get to it. And I took that Protestant body — although, as far as its anatomic perfection was concerned, it was remarkably supraconfessional — and I saw the signs of the cross made over us by the Apostles, and I heard Luther as he cheered me on with his classic and original phrase: Der alt böse Feind mit Ernst er’s jetzt meint! “Go to it, son!” shouted the blissful organist. “Come, my betrothed,” whispered his daughter. And I won’t try to hide it: this grabbed me and made me hot. In any case — for the time being. For the time being, I didn’t enter her name. But that doesn’t mean that I was idle. The massive Italian notebook, which was the main register of those I had condemned, the mother of the lists of all my victims, was in action. Every normal person feels like killing someone from time to time. But I developed this normalcy creatively — using an exquisite notebook, in which I record (and also cross out) the names of those I feel like killing. Today I entered the name of the female drug addict who accosted me on Sienna Street, I crossed out The Most Beautiful Woman in the World, I added Father Kalinowski (we all used to play cards — two walking skeletons, a certain female corpsette, Father Kalinowski, and I), I crossed out great-grandfather on Father’s side (on the whole, he is blameless), and for the hundredth time I added and for the hundredth time I crossed out The Greatest Love of My Life. That’s how it is. There is no begging for mercy here. Trouble is brewing on every page. I am constantly adding someone, crossing someone out, some appear for a few hours — when, in a surge of sudden frenzy, I enter the name, and when, in a moment, in a surge of equally sudden relief, I cross it out. Two weeks ago, in the twinkling of an eye, I entered and crossed out — and, to all intents and purposes, I crossed it out before I had time to enter it — the name of a certain, seemingly not bad, student of archeology. That’s why I had made a date with her. I made a date with her because she seemed not bad. Anyway, it’s all the same why I made a date — the affair was typical in its disastrousness. You know the pain I am talking about: the young lady, who seems not bad, turns out five minutes into the conversation to be as thick as a plank, which, if it automatically spelled the end, wouldn’t be so bad. Unfortunately, she fiercely sought another date, made persistent attempts, sent sensuous SMSes. And so, once she had finally shown up, it was impossible to leave after ten minutes. You have to play the gentleman. You have to do your time. You have to put in at least an hour. I did my time, but after doing it, I was in such a fury that I didn’t have a shadow of a doubt: immediately upon my return home, a bloody entry would follow! Very bloody! Executed venomously, with a purple felt-tip pen! But before I got home — and for me it was a bit of a hike, since the seemingly not bad student of archeology, instead of accepting my conditions and appearing either at the Dezerter, or at Guliwer on Bracka Street, insisted on Singer in the Kazimierz district, and I, guided by the obvious intentions, servilely agreed to this as well — and so, by the time I dragged myself home from that Singer located on the outskirts, my anger had passed. I smiled meditatively upon my own stupidity and upon my own unbridled sex drive, and I simply wrote the hinney off. First she was, then she wasn’t, and she was there so briefly that it was as if she had never been. I didn’t even have time to imagine ripping off her jeans, blouse, bra, and packing the first spoke that comes to hand into her heart. I don’t rape, don’t grope, but I do undress them before I kill them. It’s good to undress the future corpse. Chiefly for the sake of polemical convenience. As a philosopher we revere likes to say: “In a dispute between the naked and the clothed, the naked will never be right.” And if someone is never right, it is easier to get rid of him. Annihilating someone’s shame and pathetic bodily shell — in places it is yellowish, in places a bit fatty, in places hairy, in places congested — is not such a big deal. It can be a favor. She trembles, her tits shake. Her tits aren’t bad. I know the details. I know the details, because I am an omniscient Lutheran narrator. A Lutheran narrator, by the way, can be no other. He can only be omniscient, omnipotent, and chosen by Our Lord the One in the Trinity, Amen. Amen, Amen, Amen, Jesus Christ is Lord! She trembles, her tits shake, her tits aren’t bad, but for a moment, before entering her name in the register, this loses its significance. Besides, her tits are no longer not bad. Her tits weren’t bad until she opened her yap in Singer. As soon as she opened her yap and began to blather, her not-bad tits immediately went flabby, her shapely legs immediately became crooked, cellulitis immediately began to cover her smooth ass, pustules began to erupt on her silken skin, the luxuriant shock of hair began to become oily. And she sweats, and she goes in her panties, and she is standing in a puddle of her own excrement, and, as quickly as possible I must shorten her, and especially my, horrible shame. And so, I produce the rusty spoke from my breast pocket, and poof! in her neck, and poof! — just in case — in the liver, and the seemingly not bad student of archeology is no more. Poof! in the aorta and poof! in the artery, and no more — the tramp from the Kotlarski Roundabout is no more. Poof! in the ear and poof! in the eye, and no more — The Most Beautiful Woman in the World is no more. Poof! in the spleen and poof! in the pancreas, and alcoholic auntie is no more. Poof! in the snout and poof! in the noodle, and Father, Mother, and the neighbor lady are no more. Poof! in the belly and poof! in the jelly, and The Greatest Love of My Life is no more. Poof! in the broom and poof! in the womb, and Viola Caracas is no more. Poof. Poof. Poof. Someone inhumanly tired and with a grave injury to the heart is running a thousand-kilometer obstacle course. Over the orange track there fall icy nights. Then the unending winter of the century. Women lying in the snow, in the ice, in the frosty grass, on the banks and the shoulders of the roads. Their patterned dresses, navy blue scarfs, and sunglasses. A lot of women. There is no point in trying to hide it: there are many, very many women on the list of persons I feel like killing. If I were to kill even half the people on my list, I would have decent chances at becoming the