Andrus Kivirähk - The Man Who Spoke Snakish

Then I heard hissing at the door. Ints had come looking for me.

“What’s wrong? Are you sick?” he asked.

“No, quite well,” I replied, getting up and walking into the yard with Ints. Everything there was just as it had been yesterday, except that I had a feeling that the forest was completely empty, and the tussocks echoed under my footfalls.

ärtel and his parents were not the only ones to leave. It was just like the spring thaw, when the first broken pieces of ice are soon followed by others. Apparently quite a few had been weighing up whether to move to the village or not, and Pärtel’s parents’ decision ended their hesitation. The very next day, one of Salme’s friends left with her mother, and after them, more and more and more. Even beforehand there had not been many of us left in the forest, but after a week or two, the only ones who remained were our family, Hiie and her mother and father, Ülgas, Meeme, the Primates Pirre and Rääk, as well as a couple of decrepit old gaffers, for whom the sight of every new morning was a quite unexpected surprise.

In those days I walked around the forest frightened and bewildered and had a feeling that it was crumbling away before my eyes. All at once, trees felled in a storm appeared before me, branches blown down by the wind, and withered bushes, which I wouldn’t have noticed earlier, and it seemed to me that their collapse was somehow connected to the people leaving for the village. I can’t deny that I asked myself the question at that time: wouldn’t it be wiser for us to follow the others’ example, because the mass migration of people made the forest altogether less welcoming for me. Some peril seemed to be lurking there, something that had made others flee, and when a strong wind arose and tousled the treetops with a murmur, I flinched with fear: was this the beginning? I didn’t know what I was supposed to fear, but the people’s departure had somehow bored a hole in the forest, and from that hole there seeped something alien and nasty into the cozy old woods.

Uncle Vootele, who roamed around with me very often in those days, consoled me and told me he had seen many such departures. They had always come in waves: for a few years everyone stays put, but then suddenly dozens of families make a move. Then again many peaceful years pass, when it never even occurs to anyone to leave the forest, but it usually happens that one family decides to go for some reason, and others follow soon after. Those who move to the village are like flocks of birds, heading south in the autumn; some set off as soon as the weather gets cooler, but others only when the first snow covers the ground.

“Those who are going now waited for the snow,” said Uncle Vootele. “You can’t blame them; they stayed a long time.”

“What about us?” I asked.

“We’re like the crows and owls,” said Uncle, laughing. “We stay for the winter. At least as far as your mother and I are concerned. You and Salme are basically still children, and of course you’ll stay with your mother, but when you grow up, you’ll be deciding for yourselves whether to go or stay. And if you go, that will be it. Then there will be just the animals and snakes left in the forest.”

“I’m not going,” I assured him firmly.

“Who knows what the future will bring,” said Uncle Vootele. “Of course I would like life in the forest not to die out completely. But just think, Leemet — what kind of a life is it for you here, all alone? One day your mother and I will die, then there will be just you and Salme. Won’t that be terribly lonely?”

“There will still be Hiie, and Ints and the other adders.”

“Hiie, of course. And the adders won’t be going anywhere. So, we’ll wait and see. Just don’t ever think that your mother or I are commanding you to stay on in the forest at any price. We won’t condemn you if you decide to move to the village. Life is like that; all things come to an end. There are some trees where owls have nested for hundreds of years, and yet at some point they leave it empty, don’t return there. That’s simply how it is. At least you know the Snakish words, and I know that they will live on within you when I’m dead. That’s the most important thing. And who knows — maybe you will manage to pass them on to someone else.”

Uncle’s talk made me unhappy; my future looked miserable and dark. Moving to the village seemed extremely unpleasant, but if I tried to imagine myself as an adult in the middle of a forest abandoned by everybody, I got a lump in my throat. Uncle seemed to understand that, and he patted me on the back, saying with a laugh, “Don’t think about those far-off things now! Right now you only know we’re going to your place, and your dear mother and my precious sister will offer us a meal of goat that will take your breath away. Everything’s fine with us today, and it will be tomorrow too, and so on for years and years to come. What is to come after that, no one knows. Unpleasant things are like rain: sometimes they visit us, but there’s no point in worrying about them while the sun shines. And anyway, you can take shelter from the rain, and many things that seem nasty from far away are not so terrible at all seen close up. Let’s go and eat!”

And that is what we did. Mother was glad that Uncle came visiting us nearly every day, as he always came on an empty stomach and Mother was able to feed him on haunches and legs of goat.

“You’re a fine man, Vootele,” Mother said appreciatively to her brother. “You eat so well! If only Leemet were like you! I keep offering him one thing and another, but he only picks at it!”

“Mother, today I ate half a haunch of venison!” I argued.

“Well, what is half a haunch of venison to a growing boy like you? Only half a haunch! Eat the whole haunch! Who are you saving it for? I’ve got my own. Eat one; you get another.”

“Mother, it’s impossible to eat a whole deer!”

“Why is it impossible, if your stomach is empty? Look at how Uncle Vootele eats!”

“Mm!” mumbled Uncle. “Very good. I’ll take another leg.”

“Take it, do! Take two! You too, Leemet, take one! Take it and at least taste it!”

I sighed and picked up a roasted goat leg for myself. I wasn’t especially hungry, but sitting in the home kitchen, gnawing on goat legs, helped to give the impression that everything in the forest was as before and that the dewy grass of the next morning would not be full of the footprints of people leaving it.

I hadn’t seen Pärtel for several weeks, although he’d promised to come and see me soon. I was waiting impatiently for him, wondering why my friend wasn’t keeping his word. What was he up to in the village? It would be natural for him to escape from that loathsome place at the first opportunity, to breathe the forest air again and complain to his old buddy about all the terrible things he was experiencing there. If I were he I would have shown up long ago. He knew where to find me, and also that I couldn’t visit him. A couple of times I had in fact walked to the edge of the forest and nervously stared toward the village, hoping to see Pärtel somewhere there, but I couldn’t. I did see other villagers, including the familiar Magdaleena and a few of my sister’s friends, who had only recently left the forest. They were already wearing villagers’ clothes, and once I saw one of them with a rake. It didn’t make me envious; actually it made me feel strange, sort of sick. I imagined my sister Salme walking with a rake over the shoulder, and it disgusted me even more than the thought of her kissing with a bear.