Death in Spring (14 page)

V

I was standing before the river, by the marsh, listening to the night. I thought I saw rings in the water. All my being brought the girl to life, brought her to me, her hair pulled high, and when she was almost at my side, it fell loose, down her back. She drew nearer and melted into me as if she and I were fog. She stepped back and took me by the arm with two strong, tiny hands, and we began to walk, we headed toward the water; as we approached it, the river withdrew, farther and farther away, as we walked. I had never walked with anyone like that. My wife and I would stroll hand in hand, or I would put my arm on her shoulder, or she would hold me by the waist, and it was something children did. But the girl from the water stood very close to me, held my arm with both of her hands and laughed. I couldn’t see her face. She didn’t have a face, but she laughed. We walked like that for a long time, toward the dead water at the head of the dry, sandy trail that lay before us. Motionless canes forming a fan-like vault sprouted on both sides of the narrow path, and soon the girl and I would walk through them, unable to see sky or mountain, only leaves. She dropped my arm and stood in front of me, I in front of her. Lips at the level of lips, eyes at the level of eyes, hearts troubled, but it was as if only separation existed, as if the two could never meet. I could feel her bird-breath beseeching tenderness. At that moment I stepped back from the unknown, and my voice, not addressing anyone, whispered very softly, don’t wish for this.

I reached the marsh. At the edge the mud flower grew, a lone flower born without green leaves. There were patches of them. From the damp sprouted a new-green stem, topped by a bud. The bud grew large, the green streaked with the color of crimson dust. One day I had curled up, waiting for the flower to blossom. It made a clicking sound when it opened and the flower released the leaves. I plucked it, and bitter, viscous water spurted from the stem. If you touched it and rubbed your fingers over your lips, you got sores. All of a sudden, I realized what I desired: sorrow. The stones scattered in the mud were like sorrow, patches of sorrow. I turned back. I don’t know how long I wandered about during those nights. The clay figures were dead, destroyed. I was searching for a bond, but I didn’t know what I was searching for or where to look. Now I know, now that my life has come full circle, like a glass ball on the verge of shattering. I waited for dawn to examine myself in the water. With my hand over my mouth, the water reflected grief-filled eyes. The sky was wide, the earth wide, the village small. I clutched a rock, and as if the hand were someone else’s, I struck my forehead. My eyes filled with tears, although I had no wish to cry, and I saw everything as if I were under water, but now salty drops filled my eyes. I raised my arm and gazed at my hand; it wasn’t the hand I wished. I made my way to the blacksmith’s to see his son. He was lying down, touching himself, and I pretended I didn’t see him. To avoid seeing him, I thought about hands: my child’s, Senyor’s, the hands of the old man who had given me the drink. I looked at mine, and the hand didn’t belong to anyone, not to me, or the water, or life, or death. The same as me. My hand, like me.

I had to stop at the slaughterhouse. I was ill and paused by the wall to gaze into the distance. Clouds were coming from the direction of Pedres Altes. I glanced up. Looking at the slowly approaching clouds made me dizzy. I turned round, my face to the wall, and banged my forehead against it. I felt like vomiting, but didn’t. The stench of dead horse rose from the wall, blending with the night air, attempting to restore past things to life, things that could no longer be, things that wished to live again for a moment but could not. I started walking toward my house, afraid I wouldn’t make it. The door was ajar, and I could see a bit of starlight in the courtyard at the end. That’s when they beat me. The voice of the person beating me was telling me to stop wandering at night: if I continued to roam about at night, they would kill me. The words carried the stench of dead horse and the memory of swimming under the village. As the river hurled me along, the breath of that thing that had approached me, causing me to release my grip on the root, bore the stench of dead horse, but I hadn’t recognize it that day because it was accompanied by the smell of water and moss. It was the same malodor from the shadow that had pursued me at Font de la Jonquilla, the same breath. The blacksmith struck me, again and again, until I turned round and knocked him to the floor. He grabbed my legs, trying to pull me down, but there was a door behind me and I let myself fall against it. When he stood up I kicked him, heard him groan. He must have rolled away because I couldn’t find him. Again, he threw himself on me and knocked me senseless.

I woke up feeling I was being watched. I ached all over, like that night by the river while the village went up in flames. They were looking at me. My wife was kneeling in front of me, very close, looking into my eyes, as I had looked into my father’s that afternoon in the courtyard. She moved away when I stirred. Seated with my back to the wall, I bent forward, as if I were searching for a link with life, but the feelings that bound me were like blighted grass, and I leaned back against the wall. When my wife left, I stood up not knowing what to do. I opened the white wooden box that had blackened over the years; inside it lay the old rope and awl. I leaned over, gazing for a long time at the rope and awl, until finally my knees began to hurt. Then I picked up the rope, wrapped it round my wrist three times, and with my free hand followed the rope to the end. But I discovered nothing.

Lightning flashed, followed by a clap of thunder. Before the rain began to fall, more thunder sounded, as if the sky were rent and the lightning had come to cauterize the heavenly wounds. The water fell like a torrent over the house. It rained all night, the sky never tiring until early morning.

VI

I wanted to see the village. The wisteria trunk in front of my empty house bore three incisions that my mother had carved. The men were leaving for work, and I looked them in the face. Never before that morning had I gazed so intently at the faces of the people from my village. The men didn’t look at me, the women did, but I couldn’t discern if the women looked at me with pity or revulsion. The men had dismissed my face from those things that were visible. Old faces, young faces, all of them bear life experiences, as if histories were written on them. Suddenly I could hear a hammer striking the anvil. It was coming from the opposite direction. The last faces were those of three children. I left the village by the stables and headed toward the Pont de Fusta, where three little boys were fighting with sticks. I stopped. Two of them were running about, but one knew how to dodge the blows without moving and strike the others. The one delivering blows had a long, narrow face with little eyes and a low forehead. The other two had round faces, large ears, and desperate eyes. I started across the bridge, but I came to a halt when I reached the center. The day was limpid, the sky and water young, the dark mountains sharply outlined against the sky. The day was so clear I could almost count the trees on the farthest mountains. I retraced my steps. The little boys were still fighting. When they saw I was returning, they stopped fighting for a moment, and I covered my eyes with my arm. One of the round-faced boys came and stood by me, and when I began to walk, he did too. Soon he left me because I was moving slowly. He trudged in front of me, but stayed close by. From time to time he twisted round, searching for my feet, and when he had seen them, he would turn his back to me. At the horse enclosure, I stopped to contemplate Maraldina, the Muntanyes Morades, and Senyor’s mountain with the still green ivy. It was tiring to look that far away. In my pocket I carried the awl my mother had used to pierce my ears when I was little. You can have everything you want, but accompanied by pain, until you learn not to want anything. I had found it in the box where my wife kept the ropes. I paused to look at the grazing horses, their coats shiny, eyes entranced. I turned back round and the little boy was standing firmly in front of me, his head up, staring at me. The sun was falling on the esplanade of Pedres Baixes. Behind Pedres Altes it was all grey, everything was lost in the greyness where the watchmen lived with the tiny horses whose tails reached the ground. The little boy continued on his way in front of me, but he turned round from time to time, until we parted at the end of the horse enclosure. When I looked he was far away, and I could barely make out the dead tree on Maraldina because of the curve in the Festa esplanade. When I reached the bend in the river, I searched for the place where I had crossed the first time. I remembered a shrub on the left, but it has disappeared. I knew the shrub was there that day because at first I had planned to leave my clothes beside it rather than by the tree. Many trees were now scattered about the area. Close to the water, I found a spot I didn’t remember: long and narrow, covered with large, very white pebbles. Where had I crossed? Memory plays tricks on us. The man who killed the serpent had died at the bend in the river, trampled by his horse; I didn’t know it the first time I swam across. He and his horse had been one and the same as they chased the serpent; then they became two. I was looking for some small sign, whatever it was that could help me find where I had crossed. I strolled up and down, occasionally placing my arm in front of my eyes because the light was getting stronger and I couldn’t bear the glare. I undressed and sat naked, my back against a tree, feeling the support. To my left, in front of the marsh, lay the mud-flower pond. To my right, at a distance, the canes by the esplanade. The morning was dead, the canes swaying, and in the daylight the green water was almost colorless. Water got in my eyes. Soon the blacksmith’s house would be ready, as well as everyone else’s; the horses would neigh on moonlit nights and the blacksmith’s son would respond and the man would be
. . .
Water got in my eyes; the river was very broad in that spot. Calm, but very broad. Shiny flecks on the sun-splashed water, darkly mottled where there was no sun. When I got out, I sat down to rest. I would have wished for things to come, but things did not come. The grasses were breathing, enjoying the moment; I was breathing only from exhaustion, having swum the breadth of the river.

VII

All morning I lay down, watching the water and sky and round clouds that had gathered above Maraldina. The sun was bright, air cool, spiders weaving their webs from branch to branch. I fell asleep lying on my stomach so the light wouldn’t bother me, the sun beating down on my back. I had perhaps never slept so deeply, so deeply that I was surprised when I awoke. Feeling as if I couldn’t sleep, I strolled over to the river and lowered myself into the water, completely, eyes and hair, then I got out. When I reached the center of the seedlings, I noticed the odor of manure and the scent of wisteria blossoms, the two mixed together. I didn’t know where the smell came from, everything was so far away, and the river separated us. After the sun and water, it seemed like night beneath the trees. Countless butterflies were fluttering about, many of them resting, wings up, forming white leaves. The axe and pitchfork stood in their usual place; on the ground near the tree trunks lay some nails used to fasten the bark when extracting the seedcase from the tree. I made my way slowly beneath the trees and butterflies, the axe on my back, the awl and pitchfork in my hands. I marked the cross with my fingernail. My nails had grown hard, like my father’s. I marked the cross. I wanted to walk about because I was trembling all over. From head to toe. But not because I had moved from the sun into the shade. The trembling sprung from my heart; neither my will nor that of the wind was the cause. Some tiny bones still lay on the stone that had served as a pot. I picked up a few, threw them in the air and let them fall. They were the same color as before, made the same sound as before. Senyor’s tree had full leaves and a thick truck. I went over and embraced the trunk, my hands barely able to encircle it. The bee-emblazoned ring was fastened to the base. The fence of thorny brambles had been leveled. I glanced up and was enthralled by the butterflies; then I returned to my tree and began to open up the cross. My heart pounded with each blow of the axe, with each blow. Suddenly I was consumed by fear. Behind me stood the shrub where I had hidden the day my father killed himself, the one with the yellow flower and the furious bee. I leaned down and picked up an old leaf that was full of veins, a web of stiff filaments that had once been tender and clothed in green. I crushed it, then opened my hand and let the pieces fall. I remembered being frightened and hiding behind the shrub as I heard footsteps. It all came back to me. The person who was now unsealing the tree was someone else, and I was hiding behind the shrub. The shadow of two butterflies chasing each other distracted me. I shooed them away and returned to my task of striking the tree with the axe. The trunk was hard. A tree is solid the first time it is split open, but if it has already been breached, it is not difficult to open again. My palms began to sting after a while, and I rested the axe on the ground and spit into them, rubbing one palm against the other. Between two fingers, where the palm hollows out a bit, a blister had formed.

When I had the cross open from top to bottom, I opened it from side to side. I paused and shielded my eyes with my arm. The blister popped, and water oozed out of it; skin was pushed to one side and the raw flesh smarted. A smell emerged from the interior of the tree, like nothing I had ever smelled before. It had a faint trace of something fresh, like a wave that delved deep inside me, compelling me to breathe in what seemed to be a scent of life, enveloped by gasps of smoke, that was coming to me from within the tree.

The butterflies were going mad after flying all day. There seemed to be more and more of them, as if the sun and axe blows were encouraging them to be born and grow faster. Fear returned. Fear caused a drop of salt water to trickle down my back. I had the impression that behind me, where the bee had sucked the flower for so long, a hidden child was watching what I was doing, and the child would run away to alert the villagers, starting with the blacksmith. He would tell them that a man was hollowing out a tree with a pitchfork in the forest of the dead.

I strode over to the shrub. When I had taken four steps, I tripped. One of my feet had caught in the handle of a root, and I hurt my knee. Nothing was behind the shrub. A stream of warm blood ran down my leg. As I turned round to finish opening up the tree, I heard a little laugh, like a memory. On my left cheek, above my heart, I felt a caress mixed with wet hair, as if the air that wasn’t air were brushing my cheek with green cane leaves. With a sudden movement, I covered my eyes with my arm, burying the raw flesh from the blister in a fold in my scarred forehead, and I did what I could to keep the caress on my cheek from dying. I took hold of my cheek so the caress would not flee. A ray of sun burnt my chest and dried the blood from my knee. The branches moved. Time was fleeing, and I had to bring Time to a close. Branches swayed, leaves swayed, blades of grass swayed, as if everything that lacked a voice wished to speak to me.

The seedcase rolled out of the tree. I picked up the awl and pointed it at my heart. I was giving them only a corpse. Death without the Festa. I walked back and put away the pitchfork and axe, then returned slowly because my knee ached and the blood that had become a scab pulled with the movement. I gave the seedcase a prod, rolled it to another tree, and covered it with leaves. I hope it will be a long time before they realize. If they drag me from the tree, they will drag me out dead. I removed the four nails from the bark, letting them drop one by one. I pierced my heart with the awl and my life closed. I can begin the story of my life wherever I wish; I can tell it differently, I can begin with the death of my child, with the morning the blacksmith’s son jumped in front of me in the forest of the dead, with my visit to Senyor. It matters not what I do, my life is closing. Like a soap bubble that has turned to glass, I cannot remove anything or add anything. I can change nothing in my life. Death escaped through my heart, and when I no longer held death within me, I died.