Wojciech Zukrowski - Stone Tablets

“I’ll be at the airport. Here’s a kiss.”

“I wanted to beg your pardon again.” The words came to him from a great distance. What could she have done? That night he had abandoned her, pushed her away. In the face of the uprising, the threat to his family, she had become dispensable; worse yet, it had been as if she had not been there at all, had ceased to exist.

“For what?”

“I thought badly of you.”

“I took a breath of air…it was nothing. This is foolish. Clearly I deserved it.”

“No. It is not foolish. I thought you didn’t love me.”

“I love you. Doesn’t that bore you yet?”

“Don’t talk like that.”

“Sleep well. Think: only one day.”

“That’s terribly long. A whole day.”

“Think of what I said.”

“I remember, but it doesn’t make it any easier for me at all. I’d like to be with you.”

“You are always with me.”

After what seemed to be a moment of reflection he heard a whisper full of bitterness, “You are happy if you believe that.”

“Goodbye, my sun.”

Pereira stood in the doorway to the kitchen, his bristling gray hair sprinkled with glare from the lightbulb, listening for orders. “Miss Ward will come tomorrow?” he inquired, wiping the salad bowl, breathing on the glass and rubbing hard to polish it.

“Tomorrow evening.”

“I will make an anise cake,” he said dreamily. “Very good.” Suddenly he aimed a cunning glance at Istvan and said, “Is it true, sir, that the English are making war on Muslims? They said so at the bazaar.”

“No. They do not have the power they had formerly. They are only frightening them.”

“The English were true gentlemen. It was an honor to serve with the officers of the queen. If one of them was angry, he might throw a boot at me, but how he paid. Well, and everything was cheaper then; rice costs three times as much since they left. I cannot imagine how such a power could allow itself to be driven from this country. Surely it was a trick. They must have something clever in mind.”

“Don’t you remember how rice was carried away to Africa, and peasants here died of hunger in their thousands? Do you still miss the English?”

“I lacked for nothing. And today there is not enough rice for everyone. One has, another has not. So it was and will be, whether the English are here or not.”

“And which do you prefer now: the Russians or the Americans?” Istvan treated him to a cigarette. The cook did not dare light it in his presence. He tucked it behind his ear and averred with a wink:

“Hungarians. After the English went away the Hungarians took me, and by now I am accustomed to them. One goes away, transfers me to the new one, and I can live. If you have to, sir, please recommend me—”

“You think that I will go away before long?”

“Who can know? For me such an arrival is like birth, and a departure like death. I live because you allow me to live. All depends on the master’s generous hand. I remember. I try with all my might.”

“For the time being I am not thinking of leaving,” the counselor shrugged.

“There are changes in Hungary. They said so on the radio.”

“Only at the very top. In the government.”

“It begins at the top and ends at the bottom. The stone from the summit draws the avalanche down. The ambassador’s driver whispered to me that he heard”—he laid his hand on his chest and bowed his head with an expression of fatuous humility—“that there are going to be big changes. I thought right away—”

“He didn’t understand.” The counselor laughed dismissively. He moved away so impatiently that the cook, wishing to placate him, said, “I will serve the dinner now.”

“Eat with the watchman. I’m going out.”

At Nagar’s he found several correspondents; it was like a stock exchange where news was the commodity, where short, shrill Maurice first called out what he had for sale. On the hearth a fire blazed, fed with crumpled teletype tapes and carbon copies. Streaks of bluish cigarette smoke hovered under a lamp. All the chairs were occupied except one on which the spotted Trompette lay snarling, and the Frenchman allowed no one to drive her off it. Misha Kondratiuk was sitting there, and Trojanowski, and the representative of Xinhua, smaller than Nagar, looking like a polite schoolboy in a blue uniform fastened modestly at the neck. Jimmy Bradley sprawled on the sofa, his legs on a pile of waste paper.

“I give you my word that they are attacking without our consent, behind our backs. They did not ask for advice,” he said as categorically as if he were under oath. “This is France’s doing. They want to repay themselves for Vietnam and save Algeria for the sake of the metropolitan area. The Israelis rushed things a little. They burst in along the old Mosaic route.”

“This is not only about the Suez,” said Kondratiuk. “If the English are not succeeding in removing Nasser, they want at least to intimidate him, to reduce him to a role as the head of a temporary government that will be in their pockets. They do not like him in the role of a politician who unifies Arabs.”

“I tell you, the French have done this to spite us,” Bradley insisted, handing his glass to a servant to be filled. “They know that we will be their successors.”

“Sit down, Istvan. Well, find yourself a seat—” the hospitable host looked around helplessly. The Chinese correspondent was ready to give up his place, but as if remembering what a prestigious nation he represented, sat stiffly with his untouched glass resting on his lap.

“Don’t disturb the dog. She bites,” Nagar warned. “She even bares her teeth at me.” But Istvan gave the bitch a friendly pat and scratched her behind the ear until she rose, yawning, and jumped down onto the carpet with a gracious wag of her tail.

“Does she have fleas?” Trojanowski asked.

“So many of you come here that I cannot say for sure…” Nagar threw up his hands.

“What news?”

“Not many killed, for the Arabs dispersed, while the Israelis took almost two thousand prisoners. There was an exchange of telegrams between the Kremlin and the White House. Neither side wants the conflict to escalate. The Americans are looking out for the Arab oil, and the Russians have trouble enough with Poland and Hungary. The diplomatic maneuvering, however, is backed by force. And they are ready to mediate, to appease. Such mediations enhance their importance,” Nagar added quickly. “In the States they are displeased that the French have been proceeding on their own. It is an opportunity to punch them in the nose, to bring Eden to heel, and to refuse to allow Khrushchev to appear as the only defender of the Arabs. The bargaining is coming: do as you like in Hungary, and we will occupy the canal.”

“You know nothing of Polish affairs. Be quiet,” Trojanowski silenced him, his blue eyes glittering like a bird’s. “On the other hand, there will be real trouble with Hungary.”

They nodded in agreement, and Misha sighed heavily. “I was there with Tolbukhin,” he said. “The Romanians surrendered. The Bulgarians came over to our side, but not the Hungarians. They fought to the end. Budapest fell and they still held the Austrian border without flinching.”

“Does that surprise you?” Istvan thrust out his lip. “At that time Szalasi and his supporters had taken over our government. And the impression you made was hardly encouraging. There was no liberation, only subjugation. No doubt you remember.”

“You are right,” Kondratiuk said after a pause. “In the end we were coming onto enemy territory. There were many Ukrainians with us; they had passed over scorched earth, they had heard what the women said, what your retreat from the Dniester had been like.”