Snail on the Slope Read online

  The truck drove off and the searchlight went out. Across the yard, scraping his gigantic boots, passed the second guard, a menacing shadow with a rifle under his armpit. Every now and again he bent down and prodded the earth, looking for footprints, seemingly. Pepper pressed his sodden back to the wall and, motionless, followed him with his eyes.

  There came a terrible drawn-out cry from the forest. Somewhere doors slammed. A light went on on the first floor, someone said loudly: "Not half stuffy in your place." Something round and shining dropped into the grass and rolled to Pepper's feet. Pepper froze into stillness once more, than realized it was a yogurt bottle.

  On foot, thought Pepper. It'll have to be on foot. Twelve miles through the forest. Through the forest, that was bad. Now the forest would see a pitiful trembling man, damp with fear and fatigue, dead under the weight of his suitcase, yet for some reason clinging onto it. I'll be trailing along and the forest will hoot and yell at me from both sides.

  The guard had reappeared in the courtyard. He was not alone. Alongside came something else, breathing heavily and snorting, huge and four-footed. They halted in the middle of the yard and Pepper could hear the guard muttering: "Grab that, go on... Don't eat the thing, then ... It's not sausage, it's a raincoat, smell it then... Well? Cherchez when you're told..." The four-footed one whined and squealed. "Gaw!" said the exasperated guard. "Hunting fleas is your job... Get on there!" They melted into the darkness. Heels clacked along the porch, a door shut.

  Just then something cold and moist knocked against Pepper's cheek. He shuddered and almost fell. It was an enormous wolfhound. It whined very quietly, gave a heavy sigh, and laid its heavy head on Pepper's knees. Pepper stroked it behind the ears. The wolfhound yawned and seemed about to shift itself around to get comfortable when the record-player thundered out from the first floor. The wolfhound silently started up and bounded off.

  The record-player raged on, for miles around nothing else existed. And then, just like in an adventure film, the gates were suddenly bathed in blue light and silently opened wide, and an enormous truck slid into the yard like a vast ship lit up with constellations of signal lamps. It stopped and dipped its headlights, which died slowly as if some forest monster were giving up the ghost. Driver Voldemar thrust his head out of the window and started shouting something, mouth wide, and kept it up, straining away, his eyes fierce, then spat and dived back into the cab, came out again and chalked "Pepper!!!" on his door upside down. At this, Pepper realized the truck had come for him, seized hold of his suitcase and ran across the yard, fearing to look back, fearful of hearing shots behind him. He made hard work of scrambling up the two steps into a cab the size of a room and while he got his suitcase settled, then himself a dug-out cigarette, Voldemar kept talking, purple in the face, his voice straining, gesticulating and pushing Pepper's shoulder with the palm of his hand. Only when the record-player stopped suddenly did Pepper at last hear his voice: Voldemar wasn't saying anything in particular, he was just swearing violently.

  The truck had not succeeded in passing the gates, when Pepper fell asleep, as if someone had placed an ether mask over his face.

  Chapter Seven

  The village was very strange. When they emerged from the forest and saw it below in the dip, the silence stunned them. It was so quiet that their joy was dampened. The village was triangular in shape and the sizeable clearing on which it stood was similarly three-sided - a wide clay outcrop without a single bush or blade of grass, as if it had been burned off and then stamped down, completely black and sheltered from the sky by the interlacing tops of mighty trees.

  "I don't like this village," announced Nava. "It'll likely be hard to beg a bite to eat there. They're not likely to have food if they haven't even got fields, just bare clay. They're likely hunters, trapping and eating animals, makes you sick to think..."

  "Perhaps we've landed up at Funny Village?" inquired Kandid. "Perhaps it's Clay Clearing?"

  "How can it be Funny Village? Funny Village is just an ordinary village, like our village only funny folk live there. But here, the quiet and nobody to be seen, no kids, they might be in bed, mind... And why's there nobody about, Dummy? Let's not go into that village, I don't like it at all..."

  The sun was setting, and the village below was sinking into shadow. It had the air of being very empty but not deserted, not abandoned, simply empty, unreal, as if it were not a village at all but some sort of stage scenery. Yes, thought Kandid, probably we shouldn't go there, only my feet are hurting and I'd give a lot for a roof over my head. And something to eat. And the night's coming on... We've been wandering around the forest all day, even Nava's weary, hanging on to my arm, not letting go. "All right," he said hesitantly, "let's not go."

  "Not go, not go," said Nava, "just when I want to eat? How long can I last without eating? I've had nothing since morning ... and your robbers ... that made me mighty hungry. No, let's go down there, have a bite and if we don't like it, we'll leave straight away. The night's going to be warm, no rain ... let's go, what're you standing there for?"

  As soon as they reached the edge of the village someone called them. Alongside the first house, on the gray earth sat a gray man, practically naked. It was hard to pick him out in the twilight, he almost merged with the earth and Kandid was only able to make out his silhouette against the background of a whitewashed wall.

  "Where are you going?" asked the man in a feeble voice.

  "We're going to spend the night here and in the morning we have to go to New Village. We've lost our way, we ran away from some robbers and lost the way."

  "You came here yourselves, then?" said the man weakly. "You've done well then, good people... You come in, come in, there's lots of work to be done and hardly any people left now..." He could hardly bring the words out, as if he were nodding off. "And the work must be done, it's just got to be, got to be..." "Will you give us something to eat?" asked Kandid. "Just now we've got ..." The man spoke some words that struck Kandid as familiar, except that he knew he'd never heard them before. "It's good that a boy's come, because a boy ..." He started talking strange, incomprehensible words again.

  Nava tugged at Kandid, but he tore his arm away in annoyance."I can't understand you," he said to the man, trying to get a better look at him at least. "Just tell me whether you've got food by you or not."

  "Now if there were three..." said the man.

  Nava dragged Kandid off to one side by main force.

  "Is he ill?" said Kandid angrily. "Did you understand what he was saying?"

  "What are you talking to him for?" whispered Nava. "He hasn't got a face! How can you talk to him if he hasn't got a face?"

  "How d'you mean 'no face'?" Kandid looked around in amazement. The man was not to be seen;

  either he'd gone or had melted into the shadows.

  "He's like a deadling," she said. "Only he's not, he's got a smell, but for all that, he's like a deadling... Let's go to some other house, but we won't get anything to eat here, don't think you will."

  She hauled him off to the next house and they glanced inside. Everything in the house was odd, no beds, no smell of habitation, inside it was empty, dark, unpleasant. Nava sniffed the air.

  "There's never been any food here," she said, repelled. "You've brought me to some stupid village, Dummy. What shall we do here? In my life I've never seen villages like this. There's no children shouting and there's nobody in the street."

  They walked on. Beneath their feet lay a cool fine dust; their very steps were soundless and there were none of the usual evening hootings and gurgling from the forest.

  •'He spoke in a funny way," said Kandid. "I've been thinking, I've heard that talk somewhere before ... but when and where I don't remember..."

  "I don't remember either," said Nava, after a pause, "but it's true. Dummy, I've heard words like that, maybe in a dream, maybe in our village, not the one where you and I live now, but the other one where I was born, only then that would have been a very lo
ng time ago, because I was still very little, I've forgotten everything since, just now it was as if I remembered, but I just can't remember properly."

  In the next house they saw a man lying flat on the floor by the entrance, asleep. Kandid bent down and shook him by the shoulder, but the man did not wake up. His skin was moist and cold like an amphibian, he was flabby, soft, and lacked muscle almost entirely. His lips in the semi-darkness seemed black and had an oily gleam.

  "He's asleep," said Kandid, turning to Nava. "What d'you mean asleep, when he's looking at us?" said Nava.

  Kandid bent over the man again and it now seemed that he was watching them through barely-open eyes. The impression lasted only briefly. "No, no, he's asleep all right," said Kandid. "Let's go."

  Unusually for her, Nava said nothing. They made their way to the center of the village, glancing into every house, and in every house they saw sleepers. All the sleepers were plump, fleshy men. There wasn't a single woman or child. Nava was now completely silent and Kandid also felt uneasy. The bellies of the sleepers rumbled heavily. They didn't wake up, but almost every time that Kandid looked back at them as he passed out into the street it seemed that they were following him with quick cautious glances.

  By now it had got dark and scraps of sky made ashen by the moon peeped through between the branches; to Kandid it once more seemed weirdly like the backdrop in a good theater. He felt weary to the ultimate degree, to complete and utter indifference. Just now he wanted only one thing; to lie down somewhere under a roof (in case some nocturnal horror fell on him asleep), let it be on a hard stamped floor, but better anyhow in an empty house, not with these suspicious sleepers. Nava was now literally hanging on his arm. "Don't you be afraid," said Kandid, "there's absolutely nothing to be afraid of here." "What d'you say?" she asked sleepily. "I said: don't be afraid, they're all half dead here, I could turf them out with one hand."

  "I'm not afraid of anybody," said Nava angrily, "I'm tired out and I want to go to sleep, if you can't give me anything to eat. You keep going on from house to house, house to house. I'm fed up, it's the same in every house anyway, all the people are lying down resting, and you and me are the only ones wandering about..."

  Kandid then made up his mind and entered the first house he came across. It was pitch black inside. Kandid pricked his ears trying to determine whether anyone was inside or not, but all he could hear was the snuffling of Nava who had her forehead buried in his side. He found the wall by groping and scrabbled about on the floor to see if it was wet; he lay down placing Nava's head on his stomach. She was already asleep. He hoped to himself he had done the right thing, there was something wrong about this place ... still, just one night ... then ask the way ... they won't sleep in the daytime ... at worst into the swamp, the robbers had gone ... and if they hadn't... how were the lads in New Village? ... Surely not the day after tomorrow again? ... Not at all, tomorrow ... tomorrow...

  He was awakened by a light and thought it was the moon. Inside the house it was dark, the lilac light was coming in by the door and it struck him as interesting that this light could enter by both the door and the window in the opposite wall, then he remembered he was in the forest and this could be no real moon; he at once forgot all this as the silhouette of a man appeared in the strip of light falling from the window. The man was standing in the house with his back to Kandid, gazing out of the window, and it was obvious by his silhouette that he was standing with his arms behind his back and head bowed. The forest inhabitants never stood like that - there was simply no reason for them to do so - but Karl Etinghof used to like to stand like that by the laboratory window during the rain and fog season when there was no work to do, and the clear realization came to him that this was Karl Etinghof, who had gone absent from the biostation one day and had not returned from the forest. He had been posted as missing without trace. Kandid gave a gasp of ex citement and cried "Karl!" As Karl slowly turned, the lilac light fell across his face and Kandid saw that it was not Karl but some unknown local inhabitant; he came noiselessly up to Kandid and bent over him, hands still behind his back, so that his face became clearly visible - an emaciated, beardless face, indeed quite unlike Karl's face. He straightened up without a word, seeming not to see Kandid, and made for the door, stooping as before, and when he was stepping across the threshold Kandid realized that it was Karl after all, leaped to his feet and ran after him.

  Beyond the entrance he halted and looked up and down the street, trying to suppress a nervous tremor that had suddenly taken hold of him. It was now very bright outside from the luminous lilac cloud hanging low over the village and all the houses seemed two-dimensional and more than ever unreal, while at an angle on the other side of the street rose a long outlandish structure unlike any normal forest building. Near to it figures were moving. The man resembling Karl was heading along for the building; when he reached the crowd he mingled with it and vanished as if he had never been. Kandid also wanted to get to the building but his legs felt like cotton wool and he couldn't move. He was astonished that he could still stand up. Afraid he would fall, he looked for something to support him; there was nothing but emptiness all around. "Karl," he mumbled, swaying, "Karl, come back!" He repeated the words several times, finally shouting aloud in despair; no one heard him, for at that very moment a much louder cry rang out, piteous and wild, a frank sob of pain that rang in his ears and forced tears to his eyes; for some reason he realized at once that the cry came from that long structure, perhaps because there was nowhere else it could be.

  "Where's Nava?" he began to shout. "My girl, where are you?" He realized that he would lose her now, that the moment had come for him to lose everything that was close to him, all that linked him to life, and he would be alone. He turned to rush into the house and saw Nava, slowly falling backward. He caught and lifted her without understanding what had happened to her. Her head was thrown back and her open throat was in front of his eyes; where everybody has a hollow between their collarbones, Nava had two and he would never see them again. The screaming sob had not stopped and he knew that he had to go where it was. He was only too well aware what a feat this would be, dragging her over there, but he also knew that they would simply consider it normal procedure, because they didn't understand what it meant to hold a wife in your arms, warm and unique and carry her yourself to a place of weeping.

  The cry broke off. Kandid saw that he was standing right in front of the building before the square black door, and strove to understand what he was doing there with Nava in his arms. He did not succeed, for out of the square black door came two women and Karl, all three displeased and frowning, and halted in conversation. He saw their lips moving and guessed they were arguing irritably but the words he could not understand, just once he caught the half-familiar word "chiasmus." Then one of the women, without interrupting the conversation, turned to the crowd and gestured as if inviting all of them into the building. Kandid said, "Right away, right away," and hugged Nava to him more tightly than ever. Once again the loud cry rang out and everybody began shuffling about, the fat people began to embrace one another, hug one another close, stroke and caress each other; their eyes were dry and their lips tightly closed, nevertheless they were crying and shouting, taking farewell of each other, for it turned out they were men and women and the men were saying good-bye to the women forever. No one wanted to go first, so Kandid went up first, since he was a brave man, since he knew he had to and since he knew that there was no help for him in any case. Karl, however, glanced at him and motioned him aside with a barely perceptible shake of the head, and Kandid felt utterly weird because it wasn't Karl after all, but he understood and retreated, knocking into soft and slippery bodies with his back. And when Karl gave

  another shake of the head, he turned, slung Nava over his shoulder and ran on rubbery legs along the bright, empty village street as if in a dream; there was no sound of pursuit.

  He came to himself as he collided with a tree. Nava shrieked and he lowered h
er to the ground. There was grass underfoot.

  From here the whole village could be surveyed. A fog of lilac luminescence hung in a cone over the village, and the houses looked blurred as the figures of the people seemed blurred.

  "For some reason I can't remember anything," said Nava, "why are we here? We went to bed. Or am I dreaming?"

  Kandid lifted her and carried her farther and farther crashing through bushes, tripping over grass, until all around became completely dark. He pushed on a little farther yet, set Nava down once more and sat down beside her. Around them grew tall warm grass, keeping the damp out; never had Kandid chanced upon such a dry, warm, blissful place since he had been in the forest. He had a headache and drowsiness kept coming on; he felt no desire to think at all, there was just this feeling of huge relief that he had been about to do something terrible and had not done it.

  "Dummy," said Nava dreamily, "you know. Dummy, I've remembered where I heard talk like that before. You used to talk like that, Dummy, when you hadn't recovered your wits. Listen, Dummy, maybe you've just forgotten. You were very sick then, Dummy, lost your wits altogether..."

  "Go to sleep," said Kandid. He didn't want to think. Not about anything. Chiasmus, he recalled and fell asleep at once. Not quite at once. He recalled suddenly that it wasn't Karl that had gone missing; that was Valentine, it was Valentine's name that had been posted up in orders, Karl had perished in the forest and they had put his body, discovered by accident, in a lead coffin and shipped it to the Mainland. But he thought he might be dreaming all that.