Wieslaw Mysliwski - Stone Upon Stone

Worst of all was at the dances. People stopped fighting with knives, now it was only ever with guns. There wasn’t a single dance without any shooting, and every second one someone got killed. And there were no culprits. No one could say who’d been shooting, who the killer was. Butter wouldn’t melt. They’d all been dancing and singing, they couldn’t hear anything over the music. Maybe the guy was already dead when he came to the dance? And you lost count of the number of shot-up windows, lamps, beer barrels, bottles, drums, fiddles. And when a fiddle gets shot there’s no more playing it. A drum can be patched up and it’ll still work. But when you put a gunshot in a fiddle it’s a goner, it’s dead. Like a person.

People really had fun in those days. They were happy because the war was over. There was one dance after another. Not a Sunday went by without one. Sometimes there were two or three dances on the same Sunday in different villages. Musicians even came by train from far away, because there weren’t enough local ones for all those dances. Besides, the local musicians played the way they used to before the war, but who danced like before the war now. Now different dances were in fashion.

There were times you didn’t know which dance to go to first. You get word from one here and you get word from one over that way. There’s shooting here and shooting there. And at the station there’s only five of us officers and one bicycle. And of course you can’t leave the station unmanned.

“You were asleep,” said father, not on my case anymore.

“No I wasn’t,” I answered, though I don’t know, maybe I was.

“Look around the house.”

I looked, but I didn’t notice anything in particular.

“What about it?”

“Antek’s gone,” said father in a painful voice.

“Where is he?”

“He left.”

Then a few years later Stasiek followed Antek. Though you’d have thought that of all us four brothers Stasiek was the one God intended to stay on the land. And that no force on earth could have torn him away from it. Ever since he was tiny, come rain or shine, heat or cold, he’d always be out in the fields with father. If father was plowing, Stasiek would walk alongside him holding the whip. Give her a flick, Stasiek, the damn creature’s stopping and starting. And Stasiek would flick the whip just like father told him to. When father was sowing, he had to at least tie one of mother’s shawls around Stasiek’s neck and give him a handful of grain so he could sow too. When father mowed, every time he stood the scythe upright and sharpened the blade with a whetstone, Stasiek would hold the handle for him. When he grew up a bit, one day he took the scythe himself and straight away he started mowing like he’d been doing it all his life. Me and Antek and Michał, father had to teach us for a long time, first how you had to stand, how to grip the scythe, how to take short, even steps, how to move the scythe back and forth, how to do it with rye and wheat and barley and oats, how to lay it down and how to keep it straight. And did he ever used to get mad while he was teaching us. He was forever having to tighten the handle and sharpen the blade. Our hands would be covered in blisters from those lessons. But with Stasiek, it was like he’d come into the world knowing how to do it. He just picked up the scythe and mowed.

“Stasiek now, he’ll be a proper mower soon as he gets his strength up.” Father would watch Stasiek mowing like he was gazing at the sunrise. “None of you is as good as him. He’ll probably end up better than me. I’ve been mowing all my life and I never move that evenly. He doesn’t jerk the scythe, he doesn’t leave too much stubble. If you look at his arms it’s as smooth as if he was scooping up water. And the way he walks forward, it’s like the earth itself was moving along under his feet. That’s how it is when God means someone to do something. You can see right away, even though he’s only a child. Take a break, Stasiek! Sit for a while! Drink some water! Or throw pebbles at sparrows a bit! You’ll do your fill of mowing yet!”

Or another time father was getting all worried about how little land we had, and how would he ever be able to divide it up between the four of us sons, and Stasiek pipes up like a true farmer that can find a solution to any problem:

“We can buy some more land, daddy. You said Kaczocha was looking to sell his two acres because he was going to the mill to be a miller. That would be two more acres!”

“He’s taking over the mill, you say.” Father fell deep in thought. After a moment he said: “Well, two acres is a lot of land, that’s for sure. And it’s right next to ours. All we’d have to do is plow over the field boundary.” And he cheered up right away. He slapped his knee and said to mother: “So? Maybe we could have a slice of bread each? Can you go bring us the loaf?”

“It’s the last one,” mother reminded him.

“Never mind that. Even the last one has to be eaten sooner or later.” Father was all cheerful, like he’d just had a drink, he was so pleased about those two acres of Kaczocha’s.

Mother went and brought the bread. She cut each of us a good thick slice, not a crumb more or less for anyone, we all got exactly the same. She only hesitated when she was cutting father’s slice, but she went ahead and gave him one too, though his was much thinner. She left herself out.

“What about you?” father said. “If we’re celebrating, everyone should. Or take mine. I’ll do fine without.”

He reached into his pocket and took out his tobacco pouch, then slowly, his mind somewhere else, he started rolling himself a cigarette. And when father rolled a cigarette it meant something good was happening inside him. Because he rarely felt like smoking when he was down. As he puffed out clouds of smoke, he said to mother:

“Cut Stasiek another slice. Why should we skimp on bread for him if he likes it so much. Szymek and Antek have done all the growing they’re going to, Stasiek’s only just starting. Or give him mine if you don’t want it.”

Another time he fell to thinking about something or other, and lost in his thoughts he suddenly started bad-mouthing Kaczocha:

“Damn fool decides out of the blue to be a miller. He thinks wheat rolls are gonna come falling from the sky just like that. In that job you have to carry sacks. Him, he spends his whole day staring into space and cooing at the pigeons. Out in his fields anything grows that wants to. You’d need to not have a conscience to let land go like that. One year he was cooing away so long he didn’t notice the fall was over, and he forgot to sow. Though whether he sows or no, all that grows there is wheatgrass and other weeds. His father was the same, but at least he’d mend people’s shoes. But him, he just sits there making pigeon noises. The land would need to be cleared of weeds first of all. Plow it over in the fall, then again in the spring. And early, before the soil loosens up. Because once wheatgrass takes hold, afterward nothing can stop it. It’ll eat up the grain and eat up the land. We’d need to borrow a plow with a deep share from someone and dig that sickness out by the roots. Then go over it with the harrow. But even the harrow won’t get rid of all of it. After the harrow we’ll all have to go and pick it out by hand. Then we’d lay down manure and leave it awhile. Plow it over again. And then we could plant lupin.”

“For the love of God!” exclaimed mother. “How much do you think that land’s going to give you! And what do you need lupin for if you already have manure!”

“Well, did the bastard ever even muck his fields? The land’s starved to death, if we get a drought it’ll be like walking over dry bones out there.”