The Bridge on the Drina (45 page)

He was a Hungarianized Slovak, son of a civil servant and educated at state expense, young and genuinely musical. He was ambitions
but over-sensitive about his origins which prevented him from feeling at ease with the Austrian or Hungarian officers from rich and famous families. She was a woman in her forties, eight years older than he. She was tall and blonde, already a little faded but her skin was still a clear pink and white. With her large shining dark-blue eyes, in appearance and bearing she looked like one of those portraits of queens which so enchant young girls.

Each of them had personal, real or imagined but deep, reasons for dissatisfaction with life. Furthermore they had one great reason in common; both felt themselves to be unhappy and like outcasts in this town and this society of officers, for the most part frivolous and empty-headed. So they clung to one another feverishly like two survivors of a shipwreck. They lost themselves in one another and forgot themselves in long conversations or, as now, in music.

Such was the invisible pair whose music filled the troubled silence between the two youths.

A few moments later the music which had been pouring into the peaceful night again ran into difficulties and stopped for a time. In the silence that followed, Glasičanin began to speak in a wooden sort of voice, picking up Stiković's last words.

'Silly? There was much that was silly in that whole discussion, if we look at it fairly.'

Stiković suddenly took the cigarette from his lips, but Glasičanin went on slowly but resolutely to express views which were clearly not based on that night only but which had long troubled him.

'I listen carefully to all these discussions, both those between you two and other educated people in this town; also I read the newspapers and reviews. But the more I listen to you, the more I am convinced that the greater part of these spoken or written discussions have no connection with life at all and its real demands and problems. For life, real life, I look at from very close indeed; I see its influence on others and I feel it on myself. It may be that I am mistaken and that I do not know how to express myself well, but I often think that technical progress and the relative peace there is now in the world have created a sort of lull, a special atmosphere, artificial and unreal, in which a single class of men, the so-called intellectuals, can freely devote themselves to idleness and to the interesting game of ideas and 'views on life and the world'. It is a sort of conservatory of the spirit, with an artificial climate and exotic flowers but without any real connection with the earth, the real hard soil on which the mass of human beings move. You think that you are discussing the fate of these masses and their use in the struggle for the realization of higher aims which you have fixed for them, but in fact the wheels
which you turn in your heads have no connection with the life of the masses, nor with life in general. That game of yours becomes dangerous, or least might become dangerous, both for others and for you yourselves.'

Glasičanin paused. Stiković was so astonished by this long and considered exposition that he had not even thought of interrupting him or answering him. Only when he heard the word 'dangerous' he made an ironical gesture with his hand. That irritated Glasičanin who continued even more animatedly.

'For heaven's sake! Listening to you, one would think that all questions were settled happily, all dangers for ever removed, all roads made smooth and open so all we have to do is to walk along them. But in life there is nothing solved, or which can easily be solved, or even has any chance of being solved at all. Everything is hard and complicated, expensive and accompanied by disproportionately high risk; there is no trace either of Herak's bold hopes or of your wide horizons. Man is tormented all his life and never has what he needs, let alone what he wants. Theories such as yours only satisfy the eternal need for games, flatter your own vanity, deceive yourself and others. That is the truth, or at least that is how it appears to me.'

'It is not so. You have only to compare various historical periods and you will see the progress and meaning of man's struggle and therefore also the "theory" that gives sense and direction to that struggle.'

Glasičanin at once took this to be an allusion to his interrupted schooling and as always in such a case quivered inwardly.

'1 have not studied history. . . .' he began.

'You see. If you had studied it, you would see. . . .'

'But neither have you.'

'What? That is ... well, yes of course I have studied....'

'As well as natural sciences?'

His voice quivered vindictively. Stiković was embarrassed for a moment and then said in a dead sort of voice:

'Oh well, if you really want to know, there it is; besides natural sciences, I have been taking an interest in political, historical and social problems.'

'You are lucky to have had the chance. For as far as I know, you are an orator and an agitator also, as well as being a poet and a lover.'

Stiković smiled unnaturally. That afternoon in the deserted schoolroom passed through his mind as a distant but irritating thing. Only then he realized that Glasičanin and Zorka had been close friends until his arrival in the town. A man who does not love is incapable of feeling the greatness of another's love or the force of jealousy or the danger concealed in it.

The conversation of the two young men changed without transition into that bitter personal quarrel that had from the very beginning been hovering in the air between them. Young people do not try to avoid quarrels, even as young animals easily take part in rough and violent games among themselves.

'What I am and what I do is none of your business. I don't ask you about your cubes and your tree-trunks.'

That spasm of anger which always gripped Glasičanin at any mention of his position made him suffer.

'You leave my cubes alone. I live from them, but I don't trick people with them. I deceive no one. I seduce no one.'

'Whom do I seduce?' broke in Stiković.

'Anyone who will let you.'

'That is not true.'

'It is true. And you know it is true. Since you force me to speak, then I will tell you.'

'I am not inquisitive.'

'But I will tell you, for even leaping about tree-trunks all day long a man may still see something and learn how to think and feel. I want to tell you what I think about your countless occupations and interests and your daring theories and your verses and your loves.'

Stiković made a movement as if to rise but none the less remained where he was. The piano and violin from the officers' mess had resumed their duet some time ago (the third movement of the Sonatina, gay and lively) and their music was lost in the night and the roar of the river.

'Thank you. I have heard all that from others more intelligent than you are.'

'Oh no! Others either do not know you or lie to you or think as I do but keep silent. All your theories, all your many spiritual occupations, like your loves and your friendships, all these derive from your ambition, and that ambition is false and unhealthy for it derives from your vanity, only and exclusively from your vanity.'

'Ha, ha!'

'Yes, Even that nationalist idea which you preach so ardently is only a special form of vanity. For you are incapable of loving your mother or your sister or your own blood brother, so how much less an idea. Only from vanity could you be good, generous, self-sacrificing. For your vanity is the main force that moves you, the only thing you revere, the one and only thing that you love more
than yourself. One who doesn't know you might easily be mistaken, seeing your force and your industry, your devotion to the nationalist ideal, to science, to poetry or to any other great aim which is above personal feelings. But you cannot in any case serve it for long or remain with it for long, for your vanity will not let you. The moment your vanity is no longer in question, everything becomes meaningless to you. Yo do not want anything and would not even move a finger to obtain it. Because of it you will betray yourself, for you are yourself the slave of your own vanity. You do not know yourself how vain you are. I know your very soul and I know that you are a monster of vanity.'

Stiković did not reply. At first he had been surprised at the considered and passionate outburst of his comrade who now suddenly appeared to him in a new light and an unexpected role. Therefore that caustic, even speech which at first irritated and insulted him, now seemed interesting and almost pleasant. Individual phrases had, it is true, hit home and hurt, but on the whole all that sharp and profound exposure of his character had flattered and pleased him in a special sort of way. For to tell a young man that he is a monster merely means to tickle his pride and his self-love. In fact he wanted Glasičanin to continue this cruel probing into his inner self, that clear projection of his hidden personality, for in it he found only one more proof of his exceptional superiority. His eyes fell on the white plaque opposite him which shone in the moonlight. He looked straight at the incomprehensible Turkish inscription as if he were reading it and trying to decipher the deeper sense of what his friend beside him had been saying penetratingly and consideredly.

'Nothing is really important to you and, in fact, you neither love nor hate, for to do either you must at least for a moment stand outside yourself, express yourself, forget yourself, go beyond yourself and your vanity. But that you cannot do; nor is there anything for which you would do so even were you able. Someone else's sorrow cannot move you, how much less hurt you; not even your own sorrow unless it flatters your vanity. You desire nothing and you find joy in nothing. You are not even envious, not from goodness but from boundless egoism, for you do not notice the happiness or unhappiness of others. Nothing can move you or turn you from your purpose. You do not stop at anything, not because you are brave, but because all the healthy impulses in you are shrivelled up, because save for your vanity nothing exists for you, neither blood ties nor inward considerations, neither God nor the world, neither kin nor friend. You do not esteem even your own natural capacities. Instead of conscience it is only your own wounded vanity that can sting you, for
it alone, always and in everything, speaks with your mouth and dictates your actions.'

'Is this an allusion to Zorka?' Stiković suddenly asked.

Tes, if you like, let us talk of that too. Yes, because of Zorka also. You do not care a jot for her. It is only your inability to stop and restrain yourself before anything which momentarily and by chance is offered you and which flatters your vanity. Yes, that is so. You seduce a poor, muddled and inexperienced schoolmistress just as you write articles and poems, deliver speeches and lectures. And even before you have completely conquered them you are already tired of them, for your vanity becomes bored and looks for something beyond. But that is your own curse too, that you can stop nowhere, that you can never be sated and satisfied. You submit everything to your vanity but you are yourself the first of its slaves and its greatest martyr. It may well be that you will have still greater glory and success, a greater success than the weakness of some love-crazed girl, but you will find no satisfaction in any one thing, for your vanity will whip you onwards, for it swallows everything, even the greatest successes and then forgets them immediately, but the slightest failure or insult it will remember forever. And when everything is withered, broken, soiled, humiliated, disintegrated and destroyed about you, then you will remain alone in the wilderness you have yourself created, face to face with your vanity and you will have nothing to offer it. Then you will devour yourself, but that will not help you, for your vanity accustomed to richer food will despise and reject you. That is what you are, though you may seem different in the eyes of most men and though you think differently of yourself. But I know.'

Glasičanin ceased suddenly.

The freshness of the night could already be felt on the 
kapia 
and the silence spread, accompanied by the eternal roar of the waters. They had not even noticed when the music from the bank had ceased. Both youths had completely forgotten where they were and what they were doing. Each had been carried away by his own thoughts as only youth can be. The jealous and unhappy 'cube-measurer' had spoken only of what he had so many times thought over passionately, deeply and intensely, but for which he had never before been able to find suitable words and expressions and which that night had come easily and eloquently, bitterly and exaltedly. Stiković had listened, motionlessly looking at the white plaque with the inscription as if it had been a cinema screen. Every word had hit home. He felt every harsh comment but he no longer found in all that this scarcely visible friend beside him had said any insult or any danger.

On the other hand, it seemed to him that with every word of Glasičanin he grew, and that he flew on invisible wings, swift and un heard, exulting and daring, high above all men on this earth and their ties, laws and feelings, alone, proud and great, and happy or with some feeling akin to happiness. He flew above everything. That voice, those words of his rival, were only the sound of the waters and the roar of an invisible, lesser world far below him: it mattered little to him what it was, what it thought and what it said, for he flew above it as a bird.

The momentary silence of Glasičanin seemed to bring them both to their senses. They did not dare to look at one another. God alone knows in what form the quarrel would have continued had there not appeared on the bridge a crowd of drunkards coming from the market-place, shouting loudly and singing snatches of songs. Loudest among them was a tenor who sang in falsetto an ancient song: