“Save expressions like that for when you’re at home, after work! This is the district administration! We need to keep superstition out of here!” But people say those things without thinking, they’re just sighing. It’s easier to change the words you use or your thoughts than those kind of expressions. But that’s the sort of person he was.
When I started having a tomb built, all those years later, and I needed fifteen hundredweight of cement, he was still chairman, though his title had been changed to director. That was how much Chmiel had figured we’d need. And another two hundredweight on top, it might come in useful, we could at least make a couple steps so you wouldn’t have to jump down with
the casket. I could have bought cement off someone under the counter, and if it was for something else I might have done, but not for a tomb. First I went to the co-op. They had cement, but you needed an allocation order from the district administration. I went there. You could get an allocation order, but you had to sign an application. I signed it.
“What’s the cement for?” the clerk asked me. She was maybe twenty years old, big blue eyes, she seemed a nice girl, a bit snub-nosed. But at her age even a snub nose looks pretty.
“I’m planning to build a tomb,” I said.
“A tomb!” She almost burst out laughing, she had to turn her head and pretend like she just happened to glance the other way. Then she took a sheet of paper out of her desk and started following down with her finger to see what you were allowed to get cement for. House, cattle shed, stable, barn, silo, manure pit, for breeding rabbits, poultry, foxes, coypu, for a greenhouse to grow vegetables, flowers, potted or cut. Look, they even mention chrysanthemums, she said, pleased. But there was nothing about tombs. She asked a clerk that was sitting in the corner by the window:
“Mr. Władek, are there any official instructions about cement allocations for tombs?”
“Who’s wanting to die?”
“This citizen here.”
The guy gave me a blank look and shrugged.
“So what am I supposed to do?” I asked.
She smiled, but she spread her hands helplessly.
“You’d need to go talk to the chairman.”
“Is he in?”
“He is, but he’s busy.”
“Then I’ll wait.”
Mr. Władek chipped in:
“If he’s busy, he’ll be busy till the end of the day.”
“I used to work here years ago,” I said. “This room was the tax department. It was before your time. They didn’t have those desks either.”
Mr. Władek seemed embarrassed. The girl hung her head too.
“Maybe I’ll go ask.” She looked at me, no longer with the eyes of an official this time, got up and went out of the room.
I didn’t have to wait long, he saw me right away, though he’d supposedly been busy.
“Have a seat, Szymek,” he said. I was surprised it wasn’t “Pietruszka.” He obviously remembered me, though a lot of years had passed. He’d really aged and put on even more weight, he was squashed against the arms of his chair. His nose had gotten lumpy as well and his eyes had a heavier look than before, or maybe he’d just been thinking hard about something before I came in. He gave a crooked sort of smile:
“So you’re planning to leave for the next world?”
I sat down, struggling with my walking sticks. But it was like he didn’t notice I had them.
“What’s the hurry?”
“There’s no hurry,” I said. “Even if there was, I don’t owe the government anything. Except for the taxes you let me pay in installments. But I’ll pay it off before I die, don’t worry.”
“Who said I was worried? You want to die, be my guest. Anyone’s free to die. It’s no business of the district administration. But if you want cement, well that
is
our business.”
“It’s only fifteen hundredweight.”
“Only fifteen hundredweight. It’s not a question of how much, it’s what it’s for. What do you think, that I can give the stuff out for people to do whatever they feel like with it? It’s written there plain as day in the regs what I can do. You want to increase your yield, by all means, that’s economic development, I can give it to you for that. But if something’s not listed it’s not listed and that’s that. What’s the big deal about a tomb? You’ve got
plenty of time. You’d be better off thinking about life while you can. I’m not saying you should get cows or pigs, cause they need a lot of work and I can see your legs are, you know. But maybe a chicken farm or a duck farm. We support those kind of farms. You’d make yourself some dough, and the government would get something out of it as well. We could give you a loan. No problem. Write an application and I’ll sign off on it. The interest rate’s low and the payoff period is long, later on we can cancel part of the debt. Then instead of being a dead man you’re your own master. Your chickens are clucking, your ducks are quacking. All you do is swing by and feed them every so often, and the cash comes rolling in. If there’s a blight you’ve got insurance, the government refunds the value of the stock and you get another loan. It’s not like it used to be, when every dead hen was a cause for tears. The speckled one, the red one, the one with green legs. When one of them died it was like a person died, Walek or Franek or Bartek. You could even tell which egg came from which chicken. Now all the white ones are white, all the brown ones are brown. There’s no more laying hens, friend, it’s all just production. Or greenhouses. We support greenhouses. By all means. Cukes, tomatoes, chives, lettuce, radishes, it’s a seller’s market. You wouldn’t have to worry about delivery. They’d come and buy the stuff up, in any quantities. They have their own crates. A tomb isn’t a farm building, it doesn’t increase productivity. All that cement, however much it was, just going into the ground.”
“Fifteen hundredweight, like I said.”
“Even fifteen hundredweight. How am I going to explain afterwards that I allocated it to build tombs instead of silos. It’s a bad use of resources, a bad move. Or they might just come tell me I’m too old for the job. Believe me, there’s no shortage of folks that would like to see me gone. They’re starting to say it’s time for me to retire. But I’ve still got four years to go, that’s a long time. Other people say I never graduated from school, I just did some courses. I’m telling you, all the young folks these days have diplomas, and
they’re stuck up about it like you wouldn’t believe. They don’t give a damn about this or that or the other, all they care about is whether things are done scientifically. Every cow has to have six teats, two ears on every blade of wheat, four trotters on every pig. It won’t be long before they start wanting to plow and plant in the next world as well. They won’t even believe there was a war once. Where can you go study in wartime? In the woods, with the resistance. You know that better than anyone. A person’s lucky to have a head on his shoulders and get by somehow. But times have changed, boy have they changed since you worked here. Nowadays, those ways wouldn’t fly. These days every hundredweight of cement has to give an increase in the yield, in meat, milk, eggs, produce. They calculate everything. And it’s always more and more. Then the farmers come along and they say, if you want more productivity I need cement. I can provide a hundred head like you want, director, but I’d need to build an extension on my hog shed. I could do this, I could do that, but I need cement! But we get a wagonload or two of cement and we’ve no idea when the next one’ll come along. It gives me a headache trying to figure out who I should give the cement to and who not. I go visit my father-in-law’s tomb on All Souls’, and instead of thinking about him I keep thinking how many cattle sheds or pig sheds or silos you could have made from the cement that’s gone into the ground there. It’s heartbreaking. And there’s one guy here in the building that’s just waiting for me to trip up. He’s always scheming against me. That director, he’s too old, he’s stupid, he’s a lousy party member. Son of a bitch finished college on a scholarship we gave him from the district. But try getting him to actually do anything. Or if a directive comes through, he says it’s dumb. For those people everything’s dumb. But directives are directives. There aren’t dumb ones and smart ones, you just have to obey them. Why do you think I went gray? Because of old age? No. I feel just as strong as when I was young. I sometimes have an urge to grab a tree and rip it up by the roots. I can do it with my Józka five times in a night. Except it’s too much for her, all she wants is the usual once a week.
I’m too old for you, Leon, she says to me. If you’d married someone younger it’d make you younger as well. Well when we got married you were still young, I say, you can’t change anything now. Though sometimes I think about it, getting married, know what I mean? Why not? The girls in the offices are younger and younger. Everywhere you look they’re smiling and blushing, it makes your heart race. But just try getting married. Right away people’ll be saying this, that, and the other. Because when you’re in a position like this you have to be clean as clean can be. So let it be just Józka. Though it’s a pity, friend. You, you’re all set to head out for the next world, and you’re not the least bit gray, you’ve just got the odd gray hair. Me, I’m gray as a mouse. Why? It’s from all the thinking. And I have to think straight, think right, according to the instructions, not any way I feel like it. Think like a farmer. Be fair, think about the future. Imagine how much thinking that is. There’s not enough hours at work, I’m telling you. I have to think at home as well. In your day things were different. You could even go over to the pub during working hours. Or not come to work at all three days running. Try that today. If they even caught a glimpse of the director drinking. Though I have to tell you, often I feel like getting so drunk I’d pass out. Forget about it all if only for a moment. Night comes, everyone’s asleep, and I’m tossing and turning and thinking, for instance about who I should give cement to, and mostly who not to give it to. Because giving it, I could give it to everyone. Except how? People are crapping themselves over the new buildings they’ve planned. My Józka wakes up and says, lie still, can’t you. You’re thinking and thinking, but you’re not gonna think up anything new. You’d be better off praying. It’s true, I’d be glad to pray once in a while. But how can I pray when I have this job? You pray for me, Józka, maybe that’ll help me feel better. You see, an old wife is good for some things, when times are hard. A young one’d only be interested in fooling around. Though don’t think I’d be afraid to sign your application. I’ve been signing things all these years and so far I’m fine. It’d be different even if you only wanted to
cement your yard. I’d just sign and be done with it. Or build steps to your front door. I’d sign and take it on myself. Your legs are bad, we do what we can to help invalids, there’s an explanation. Or even build an outhouse. I’d sign, it’s God’s will. You could argue whether it’s a farm building or not. But a tomb’s a tomb. Death, the next world, something to do with God. Well, not for everyone. For some people you’re just there one minute, gone the next. Though I wouldn’t trust anyone on that. People are complicated creatures, as they say. Not at all straightforward. You can never be sure they won’t change at some point. But here it’s all about life. You can hear it on the radio, they show it on the television, it’s in the papers, they talk about it at meetings. You’ve chosen a bad time, friend. We’re supposed to improve our lives. And rightly so. Because people ought to live better. We spent too long living in the next world, thinking we’d have it easier there. That there’d be more justice. And choirs of angels. It needs to be better here. And it will be! For instance, at the last meeting we passed a resolution to build a road through to Zarzecze, there’ll be a bus line. And if there’s going to be a road, there needs to be a bridge as well. No more wagons getting sunk in the river. The young folks want a soccer field so we’ll make a soccer field as well, better they kick a ball around than go drinking. We could use a community center as well. We’ll get one, not right away but eventually. And just so you know, we’re also thinking about getting in running water. We’ve spent enough time lugging buckets from the springs. You’ll just turn on the tap and water comes out. And if everything goes well, one of these days we’ll even dam that little river of ours and make a lake. We’ll build cabins and people’ll come on vacation. You’ll see what life’s gonna be like! Maybe there’ll even be fish. You and I can go fishing one day. And we’re planning to have pheasants in the fields. We’ll bring them in and set them free. You’re mowing away, and here there’s a pheasant in your field. It’ll make mowing a whole lot nicer. Also they’re working on getting rid of the potato beetle. They’re gonna turn the pub into a bookstore and build a new pub. While
the old road lasted the old pub was fine. But nowadays there’s more outsiders passing through than locals, you have to think about them as well. Marzec already offered to donate his old wood plow. We’d hang it over the doorway and the place would be called ‘The Wooden Plow.’ And we’re thinking of starting a choir. Why should everyone sing on their own in their own house. Plus, the old people are dying and the old songs are going with them. Then one spring we’ll plant trees along the new road. We even thought of a slogan: Plant a Tree, Make Some Shade. We’ll put in a whole bunch of trees. Elms, lindens, acacias. You’ll see how green it’ll be. And here you are talking about a tomb. I told you already, a tomb is a thing of the next world. Anyone that’s in a hurry to go there, it means they’ve no wish to live in this one. It’s worse than not paying your taxes. Your taxes can be canceled or at least paid in installments. But if someone doesn’t want to live, it means they’re being dragged backwards, it means there’s something wrong with their consciousness. Szymek, Szymek, friend, when are you finally going to stop being a peasant? It’s more than a hundred years since there was serfs. Hardly anyone even remembers Piłsudski these days. Before you know it they’ll forget the occupation as well. And high time. The past has caused us pain for too long. We’ve gotten our tail mixed up with our head. It’s time to think of the future. And you want to face the future with a tomb? You’re not interested in anything else, cause you’re just going to go off and die? And me, push comes to shove how am I going to explain I’m allocating cement for the next world? That would mean I believe in life after death, if I’ve started giving out cement for building graves. Whereas actually, you know best of all I never was a believer. You’d never see a Christmas tree or a nativity scene at my place. And carol singers, I’d run them off like dogs. I only ever believed in a better life here on earth. A better life here was my Star of Bethlehem.”