Павел Хюлле: Cold Sea Stories

Paweł Huellespent his early writing career as an employee of the Solidarity Movement’s press office in the late 1980s. He subsequently achieved great critical success (both domestically and in translation) as a writer of novels, short stories and essays, and has been honoured with numerous awards. His first novel, Who Was David Weiser? (1987, published in English by Bloomsbury, 1990) was described by critics in Poland as ‘the book of the decade’, ‘a masterpiece’ and ‘a literary triumph’ and elicited comparisons to Günter Grass and Bruno Schulz; subsequently it has been widely translated, and was shortlisted for the inaugural Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. Huelle followed this with Moving House and Other Stories (1991, Bloomsbury 1994), First Love and Other Stories (1996), and then three novels, Mercedes Benz (2001), Castorp (2004) and The Last Supper (2007). The novels were published in English translation by Serpent’s Tale (2005, 2007 and 2008 respectively), with Mercedes Benz and Castorp both shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize.

THE TRAIN WAS moving fast. Only two of us remained in the compartment as the others got off at the previous station. My travelling companion, a slim, light brown haired man in his thirties, a little younger than I, took off his shoes and stretched out to sleep on the seat opposite. I was considering doing the same but hesitated, as there were only fifteen or twenty minutes left before my stop.

I moved next to the window and pressed my nose against the glass as if hoping to see something through the pitch dark. No moon, no stars, no lights to be seen out there. My eyelids became heavy, lulled by the constant rattling and swaying of the train. Just as I closed my eyes I noticed that the train sounds had changed and the shaking stopped. The train was slowing down. Soon it came to a halt. Outside, there was nothing to be seen. I entered the aisle and peered out but still nothing. This was no ordinary darkness.

I pulled down the window and detected there was movement outside. This strange darkness – like a curious child who sticks his finger into every hole he can reach – flowed through the window, twisting, winding, becoming white. Then I realised we were in the midst of a dense fog. For a moment a light shone through the moving mist. I was never aware that this last train of the day made such a stop. I closed the window to those foggy fingers. As I was about to return to my compartment, the door to the car at the other end of the aisle opened and the conductor entered ringing a small bell:

‘Breakdown! We’ll be here for an hour. Please do not get off the train, the fog is very thick….’

As he passed by me I asked the conductor the name of this place.

‘Second Island station,’ he said.

I said I’d never heard of it before.

‘This is a very small station,’ he said. ‘Not every train stops here.’

My travelling companion also awoke and was putting on his shoes. He approached me with sleepy eyes, touched my arm and cocked his head as if to ask what was happening. A questioning sound came from his mouth. I realized that he was mute, and it occurred to me that he might also be deaf.

‘Breakdown,’ I said slowly so he could read my lips.

I was not mistaken. My travelling companion was both mute and deaf – but we found a way of communicating. His face lightened up as he noticed the fog. He opened the window, stretched out his arm and waved it in the fog while uttering joyous sounds. Then he turned to me and made a sign with his hand for me to follow him outside. His finger pointing to the outside, he opened the door, then grasping the iron handle, stepped down. He was emitting little screams and laughing. As he reached the ground he let go, turned around and extended his hands toward me.

To read the rest of this story, purchase Elsewhere: Stories from Small Town Europe here.

First published in Great Britain in 2012 by Comma Press

www.commapress.co.uk

Copyright © remains with the author and translator 2012

This collection copyright © Comma Press 2012

All rights reserved.

First published in Kraków as Opowiečci chłodnego morza by Wydawnictwo Znak, 2008.

The moral rights of Paweł Huelle to be identified as the Author of this Work, and of Antonia Lloyd-Jones to be identified as the Translator of this Work, have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This collection is entirely a work of fiction. The characters and incidents portrayed in it are entirely the work of the author’s imagination. The opinions of the author are not those of the publisher.

The publisher gratefully acknowledges assistance from the Arts Council England.

This translation has been funded by the Polish Book Institute ©POLAND Translation Program.

Who built you so high aloft, O lovely forest?

‘Impossible’ [German].