaps for this reason that even the most important curse maker in the state, Sukrullah, who had arrived on the empire’s extreme border the previous nighty,was slightly shaken, as those who saw him reported.

The sky was overcast and damp, and the whole plain around the small temporary minaret erected specially for the purpose was swathed in mist.

The curse maker climbed the little minaret and stared for a while in our direction, toward where, in Turkish eyes, the accursed continent of Europe began, The weather was indeed extremely bad, and almost nothing could be seen in the fog. The small group of high dignitaries who had accompanied Sukrullah from the capital to the border stood speechless, Down below, at the foot of the minaret, the imperial chronicler had opened a thick tome to record the event.

Sukrullah raised his arms in front of him, so that they emerged from the wide sleeves of his half-clerical, half-laic gown. Everybody saw that the palms of his hands were exceptionally broad. However, nobody was surprised at this, because he was not the state’s foremost curse maker for nothing,

He studied his hands for a while and, turning his eyes toward the ash-colored distance, raised his palms in front of his face to the level of his brow, His palms paled as the blood drained from them, He held them there for a time until they were as white as the palms of a corpse, and then thrust them violently forward, as if the evil were in the form of a bubble he was dispatching into the distance,

He did this three times in a row. The commination was complete.

In silence, without a word’ he climbed down first from the minaret, followed immediately by his escorts. Together with the other officials, they accompanied him to his carriage, whose doors were embellished with the emblem of the Great Royal Commination. He climbed into the carriage together with his assistants and guards, and as the vehicle departed through the winter cold in the direction from which it had come, the curse traveled in the opposite direction, toward us toward the lands of Europe. It went (or rather came) through the fog like some bird of ill omen, like a herald or a sick dream.

So’ God on high, there it is! What sort of country is this with which fate has embroiled us? What signs it sends through the air to us! And what will it send after them?

THE MONTH OF ST. NDREU began and ended in fog. Sometimes the fog seemed to freeze stock-still.

Everything half dissolved in it: the riverbanks, the nearby hamlets, the bleak sandbank^ the bridge. On such days of mist the victim immured in the lap of the bridge seemed both more remote and closer, as if he would shortly resolve his ambiguous position and step out toward us, a living man toward the living, or retreat, a dead man toward the dead.

But he remained in between, neither in this world nor in the next, a constant burden to us all Nobody knew what had happened to his flesh inside, but his plaster mask was still the same. His open, vacant eyes, his cheeks, lips, and chin, were the same as before. Sometimes a drop of moisture would appear on his features, as if on the surface of a wall, and leave a mark when it dried.

There were people who stayed for a long time, trying to decipher these signs. There were noisy crowds who chattered under his very nose, shook their fingers in front of his eyes, and even criticized him. Anybody else suspended in his position would not dream of anything but gathering his own bones in some grave. It was believed that lightning frightened him, while ravens no longer flew low above him.

His family’s visits became rarer. They now no longer came in two hostile groups, but in four: his wife and baby, his parents, and his two brothers separately. Their quarrel over sharing the compensation had deepened during the autumn, and the lawsuit they had initiated over its division would be, it seemed, hopelessly protracted.

Each party came and stayed a while by the plaster mask as if before a court, with their own explanations and worries. The man’s open eyes stared at them all impartially, while the visitors no doubt imagined that next time they would reach a better understanding with the plaster.

Next time … There were indeed days on which it seemed that he would surmount the plaster barrier and would give to them and take from them. It would be his turn to judge perhaps not only his relatives but people of all kinds.

I have seen statues age, but my mind tells me that this bas-relief, perhaps the only one in the world with the dead man’s flesh, bones, and maybe soul inside it, will have a different life expectancy. Either it will burst prematurely, or it will outlive all others. The seasons will deposit their dust on it, the wind will slowly, very slowly erode it, as it erodes all the world, and he, Murrash Zenebisha, who has now donned his protective mask, and for whom the years have stopped, will eventually find old age. But old age will come not by years and seasons. In the normal way of human age, but by centuries. Sometimes I say to myself. Poor you, Murrash Zenebisha. What horrors you will see. For the future seems to me pregnant only with terrible disasters. But sometimes I think to myself. You are fortunate in what you will see, because, whatever will happen, I am sure that like every storm this too will pass, just as every night finds a dawn.

THE BLOODSHED occurred one day before Christmas, at four in the afternoon. Everything took place in a very short time, the bat of an eyelid, but it was an event of the kind that is able to divide time in two. Since that day in the month of St. Ndreu, people do not talk about time in general, they talk about time before and time after.

Until shortly before four o’clock (on that cloudy day, it seemed to have been four o’clock since morning), until just before the fatal moment, there was no ominous sign anywhere. Everything looked empty, when suddenly, God knows how, the chill fog spawned seven horsemen. They were approaching at speed with a curious kind of gallop, not in a straight line but describing wide arcs, as if an invisible gale were driving their horses first in one direction and then in another. When they drew near enough to distinguish their helmets and breastplates, they were seen to be Turkish horsemen.

When our sentries on the right bank saw that the horsemen were coming to the bridge, they blocked the entrance with crossed spears. The horsemen continued their rush toward the bridge in their unusual gallop, describing arcs. Our sentries made signs for them to halt. They were required to stop, even if they had crossed the border with permission and all the more so if they had come without permission, which had often happened recently. But the horsemen did not obey.

To those who witnessed the skirmish from the distance of the riverbank, it resembled a dumb show. Two of the Turkish horsemen were able to rush through our guards and head for the middle of the bridge. A third was brought down from his mount, and a skirmish began around him. One of our guards ran after the horsemen who were racing ahead. Those left behind, Albanians and Turks, crossed spears. Another horseman succeeded in struggling free of the confusion and went on the heels of our guard, who was pursuing the first two horsemen. Meanwhile, our sentries on the left side of the bridge were rushing to the help of their comrades. They met the first two Turkish horsemen in the center of the bridge. An Albanian sentry pursuing the horsemen joined the fight, as did the third Turkish rider, who had pursued our guard.