Ivan Klima - No Saints or Angels

The only sort of fate I'd want would be one that raised me above mediocrity and the void from which death winks. The trouble is I don't know what I might do to achieve it. I generally end up indulging in pipe dreams.

Every moment I'm here I feel that I'm getting further and further away from the life I usually lead. These last few days I've had the feeling that my head is cleared somehow; at last I've been able to see in clear outline everything I've ever set eyes on in my life. I've even been able to see in clear outline what is yet to come.

I have come to realize that the work I do is poisoning my soul. It forces me to concern myself with the despicable dealings of the past to such an extent that I end up not seeing anything else. Each of us has some connection with them, either personally or

via our fathers or mothers. I got the impression that — like in Sodom — there wouldn't be ten just men to be found in our city.

Before I left Prague I tried to compile the city's horoscope for the next century. It predicted the city's downfall in the year 2006. I tried to work out whether this downfall would be due to war or flood, or to something from on high — although water also comes from above. But now it strikes me that it needn't be the sort of catastrophe that destroys buildings, it could equally be a moral downfall.

When I went to bed in my tent on the fifth day of our wanderings I couldn't get to sleep. I seemed to be seized by an inexplicable agitation, a foreboding that something inevitable was going to happen.

Suddenly my tent flap was lifted and I caught sight of Věra in the dim light of the moon.

'Is that you?' I asked, the way I used to ask her not so long ago when we made love, but now the question took on a new meaning.

'It's me,' she whispered. 'If Mickey Mouse won't come to the mountain, the mountain will have to come to Mickey Mouse.'

'I have plenty of mountains here,' I said. But she quickly slipped out of her tracksuit and lay down next to me.

The moon was shining, so a ray of pallid light fell on us through the fabric of the tent. I could hear the murmur of the stream, and close by, maybe right above us, a bird shrieked. We made love and she moaned more than she had ever done in the past; I don't know if it was due to ecstasy, a sense of victory or sadness.

'Do you love me?' she wanted to know. 'Tell me you still love me.'

But I remained silent.

Suddenly she pushed me away and started to get dressed. I went out of the tent with her. Above us the stars shone and seemed to me unusually bright.

'I'm sorry,' I said. 'But there would be no sense starting again. It wouldn't go anywhere.'

'Who told you I wanted to start something?' she hurled at me. 'I needed to find out if you'd come crawling if I wanted.'

'But I didn't come crawling to you, did I?'

'Oh no? And you dare to say that to my face after what you've just done. You're a vile, disgusting, lying beast.'

Maybe she was right. It struck me that all the time I've been waiting for her to come to me and for us to make love.

At the time when I was striving to become an interpreter of history I once read some medieval legends that dealt with physical abstinence. They decried property, food, drink and also, of course, what is called sexual love — which for their authors was the result of original sin. They went so far in their condemnation of physical desire that the best married couples in their view were those who remained virgins to the end of their days. The hypocrisy of those authors disgusted me. They sneered at the desires of the body without which they themselves would never have been born. But there was one thing I had to grant them: the realization that you have to fix your gaze on something that is above those desires and be responsible for how you behave and the things you do.

I turned away and went back into my tent. I lay down again and tried to think of something nice that had happened to me in the past or something I still looked forward to, but nothing occurred to me.

The next morning we stopped in the town of Rožňava. Soon we split up and we each set off as the fancy took us. I wandered through the sweltering streets and alleyways, where there was little sign of life in the heat of the late morning, apart from the occasional half-naked child running past or a dog with its tongue lolling out. An out-of-the-way sweet shop offered Italian icecream but I was more attracted by a nearby shop sign that advertised the services of a fortune-teller.

As I opened the door, I set several bells ringing at once, but the only living creature to appear was a cinnamon-coloured Persian cat. It jumped up on the counter and gazed at me with its yellow fiendish eyes. A posy of dried herbs hanging from the ceiling filled the shop with a spicy scent.

At last a door at the back of the shop creaked and a smiling woman in a long purple dressing gown appeared. Even if it hadn't been written above the shop, Id have suspected her of engaging in some kind of witchcraft. 'You wish to have your fortune told, young sir?' she asked.

She had long unkempt black hair and dark Indian eyes, and around her neck she wore a heavy chain that seemed to be gold, as did the bracelets on her brown wrists.

I asked her what she used to tell fortunes, and she told me it was inspiration from God. She could take a look at my palm but it wasn't necessary. Anyway she had to look at my aura first before she could raise the blinds that concealed my future. She gestured me to follow her into an alcove where there stood two faded armchairs and a small table with a few scattered dried flowers on it. Amazingly enough the place was pleasantly cool.

She pointed me to one of the armchairs and sat down opposite. She asked me to place my hands on the table palms upwards, to stop thinking about anything else, and to look in her direction. She took my hand for a moment, but she didn't seem to be concentrating on it. She asked me whether I wanted to know both the good and the bad things about myself and I nodded. She let go of my hand, stared at me and then mumbled something incomprehensible. Then she told me my aura was gradually becoming clearer and I was emerging from it and floating upwards. She could see that I was a good man with many abilities, but I had experienced great pain. She could see me crying over a coffin and snakes winding themselves round my legs, but I wasn't to be afraid as they didn't bite.

'You will have a long life, young sir, and the illnesses you will have won't be any threat to you. I can see sparks flying from your

fingertips; you must have touched lots of people with them. Take care, take great care or the sparks from your hands will burn you.'

The cat quietly crept into the room and jumped on to the woman's lap, but the fortune-teller didn't seem to notice, her attention apparently fixed on the images that appeared before her eyes, images that she reported to me. Her concentration impressed me, as well as the fact that she didn't try to baffle me with external aids such as cards or a crystal ball.

In the near future, she continued, she could see many obstacles in my path: they are solid and powerful, but I wouldn't vanquish them, I'd go round them. I would climb into a vehicle that would take me to the royal heights, and no enemies that stood in my way would get the better of me. She told me I had lots of friends, and one friend in particular, who was strong and kind, would stand by me. The disaster that was going to overthrow all the cities around me would pass me by.

I wanted to ask her what disaster she was referring to, but I was afraid of interrupting the flow of her visions.

'I also see a woman,' she went on. 'She is older than you. She is far away and she is waiting for you. But it isn't your mother. Yes, she is looking for you because she is in danger. A great danger that you can save her from. You will be richly rewarded.' She fell silent and raised her hands as if about to give me a blessing. Then she stood up.