The Painted Bird Part 2

I was miles from Olga's village. The current carried me toward a sh.o.r.e obscured by a deepening shadow. I began to discern the marshes, the tall swaying clumps of rushes, the hidden nests of sleeping ducks. The bladder moved slowly through the scattered tufts of gra.s.s. Waterflies hovered nervously on every side of me. The yellow chalices of lilies rustled, and a frightened frog belched from a ditch. Suddenly a reed pierced the bladder. I stood on the spongy bottom.

It was completely still. I could hear vague voices, human or animal, in the alder groves and dank swamps. My body was doubled up with cramp and covered with gooseflesh. I listened intently, but the stillness was everywhere.

3.

I was frightened to find myself entirely alone. But I remembered the two things which, according to Olga, were necessary for survival without human help. The first was a knowledge of plants and animals, familiarity with poisons and medicinal herbs. The other was possession of fire, or a "comet" of one's own. The first was harder to obtain-it required a great deal of experience. The second consisted merely of a one-quart preserve can, open at one end and with a lot of small nail holes punched in the sides. A three-foot loop of wire was hooked to the top of the can by way of a handle, so that one could swing it either like a la.s.so or like a censer in church.

Such a small portable stove could serve as a constant source of heat and as a miniature kitchen. One filled it with any kind of fuel available, always keeping some sparks of fire at the bottom. By swinging the can energetically, one pumped air through the holes, as the blacksmith does with his bellows, while centrifugal force kept the fuel in place. A judicious choice of fuel and an appropriate swinging motion permitted the building up of heat suitable for various purposes, while steady stoking prevented the "comet" from going out. For example, the baking of potatoes, turnips, or fish required a slow fire of peat and damp leaves, and the roasting of a freshly killed bird required the live flame of dry twigs and hay. Birds' eggs freshly plucked from their nests were best cooked on a fire of potato stalks.

To keep the fire alight through the night, the comet had to be tightly packed with damp moss collected from the bases of tall trees. The moss burned with a dim glow, producing smoke which repelled snakes and insects. In case of danger it could be brought to white heat with a few swings. On wet snowy days the comet had to be refilled frequently with dry resinous wood or bark and required a lot of swinging. On windy or hot dry days the comet did not need much swinging, and its burning could be further slowed down by adding fresh gra.s.s or by sprinkling in some water.

The comet was also indispensable protection against dogs and people. Even the most vicious dogs stopped short when they saw a wildly swinging object showering sparks which threatened to set their fur on fire. Not even the boldest man wanted to risk losing his sight or having his face burned. A man armed with a loaded comet became a fortress and could be safely attacked only with a long pole or by throwing rocks.

That is why the extinction of a comet was an extremely serious thing. It could happen through carelessness, oversleeping, or a sudden downpour. Matches were very scarce in that area. They were costly and hard to obtain. Those who had any matches got into the habit of splitting each match in half for economy.

Fire was therefore preserved most scrupulously in kitchen stoves or in the fireboxes of ovens. Before retiring for the night women would bank up ashes to make certain that the embers would keep glowing until morning. At dawn they reverently made the sign of the cross before blowing the fire back to life. Fire, they said, is no natural friend to man. That is why one must humor it. It was also believed that sharing fire, especially borrowing it, could only result in misfortune. After all, those who borrow fire on this earth might have to return it in h.e.l.l. And carrying fire out of the house might make the cows dry or go barren. Also, a fire that went out could produce disastrous consequences in cases of childbirth.

Just as fire was essential to the comet, the comet was essential to life. A comet was necessary for approaching human settlements, which were always guarded by packs of savage dogs. And in the winter an extinguished comet might lead to frostbite as well as to the lack of cooked food.

People always carried small sacks on their backs or at their belts for collecting fuel for the comets. In the daytime, peasants working in the fields baked vegetables, birds, and fish in them. At night, men and boys coming home would swing them with all their strength and let them fly into the sky, burning fiercely, like soaring red disks. The comets flew in a wide arc, and their fiery tails traced their courses. That is how they got their name. They did really look like comets in the skies with their flaming tails, whose appearance, as Olga explained, signified war, plague, and death.

It was very difficult to obtain a can for a comet. These were found only along the railroad tracks which carried military transports. The local peasants prevented outsiders from collecting them, exacting a high price for the cans they found themselves. Communities on each side of the tracks fought over the cans. Every day they sent out teams of men and boys equipped with sacks for any cans they could find, and armed with axes to ward off any compet.i.tors.

I was given my first comet by Olga, who had received it in payment for treating a patient. I took very good care of it, hammering over the holes that threatened to become too large, flattening dents, and polis.h.i.+ng the metal. Anxious not to be robbed of my only important possession, I wrapped some of the wire attached to the handle around my wrist and never parted from my comet. The brisk, sparkling fire filled me with a feeling of security and pride. I never missed an opportunity to fill my sack with the right kinds of fuel. Olga often sent me to the woods for certain plants and herbs with curative properties, and I felt perfectly safe as long as I had my comet with me.

But Olga was now far away and I was without the comet. I s.h.i.+vered with cold and fear and my feet were bleeding from cuts of the sharp blades of water reeds. I brushed off from my calves and thighs the leeches which swelled visibly as they sucked my blood. Long, crooked shadows fell over the river and m.u.f.fled sounds crept along the murky banks. In the creaking of the thick beech branches, in the rustling of the willows trailing their leaves in the water, I heard the utterances of the mystic beings of whom Olga had spoken. They took on peculiar shapes, serpentine and peaked of face, having a bat's head and a snake's body. And they coiled themselves around a man's legs, drawing his will to live out of him until he sat down on the ground, in search of a slumber from which there was no awakening. I had sometimes seen such strange-shaped snakes in barns, where they terrified the cows into agitated mooing. They were said to drink the cows' milk or, even worse, to crawl inside the animals and consume all the food they ate until the cows starved to death.

Cutting through the reeds and tall gra.s.ses, I started running away from the river, forcing through barricades of tangled weeds, bending low to squeeze under walls of overhanging branches, almost impaling myself on sharp reeds and thorns.

A cow mooed far away. I quickly climbed a tree and after scanning the countryside from its height I noticed the twinkle of comets. People were coming home from the pastures. Cautiously I made my way in their direction, listening for the sound of their dog, which came toward me through the undergrowth.

The voices were quite close. There was obviously a path behind the thick wall of foliage. I heard the shuffle of the walking cows and the voices of young herdsmen. Now and then some sparks from their comets lit up the dark sky and then zigzagged down into oblivion. I followed them along the bushes, determined to attack the herdsmen and to seize a comet.

The dog they had with them picked up my scent several times. It dashed into the bushes, but evidently did not feel too secure in the dark. When I hissed like a snake it withdrew to the path, growling from time to time. The herdsmen, sensing danger, grew silent and listened to the sounds of the forest.

I approached the lane. The cows almost rubbed their flanks against the branches behind which I was hiding. They were so close I could smell their bodies. The dog tried another attack, but hissing drove it back to the road.

When the cows moved closer to me I jabbed two of them with a sharp stick. They bellowed and started trotting, followed by the dog. Then I screamed with a long, vibrating banshee howl and struck the nearest herder in the face. Before he had time to realize what was happening, I grabbed his comet and sped back into the bushes.

The other boys, frightened by the eerie howl and the panic of the cows, ran toward the village, dragging the dazed herder with them. Then I went deeper into the forest, dampening the bright fire of the comet with some fresh leaves.

When I was far enough, I blew at the comet. Its light lured scores of odd insects out of the dark. I saw witches hanging from the trees. They stared at me, trying to lead me astray and confuse me. I distinctly heard the shudders of wandering souls which had escaped from the bodies of penitent sinners. In the rusty glow of my comet I saw trees bending over me. I heard the plaintive voices and strange movements of ghosts and ghouls trying to bore their way out from inside their trunks.

Here and there I saw ax cuts on tree trunks. I remembered that Olga had told me that such cuts were made by peasants trying to cast evil spells on their enemies. Striking the juicy flesh of the tree with an ax, one had to utter the name of a hated person and visualize his face. The cut would then bring disease and death to the enemy. There were many such scars on the trees around me. People here must have had many enemies, and they were quite busy in their efforts to bring them disaster.

Frightened, I swung the comet wildly. I saw unending rows of trees bowing obsequiously to me, inviting me to step deeper and deeper into their closing ranks.

Sooner or later I had to heed their invitation. I wanted to stay away from the riverside villages.

I went ahead, firmly convinced that Olga's spells would eventually bring me back to her. Didn't she always say that if I tried to run away, she could bewitch my feet and make them walk me back to her? I had nothing to fear. Some unknown force, either from above or within myself, was leading me unerringly back to old Olga.

4.

I was now living at the miller's, whom the villagers had nicknamed Jealous. He was more taciturn than was usual in the area. Even when neighbors came to pay him a visit, he would just sit, taking an occasional sip of vodka, and drawling out a word once in a while, lost in thought or staring at a dried-up fly stuck to the wall.

He abandoned his reverie only when his wife entered the room. Equally quiet and reticent, she would always sit down behind her husband, modestly dropping her gaze when men entered the room and furtively glanced at her.

I slept in the attic directly above their bedroom. At night I was awakened by their quarrels. The miller suspected his wife of flirting and lasciviously displaying her body in the fields and in the mill before a young plowboy. His wife did not deny this, but sat pa.s.sive and still. Sometimes the quarrel did not end. The enraged miller lit candles in the room, put on his boots, and beat his wife. I would cling to a crack in the floorboards and watch the miller las.h.i.+ng his naked wife with a horsewhip. The woman cowered behind a feather quilt tugged off the bed, but the man pulled it away, flung it on the floor, and standing over her with his legs spread wide continued to lash her plump body with the whip. After every stroke, red blood-swollen lines would appear on her tender skin.

The miller was merciless. With a grand sweep of the arm he looped the leather thong of the whip over her b.u.t.tocks and thighs, slashed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and neck, scourged her shoulders and s.h.i.+ns. The woman weakened and lay whining like a puppy. Then she crawled toward her husband's legs, begging forgiveness.

Finally the miller threw down the whip and, after blowing out the candle, went to bed. The woman remained groaning. The following day she would cover her wounds, move with difficulty, and wipe away her tears with bruised, cut palms.

There was another inhabitant of the hut: a well-fed tabby cat. One day she was seized by a frenzy. Instead of mewing she emitted half-smothered squeals. She slid along the walls as sinuously as a snake, swung her pulsating flanks, and clawed at the skirts of the miller's wife. She growled in a strange voice and moaned, her raucous shrieks making everyone restless. At dusk the tabby whined insanely, her tail beating her flanks, her nose thrusting.

The miller locked the inflamed female in the cellar and went to his mill, telling his wife that he would bring the plowboy home for supper. Without a word the woman set about preparing the food and table.

The plowboy was an orphan. It was his first season of work at the miller's farm. He was a tall, placid youth with flaxen hair which he habitually pushed back from his sweating brow. The miller knew that the villagers gossiped about his wife and the boy. It was said that she changed when she gazed into the boy's blue eyes. Heedless of the risk of being noticed by her husband, she impulsively hiked her skirt high above her knees with one hand, and with the other pushed down the bodice of her dress to display her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, all the time staring into the boy's eyes.

The miller returned with the young man, carrying in a sack slung over his shoulder, a tomcat borrowed from a neighbor. The tomcat had a head as large as a turnip and a long, strong tail. The tabby was howling l.u.s.tingly in the cellar. When the miller released her, she sprang to the center of the room. The two cats began to circle one another mistrustfully, panting, coming nearer and nearer.

The miller's wife served supper. They ate silently. The miller sat at the middle of the table, his wife on one side and the plowboy on the other. I ate my portion squatting by the oven. I admired the appet.i.tes of the two men: huge chunks of meat and bread, washed down with gulps of vodka, disappeared in their throats like hazelnuts.

The woman was the only one who chewed her food slowly. When she bowed her head low over the bowl the plowboy would dart a glance faster than lightning at her bulging bodice.

In the center of the room the tabby suddenly arched her body, bared her teeth and claws, and pounced on the tomcat. He halted, stretched his back, and sputtered saliva straight into her inflamed eyes. The female circled him, leaped toward him, recoiled, and then struck him in the muzzle. Now the tomcat stalked around her cautiously, sniffing her intoxicating odor. He arched his tail and tried to come at her from the rear. But the female would not let him; she flattened her body on the floor and turned like a millstone, striking his nose with her stiff, outstretched paws.

Fascinated, the miller and the other two stared silently while eating. The woman sat with a flushed face; even her neck was reddening. The plowboy raised his eyes, only to drop them at once. Sweat ran down through his short hair and he continually pushed it away from his hot brow. Only the miller sat calmly eating, watching the cats, and glancing casually at his wife and guest.

The tomcat suddenly came to a decision. His movements became lighter. He advanced. She moved playfully as if to draw back, but the male leapt high and flopped onto her with all fours. He sank his teeth in her neck and intently, tautly, plunged directly into her without any squirming. When satiated and exhausted, he relaxed. The tabby, nailed to the floor, screamed shrilly and sprang out from under him. She jumped onto the cooled oven and tossed about on it like a fish, looping her paws over her neck, rubbing her head against the warm wall.

The miller's wife and the plowboy ceased eating. They stared at each other, gaping over their food-filled mouths. The woman breathed heavily, placed her hands under her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and squeezed them, clearly unaware of herself. The plowboy looked alternately at the cats and at her, licked his dry lips, and got down his food with difficulty.

The miller swallowed the last of his meal, leaned his head back, and abruptly gulped down his gla.s.s of vodka. Though drunk, he got up, and grasping his iron spoon and tapping it, he approached the plowboy. The youth sat bewildered. The woman hitched up her skirt and began puttering at the fire.

The miller bent over the plowboy and whispered something in his reddened ear. The youth jumped up as if p.r.i.c.ked with a knife and began to deny something. The miller asked loudly now whether the boy l.u.s.ted after his wife. The plowboy blushed but did not answer. The miller's wife turned away and continued to clean the pots.

The miller pointed at the strolling tomcat and again whispered something to the youth. The latter, with an effort, rose from the table, intending to leave the room. The miller came forward overturning his stool and, before the youth realized it, suddenly pushed him against the wall, pressed one arm against his throat, and drove a knee into his stomach. The boy could not move. Terror stricken, panting loudly, he babbled something.

The woman dashed toward her husband, imploring and wailing. The awakened tabby cat lying on the oven looked down on the spectacle, while the frightened tomcat leapt onto the table.

With a single kick the miller got the woman out of his way. And with a rapid movement such as women use to gouge out the rotten spots while peeling potatoes, he plunged the spoon into one of the boy's eyes and twisted it.

The eye sprang out of his face like a yolk from a broken egg and rolled down the miller's hand onto the floor. The plowboy howled and shrieked, but the miller's hold kept him pinned against the wall. Then the blood-covered spoon plunged into the other eye, which sprang out even faster. For a moment the eye rested on the boy's cheek as if uncertain what to do next; then it finally tumbled down his s.h.i.+rt onto the floor.

It all had happened in a moment. I could not believe what I had seen. Something like a glimmer of hope crossed my mind that the gouged eyes could be put back where they belonged. The miller's wife was screaming wildly. She rushed to the adjoining room and woke up her children, who also started crying in terror. The plowboy screamed and then grew silent covering his face with his hands. Rivulets of blood seeped through his fingers down his arms, dripping slowly on his s.h.i.+rt and trousers.

The miller, still enraged, pushed him toward the window as though unaware that the youth was blind. The boy stumbled, cried out, and nearly knocked over a table. The miller grabbed him by the shoulders, opened the door with his foot, and kicked him out. The boy yelled again, stumbled through the doorway, and fell down in the yard. The dogs started barking, though they did not know what had happened.

The eyeb.a.l.l.s lay on the floor. I walked around them, catching their steady stare. The cats timidly moved out into the middle of the room and began to play with the eyes as if they were b.a.l.l.s of thread. Their own pupils narrowed to slits from the light of the oil lamp. The cats rolled the eyes around, sniffed them, licked them, and pa.s.sed them to one another gently with their padded paws. Now it seemed that the eyes were staring at me from every corner of the room, as though they had acquired a new life and motion of their own.

I watched them with fascination. If the miller had not been there I myself would have taken them. Surely they could still see. I would keep them in my pocket and take them out when needed, placing them over my own. Then I would see twice as much, maybe even more. Perhaps I could attach them to the back of my head and they would tell me, though I was not quite certain how, what went on behind me. Better still, I could leave the eyes somewhere and they would tell me later what happened during my absence.

Maybe the eyes had no intention of serving anyone. They could easily escape from the cats and roll out of the door. They could wander over the fields, lakes, and woods, viewing everything about them, free as birds released from a trap. They would no longer die, since they were free, and being small they could easily hide in various places and watch people in secret. Excited, I decided to close the door quietly and capture the eyes.

The miller, evidently annoyed by the cats' play, kicked the animals away and squashed the eyeb.a.l.l.s with his heavy boots. Something popped under his thick sole. A marvelous mirror, which could reflect the whole world, was broken. There remained on the floor only a crushed bit of jelly. I felt a terrible sense of loss.

The miller, paying no attention to me, seated himself on the bench and swayed slowly as he fell asleep. I stood up cautiously, lifted the bloodied spoon from the floor and began to gather the dishes. It was my duty to keep the room neat and the floor swept. As I cleaned I kept away from the crushed eyes, uncertain what to do with them. Finally I looked away and quickly swept the ooze into the pail and threw it in the oven.

In the morning I awoke early. Underneath me I heard the miller and his wife snoring. Carefully I packed a sack of food, loaded the comet with hot embers and, bribing the dog in the yard with a piece of sausage, fled from the hut.

At the mill wall, next to the barn, lay the plowboy. At first I meant to pa.s.s him by quickly, but I stopped when I realized that he was sightless. He was still stunned. He covered his face with his hands, he moaned and sobbed. There was caked blood on his face, hands, and s.h.i.+rt. I wanted to say something, but I was afraid that he would ask me about his eyes and then I would have to tell him to forget about them, since the miller had stamped them into pulp. I was terribly sorry for him.

I wondered whether the loss of one's sight would deprive a person also of the memory of everything that he had seen before. If so, the man would no longer be able to see even in his dreams. If not, if only the eyeless could still see through their memory, it would not be too bad. The world seemed to be pretty much the same everywhere, and even though people differed from one another, just as animals and trees did, one should know fairly well what they looked like after seeing them for years. I had lived only seven years, but I remembered a lot of things. When I closed my eyes, many details came back still more vividly. Who knows, perhaps without his eyes the plowboy would start seeing an entirely new, more fascinating world.

I heard some sound from the village. Afraid that the miller might wake up, I went on my way, touching my eyes from time to time. I walked more cautiously now, for I knew that eyeb.a.l.l.s did not have strong roots. When one bent down they hung like apples from a tree and could easily drop out. I resolved to jump across fences with my head held up; but on my first try I stumbled and fell down. I lifted my fingers fearfully to my eyes to see whether they were still there. After carefully checking that they opened and closed properly, I noticed with delight the partridges and thrushes in flight. They flew very fast but my sight could follow them and even overtake them as they soared under the clouds, becoming smaller than raindrops. I made a promise to myself to remember everything I saw; if someone should pluck out my eyes, then I would retain the memory of all that I had seen for as long as I lived.

5.

My duty was to set snares for Lekh, who sold birds in several neighboring villages. There was no one who could compete with him in this. He worked alone. He took me in because I was very small, thin, and light. Thus I could set traps in places where Lekh himself could not reach: on slender branches of trees, in dense clumps of nettle and thistle, on the waterlogged islets in the bogs and swamps.

Lekh had no family. His hut was filled with birds of all varieties, from the common sparrow to the wise owl. The peasants bartered food for Lekh's birds, and he did not have to worry about essentials: milk, b.u.t.ter, sour cream, cheeses, bread, hunter's sausage, vodka, fruits, and even cloth. He would collect all this from the nearby villages while carrying around his caged birds and hawking their beauty and singing abilities.

Lekh had a pimpled, freckled face. The peasants claimed that such faces belong to those who steal eggs from swallows' nests; Lekh himself a.s.serted that this was due to his spitting carelessly into fire in his youth, claiming that his father was a village scribe who wanted him to become a priest. But he was drawn to the forests. He studied the ways of birds and envied them their ability to fly. One day he escaped from his father's hut and began to wander from village to village, from forest to forest, like a wild and abandoned bird. In time he began to catch birds. He observed the wondrous habits of quail and larks, could imitate the carefree call of the cuckoo, the screech of the magpie, the hooting of the owl. He knew the courting habits of the bullfinch; the jealous fury of the landrail, circling a nest abandoned by its female; and the sorrow of the swallow whose nesting place was wantonly destroyed by young boys. He understood the secrets of the hawk's flight and admired the stork's patience in hunting for frogs. He envied the nightingale its song.

Thus he pa.s.sed his youth amidst the birds and trees. Now he was rapidly growing bald, his teeth were rotting, the skin of his face was sagging into folds, and he was becoming slightly shortsighted. So he settled down for good in a hut he built himself, in which he occupied one corner and filled the others with birdcages. At the very bottom of one of these cages a narrow s.p.a.ce was found for me.

Lekh spoke often of his birds. I listened avidly to everything he had to say. I learned that flocks of storks always came from beyond distant oceans on St. Joseph's day and remained in the village until St. Bartholomew drove all the frogs into the mud with hop poles. The mud would plug the frogs' mouths and the storks, unable to hear their croaking, would not be able to catch them and would therefore have to leave. The storks brought good luck to the houses on which they nested.

Lekh was the only man in the area who knew how to prepare a stork's nest in advance, and his nests were never without tenants. He charged high prices for building such nests, and only the wealthiest farmers could afford his services.

Lekh set about nest building with great deliberation. On the selected roof he first placed a harrow at the halfway point, providing a framework for the structure. It was always slanted slightly toward the west, so that the prevailing winds could not damage the nest badly. Then Lekh drove long nails halfway into the harrow, thus providing anchorage for the twigs and straw which the storks gathered themselves. Just before their arrival he placed a large piece of red cloth in the middle of the harrow to attract the storks' attention.

It was known that it brought good luck to see the first springtime stork in flight; but seeing the first springtime stork sitting down was an augury of a year of trouble and misfortune. The storks also provided clues as to what went on in the village. They would never return to a roof under which some misdeed had been committed in their absence or under which people lived in sin.

They were strange birds. Lekh told me how he had been pecked by a female sitting on her eggs when he tried to correct the position of the nest. He took revenge by placing one goose egg among the other stork eggs. When the chicks hatched, the storks looked with amazement at their offspring. One of them was misshapen, on short bowlegs, with a flat beak. Father Stork charged his wife with adultery and wanted to kill the b.a.s.t.a.r.d chick on the spot. Mother Stork felt that the baby should be kept in the nest. Family argument continued for several days. Finally the hen decided on her own to save the gosling's life, and she carefully rolled it onto the thatched roof, from which it fell harmlessly into some straw.

It would seem that this closed the matter and that matrimonial harmony would be restored. But when the time came for flying away, all the storks held a conference as usual. After debate it was decided that the hen was guilty of adultery and did not deserve to accompany the husband. Sentence was duly pa.s.sed. Before the birds took off in their faultless formation, the faithless wife was attacked with beaks and wings. She fell down dead, close to the thatched house on which she had lived with her husband. Next to her body the peasants found an ugly gosling shedding bitter tears.

The swallows also led interesting lives. The favorite birds of the Virgin Mary, they came as harbingers of spring and joy. In the fall they were supposed to fly far away from human life, to perch, tired and sleepy, on the reeds growing in distant marshes. Lekh said that they rested on a reed until it broke under their weight, plunging them into the water. They were supposed to remain underwater all through the winter, secure in their icy home.

The voice of the cuckoo could mean many things. A man hearing it for the first time in the season should immediately start jangling coins in his pockets and counting all his money, in order to secure at least the same amount for the whole year. Thieves should be careful to remember when they heard their first cuckoo of the year. If it was before there were leaves on the trees, it was better to abandon their plans of robbery, which would be unsuccessful.

Lekh had a special affection for cuckoos. He regarded them as people turned into birds-n.o.blemen, begging G.o.d in vain to turn them back into humans. He perceived a clue to their n.o.ble ancestry in the manner in which they raised their young. The cuckoos, he said, never undertook the education of their young themselves. Instead, they hired wagtails to feed and look after their young, while they themselves continued flying around the forest, calling upon the Lord to change them back into gentlemen.

Lekh viewed bats with disgust, regarding them as half birds and half mice. He called them the emissaries of evil spirits, looking for fresh victims, capable of attaching themselves to a human scalp and infusing sinful desires into the brain. Even bats, however, had their uses. Lekh once caught a bat in the attic. He captured it with a net and placed it on an anthill outside the house. By the next day only white bones remained. Lekh meticulously collected the skeleton and took out the wishbone, which he wore on his chest. After grinding the rest of the bones to dust, he mixed them in a gla.s.s of vodka and gave it to the woman he loved. This, he said, would a.s.sure him of her increased desire for him.

Lekh taught me that a man should always watch birds carefully and draw conclusions from their behavior. If they were seen flying in a red sunset in large numbers, and were of many different breeds, then it was obvious that evil spirits on the lookout for d.a.m.ned souls rode on their wings. When crows, rooks, and jackdaws a.s.sembled together in a field, the meeting was usually inspired by an Evil one, who tried to instill in them hate for other birds. The appearance of long-winged white crows signaled a cloudburst; low-flying wild geese in the springtime meant a rainy summer and a poor harvest.

At dawn when the birds were sleeping we would venture out to stalk up to their nests. Lekh strode ahead, carefully jumping over bushes and shrubs. I followed directly behind. Later on, when daylight reached even the most shaded corners of the forest and fields, we would take the terrified, thras.h.i.+ng birds from the traps we had set the day before. Lekh removed them carefully, either speaking soothingly to them or threatening them with death. Then he would put them into a large bag slung over his shoulder, in which they would struggle and stir until their strength waned and they calmed down. Every new prisoner pushed down into the bag brought new life, causing the bag to quiver and swing against Lekh's back. Above our heads the friends and family of the prisoner would circle, twittering curses. Lekh would then look up from under his gray eyebrows and hurl insults at them. When the birds persisted, Lekh put the bag down, took out a sling, placed a sharp stone in it, and, aiming it carefully, shot it at the flock. He never missed; suddenly a motionless bird would hurtle from the sky. Lekh would not bother to look for the corpse.

When noon approached, Lekh hastened his steps and wiped the perspiration from his brow more often. The most important hour of his day was nearing. A woman locally nicknamed Stupid Ludmila was waiting for him in some distant forest clearing known only to the two of them. I would proudly trot behind him, the bag of twitching birds slung over my shoulder.

The forest became increasingly dense and forbidding. The slimy striped trunks of snake-colored hornbeams shot straight up into the clouds. The linden trees, all of which, according to Lekh, remembered the very beginnings of the human race, stood broad-shouldered, their trunks resembling coats of mail festooned with the gray patina of mosses. The oaks stretched out of their trunks like the necks of starving birds looking for food, and obscured the sun with gloomy branches, casting the pines and poplars and lindens into shadow. Sometimes Lekh would stop and silently look at some spoors in the crannies of decaying bark, and in tree knots and gallnuts full of black, curious holes from whose interior shone bare white wood. We would pa.s.s through groves of young birches with lean, fragile shoots, diffidently flexing their thin, small branches and buds.

Through the gauzy curtain of foliage we were noticed by perching flocks of birds who became frightened and would soar away with beating wings. Their chirping mixed with the chorus of bees murmuring around us like a moving, gleaming cloud. Lekh protected his face with his hands and fled from the bees to a denser thicket, while I ran at his heels holding on to the bag of birds and basket of traps, waving my hand to drive off the hara.s.sing and vengeful swarm.

Stupid Ludmila was a strange woman and I feared her increasingly. She was well built and taller than the other women. Her hair, seemingly never cut, cascaded down her shoulders. She had large b.r.e.a.s.t.s, which hung nearly to her belly, and strong muscular calves. In the summer she went around dressed only in a faded sack which revealed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and a clump of red hair at her crotch. Men and boys would tell of the pranks they played with Ludmila when she was in the mood. The village women often tried to trap her but, as Lekh said with pride, Ludmila's tail was windblown and no one could catch her against her will. She would disappear in the undergrowth like a starling and creep out when no one was around.

No one knew where her lair was. Sometimes at dawn when peasants walked to the fields, scythes on their shoulders, they saw Stupid Ludmila waving to them amorously from afar. They would halt and wave back to her, stretching their arms lazily as their will to work weakened. Only the calls of their wives and mothers, approaching with sickles and hoes, brought them back to their senses. Women often set dogs on Ludmila. The largest and most dangerous one ever sent to attack her decided not to return. After that she would always appear holding the animal by a rope. The other dogs would flee with their tails between their legs.

It was said that Stupid Ludmila lived with this huge dog as with a man. Others predicted that someday she would give birth to children whose bodies would be covered with canine hair and who would have lupine ears and four paws, and that these monsters would live somewhere in the forest.

Lekh never repeated these stories about Ludmila. He only mentioned once that when she was very young and innocent her parents ordered her to get married to the son of the village psalmist, notorious for his ugliness and cruelty. Ludmila refused, infuriating her fiance so much that he enticed her outside the village where an entire herd of drunken peasants raped the girl until she lost consciousness. After that she was a changed woman; her mind had become addled. Since no one remembered her family and she was considered not too bright, she was nicknamed Stupid Ludmila.

She lived in the forests, lured men into the bushes and pleased them so much with her voluptuousness that afterwards they could not even look at their fat and stinking wives. No one man could satisfy her; she had to have several men, one after another. And yet she was Lekh's great love. He made up tender songs for her in which she figured as a strange-colored bird flying to faraway worlds, free and quick, brighter and more beautiful than other creatures. To Lekh she seemed to belong to that pagan, primitive kingdom of birds and forests where everything was infinitely abundant, wild, blooming, and royal in its perpetual decay, death, and rebirth; illicit and clas.h.i.+ng with the human world.

Every day at noon Lekh and I would walk toward the clearing where he hoped to meet Ludmila. When we arrived Lekh hooted in imitation of an owl. Stupid Ludmila would rise above the tall gra.s.s, bluebottles and poppy flowers intertwined in her hair. Lekh rushed eagerly toward her and they stood together, swaying slightly like the gra.s.ses around them, almost growing into each other like two tree trunks rising up from a single root.

I watched them from the edge of the clearing, behind the leaves of ferns. The birds in my bag were disturbed by the sudden stillness and chirped and floundered and excitedly beat their wings against each other. The man and woman kissed each other's hair and eyes, and rubbed cheek against cheek. They were intoxicated by the touch and smell of their bodies and slowly their hands became more playful. Lekh moved his big, calloused paws over the smooth arms of the woman while she drew his face closer to hers. Together they slid down into the tall gra.s.s which now shook above their bodies, partly concealing them from the curious gaze of the birds gyrating over the clearing. Lekh would say afterwards that while they lay in the gra.s.s Ludmila told him stories of her life and her sufferings, disclosing the quirks and kinks of her strange untamed feelings, all the byways and secret pa.s.sages that her frail mind wandered through.

It was hot. There was not a breath of wind and the treetops stood rigid. The gra.s.shoppers and dragonflies buzzed; a b.u.t.terfly suspended on an invisible breeze hovered over the sun-whitened clearing. The woodp.e.c.k.e.r ceased pecking, the cuckoo grew silent. I dozed off. Then I was awakened by voices. The man and the woman stood clinging to each other as if grown into the soil, saying words to each other I did not understand. They separated reluctantly; Stupid Ludmila waved her hand. Lekh strode toward me, repeatedly turning to look at her as he stumbled, a wistful smile on his lips.

On the way home we set more traps; Lekh was tired and withdrawn. In the evening, when the birds fell asleep in their cages, he cheered up. Restless, he spoke of Ludmila. His body trembled, he giggled, closing his eyes. His white pimply cheeks grew flushed.

Sometimes days pa.s.sed and Stupid Ludmila did not appear in the forest. Lekh would become possessed by a silent rage. He would stare solemnly at the birds in the cages, mumbling something to himself. Finally, after prolonged scrutiny, he would choose the strongest bird, tie it to his wrist, and prepare stinking paints of different colors which he mixed together from the most varied components. When the colors satisfied him, Lekh would turn the bird over and paint its wings, head, and breast in rainbow hues until it became more dappled and vivid than a bouquet of wildflowers.

Then we would go into the thick of the forest. There Lekh took out the painted bird and ordered me to hold it in my hand and squeeze it lightly. The bird would begin to twitter and attract a flock of the same species which would fly nervously over our heads. Our prisoner, hearing them, strained toward them, warbling more loudly, its little heart, locked in its freshly painted breast, beating violently.

When a sufficient number of birds gathered above our heads, Lekh would give me a sign to release the prisoner. It would soar, happy and free, a spot of rainbow against the backdrop of clouds, and then plunge into the waiting brown flock. For an instant the birds were confounded. The painted bird circled from one end of the flock to the other, vainly trying to convince its kin that it was one of them. But, dazzled by its brilliant colors, they flew around it unconvinced. The painted bird would be forced farther and farther away as it zealously tried to enter the ranks of the flock. We saw soon afterwards how one bird after another would peel off in a fierce attack. Shortly the many-hued shape lost its place in the sky and dropped to the ground. When we finally found the painted bird it was usually dead. Lekh keenly examined the number of blows which the bird had received. Blood seeped through its colored wings, diluting the paint and soiling Lekh's hands.