He did not pluck the chickens. He only tore off the feathers together with the skin. They stuck to his fingers, which were dark with blood. The bitch snatched the entrails as they were ripped out and gulped them down with one snap of her lean muzzle.
“I won’t eat,” Margit whispered. “I want to wash up, have some tea, and sleep.”
“I’ll watch to be sure he doesn’t skimp on the spices.”
“The water is in a barrel under the ceiling, but it is cool. You need only pull the cord and it will pour. The other barrel, the one by the wall with the dipper beside it, is for washing after. The water closet is here — but who except in a case of great urgency would come out to the yard — only please flush. One guest from the ministry is already sleeping: a Hindu, not important. If I had known that you were coming, I would have purchased more vegetables and some tinned foods and set aside the best part of the hotel,” he said proudly.
The moon shone brightly; it seemed to stare unnervingly into their faces. Weariness came over them, and they shivered from the chill of the mountain night. The flickering light gave the walls of the shed a greenish tinge and glimmered on the disemboweled chickens. The dog sniffed the severed heads and munched them, choking on the beaks.
The boy came out of the kitchen to help Istvan spread out the bundles of bedding that were strapped to the roof of the car. But, enthralled by the green globe that was the full moon, he stood for a long time with his head turned up as if he were bewitched.
Margit slipped into the shed and sat on a block of wood behind the caretaker, who was tending the fireplace. He ran his hands over the hot embers as if his skin were fireproof. The feathers that still stuck to his fingers sizzled; the stench of them drifted through the room.
Why did I feel the slaughter of those roosters as an injury to myself? Nothing really happened; the rest of the chickens fell asleep again. They will not realize tomorrow that there are fewer of them. Does some ruthless hand also snatch us away for some reason that to it is self-evident? An evil vision — as if I press blindly on toward something that I don’t yet comprehend, but that will overtake and seize me. Is it possible to hear in the cries of slaughtered birds the voice of one’s own fear of death?
She pressed her fingers between her teeth and bit until it hurt. It was a relief. That herdsman, lame, thrown aside by his people — we took him back to be thrown aside again, to live through the despair of isolation a second time. They will leave him on the road. They will betray him. He will try feverishly to catch up with them, dragging his ailing leg. The long shadow will gain on him, a whine will urge him on: the craven sob of the hyena, walking along as if with a broken back, sneaking from one windfallen tree to another, under bushes, in the twilight, lured by the decay of the body. It also wishes no man to be wronged; it wants only the carrion, the rotting meat. Its jaws snap; they can crush the thickest bone. And that cripple knew it was waiting for him to die, if not tonight, then tomorrow. The next day. Shouldn’t I have stayed by him, torn away the rags even if he resisted, made an incision, put on a dressing? Did I do all I could have?
She reproached herself for the relief they had felt at letting him go, at giving him back to his own people, perhaps his own family. The sick should be treated by force here. Women swinging vessels with embers in front of their eyelids, men guarding flocks with spears in their hands. It may even be that they are happy; it is enough to accept the premise that this is the only life possible for them, inevitable as fate. Does it matter how one dies? We pass through that black gate alone, slipping from the arms that want to hold us. Is it worth it to form bonds in this life, to cling with all one’s might, to struggle?
Perhaps that man who sat on the edge of the road threw away his stick because he knew by then that one does not defend oneself — that he was doomed because he was already dead in the eyes of his people, who had walked away. Perhaps he was reconciled to it. She smelled the scent of a hyena whining with the lust to tear and devour the still-warm body.
She prayed, she hid her face in her hands and prayed, for rescue for the lame man. After all, some truck might come along; he might shout, might stop it. A will to struggle might awaken in him. But she felt a bitter certainty that the sick man would not cry out, and that the hyena, frightened away by the truck’s headlights and the roar of its engine, would return.
In a drowsy burst of weeping she accused herself and begged for mercy for the man whose kin had abandoned him. And they will feel no guilt; their hands will be clean. Because they won’t know. Blessed ignorance.
In the leaping firelight the old man turned his brown, furrowed face toward her. “The chickens will be ready soon.”
The door opened. Istvan said that the bed was ready. He was baffled when Margit rose and clung to him desperately.
“A sleepy little girl?” He stroked her back and held her close. “I’ll tuck you in in a little while. I’ll feed you.”
“Do you think”—her tense whisper demanded an answer—“that they took that man with them?”
“Who?”
“The old man with the infected leg.” She was angry that he had not understood at once. “I saw a hyena slinking along behind him.”
“Of course they took him. You were dozing. That nightmare tired you. But surely you wanted to exchange me for him and devote your life to him,” he said with an indulgent smile. “You know the devout principle: nonviolence. Change nothing by force. Let evil destroy itself, and let us perfect ourselves. Let the world not hinder us in this. Nor any hyena.”
She was appalled. “You can’t be serious.”
“Of course not. I wanted to remind you of the law of this country in which we are only guests. They must deal with this themselves — not as individuals but as ethnic groups, as a state.”
“Mother India!” she sighed.
“Exactly. Remember how those mothers by the walls of the dung cottages raise locks of their daughters’ hair in the sun and delouse them. They comb out the lice and let them fall into the grass. To kill them is not allowed, for life is sacred. Calm down. Don’t castigate yourself. What is one cripple in the scheme of things? Life goes on.”
The old caretaker, busy with the reddening chickens that were roasting on a wire net over hot charcoal, seemed not to notice that the visitors were waiting. The dog scratched with its paw, pushed aside a creaking partition, and stepped into a dark corner. They heard the thin, mournful whine of a puppy.
Margit hurried to help. The bitch lay by her pups, impaling one on a sharp point of the armor. She would not allow the whimpering little dog to be freed. Istvan lit the corner with a flashlight. The dog growled at Margit, ready to bite. Her lips were curled and trembling; her fangs were bared. The oppressive armor, unnecessary inside the house, pressed against her back. The puppy was damp and soft as dough; she licked its lacerated belly and turned the others over with her paws. They pushed their way unerringly toward her teats. Her downy coat swarmed with translucent yellow fleas.
“Stop worrying about the whole world.” He drew her firmly to him. “Come and eat.”
She rose obediently. A savory smell was coming from the roasted chickens. The juicy meat with its crisp surface held the pungent aroma of spices. She hardly bothered to taste it before biting eagerly into a leg.
The bitch left the mewling puppy and drew near them, waiting, tense with anticipation, to be thrown a bone. The gleam of the open fireplace played on her tin spikes. The flames glimmered; red sparks flew up, tracing zigzags in the air. The remaining chickens squeaked in their sleep, sometimes stretching their necks and cocking their heads to look out with eyes like rubies, full of wonderment, only to tuck them under their wings again. Perhaps they had seen an apparition; perhaps they had heard those cries again.