The Trap. Ludovic Bruckstein

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СКАЧАТЬ now it was completely different. He had arrived in the house of Ionu Stan, Son of the Trustworthy One, as a kind of clandestine tenant, on an unlimited stay, paying for his board and lodgings. Disguised to look like one of them, although he was not one of them, but rather a young sir from town, dressed in peasant’s frieze trousers and hemp smock, with rustic moccasins and a straw hat adorned with an ostrich feather, garb he wore quite awkwardly.

      They all felt embarrassed. Ernst tried to strike up a conversation with Ionu:

      ‘It was hot today.’

      ‘Hot.’

      ‘But the weather is getting cooler.’

      ‘It’s getting cooler.’

      The host’s three children, the eldest daughter, Eudochia, who was old enough to marry, and the two younger ones, Andilina, who was fourteen, and Ionuț, the little lad of six, gazed at the familiar stranger, who had visited their house many times but who now had come dressed in peasant garb. He would have to give them an explanation… In the meantime, it had grown dark and Ileana, the forester’s wife, a strong woman a head taller than her husband, had lit the oil lamp. The flames sputtered, casting shadows over the whitewashed walls of the house, they roared high, like monsters, and then docilely quieted down, while the wick desperately sucked in air. The lamp began to crackle, the flame settled, casting a yellow light on their faces.

      Ileana had completed four years of schooling there in the mountains, at the primary school in the hamlet of Sihei, at the foot of Agriș Hill, after which she had lived for a few years in the town, in the house of Father Ion Bîrcea. The priest’s wife, Adriana, in order to help her husband and increase his rather modest income, had set up a carpet-weaving workshop in their yard. Ileana and other girls from the country worked on traditional Maramureș carpets in the workshop. A clever, playful woman, with a certain amount of town education and with the wisdom instilled in her at home, Ileana was the first to find the right tone to dissipate the awkwardness:

      ‘In these parts, young sir, we call to each other from the neighbouring hilltops by name, like this: Gheo–, Pa–, Ste– . How should we call you? Er–?’

      They all laughed and the ice melted.

      ‘You oughtn’t to call me at all!’ said Ernst gravely. ‘You know very well that I’m here, but in fact I’m not here… ’

      Ileana took the cauldron from the large stove, which occupied around a quarter of the room.

      ‘Take a seat at the table, young sir.’

      The cauldron of maize porridge crackled and smoked. They all sat down around the table. None of the dishes from the great Sacher Restaurant in central Vienna was as tasty as that maize porridge and whey.

      No doubt about it: clothes don’t make the man, but rather they conceal him. He was still a young sir from the town. True, his face was sunburned, but his hands were those of a town dweller, with slender, nervous fingers. All of a sudden, Ileana, the forester’s wife, burst out laughing. She looked intently at the hands of their new lodger. It was only now that Ernst noticed that he had forgotten to take off his gold signet ring, embossed with his monogram. A peasant with a gold signet ring? Such a thing was unheard of in the mountains of Maramureș, even if you walked their length and breadth…

      They all made merry around the table.

      After supper, Ileana urged her husband – Ionu was a man slow to react – to make up a bed for the ‘young sir.’ Which is to say, to make up the only bed in the house: the others slept in the main room – Ionu, Ileana and their eldest daughter Eudochia on the chests that lined the three walls, and the two youngest, Andilina and Ion, on the shelf behind the stove.

      Ionu had bought the only bed in the house a long while ago, without planning to do so beforehand, at the big fair in Sighet: he had liked the light pinewood, stained light brown, and above all he had liked the two white doves carved on the tall headboard, on whose beaks rested a large red heart. Sweating and triumphant, Ionu had carted the bed back from the fair. The whole family had liked it, but when night fell, nobody had wanted to sleep in it. Ileana and Ionu himself, along with their daughter Eudochia, preferred the chests in the main room, and neither of the two youngest children had wanted to abandon the large, warm stove behind which they slept. And so the beautiful bed with the red heart and white doves had remained unused, in the narrow chamber next to the main room.

      The hosts were overjoyed to have the opportunity to provide the young sir from town with town-like accommodation.

      But nor did Ernst feel at ease in the large bed in the small chamber. Perhaps because the straw mattress was too hard, packed too tightly, or perhaps because of the feather duvet, which was stuffed not only with down, but with whole feathers, which pricked him through the cloth. Or perhaps because with the coming of night a shadow of fear also descended, thickening the darkness.

      Nor did the host, Ionu Stan Son of the Trustworthy One sleep peacefully that night. Ernst could hear him tossing and turning and then going out onto the veranda to breathe some fresh air. Or perhaps he went out merely to gaze at the stars? Or perhaps a fine coating of fear had settled on his soul too?

      Towards morning, Ernst, exhausted, drifted off and finally fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. He was awoken by the rays of the already risen sun, which poured down warmly over the cool uplands.

      Although his hosts had left a basin and a mug of water for him on a stool in the corner of the room, Ernst did not wash inside the house. He took his towel and a fragment of soap and went down to the stream in the valley. The water was cold, invigorating. Ernst rinsed with a little water and then rubbed his chest and back with the towel. His skin reddened and he felt well. He went into the house to eat breakfast. A flat loaf of maize bread, fresh from the oven, was waiting for him, and cottage cheese and a mug of milk. The family had long since eaten and gone off to do their chores. The children had gone down to the school in Sihei. Ionu, before going to guard the woods, was busy in the barn, where he kept a cow, after which he would muck out the hencoops.

      Ernst went into the barn and called Ionu into the house, because he wished to speak to him and Ileana.

      They sat down at the table and Ernst told them that there was no point, nor was it proper, that he stay in the house. Relatives and friends of the family would come to visit and ask all kinds of questions. People are curious by nature: ‘Who’s that man? Where’s he from?’ ‘A relative.’ ‘What kind of relative? How come I’ve never seen him before?’… No, he would spend the day outside, in the forest, and he would come to the house to eat when he was hungry. He would come inside only when he was sure there were no visitors there. And in the evening, he would cross the fence by the stile at the back of the house and sleep in the hayloft of the barn. The children shouldn’t tell anybody he was staying there. They were old enough to understand.

      His hosts remained silent. It was obvious they were in a quandary.

      ‘I like to sleep in haylofts. That’s what I do when I’m hiking,’ said Ernst.

      Ionu Stan remained silent for a long time. He was somewhat embarrassed, but ultimately satisfied with the proposal. After a time, he said:

      ‘If you think it will be better that way –’

      And Ileana added: ‘Yes, yes, if that’s the way the gentleman wants it.’

      Ernst went outside and found himself in the vastness of the Agriș Valley, surrounded by forests. He was free. For the first time in СКАЧАТЬ