Sexton Messerschmidt was clearly moved by his own rhetoric. A tear glistened in his eye. He didn’t even try to hide the fact at all.
“You gentlemen will forgive me,” he said in a rough voice, reining in his own emotion, “but, as the Bolsheviks are wont to say, I’m a ślioznyj czeławiek, a tearful man. The third, the youngest of the Calvinists,” he continued, wiping the tear with his sleeve and blowing his nose out on the floor, “the third, the youngest of the Calvinists, was undone by what will soon undo all of you as welclass="underline" a hasty exchange of glances with a certain Catholic woman.
“A tavern in the vicinity of Częstochowa, and a widow tavern-keeper of impressive corporality, older than him by a few good years. At dawn, instead of setting off further, instead of further escorting the bell, he’s cutting wood in the courtyard, carrying water, and claiming that he’s discovered the meaning of life. Gentlemen! The meaning of life and a mixed marriage — this is like fire and water! You don’t understand a thing now anyway. Any moment, you will tumble into the arms of alluring young papist girls, but the time will come when you will remember my words. Never mind. On the field of battle, that is, on the route of the journey there remains the final rider of the Gospel, the Augsburg Lutheran evangelical. The route leads, God guides him, further to the south. It is already the height of a luxuriant, sweltering spring. The sleigh was long ago replaced by horse and cart. He is alone on the sandy road. His fingers graze the surface of the bell, smooth like a Protestant girl’s skin, and that freezing, dark Kiejdany night when they took the bell down from the tower, when, driven not only by a divine calling, they set off into the unknown — that time, so it seems to him now, is not of this world, and not of this life. Now the road leads upward, hill after hill, higher and higher, and finally — there it is. At his feet stretches the promised valley. Evangelicals busy themselves around their farmyards. Church choirs sing psalm after psalm. Birds fly up to the sky. Everywhere a good, amicable light shines forth. Hosanna.
“And in that manner,” the Sexton’s voice suddenly seemed to break off, and now he spoke entirely without conviction, “and in that manner my ancient ancestor reached the Cieszyn land. Let the middle bell sing!” he suddenly shouted, and there was no way not to think that with this shout he wished to drown out something that either had not yet been said, or that had already been said in excess. “I’ll tell you the story of the middle bell another time, another time. For today it is enough for you to know that it was cast and offered to us on the personal instructions of King Charles XII of Sweden, who not only routed the Evangelical-Eater, Emperor Joseph I, but also wrung from him six churches of Grace! That’s right. Six churches of Grace! Sagan—Żagan! Freistadt — Kożuchów! Hirschberg — Jelenia Góra! Landshut — Kamienna Góra! Militsch — Milicz! Teschen — Cieszyn! And now, and now,” Sexton Messerschmidt readied himself for the finale, “and now let the great bell sing!”
Hearts rocked under cast-iron domes that beat for all their might in their own rhythm, even though it was all directed by Messerschmidt. His voice was entirely buried in their music. It seemed to us that we pulled the ropes, but it was they that pulled us up and let us down. We flew up, and we fell down, like apprentice angels. Sexton Messerschmidt told the entire unhearable story of the great Wittenberg bell.
“That’s right, that’s right. The great bell comes from the castle church in Wittenberg,” Sexton Messerschmidt’s gaping mouth dumbly told the tale. “The generous folk of Wittenberg made an offering of that bell to the oppressed folk of Cieszyn, so that they, listening to the very same tones to which our Reformer, Dr. Martin Luther, listened, might not grow weary in their reformatory zeal. That’s right, that’s right, gentlemen, the great bell rang in the tower of the castle Church of St. Paul. It rang on that cold October morning when our Reformer, with the help of a sixteenth-century hammer, nailed his ninety-five theses on the topic of indulgences to the church door. If you gentlemen will listen carefully,” Sexton Messerschmidt turned his face upward, “if you gentlemen will listen carefully, you will hear that the passionate banging of the Lutheran hammer has settled forever in the tone of the great bell, and it echoes in it quite clearly even now. That is to say,” in Messerschmidt’s unheard narration there echoed an almost audible venomous accent, “that is to say, if you are pious, you will hear it. The impious, Bolsheviks, pagans, and other slayers of Catholic girls won’t hear a thing. For the might of our bell is based not only on the fact that its tone surpasses other tones, but that it also absorbs other tones and records them in the abysses of its substance. That is the reason why it is said that all of our bells are Wittenberg bells, although we also have a Swedish bell and a Radziwiłł bell. But the great Wittenberg bell surpasses them, it leads them, it absorbs their voice, and it bestows its own voice upon them. Listen, listen, and you will hear, in the transparent, cold, October air (the first snows lurk in the clouds over Wittenberg), you will hear the banging of the irascible hammer, piercing the parchment with iron nails.”
•
I strained my ears, I slowly dressed, and more and more clearly I heard blows that were, admittedly, not irascible, but regular and forceful. An inky glow filled the kitchen. Someone had screwed a deep blue light bulb, left behind by the Germans, into the lamp that was hanging over the table. Mr. Trąba stood on a stool and nailed a large gray blanket to the window frame with unexpected skill.
“A black-out like during the occupation, like during the occupation, Chief, only even stricter. Verdunkelung sensu largo. Stricter, because under the Germans we were younger and often, especially after we’d had a glass, hastier. Stricter,” Mr. Trąba sighed heavily, “stricter, because we are passing from the phase of theoretical debate to the phase of praxis.”