Agota Kristof: The Book of Lies

"Aren't you ashamed to beg? Come with me, I've got a few easy little jobs for you. Cutting wood, for example, or cleaning up the terrace. You're big enough and strong enough for that. Afterward, if you work well, I'll give you some bread and soup."

We answer:

"We don't want to work for you, madam. We don't want to eat your soup or your bread. We are not hungry."

She asks:

"Then why are you begging?"

"To find out what effect it has and to observe people's reactions."

She walks off shouting:

"Dirty little hooligans! And impertinent too!"

On our way home, we throw the apples, the biscuits, the chocolate, and the coins in the tall grass by the roadside.

It is impossible to throw away the stroking on our hair.

We are fishing in the stream. Harelip runs by. She doesn't see us. She lies down in the grass and lifts her skirt. She isn't wearing underpants. We see her bare buttocks and the hair between her legs. We don't have hair between our legs yet. Harelip has some, but not very much.

Harelip whistles. A dog arrives. It's our dog. She takes him in her arms and rolls with him in the grass. The dog barks, gets loose, shakes himself, and runs off. Harelip calls him gently as she strokes her sex with her fingers.

The dog comes back, sniffs Harelip's sex several times, and starts to lick it.

Harelip spreads her legs and presses the dog's head to her belly with both hands. She breathes very deeply and wriggles.

The dog's sex becomes visible, it gets longer and longer, it is thin and red. The dog raises his head and tries to climb onto Harelip.

Harelip turns over, she is on her knees, she offers her backside to the dog. The dog places his front paws on Harelip's back, his hindquarters trembling. He feels around, gets closer and closer, puts himself between Harelip's legs, and sticks himself against her buttocks. He moves very quickly backward and forward. Harelip gives a cry, and after a moment she falls on her stomach.

The dog walks off slowly.

Harelip lies on the ground for a while, then gets up, sees us, and blushes. She shouts:

"Dirty little spies! What did you see?"

We answer:

"We saw you playing with our dog."

She asks:

"Am I still your friend?"

"Yes. And we'll allow you to play with our dog as much as you like."

"And you won't tell anybody what you saw?"

"We never tell anybody anything. You can depend on us."

She sits down in the grass and cries:

"Only animals love me."

We ask:

"Is it true your mother is mad?"

"No. She's just deaf and blind."

"What happened to her?"

"Nothing. Nothing special. One day she went blind, and later on she went deaf. She says it'll be the same for me. Have you seen my eyes? In the morning, when I wake up, my eyelashes are stuck together and my eyes are full of pus."

We say:

"It's certainly an illness that medicine can cure."

She says:

"Maybe. But how can you go to a doctor without money? Anyway, there aren't any doctors. They're all at the front." We ask:

"And what about your ears? Do they hurt?" "No, I don't have any problem with my ears. And I don't think my mother has either. She pretends not to hear anything, that suits her when I ask her questions."

Exercise in Blindness and Deafness

One of us pretends to be blind, the other deaf. To begin with, by way of training, the blind one ties one of Grandmother's black shawls over his eyes and the deaf one stuffs his ears with grass. The shawl smells bad, like Grandmother.

We hold hands and go out walking during air raids, when people are hiding in their cellars and the streets are deserted.

The deaf one describes what he sees:

"The street is long and straight. It is lined with low singlestory houses. They are white, gray, pink, yellow, and blue. At the end of the street, I can see a park with trees and a fountain. The sky is blue, with a few white clouds. I can see planes. Five bombers. They are flying low."

The blind one talks slowly so that the deaf one can read his lips:

"I can hear the planes. They are making a deep sputtering noise. Their engines are laboring. They are full of bombs. Now they've passed over. I can hear the birds again. Otherwise everything is quiet."

The deaf one reads the blind one's lips and answers:

"Yes, the street is empty."

The blind one says:

"Not for long. I can hear footsteps in the side street on the left."

The deaf one says:

"You're right. It's a man."

The blind one asks:

"What is he like?"

The deaf one answers:

"Like all of them. Poor, old."

The blind one says:

"I know. I recognize old men's footsteps. I can also hear that he's barefoot, so he's poor."

The deaf one says:

"He's bald. He's wearing an old army jacket. His trousers are too short. His feet are dirty."

"What about his eyes?"

"I can't see them. He's looking down."

"And his mouth?"

"His lips are too drawn. He must have lost all his teeth."

"And his hands?"

"They're in his pockets. The pockets are huge and filled with something. Potatoes or walnuts, there are bumps showing. He's raising his head, he's looking at us. But I can't make out the color of his eyes."

"Can you see anything else?"

"Lines, deep lines on his face, like scars."

The blind one says:

"I can hear the sirens. The raid is over. Let's go home."

Later, with time, we no longer need a shawl over our eyes or grass in our ears. The one playing the blind man simply turns his gaze inward, and the deaf one shuts his ears to all sounds.

We find a man in the forest. A living man, a young man, without a uniform. He is lying behind a bush. He looks at us without moving.

We ask him:

"Why are you lying there?"

He answers:

"I can't walk anymore. I've come from the other side of the frontier. I've been walking for two weeks. Day and night. Especially night. I'm too weak now. I'm hungry. I haven't eaten for three days."

We ask:

"Why haven't you got a uniform? All young men have a uniform. They are all soldiers."

He says:

"I don't want to be a soldier anymore."

"You don't want to fight the enemy anymore?"

"I don't want to fight anyone. I have no enemies. I want to go home."

"Where is your home?"

"Still a long way off". I'll never get there if I don't find something to eat."

We ask:

"Why don't you go and buy something to eat? Don't you have any money?"

"No, I don't have any money, and I can't be seen. I must hide. No one must see me."

"Why?"

"I left my regiment without leave. I ran away. I'm a deserter. If they found me, I'd be shot or hanged."

We ask:

"Like a murderer?"

"Yes, exactly like a murderer."

"And yet you don't want to kill anyone. You just want to go home."

"Yes, I just want to go home."

We ask:

"What do you want us to bring you to eat?"

"Anything."

"Goat's milk, hard-boiled eggs, bread, fruit?"

"Yes, yes, anything."

We ask:

"And a blanket? The nights are cold, and it often rains."

He says:

"Yes, but you mustn't be seen. And you won't say anything to anybody, will you? Not even to your mother."

We answer:

"No one will see us, we never say anything to anybody, and we have no mother."

When we come back with the food and blanket, he says:

"You're very kind."

We say:

"We weren't trying to be kind. We've brought you these things because you absolutely need them. That's all."

He says again:

"I don't know how to thank you. I'll never forget you."

His eyes fill with tears.

We say:

"Crying is no use, you know. We never cry, even though we aren't men yet, like you."