Wojciech Zukrowski - Stone Tablets

“One might think that nothing happens in this country,” Nagar said, motioning to the distant landscape: the empty fields, the clumps of trees with bleached trunks and almost black shocks of leaves blurred by a ripple of hot air. “However, since my arrival — and I am in my ninth year here — there have been enormous changes. They occurred imperceptibly, as if through no one’s volition. The awakening revealed itself in collective action that surprised those who were put off guard by the apparent passiveness of the Hindus.

“A consciousness of rights is growing in the depths of that mass of people, and not even the rights of class, but human rights. If they would go further and take the view that they only live once, that each is unique, that in any case they should act quickly…If that crude definition of religion as an opiate applies anywhere, it applies above all here in India. They suffer calmly as oxen; they accept the yoke of predestination; they trust that for that humility and submission, that lack of rebellion, they will be rewarded in the next incarnation. You know, I would wish for a bloody revolution in this country — if they were at all able to pull it off.”

“You say that?” Terey looked at Nagar’s ruddy, creased face. “I thought you were here to find peace above all else. Your country has had enough to live through: defeat, painful capitulation. Struggles of generals for power, struggles for influence with the Americans and the English, for benevolent patronage. The breakup of your empire: Vietnam, then Morocco and Algeria. When it comes to the point, you’ve had enough of unstable governments, ministerial intrigue, corrupt police and collaborators in high places.”

Nagar rocked back and forth and smiled indulgently, with a hint of irony.

“Peace. There are these years to appreciate it”—he began toying with a cigarette—“and just a little more perseverance to hold out here at my observation post while new forces, still unknown to themselves, try to take power. You are astonished that I love India. A splendid country! Money is worth more here than in Europe; I can get everything for centimes. Where would I find such deferential servants, such lovers—” he winked knowingly. He did not hide his weakness and often let himself be seen in the company of supple young men with crimped hair reeking of brilliantine. “Where would they entertain me so regally, so sumptuously? I am on a first-name basis with the heads of all the government departments, and with people rich as monarchs. What magnificent hunts! And yet I would wish this country and those grass-eating sheep a bloodbath. War…though not many Indians died for England in Africa, Burma, and Italy, war opened their eyes and showed them that England is weak, that the British lion will roar, will behave menacingly, but when one waves the firebrand in front of him, he will back away.”

Nagar was in his element. He had snagged himself a patient listener; he perorated with the gestures of a populist politician. Istvan lit a cigarette and thought of Margit.

“War? It hastened India’s independence. Though the present state of things is very convenient for me, I would be glad to see the next stage: revolution. For just this reason, that in my own way I love these people. You, Istvan, ought to understand me. Quite simply, I feel better when I admit this thought — when I accept internally the changes that the India of today will inflict on me.”

It’s easy for you to talk of being resigned, Terey thought, since you only see the arrival of that moment in the distant future. You are almost certain that it will not affect you.

The cigarette smoke drifted away in the sunlight. The parrots screeched. The rattle of casual applause reached them: the gracious acceptance of the conclusion of someone’s speech.

“Doesn’t it seem to you that there is an unhealthy momentum in business these days, a driven quality? The papers are full of sensational headlines; the country teems with shady transactions. Pity that they are of no interest to anyone outside India. We would have an easy life; I’m thinking of us—” Nagar pointed a thumb at his tight blue striped shirt and the big sapphire bow tie that fluttered like a startled butterfly—“of us, correspondents. Those who have money want to turn it around as soon as possible, to take the profit, hide the income, withdraw the capital. The ground shakes under one’s feet. A foul smell is in the air. One grasps, one wrests what one can, as long as one can. I am not thinking of foreign capital under Indian names, only of no less rapacious Indian nabobs — the workings of instinct,” he reflected, crushing a Gauloise between his fingers, “as with flies, which are the most vexing in autumn, the day before the first chill, which exterminates them.”

“You’re in a good humor,” Terey said, nodding. “You’re galloping on our horse! The threat of revolution — that’s the prerogative of the communists.”

“I could settle for war,” Nagar conceded. “The impulses that unite a nation are needed here. They might equally well come from within as from outside.”

“But who would want to fight them?” Terey said doubtfully. “Winning such a war might be more troublesome than losing. What could be done with those hundreds of millions? How could they be fed and clothed and goaded into rational activity?”

Nagar brooded. “Pakistan could attack them, with the tacit approval of the Americans, if they move too far to the left. Or China, if the Americans instead of the English became overly involved with them. Perhaps war would bring a sudden assumption of power by the army, as happens in newly formed democracies. That was the case in Egypt and Turkey, and not long ago in South Korea. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if momentous developments set in before our stay in India is over.”

“But the Congress Party and Nehru—”

“Tradition still keeps the party going; they wrap themselves in their achievements in the time of the struggle for independence. But by now that is history, a defense of the power the nation bestowed on them, and they know how to make the most of it. Nehru is an old man. He can only ask, like Gandhi, that they respect his gray hair. But every plea, every appeal for restraint and deliberation, may be drowned out tomorrow by an uproar from the impatient crowd.”

They heard the whistle of a locomotive from beyond the river: a long shriek on two notes, like shepherds’ pipes. Maurice listened with his head tilted.

“You take me for a drunken soothsayer, and my throat is dry as pepper. I can’t drink alone. I’d like to get you to slip off with me to the hotel bar. If we take a whole bottle, we can be sure they won’t dupe us with watered-down whiskey, as my valet tried to do. I warn you, they will pour tea into it.”

“That hasn’t happened to me so far,” Istvan laughed. “Maybe it’s because when my friends get together and we start a bottle, we don’t stop until we can see the bottom.”

“Good principle, but it only works at your age. I drink for taste, and more for memory’s sake than for new excitements. Well, let’s go; it was only a sense of obligation that brought us here.” He sprang up and pressed forward jauntily, with the exaggerated sprightliness of old men who pretend when others are watching that they have preserved their youthfulness.

Terey looked around at the pale columns of the building; inside it, voices ascended with a singsong lilt. They felt the mischievous delight of schoolboys playing hooky. Maurice drove out first in his Peugeot and Terey glided quickly after him. They passed peasant carts and squeezed between wagons loaded with young timber. Their cars chased each other like two dogs.

On the narrow road, bursts of wind stirred up red dust full of golden flecks of chaff — the dried, matted straw ground by arba wheels heavy as the vicissitudes of peasant life.