Invitation to a Beheading (14 page)

He was awakened by a muted tapping, scratching, and the sound of something crumbling somewhere. Just as when, having fallen asleep healthy last night, you wake up past midnight in a fever. He listened to these sounds for quite a long while—trup, trup, tock-tock-tock—without any thought about their meaning, simply listening, because they had awakened him and because his hearing had nothing else to do. Trup, tap, scratch, crumble-crumble. Where? To the right? To the left? Cincinnatus raised himself up a little.

He listened—his whole head became an organ of hearing, his whole body a tense heart; he listened and already began to make sense out of certain indications: the weak distillation
of darkness within the cell … the dark had settled to the bottom … Beyond the bars of the window, a gray twilight—that meant it was three or half past three … The guards asleep in the cold … The sounds were coming from somewhere below … no, it was, rather, from above, no, it was still below, just on the other side of the wall, at floor level, like a large mouse scratching with iron claws.

Cincinnatus was especially excited by the concentrated self-confidence of the sounds, the insistent seriousness with which they pursued, in the quiet of the fortress night, perhaps a distant, but none the less attainable goal. With bated breath, with a phantomlike lightness, like a sheet of tissue paper, he slipped off—and tiptoed along the sticky, clinging—to the corner from which it seemed—it seemed to be—but coming closer, he realized that he was mistaken—the tapping was more to the right and higher up; he moved, and again got confused, fooled by the aural deception that occurs when a sound, traversing diagonally one’s head, is hurriedly served by the wrong ear.

Stepping awkwardly, Cincinnatus brushed against the tray, which was standing on the floor near the wall. “Cincinnatus!” said the tray reproachfully; and then the tapping ceased with abrupt suddenness, which conveyed to the listener a heartening rationality; and, standing motionless by the wall, pressing down with his toe the spoon on the tray and tilting his open, hollow head, Cincinnatus felt that the unknown digger was also standing still and listening.

A half-minute passed and the sounds, quieter, more restrained, but more expressive and wiser, began again. Turning and slowly moving his sole off the zinc, Cincinnatus tried again to ascertain their location: to the right, if one
stood facing the door … yes, to the right, and, in any case, still far off … after listening a long time that was all he was able to conclude. Finally moving back toward the cot to get his slippers—he could not stand it barefoot any longer–he startled the loud-legged chair, which never spent the night in the same spot twice, and again the sounds ceased, this time for good; that is, they might have resumed after a cautious interval, but morning was already coming into its own and Cincinnatus saw—with the eyes of habitual imagination—Rodion, all steaming from the dampness and opening in a yawn his bright-red mouth as he stretched on his stool in the hall.

All morning long Cincinnatus listened and calculated how he could make known his attitude to the sounds in case they should recur. A summer thunderstorm, simply yet tastefully staged, was performed outside: it was as dark as evening in the cell, thunder was heard, now substantial and round, now sharp and crackly, and lightning printed the shadows of the bars in unexpected places. At noon Rodrig Ivanovich arrived.

“You have company,” he said, “but first I wanted to find out …”

“Who?” asked Cincinnatus, at the same time thinking: please, not now… (that is, please do not let the tapping resume now).

“You see, here’s the way it is,” said the director, “I am not sure that you wish … You see, it’s your mother—
votre mère, paraît-il.”

“My mother?” asked Cincinnatus.

“Well, yes—mother, mummy, mama—in short, the
woman who gave birth to you. Shall I admit her? Make up your mind quickly.”

“…  I have only seen her once in my life,” said Cincinnatus, “and I really have no feeling … no, no, it’s not worth it, don’t, it would be pointless.”

“As you wish,” said the director and went out.

A minute later, cooing politely, he led in diminutive Cecilia C, clad in a black raincoat. “I shall leave you two alone,” he added benevolently, “even though it is against our rules, sometimes there are situations … exceptions … mother and son … I defer …”

Exit
, backing out like a courtier.

In her shiny black raincoat and a similar waterproof hat with lowered brim (giving it something of the appearance of a sou’wester), Cecilia C. remained standing in the center of the cell, looking with a clear gaze at her son; she unbuttoned herself; she sniffled noisily and said in her rapid, choppy way: “What a storm, what mud, I thought I’d never make it up here, streams and torrents coming down the road at me …”

“Sit down,” said Cincinnatus, “don’t stand like that.”

“Say what you will, but it’s quiet here in your place,” she went on, sniffling all the while and rubbing her finger firmly, as if it were a cheese grater, under her nose, so that the pink tip wrinkled and wagged. “I’ll say one thing, it’s quiet and fairly clean. By the way, over at the maternity ward, we don’t have private quarters as big as this. Oh, that bed—my dear, just look what a mess your bed is!”

She plopped down her midwife’s bag, nimbly pulled the black cotton gloves off her small, mobile hands, and, stooping low over the cot, began making the bed afresh. Her
back in the belted coat with its seal-like sheen, her mended stockings…

“Now, that’s better,” she said, straightening up; then, standing for a moment with arms akimbo, she looked askance at the book-cluttered table.

She was youthful, and all her features were a model for those of Cincinnatus, which had emulated them in their own way; Cincinnatus himself was vaguely aware of this resemblance as he looked at her sharp-nosed little face, and protruding, luminous eyes. Her dress was opened in front, revealing a triangle of red sun-tanned freckled skin; in general, however, the integument was the same as that from which a piece had once been taken for Cincinnatus—a pale, thin skin, with sky-blue veins.

“Tsk, tsk, a little straightening up would be in order here too …” she prattled and, as quickly as she did everything else, busied herself with the books, arranging them in even piles. In passing her interest was caught by an illustration in an open magazine; she fished out of her raincoat pocket a kidney-shaped case and, dropping the corners of her mouth, put on a pince-nez. “Came out back in ’26,” she said with a laugh. “Such a long time ago, it’s really hard to believe it.”

(Two photographs: in one the President of the Isles shaking with a dental smile the hand of the venerable great granddaughter of the last of the inventors at the Manchester railroad station; in the other, a two-headed calf born in a Danube village.)

She sighed causelessly, pushed the volume aside, knocked the pencil off, did not catch it in time, and said “oops!”

“Leave as is,” said Cincinnatus. “There can be no disorder here—only a shifting about.”

“Here, I brought you this.” (She pulled a pound bag out of her coat pocket, pulling out the lining as well.) “Here. Some candy. Suck on it to your heart’s content.”

She sat down and puffed out her cheeks.

“I climbed, and climbed, and finally made it, and now I am tired,” she said, puffing deliberately; then she froze, gazing with vague longing at the cobweb up above.

“Why did you come?” asked Cincinnatus pacing about the cell. “It doesn’t do you any good, and it doesn’t do me any good. Why? It is neither kind, nor interesting. For I can see perfectly well that you are just as much of a parody as everybody and everything else. And if they treat me to such a clever parody of a mother … But imagine, for instance, that I have pinned my hopes on some distant sound—how can I have faith in it, if even
you
are a fraud? And you speak of ‘candy!’ Why not ‘goodies’? And why is your raincoat wet when your shoes are dry—see, that’s careless. Tell the prop man for me.”

Hastily and guiltily, she said, “But I wore rubbers—I left them down in the office, word of honor.”

“Oh, enough, enough. Just don’t start explaining. Play your role—go heavy on the prattle and the unconcern—and you won’t have to worry, it’ll get by.”

“I came because I am your mother,” she said softly, and Cincinnatus burst out laughing:

“No, no, don’t let it degenerate into farce. Remember, this is a drama. A little comedy is all right, but still you ought not to walk too far from the station—the drama might leave without you. You’d do better to … yes, I’ll
tell you what, why don’t you tell me again the legend about my father. Can it be true that he vanished into the dark of night, and you never found out who he was or where he came from—it’s strange …”

“Only his voice—I didn’t see the face,” she answered as softly as before.

“That’s it, that’s it, play up to me—I think perhaps we’ll make him a runaway sailor,” dejectedly continued Cincinnatus, snapping his fingers and pacing, pacing, “or a sylvan robber making a guest appearance in a public park. Or a wayward craftsman, a carpenter … Come, quickly, think of something.”

“You don’t understand,” she cried (in her excitement she stood up and immediately sat down again). “It’s true, I don’t know who he was—a tramp, a fugitive, anything is possible … But why can’t you understand … yes, it was a holiday, it was dark in the park, and I was still a child, but that’s beside the point. The important thing is that it was not possible to make a mistake! A man who is being burned alive knows perfectly well that he isn’t taking a dip in our Strop. Why, what I mean is, one can’t be wrong … Oh, can’t you understand?”

“Can’t understand what?”

“Oh, Cincinnatus, he too was …”

“What do you mean, ‘he too’?”

“He was also like you, Cincinnatus.…”

She quite lowered her face, dropping her pince-nez into her cupped hand.

Pause.

“How do you know this?” Cincinnatus asked morosely. “How can you suddenly notice …”

“I am not going to tell you anything more,” she said without raising her eyes.

Cincinnatus sat down on the cot and lapsed into thought. His mother blew her nose with an extraordinarily loud trumpet sound, which one would hardly expect from so small a woman, and looked up at the window recess. Evidently the weather had cleared, for one felt the close presence of blue skies, and the sun had painted its stripe on the wall—now it would pale, then brighten again.

“There are cornflowers now in the rye,” she said, speaking fast, “and everything is so wonderful—clouds are scudding, everything is so restless and bright. I live far from here, in Doctorton, and when I come to this city of yours, when I drive across the fields in the little old gig, and see the Strop gleaming, and this hill with the fortress on it, and everything, it always seems to me that a marvelous tale is being repeated over and over again, and I either don’t have the time to, or am unable to grasp it, and still somebody keeps repeating it to me, with such patience! I work all day at our ward, I take everything in my stride, I have lovers, I adore ice-cold lemonade, although I’ve dropped smoking, because of heart trouble—and here I am sitting with you … I sit here and I don’t know why I sit, why I bawl, and why I tell you all this, and now I shall be hot trudging down in this coat and this wool dress, the sun will be absolutely fiendish after a storm like that …”

“No, you’re still only a parody,” murmured Cincinnatus.

She smiled interrogatively.

“Just like this spider, just like those bars, just like the striking of that clock,” murmured Cincinnatus.

“So,” she said, and blew her nose again.

“So, that’s how it is,” she repeated.

They both remained silent, not looking at each other, while the clock struck with nonsensical resonance.

“When you go out,” said Cincinnatus, “note the clock in the corridor. The dial is blank; however, every hour the watchman washes off the old hand and daubs on a new one—and that’s how we live, by tarbrush time, and the ringing is the work of the watchman, which is why he is called a ‘watch’ man.”

“You oughtn’t joke like that,” said Cecilia C. “There are, you know, all sorts of marvelous gimmicks. I remember, for instance when I was a child, there were objects called
‘nonnons’
that were popular, and not only among children, but among adults too, and, you see, a special mirror came with them, not just crooked, but completely distorted. You couldn’t make out anything of it, it was all gaps and jumble, and made no sense to the eye—yet the crookedness was no ordinary one, but calculated in just such a way as to … Or rather, to match its crookedness they had made … No, wait a minute, I am explaining badly. Well, you would have a crazy mirror like that and a whole collection of different
‘nonnons,’
absolutely absurd objects, shapeless, mottled, pockmarked, knobby things, like some kind of fossils—but the mirror, which completely distorted ordinary objects, now, you see, got real food, that is, when you placed one of these incomprehensible, monstrous objects so that it was reflected in the incomprehensible, monstrous mirror, a marvelous thing happened; minus by minus equaled plus, everything was restored, everything was fine, and the shapeless speckledness became in the mirror a wonderful, sensible image; flowers, a ship, a person, a landscape.
You could have your own portrait custom made, that is, you received some nightmarish jumble, and this thing was you, only the key to you was held by the mirror. Oh, I remember what fun it was, and how it was a little frightening—what if suddenly nothing should come out?—to pick up a new, incomprehensible
‘nonnon’
and bring it near the mirror, and see your hand get all scrambled, and and at the same time see the meaningless
‘nonnon’
turn into a charming picture, so very, very clear …”