Josef Svatopluk Machar

“ Here the sharp, whirling sounds from the piano interrupted my hero. They were playing a waltz.
The wave of tones brought new life to the company. One of the maidens marked time with her foot, another clapped her hands; a young fellow with a big shock of hair put his arm around the waist of a slender blonde, and they danced between the tables.
As if in a dream, Lucy sang in a soft soprano voice:
“Only once we live down here:
Beauty, youth soon disappear;
Age runs riot with our face,
Of our youth leaves not a trace.” ”

“ A small bell began to ring in the cemetery chapel. The musicians played a funeral march.
Behind the coffin walked a small, decrepit old woman. Her eyes were red, but dry. She scanned the crowd. For a moment a sad happiness flashed over her face, and then she turned her head away.
Lucy mechanically joined the procession, and kept looking in one direction, where behind the coffin a bent head in a black kerchief was trembling. Slowly a gloomy sadness stole into her melancholy soul. The funeral march sounded so full of lament and chiding. ”

“ She arose, dried her tears, shook out her dress, opened her black sunshade, and walked towards the gate between a row of flowery graves. She went back by the dusty road over which she had come, and then across the bridge and by the street that led to the common. She protected herself with the parasol; more against the eyes of the people than against the burning sun. She passed the common and walked along the streets. . . . Everywhere was life, and everywhere warmth and joy, but Lucy saw it all through a mist, as though from a distance. ”

“ Reader, I see you looking with misgivings at the author of these lines! In fact, I am telling you of this hero, drag out hundreds of verses on him, analyze his soul for you,—and yet, contrary to all proprieties, I have forgotten to describe him or at least to introduce him! You have probably said ten times: behold, the older generation is right when it says that the younger is slovenly in everything! Reader, I ask you in all earnestness, recall all the books that you have read, recall all the descriptions of people, which authors have given with praiseworthy minuteness! ”

“ You cannot die, you have not the strength, and you have no cause to die!”
And the second: “Down, down!” but it whispered it so sadly, and in so trembling a voice, that it was painful to bear it.
Cold perspiration in small pearls dropped down her brow. Her knees grew weak from fear. Terror clutched her white throat still tighter. Her glassy eyes bulged out as she looked down into the ghastly green,—and the two halves of her soul continued struggling with each other. . . .
Lucy suddenly motioned with her hand, and faintly whispered: “Perhaps to-morrow. . . .” ”

“ Those are the places to which the old lady took Lucy the day after their arrival.
Reader, have you ever seen the life in an ant hill? These Philistine insects live in an unvaried, provincial manner. Everybody knows everybody else, and everybody has his precise daily work to do. They go out in the morning, meet friends, their feelers touch, as if they were telling their last night’s dreams, their trifling gossip, and the news of the day, and they move on, and again meet some one else, and again stand a while and talk, and then hurry on. ”

“ In those few days she had found a new life through Lucy. Her soul was like one of those winding plants that grow only when they can climb up something stronger, a tree, a bush, or even a withe. They gently enfold it with their vines, leaves and flowers, running together with it into one inseparable life. A blow that is aimed at one, also reaches the other; with the death of the one, ends also the life of the other. ”

“ Your dead eyes are lying somewhere down below in a coffin, and above, everything keeps growing, shining, blooming,—do you not feel a terrible, endless sorrow? And your life. . . . I swear to you, I would rather see you in that coffin than here. How will it all end? Just as with Kata, of whom your madam has been telling me to-day? Or will you grow old here in misery, slime, and shame?” My hero drew a deep breath, partly from moral excitement, partly from a feeling of pity. ”

“ The burgomistress referred several times to Lucy, as if by chance, but Jiří answered her questions evasively.
He was tired of his relations to Lucy. In the depth of his soul he felt that, though he had acted foolishly, he had done the proper thing. Lucy was now living in retirement, unknown to any one; she was the whole life of his aunt, to whom he owed so much, and that was well. ’Tis true, the enchantment which had once blinded his eye had paled: he looked at her now with an entirely different eye,—with the eye of a man that surveys a maiden’s attractive body. ”

“ Do you know, gentlemen, what gigantic tribute the nation pays for its enlightenment? If you only gave the nation enlightenment! Bah, here you place it on the throne as your sovereign,—just look here, I beg you,” he pointed to the National Gazette—“and if the people do not elect you, they are a lot of blind dullards. You excite their enthusiasm, which you ought to guard like gold, to a wild passion. A hundred times a year you strain their strength to shoot at an ephemeral target. ”

“ She was praying for herself, her father, her dead mother, the kind lady, under whose roof she was living, Jiří, the old woman, her wretched companions, who were still weltering in the mire,—sympathy for everybody, love for everything flowed from her soul.
“Dear child, pray, forgive me,” were the gentle words which she heard. With gentle care, such as we use towards holy relics, the old lady spread strange, old-fashioned garments upon the table and the couch. ”

“ Lucy thought calmly.
At the left was a small pond. The heat of the sun beat upon it in a stream of light. Nearby was a mill . . . its monotonous click re-echoed in the distance.
And again all was quiet about her. The telegraph posts, the young trees, the heaps of gravel, the meadows, and the fields,—the whole landscape faded away behind her. . . . Half an hour later she again passed through a village. Near the road lay a cemetery. Crosses and trees towered above the white wall.
“These cemeteries,” it occurred to her, “are all alike . . . everywhere they take away that which is dearest tous. ”

“ The guest made ironical glosses, and the old lady, whenever possible, returned to the broad stream of her feelings. Then the parlor brightened up. There entered female figures in gay, fantastic raiments, a bold glance in their burning eyes, their alabaster bosoms uncovered, their hair exhaling pungent perfumes, their arms bare, their calves filled out,—in short, these are the bankrupts of feeling, who in this gambling-house of the world play for a piece of bread. To-day they have youth, beauty, jests and smiles,—to-morrow another card will fall for them, and everything is forever lost. ”

“ In the evening she takes a walk on the common with her girl friends, exchanging confidences with them, their anxieties, their dreams, but not all of them: in the depth of her little soul some hero is always hidden, a baron, a count, a dignitary, perhaps a doctor. She has two or three platonic love affairs with students; she is protected from the pitfalls and persecutions of the provincial Don Juans, not by the eye of her mother, though she keeps a sharp lookout on her, but by her inborn shrewdness. ”

“ A murky moment that chokes the human throat. The soul is crowded in an awful circle, in which it tosses about aimlessly and hopelessly. Gloomy thoughts strike it; gloomy scenes arise in it; disconsolate melodies stir its very depths. It would gladly fly out of the heavy fetters of its body, away from this beclouded earth, higher, higher, somewhere into the ether, beyond the darkling heavens. . . .
These moments Lucy was passing alone in her room. ”

“ She had come to the picnic only to please the old lady, whose dim old eyes were all the time turned watchfully upon her, with the suspicion that the country ennui was oppressing the dear young soul. The company met in front of the old castle. All the local gallants beset Lucy with clever speeches upon their lips. They were all so abominably funny! Lucy felt like a strange hen that had gotten into a flock of cocks, that abandoned their hens, their familiar, good old hens, and ran to her. ”

“ Lucy walked back silently, and with bowed head.
“That fellow there,” the burgomistress pointed to him, “is a dangerous fool, a Jacobin, a runaway student, a good-for-nothing. Has he not done you any harm?”
Lucy only turned her head.
“What an unlucky woman his old mother is!” the burgomistress said, pityingly. “She wanted to have a doctor! His father was but a blacksmith’s apprentice. Well, blood will out. What is mob, remains mob. His consumption, I always say, is her good fortune.” ”

“ Lucy stood undecided, and looked around her.
A sacristan and a young priest and ministrants with lamps passed by. They crossed the bridge, and turned to walk along the stream.
She followed them.
It was in the quarter of low houses, covered with shingles or straw, the small windows frequently pasted up with paper. On the threshold stood slatternly, wizened women gossiping about their husbands, their sorrows, their hopes. Half-naked, dirty children were wallowing in the dust of the road. White geese, a dirty pig, and a flock of chickens were running about noisily. ”

“ A woman knows how to be happy. To us, happiness is a flighty dream, a flash of light. Her delicate nerves seize the flighty dream, the gleam of light, and gourmandize on every atom of it. A yielding and soft soul lives on that dream and light, like a flower whose leaves turn their whole surface towards the rays of the sun. ”

“ Everything was merged in the full splendor of the sun. The air was astir with the burning heat. That town appeared to Lucy like a hostile being: immovable, firm, haughty, shut against her, and driving her into the distance.
She locked once more into the castle park. It seemed to her that she conld see the bench that was hidden behind the branches. She saw the whirling points around that tower,—a swarm of swallows. She glanced at the cemetery: there . . . in that place it was . . . that black grave, covered but an hour ago. . . . ”

“ In the straight-drawn rows of beets and potatoes stood laboring people; they shaded their eyes with their hands, conversed with each other, and looked into the road.
The horses began to trot. An endless avenue of chestnuts, full of pyramidal blossoms, lay before thern, as if opened for their reception. A pleasant, greenish shade fell into the carriage. The old lady looked at the country through a black lorgnette. The shade refreshed her. She saw Říp, and Ještěd, and Milešovka, familiar villages about her, and familiar roads, and she pointed them all out to Lucy. ”

“ Jiří was for a whole evening drowned in the glitter of Lucy’s eyes. For a whole evening he felt within himself a sense of moral rectitude, and he chid and pitied her. He spoke impassionately, and he spoke much. At midnight he pressed her hand, and went home through the damp night.
As he walked, the icy calm returned to him. He called himself an ideal ass and fool, to allow himself to be seduced by treacherously clear eyes to play a stupid comedy. He swore he would never put his foot again in that house. . . . On reaching home, he retired and slept a peaceful sleep, as ever, until nine. ”

“ The nearness of the whirling life buoyed her. She hastened on.
“Here, these people are walking about, laughing and talking,” she thought; “each has his little world, and in it his joys, his cares, his sorrows. . . . This their world will disappear with them. No one else will inherit it,—they will all live their . . . what was it he said that time in the park?” That sentence had never before occurred to her,—indeed, she had not heard it that time,—the words only fell accidentally upon her soul, and that soul had found them this day: “‘And that life! ”

“ Jiří’s house bordered with its back wall upon the castle park, and fronted on the open country. The burgomaster’s wife entered the spacious yard. She did not see any other creature but chickens, geese, ducks, a flock of sparrows, and a few pigeons that were flying about a round dove-cot. In the sultry air was the odor of the stable and the aroma of hay, The burgomistress strutted by the steward’s dwelling to the one-story building in the back of the yard. A woman came out of it and, seeing her, wiped her hands on her apron, and ran up to her to kiss her hand. ”

“ I have attacks of virtue, I know not why,—moments, when suddenly everything overpowers me, my youth, my life of to-day, my life of to-morrow, and I feel only an infinite pity for myself, and nothing else. ”

“ MY reader! You, no doubt, know many a well-drawn and many a hideous picture that in glowing colors,—in ruby, blood, gold, jasper,—paints the setting sun. You will forgive me this assumption, nay, perchance, will laud the author for saying briefly: The sun has just set over Prague. . . .
It is Saturday, in the month of May. The scene is in the Fifth Ward.
The sultry day for the first time draws a deep breath after the sun’s decline. Moisture is borne through the air; ill odors, growing more intense, are wafted through the short, arrow, crooked streets. ”