Stone Upon Stone (48 page)

“Tomorrow, tomorrow, how long has it been tomorrow. Everyone else’s fields are all plowed and harrowed, some folks have even done their sowing, and our fields haven’t been touched since harvesttime. People are starting to ask if we’re selling up, because the land’s not being worked, and he keeps saying tomorrow. Tomorrow’s good for the next world, in this one you have to plow and sow as long as the land’ll produce. Because when it stops, you won’t be able to beg it to start again. The land is good while it’s good, but if it sets its mind to it, it can be stone.”

“Grandfather was here with me all night,” I said to try and change the subject. “He just disappeared a moment ago.”

“So did he tell you where he buried those papers?” father asked, perking up.

“Not that one. Grandfather Łukasz from America.”

He waved his hand.

“Him, he was a good-for-nothing. What did he want?”

“Nothing. He just came to talk.”

“He must have needed to do penance. Was he barefoot?”

“I didn’t look at his feet.”

“He probably was. You always have to do penance barefoot.”

One time I came back drunk, it was almost nighttime. For some reason I’d thought to slip a bottle in my pocket as we were leaving the pub. You might have said I had a premonition. But I didn’t, it was just that I’d gotten paid that day, and when you got paid you sometimes took an extra bottle for the road. It came in handy in the morning when you couldn’t get yourself together. I was a bit surprised to see a light still on in our window. But I thought, father’s probably just soaking his feet. He had varicose veins and
sores and when they were bothering him more than usual, he’d brew up herbs and soak his feet in them. He’d sit on a chair and put his feet in a pail till the cold woke him up or I got back.

I went in and I thought I was seeing things, it looked like Michał was sitting on the bench by the window. Except he seemed kind of sleepy, because he didn’t even raise his head when I came in. But it was him all right. Maybe he’d been traveling a long while and he was tired? He never did have much staying power. One time he came back from market with father and the wagon kept bouncing up and down, it made him throw up. Or if he stayed up late one night, the next day he’d be all pale and have rings under his eyes.

“You’re here, Michał,” I said. And though my head was spinning, I was pleased to see him. “It’s been years and years, we’ve been waiting all this time. Let’s have a drink, brother. As it happens I’ve got a bottle on me. I took it because I had a feeling. How about that.” I pulled out the bottle and stood it on the table. “Where are some glasses?” I ask. Father’s sitting on a chair with his head down, like he’s dozing. All of a sudden he jerks his head up and says to me:

“What, you want to give him vodka, you piece of work? Look at him.”

“What do I need to look for? I can see it’s Michał. Would I not know Michał? My own brother? He looks a bit older, but not even that much considering how many years it’s been. Tell him, Michał, we’re brothers, right? You’re off away, and I’m here, and we don’t know anything about each other, but you don’t need to know anything to be brothers. Say, do you remember Franek Maziejuk? You were in the same class together. He hung himself. He was missing twenty hundredweight of sugar from his warehouse. What did he need all that sugar for? Course, the priest says from the pulpit, you mustn’t sin. That’s easy to say. As for me, I’m more or less alive here. But never mind that, you’re here, you’ve come, that’s the main thing. Now where are those glasses, mother?”

Mother didn’t say a word. She was lying there with her eyes half closed,
like she was asleep, though I knew she wasn’t. I thought maybe she was in a huff because Michał was back and I’d come home drunk. Oh well.

“Do you know where they are, father?”

But father wasn’t saying anything either. Besides, he might not have known if we had any glasses in the house. What would we have used them for? We only ever drank milk or water, sometimes herbs, and for that a mug was better than a glass. It’s bigger and thicker, it’s got a handle to hold it by, and mugs last much longer than glasses. There’s one tin mug, I’ve got it to this day, it’s my favorite thing to drink out of. Grandfather used it too and he said his grandfather did as well, show me a glass that’ll live that long. Water never tastes as good as from that mug. Sometimes I’m not even thirsty, but when I drink from the mug it’s like drinking straight from the spring. Or try picking up a glass with a hand that’s tired from work, it’s like picking up an egg with tongs. When you come back from mowing, whatever you pick up it’s like you were grabbing your scythe.

“Let’s look around then,” I said. I took the lamp from the table so I could see better. “We can’t go drinking from the bottle when my brother’s come to visit. It’s so good to see you, brother. At last we’ll be able to talk and catch up after all these years. And you can tell me what it was you wanted from me back then, during the war.”

I opened the dresser. Plates, big and little bottles, bags, it all began to dance in front of my eyes, but I didn’t see any glasses in the dance. I wasn’t sure myself whether there were any in the house, but I had this mighty urge to drink from a glass.

“How do you like that? Like the ground swallowed them up. Tomorrow I’m gonna go buy a dozen glasses and we’ll keep them on display.” I turned toward mother in bed. “Where are the glasses?” I tugged at her quilt. “Michał and me want a drink.” Then I saw in the light of the lamp that her eyes were filled with tears. “What are you crying for? There’s no reason. I’ve come home drunker than this many a time. I’m not that drunk
tonight. Wicek Fulara had a baby boy. I married him and Bronka back when. You know what, tomorrow I’ll borrow Machała’s mowing machine and the whole lot’ll be done in a day. I helped him with his application, he’s sure to lend me his mower. Let him try not to, the son of a bitch.” I was still standing over mother, holding the swaying lamp, and she was crying more and more. “Don’t cry, mother,” I said. “Father, what’s up with mother?” I turned abruptly toward father and the lamp lurched in my hand like the flame had jumped out into the room. It went dark for a moment then got brighter again.

“Put the damn lamp down before you burn the place to the ground.” Father raised his head and I could see he had tears in his eyes as well. He wiped them away with the back of his hand.

“Are you crying because Michał’s here?”

“He’s either Michał or he isn’t,” he said. “God alone knows.”

“Why would God need to know if someone is Mchał or not? I know I’m Szymek, you know you’re father, Michał knows he’s Michał. Everyone knows on their own better than God. Was he just born, that God has to know for him that he’s Michał? Me, even if I didn’t want to be Szymek there’s nothing I could do about it. Even when I’m drunk I know who I am, because no one’s going to be me in my place. Though you should have written to say you were coming, Michał. See, everyone’s crying now.”

“He didn’t come, he was brought.”

“By who?”

“His wife or whoever.”

“You have a wife, Michał? You never said anything. We could have at least sent congratulations. All the best to the newlyweds. Or, may the sun never set on the road of your new life together. Or, here’s wishing you health, happiness, good fortune, and your first son. You don’t even need to make anything up, you can choose a greeting at the post office. Jaśka the postmistress, she just asks you which one you want, the number two or the number five?
Which one is cheaper? But for you I’d send the most expensive one. Maybe you did mention it? Maybe I forgot after all these years. Well now we really do need to have a drink. Father and mother, let them cry, that’s their job. Ours is to drink. Don’t you worry about them. I live here with them, they see me every day, and they sometimes cry over me as well. Not father, but mother does. And over you too, specially after you’ve been gone so long.”

The tin mug happened to be on the table and I rinsed it out.

“You use the mug. I can drink from the bottle. Tomorrow we’ll drink from glasses.” I poured him out the bigger amount and left the smaller half for myself. “Here’s to your health, because you came back, you didn’t forget us.”

I was just lifting the bottle to my mouth when father jumped up and covered the mug with his hand.

“Are you trying to get him drunk on top of everything, you damn godless animal? Drunken idiot, can’t you see him?”

“Of course I can see him! He’s my brother!” I slammed the bottle down on the table so hard the vodka splashed out of the neck. “Tell him you’re my brother, Michał.” I grabbed his head in both hands and jerked it up. He looked at me with eyes that saw almost nothing, had no life in them. “You’re my brother. Always were, always will be.”

At that moment mother got out of bed and asked him:

“Say something, Michał. Tell me, where does it hurt?”

“Where it hurts him is his business,” I snapped at mother, though she hadn’t done anything wrong. “He’s here, he’s back, that’s all that matters.”

“Well since he came back he’s been sitting there not saying a word.” Father got up from his chair and set off toward the water buckets, then when he got halfway he turned and went toward mother, then he turned back again, like he was cutting across a field but didn’t really know where he was going. “She looked after him for a bit. But what could she do. Said he’d be better off here. We keep asking him, Michał, Michał, but it’s like talking to
a brick wall. Will you not tell your own mother and father? Even trees tell each other, any living thing will. A man’ll talk to the earth beneath his feet if he’s got no one else to talk to. You can’t live and not talk.”

“Have a drink, father.” I pushed the mug of vodka into the hands he was holding out helplessly in front of him, like he wanted to lay them down somewhere, ease his troubles at least that much. “He doesn’t need to talk. We can talk to him.”

Mother died not long afterwards. Not from her illness so much as out of worry, because she kept crying and crying and saying, Michał, son, what’s wrong? After she passed away father got sick too. Often he didn’t hear what you said to him, like all his attention was focused on listening to the next world where mother had gone. So now everything was on my shoulders. He and Michał did nothing at all. They just sat there, one of them on a stool by the stove, the other one on the bench, waiting for me to come back from work.

I even thought about quitting, because it was getting too much for me. Right after mother died I still got some help from the women that lived nearby. One of them would cook for us from time to time, another one would clean the house, another one would do the laundry, and a fourth one would at least come and offer her sympathy. But as mother’s death faded into the past, they stopped coming too. On the other hand I was reluctant to give up my job, because those few zlotys I brought in on the first of every month came in handy, you could always buy salt or sugar or a piece of sausage.

Then one day soon after Easter an inspector from the county came, and Chairman Maślanka showed him around the offices. This is highways, this is taxation, this is insurance, quotas, Mierzwa, Antos, Winiarski, Miss Krysia, Miss Jadzia. And I happened to be eating blessed eggs. In our offices we’d somehow gotten into the habit of always having a midmorning snack, Mrs. Kopeć, the caretaker, would even make tea and sell it for a zloty a glass. When I had something I could bring from home I did, so as to not be worse
than the others. I mean, it wasn’t for being hungry, I could stand being hungry, I could go without food for three days straight. When they came in I’d set the eggs out on the table on a piece of newspaper and I was peeling them, one of them was colored red and the other one green.

“What’s this, you’re eating blessed eggs, Pietruszka?” said Maślanka, half asking, half making fun of me, and the guy from the county smiled awkwardly.

“That’s right.” I went on peeling them.

“So what, blessed ones are better than ordinary hen’s eggs?” says Maślanka.

“I think they’re better. If someone else disagrees they don’t have to eat them.”

“I see! You must have blessed a whole lot of them if you don’t have time to eat them all at home and you have to bring them to work?”

“A
kopa
.”

“The thing is, the district administration isn’t a church, Pietruszka!” he snapped like an angry dog.

“Right, but I’m not blessing them, I’m eating them.”

He didn’t say anything else, but I had the feeling he wasn’t going to let me off lightly with those blessed eggs, and in front of the county inspector as well. I must have really made him mad, because he started bugging other people about eating. Antos was having bread and cheese. Bread and cheese doesn’t have anything to do with God, except for saying, give us this day our daily bread, but believers and nonbelievers eat bread just the same. But he tore Antos off a strip, he said he had so many slices of bread he’d be eating for an hour, and the regulations specified fifteen minutes for the break.

A couple of days later he called me into his office, and though we’d been on first-name terms for a long time, he said:

“You drink too much, Pietruszka. It has to stop.”

I was so mad, if I’d had something at hand I would have smashed his skull
open. But all there was on his desk was an inkpot and a blotter, that wouldn’t have been any good.

“Don’t you Pietruszka me, you little squirt. The name’s Szymek, in case you’d forgotten. And if I drink, it’s on my own time. Don’t think I don’t know what’s gotten your back up. It’s not my drinking. Like you don’t drink? I can’t remember how many times I’ve seen you under the table. You’re full of yourself because you’re the chairman. What did you do in the occupation? Shit your pants is what.”

A week later I lost my job. And it wasn’t because of the drinking like he was trying to make me believe, because at that time I was already drinking less. In reality it was those blessed eggs that had scared him. He might even have liked the taste of them just like me, except that him, he’d hide under his blanket to peel them, and on top of that he’d send his kid out in front of the house to look out, pretend he was playing when actually he was making sure no one was coming. Then all of a sudden he sees a government worker in a government office eating blessed eggs like it was the most natural thing in the world, and it felt to him like they were hand grenades, not eggs. Besides, he wasn’t just afraid of blessed eggs. He was afraid of everything. And God forbid you ever said in front of him, Dear God! He’d turn red as a beetroot and if he could he would’ve stuck the words right back down your throat.