Also, someone or other always sat down with you, because even if he didn’t have an actual reason to be grateful to you, he wanted to be grateful just in case. Then someone else would come along, then someone else again, often it was whoever found themselves in the pub at the time. Because who doesn’t want to be a soul instead of just a body? When it came time to shut the pub, Jasiński, the manager, would lock up on the outside, and inside we’d carry on drinking. At most the prices would go up some, he had to earn a bit extra too on top of his salary. He’d go lie down on the chairs behind the counter and we’d drink on. I’m telling you, we drank like it was our souls celebrating because they were in heaven, and not us in a pub. Wake me up on your way out. Come off it, Jasiński, who’s leaving, where would we go. We’re not gonna come all the way down to earth again. We poured drinks left, right, and center, wake up Jasiński, we need another bottle. Because I was Eagle again. Come on now! You’ve abandoned us God, good job Eagle’s here. Come on now! Soon as Eagle’s here, every tear we shed is one dead enemy body! Come on now! Eagle’s in the village with his men, they’re drinking at young Marysia Król’s, there’s going to be a parade through the village, bring your flour and lard! Though it often ended sadly, one or another guy killed, a guy gets killed so many times and he has to keep on living. You were Eagle and now you’re a piece of crap, not a government official. Wake up, Jasiński, another bottle!
The next day you’d be sitting half dead at your desk, your head would be splitting and your belly would be aching, and on top of everything you’d have to listen to folks complaining about how hard life was. No one cared that maybe you had it even harder, but you weren’t going to take some form and go complain, who to? To God? Why is this happening to me, God?
Oftentimes I’d barely make it home when I had to be off to work, there’d only be time to have a quick mouthful of sour milk or cabbage juice. And though home was close by, once the devil began leading you astray he’d push you any which way, sometimes you even ended up back where you started. He’d mix your head up so bad you’d almost get lost in your own village. The only thing for it was to go from one house to the next. Luckily, in those days the houses were close together, like beads in a rosary, it was like they were only separated by the winter insulation on the outside, so you could count off the houses as you went, Hail Mary, full of grace, Our Father. Today almost all the houses are new, it’s like someone snapped the rosary and the beads got scattered to the four winds, and you’ll never be able to pray that way again.
When you get there, you still have to find the door, and find the handle in the door. There were times it was like searching for a needle in a haystack. I’d be looking and looking, and father would stand on the other side of the door and not open it.
“Open the door, father, it’s me, Szymek.”
“Open it your self, you drunken lout.”
“I can’t find the handle.”
“You hear that, mother? He can’t find the handle.”
“Come on, Józef, open the door for him, he’s your own son.”
“He’s a devil, he’s no son of mine. Do you hear him scraping his claws on the door? I’m not letting any devil into my house, not while it’s still mine. Keep scraping, Antichrist, scrape till your claws are worn away.”
“Open the door, Józef,” mother would plead with him.
“Get up and open it yourself.”
“I would, but I can’t get up. Open the door, Józef. Even a prodigal son is still a son.”
“I had sons, but they all left. Anything that’s good, it either dies or it goes away, only what’s bad stays behind.”
One time when he refused to open the door for me, I somehow managed to find the handle, but it turned out he’d put the hook on inside. I started hammering with my fists, I knew he was standing right there, and in the end I was so furious I kicked at the door and I shouted:
“Soon as mother dies, I’m out of here! Nothing’s gonna keep me!” And I walked off and sat on a rock outside the house. The night was maybe halfway through. I’d barely sat down when someone joined me.
“Shift up there a bit.”
I looked, and it was Grandfather Łukasz, the one that had run away to America before the first war. The moon was bright as a shiny coin, the stars were like grains on the threshing floor, I couldn’t fail to know him. It even made me sober up a bit. They say that in such cases you have to ask what their soul needs. But what can a soul from America need? It’s only village souls that are always in need of something. Is it you, grandfather, I ask. Then greetings to you. How are things over there in America? They said you made a fortune, now I see you’re back. Maybe it’s true that when a person dies, his soul goes back to where he was born. Though why did you have to take it all the way to America in the first place? You paid its passage, and now it’s back. You should have left it here when the Cossacks came looking for you, they wouldn’t have harmed it, and people would have comforted it somehow or other. Then you wouldn’t be drawn back here after you died. Was it so bad for you over there in America? If it makes you feel any better, you wouldn’t have had it any easier here. Here it’s the same as America, just on the other side of the world. Because America is anywhere we’re not, grandfather. Tell me at least, what’s it like in the next world? You killed the overseer, you know better than other people. You did the right thing, whether or not he was a bastard. A man often feels like killing someone, but these days there aren’t any more overseers. It’s a different system now. You probably don’t know what a system is? You know, like a government. You killed an overseer and you had to run away, and your grandson’s a government worker. You must have dreamed of having someone like that in the family? Here you are, he’s sitting right next to you on a rock. He’s a bit drunk, but that’s because of you, grandfather. With you grandparents, whatever popped into your head you lost yourselves dreaming about it, and because of that, afterwards your grandchildren have to drink. You’re all in the next world, your grandchildren are still in this one, and it’s all one big circle. And circles can’t be straightened out. So it’s better to go to the pub than go away, because it’s the same thing, just closer. Though sometimes, when there’s a full moon like tonight, I feel like tying myself up on a chain and howling. I’d be a better dog than our Twisty. I’d smell thieves, and I’d smell your soul, grandfather. You wouldn’t have to worry that no one would recognize you. Did you ever see a moon like that in America? You only ever get them here, over the village. Like someone took an ax and cut a hole in the sky. You could toss in a fishing net and catch yourself some fish. Do you know if fish from the sky are the same as fish from the river, grandfather?
We talked on and on, almost till sunup. He didn’t say a word, while I talked about this and about that. In the morning father came outside and gazed up at the sky.
“This is quite some weather. I don’t know why the sky looks so high up or so deep? Imagine having a farm like that sky. On a big plain. All you’d need to do would be pray, and everything would sprout and grow and flower. Not the tiniest cloud in sight. A sun like Jesus’s eye. So then, maybe you could come do some work in the fields?”
“No way, not when I haven’t slept. I’ll do it tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow, tomorrow, how long has it been tomorrow. Everyone else’s fields are all plowed and harrowed, some folks have even done their sowing, and our fields haven’t been touched since harvesttime. People are starting to ask if we’re selling up, because the land’s not being worked, and he keeps saying tomorrow. Tomorrow’s good for the next world, in this one you have to plow and sow as long as the land’ll produce. Because when it stops, you won’t be able to beg it to start again. The land is good while it’s good, but if it sets its mind to it, it can be stone.”