Wojciech Zukrowski - Stone Tablets

“Istvan!” she cried, her voice ringing with gratitude and readiness. After a moment she added, “After all, I will be with you.”

“Remember: a foreign language, unfamiliar customs, different conditions. I don’t earn much. You will be cut off from your family — sentenced to be with me.”

“My father will not disinherit me. I have a profession; I can work. It would not go badly with us.” She clasped his hands, eager to embrace what lay ahead. “But — will she agree?”

“I cannot answer for her. She is brave. And she loves me. Yes, for just that reason she should not create difficulties. There is a different issue, much harder.” He stopped speaking and looked her in the eye. “I have never mentioned this to you. I have been silent, for it was more comfortable for me. The pronouncement of the court is merely a formal dissolution of the marriage. I am a Catholic, and for us there is no release from vows we have called God to witness.”

“Is that so important to you?” She pulled her hand away in astonishment and held it to her head, entangling her fingers in the coppery strands of her hair. “I am a Christian as well, but I don’t understand such scruples.”

“I vowed, ‘Till death do us part.’ Only death severs the bond of marriage.”

She looked at him uncomprehendingly. At last her face broke into an indulgent smile.

“So it is said. Surely you are not telling me to wait for her death. You would not want me to wish her that. There must be a solution. And perhaps you are looking for an artful way to hedge yourself from me; your love is not strong enough. Can you think of the future, of your life when we are not together? If you really loved me, there would be no obstacle that we could not overcome together. Istvan, Istvan, it would be better not to talk about this, not to make plans — to live as they do here, taking what comes and hoping—” She covered her face with her hands.

It seemed to him that she was weeping. He hurried to her and took her in his arms, kissing her hair and the back of her neck. He whispered entreaties and begged her forgiveness. He knew he had caused her pain.

She lowered her hands and her eyes sparkled. Her lashes were plastered together by tears, but she was smiling. “I won’t let you go,” she said doggedly. “For how long did they send you here?”

“Two years. Three. This is my second year.”

“Well, we have a year ahead of us, at least. What is there to worry about? We Australians don’t give up easily. If only you also want—”

“How I want you. I desire you,” he whispered straight into her parted lips.

“I promised the professor that I would be back today. If you want to be with me longer, drive me to the airport.”

“Stay the night,” he pleaded.

“I can’t. I had to see you. That’s why I dropped in for just a couple of hours.”

Incredulously and with a trace of hope he asked, “Do you have a ticket?”

“I have, I have. I had that to begin with. Well, are you coming or must I call the Excelsior for a taxi?”

Her hair was dazzling in the sunlight that was stealing into the room. The sadness had gone from her eyes.

“Let’s go.” She tugged at his hand. “I don’t like to rush.”

When they were off to the city, driving on asphalt that glowed with the reflected fire of the sunset, he accelerated the engine. They crested out on the summit of a barren hill overgrown with large thistles that seemed hewn from silver. Far ahead of them, irradiated by the low sunbeams, a half-naked Hindu alternately walked and fell. He raised his hands as if pleading and collapsed on the ground, only to rise immediately, take three steps and extend his arms again as if seeking support. Then he dropped to the ground at the edge of the road.

“What has happened to him?” she asked worriedly. “Slow down. We must take a look.”

The lean man, wearing a dhoti and a strap from which hung a jug made from a bottle-gourd, fell down and rose to his feet like a broken toy.

Istvan caught up with him and put on the brakes. They both got out of the car and waited hand in hand until he drew near. He paid no attention to them, but rose and fell as if he were using his body to measure the distance he was traveling. His forehead and chest were gray from the ash that had been smeared on them. His face was serene and full of concentration; his dark eyes flashed with a look of such rapt attention that it was disturbing.

“A sadhu,” Terey said softly. “A holy pilgrim.”

“Is he demented?” she asked. “His movements are orderly, rhythmical. There is something about this that is unsettling to a normal person. Why is he making his walk so difficult? What sense does it make? He must be mad.”

She spoke out loud, certain that the man did not understand English. They trembled when the wayfarer said calmly, even with a tinge of irony in his tone, “No, Mr. Terey. Please explain to your companion that I am no more mad than you or she.”

The counselor went up to the man and peered into his eyes, but the Hindu only dropped to the ground again with his hands outstretched. Terey could not recall the hollow, hirsute face. Drops of sweat made furrows on its dusty cheeks; the gray forehead rubbed with ashes made a strange mask of it.

“You know me?”

“Yes. You came to the ministry. You are from the Hungarian embassy. And I…The official with whom you still had business not long ago died, and I was born.”

“I don’t understand.”

Still holding hands, they walked beside him, by now somewhat accustomed to the throwing up of the arms and the sudden falls. Their long shadows lay on the asphalt and the red line on the side of the road.

“I was called,” he said in a mild voice, as if he were translating into a children’s language. “A light entered into me. I understood the senselessness of the work in my office. I realized that I was squandering my life instead of perfecting myself. So I closed my portfolios, shut the books, and walked out. I am going to meet the source of light.”

“But why in such a strange way? Isn’t a pilgrimage on foot enough?”

“I will show my body that it is subject to me, as a corporal teaches a recruit discipline — as you, sir, give an order to a recalcitrant servant. For a long time I myself was the servant of my body, so it did not try to rebel. It pretends that things are bad — difficult — that sharp gravel pricks it. It begs for food and water, and I force it into a longer march. Now it is quiet. It listens meekly. Once again it has taken its proper role in my life.”

He stood up, then fell forward as far as his outstretched hands could reach. He allowed himself to take three small steps and raised his arms again as if to measure off a section of road.

“But this insanity — you are exhausting yourself. You are doing a disservice to yourself and your family, if you have one.”

“I have. My wife and sons accepted my decision, for neither tears nor anger altered it. They do not beg me to come back. I am not compelling others to do as I am doing. If I am injuring anyone, it is only myself. This is my body and I have the right to do as I please with it,” he said calmly, his even voice at odds with the rhythmic steps and falls that resembled the movements of a mechanical clown. “Leave me at least a little freedom. If I perish, it is only I; and you? In your world there is not even a place for such a journey as mine. And all your technology and science — to what do they lead humanity but to violence, fear, and annihilation? I am harming no one. Respect my will.”

Suddenly Istvan remembered an official sitting in the corner of a room, behind a table with a large fan, tidy, even-humored, smiling agreeably. But that man had worn spectacles.