Wieslaw Mysliwski - Stone Upon Stone

I wasn’t thinking what I was doing. It was like someone had jabbed me in the side with a knife. I jumped down off my load.

“Back up, boys!” I shouted. “I’m going out there!”

There was alarm among the wagons.

“Are you nuts, Szymek?!”

“What’s gotten into you now?”

“You’ll never make it across!”

“There’s one car after another!”

“Think what you’re doing, for heaven’s sake!”

I straightened the traces and bridle, patted the horse on the neck, checked the straps. I didn’t feel upset, I wasn’t mad at anyone.

“Szymek, for the love of God!” Kuś leaned down all the way from his load. “I ought to be the one to go, you know. I’m the first in line. I’m only a few steps from death anyway. And my mare’s ready to die as well.”

I took the whip and reins in hand, but I could see the farmers standing there like the cat had their tongues.

“Come on, back up! Otherwise I won’t be able to get out from behind Kuś!”

And all of a sudden it was like the fear got into them, one after another they started backing up, pulling their horses’ heads up, snapping their whips, shouting, “Whoa, back up!” The reaches and axles creaked and goddammits were flying, because reversing a loaded wagon is no easy task.

I jerked back, pulled the horse to the right, and first of all drove into the field. Then, as I passed Kuś’s wagon I tightened the reins and it was giddyup! toward the road.

“Dear God, he’s going to kill himself! Stop! Wait up! Szymek!”

Kuś’s hoarse voice rang out through the air:

“Cross yourself at least!”

I leaned my shoulder against the wagon. The whip was burning my hand. The horse was trotting along at a decent pace, maybe he sensed what he was up against. The front of the shaft was almost at the road when suddenly he hesitated and tossed his head. That part happened to be uphill. I flicked the whip across his back and legs. His whole body tensed, all the way to his hind hooves that were steadied against the ground. Gee up! Gee up! He was already coming out in front of the moving cars. Then the wagon sort of jerked him backwards, or maybe he just got scared of the cars. I braced my shoulder with all my strength against the load and took the whip to his legs once and twice again, till the horse arched. He moved forward. His front hooves were already clopping on the blacktop. The front wheels were on it too. I leaned back and whipped him again, like I was knocking the cars away from in front of him. By now my legs were coming out onto the road as well.

All of a sudden something flashed in front of my eyes. There was a terrifying honking sound right close by. I heard the squeal of tires. There was a crash and I came down like a felled tree. To begin with I couldn’t see a thing, like a fog had fallen all around me, I couldn’t feel anything either, I only heard voices and shouts somewhere far away. Then the fog began to slowly clear, and nearby to my left I saw a big hole, and in the hole a light-colored head covered in blood and looking like it was sleeping. I tried to get up. But it was as if I didn’t have a body, all I had was my will. Right in front of me on the blacktop my legs were lying all twisted like tree roots, and they were covered in blood. It seemed like my blood was flowing out of them, spilling far and wide. Though they weren’t hurting. I had the vague feeling they mustn’t have been my legs after all. And the whip I was holding in my right hand also didn’t seem to be mine, or the hand itself. Where could a whip have come from? I couldn’t for the life of me remember what I’d needed it for. It was like I was dreaming it all. It was only the road I knew was real, because I could see there weren’t any acacias growing alongside it anymore.

People were gathering around me. I couldn’t figure out why. They were shouting, their heads were bobbing like turkeys’ heads, they were waving their arms about. There were more and more of them. They shouted louder and louder, waved their arms faster and faster, and all of them were staring at me like crazy. Someone kicked my legs as they lay there on the blacktop. But it didn’t hurt at all. Someone else leaned over me, he was wearing a checkered shirt and he had eyes like a fish.

“He’s alive,” I heard him say, his voice was so loud it felt like it was boring into my ears.

He started to tug at my shoulders. And he must have woken me from my dream, because I saw I was sitting hunched over among the sheaves, and the people standing over me were real. Right next to me stood my horse, tangled in the traces, the shaft forcing his head all the way up to the sky.

“See, peasant like him, still alive.”

At that moment I felt it was my hand holding the whip, and I sensed a huge furious force gathering in that whip. I started lashing out blindly at all those screaming faces, and eyes, and shirts.

“You bastards!” I felt I was shouting at the whole world, though the sound might not even have passed my throat. Because the fog covered everything back up. As if I didn’t have a body again. Someone pulled the whip from my hand. Then when the fog rose again a moment later, I saw Kuś kneeling over me.

“You’re alive. Thank the Lord, you’re alive.”

I decided to write a letter to Antek and Stasiek about the tomb. I went to the co-op, I bought paper and ink and a penholder and a nib. Because when was the last time I wrote anyone a letter? I don’t even remember. No one in the house went to school anymore so those things weren’t needed. All we had was an old dried-up inkpot lying around from back when mother was still alive and she still wrote to them. I never wrote after they left home, even though they were my brothers. And they never wrote to me. It just worked out that way. They were in the city and I was in the village. They had their lives, I had mine. What was there to write about? Was I supposed to tell them what was happening in the village, when they maybe weren’t that interested in remembering the village anymore? What was the point of forcing myself on someone else’s life, even if it was my brothers’? Besides, one or other of them would swing by for a visit every two or three years so we more or less knew what was going on with them. One of them traveled abroad, one of them bought a car. One of them got an apartment, three rooms and a kitchen, the other one split up with his wife and got married again. One has a daughter and a son, the other one only a son, but he’s not that interested in school. As for my news, well, when mother died I sent them a telegram: “Mother died. Come.” Then, a few years later another one: “Father died. Come.” That was all my news. Though even if there’d been more, would they have wanted to know?

While mother was alive she’d always have to write a few words to them every Christmas. And each time it was the name day of Saint Stanislaus or Saint Anthony. And sometimes when she’d suddenly miss them or when she had a dream about one of them. When the flour was bolted she’d send them a packet, and a letter to go with it. Then they’d write a thank-you for the flour and send their regards to everyone at home, “and Szymek as well.” That was enough. I mean, we didn’t stop being brothers.

But a tomb is a tomb, you only build one in your whole lifetime, so I had to ask them if they wanted to be buried with everyone else, because I’d planned eight places so there’d be room for them as well. Or maybe they’d rather be buried there, where they live — that way I wouldn’t have to spend more money unnecessarily, I’d have a smaller tomb built. Of course, I hope they live as long and as happily as possible, but sooner or later they have to die, because all of us that are alive are going to die. And please answer right away, because I’ve paid for the plot and gotten the cement, and I’m all set with Chmiel. They probably remember Chmiel, he built tombs even before the war, half the tombs in our cemetery are his work. He’ll make us a solid, comfortable tomb. I just have to let him know that my brothers agree.