Three Stories/On Condition: or Pensioned Off/Chapter 7

by Vítězslav Hálek

 

CHAPTER VII.

 

T drew nigh to Easter Day when old Loyka said to his wife, “For my part I no longer wish to be hospodar, but would fain retire altogether to the pension house.”

On this Loyka’s wife said “And are almost five years of our hospodarship to be so completely cancelled. That would be just as though we were to take flight from the farm house.”

“And what are we in the farm house? Dost think that we are still hospodars here?” enquired Loyka with a kind of angry fervour. And on this he began to explain how Joseph began to take everything upon himself. “And pray what value is set upou you as mistress, I wish to know,” he added. And when he had said all he meant to say, he spat. After this he added “Thou hast taught thy son these manners, that spoilt pet of thine.”

Loyka’s wife felt the bitterness of this reproach; she was silent and furtively wiped away a tear, and for a long time sought in vain for a reply. “At all events it was not I who taught the young bride, and she has corrupted Joseph,” said Loyka’s wife at last.

That is as much as to say “It was I who chose the young bride, and therefore I am to blame for it all,” said Loyka in an access of fury.

On this Loyka’s wife was again silent, and secretly wiped away a second salt tear.

Then Loyka paced twice up and down the apartment. His head was bowed, his two eyes measured his steps, his hands were lodged behind his back, and the fingers of one hand tapped on the fingers of the other. Then he halted in front of his wife, drew himself up, and said “And do you know what is the best of this pretty business? That we both richly deserve to be treated thus. But thou more than I, because I only obeyed thee when thou didst hound me on against my father. But now things are reversed, fate has singled me out for punishment, you are not worthy its attention.”

Here Loyka’s wife no longer stretched out her hand to wipe away a tear, but said to Loyka, flinging her words into his very face, “If thou thinkest that it has come upon us in consequence of our ill-dealing toward thy father—good, let us bear it; for my part I will not say thee nay, and I do not wish to shirk my share of the blame, nor would I ever shuffle it off myself on to thee.”

“Well said, wife,” responded Loyka, paced once to and fro the apartment, and as he did so, muttered “Let us bear it, let us bear it, if thou so wishest, let us bear it, and let us begin from this very day. I, in sooth, have already borne it for a long time, but since thou so wishest, let us begin from this very day in earnest. But this I say to thee: whatsoever comes to pass, pity me thou must not, neither will I pity thee, that I think thou desirest not at my hands.”

On this he looked out of the window, and seeing Joseph going across the courtyard, summoned him, and forthwith again returned to the apartment. “And so it is beginning already,” said he, just as if it was the eve of a kind of battle.

After a brief moment Joseph came, and here old old Loyka was already seated by the table with some solemnity, because such an act could not be completed without a certain amount of ceremony.

“I have summoned thee,” began Loyka, “or more properly speaking I have begged thee to come, since I have already no more power to command, and I know not whether thou would’st obey. But I and thy mother, look you, desire to place the hospodarship in thy hands and Barushka’s. And thou art aware that in the agreement we have reserved to ourselves in case of such a contingency to wit: that we should quit the hospodarship within the course of six years:—to be rendered to us by thee a quarter of all the produce of the farm. So, then, I ask thee in the presence of the Lord God, wilt thou conscientiously fulfil thy part of the contract?”

Joseph, at these words, merely smiled like a man whose object is accomplished—an object which he had long had in view. For I think the reader will agree with us so far as this—that all the wrongs which Joseph heaped upon his father only aimed at making the hospodarship a burden to him, so that he might voluntarily surrender it of himself. And now his father surrendered it, voluntarily surrendered it, be it understood, because surrender it he must.

“Why should I not fulfil my portion of the contract, and give you what belongs to you,” said Joseph. “It is understood, of course, that you will also contribute a fourth part of all the outlay on the farm. And if the produce is scanty, your share will be scanty, too, and if the outlay be greater, then you will have to contribute more. All just as the Lord God blesses our undertakings.” Joseph said all this smilingly, and as he pronounced the last sentence his lip almost curled, as though he said only in different words, “I have you in a trap, dear father; I shall give you just as much as I choose.”

Old Loyka certainly perfectly well understood that his son led him thus to a kind of chasm, and now said to him “Leap!” He felt it but too well, even some motes danced before his eyes, even his head, went round a little. But sometimes a man, in presence of very important events stands as it were blindfold, if not actually blind: he knows that he is standing above an abyss, but still he says “I leap!” and he leaps.

“Why should we discuss the matter further,” said old Loyka, “it is all made out and signed in the lawyer’s books, and that is the agreement. What is there written is valid.”

“Undoubtedly,” said Joseph, and again his lip curled.

“I had further reserved the right to us old folk,” continued Loyka, “of dwelling in the farm house during the remainder of the six years and during that time Frank was to mess with you young people.”

“That is hard lines for the estate,” said Joseph again, just as if he wished to show that he was but trifling with his father, and that he had long ago preconcerted everything in his own mind. “No, no, that will not do at all. To manage the estate from the pension house in which we can scarce turn round will not do at all, and I am sure that as hospodar you will recognize as much yourself. As to Frank it will be time enough to settle who is to feed and lodge him when we have him at home again. For I certainly am not going to carry his victuals after him when I have no notion where he is.”

And thus old Loyka was practically chuzzled out of both his conditions, and felt little inclination to impose others. “And so you think we must be banished to the pension house,” he said, but only in order to make a remark. “Well, if you think so we will be banished to the pension house,” he added. “Dost hear, aged wife of my bosom, we are banished—ousted.” And he said it in a tone of voice which implied “Misfortune begins from this moment.”

Loyka’s wife had turned away, and did not answer.

On this Loyka stepped close to his son’s side and began to speak again somewhat ceremoniously, as if to mark the importance of the present step of which, however, he was no longer master. “Thou seest, Joseph, thy mother: look at her. Her hair is already streaked with grey, just as my hair is streaked with grey. Thou wilt be hospodar here now, and if thou thinkest that thou canst safely wrong me, thy father, the Lord God forgive thee. But look that thou dost not wrong thy mother. She has suffered much for thy sake, she has loved thee all too dearly, and therefore wrong her not.”

At these words Loyka’s wife wiped her eyes (if it is possible to say so) outloud; that is to say she sobbed all the while as if she wished to demonstrate that her son had already frequently done her wrong, Loyka was meek and mild, and Joseph did not answer.

Only after a pause, Joseph enquired: “Then when would you like to shift your things?”

“Well, what thinkest thou, aged wife of my bosom, when are we to be banished,” enquired old Loyka.

“Well, if it has to be, perhaps the sooner it is done the better,” said Joseph’s mother, thinking at the same time that her son would say that there was no need of shifting just yet.

“As you will,” said Joseph. “I will send the servants at once to help you to remove your things.” He turned the matter in this way, so that he might still appear in the light of a dutiful son.

“Send them, Joseph, send them,” said old Loyka, and on this Joseph departed.

But old Loyka did not tarry for the servants. He at once began to drag from the wall chests and drawers, and to remove the chairs from their places by the table, and all in as much haste as though an enemy was approaching and everything had to be cleared out of the way within an hour.

Then came the servants into the apartment to assist; but old Loyka thanked them with a kind of mock reverence for their zeal, and requested them to send Vena to him who would help him best, and would also season his work with some wise saws and maxims.

So, then, Vena came, and scarcely had he appeared in the doorway before he exclaimed: “See, see, pantata, might you not just as well have let yourself be ousted that day when your son had got you half turned out of doors. What work we had to set all straight again-and all in vain. But if it must be so, then the Lord God help you.”

Old Loyka paused beside a chest, and said “Prythee, how sayst thou? It seems to me that thou dost completely pity me?”

“Pantata,” answered Vena, “I do pity you. I pity every one as soon as he is pensioned off. I ever jeered at you when you evilly entreated the pensioner on your bounty, and I pitied him, your own father, while it went on. If I could have remembered how your father played the hospodar, I should have pitied the pensioner on his bounty, and if I live to see Joseph pensioned off, I shall begin to pity him, and I shall give it his successor—perhaps his son. Oh! ye peasant proprietors! how ill you regulate your affairs. Come move out of the way old tea-chest,” he said, turning abruptly towards Loyka, as though he meant him by this expression.

“Pray, what do mean by that,” said Loyka, and nudged himself into a certain amount of good humour and tried to smile.

“I mean by that, that you are the principal piece of furniture which hampers Joseph here, and that if you would walk off to the lumber room all the rest might be permitted to remain,” sneered Vena.

“Listen, aged wife of my bosom, listen to this sapient Solomon. So long we have had him in the house and never knew his worth. We have to be banished the farm in order to duly appreciate his wisdom. Without our banishment this well of wisdom would have been forever sealed. Ha! ha! and so I am the principal piece of furniture,” laughed old Loyka. “And, pray, what have you got to say of my aged wife yonder.”

“She requites you for your young days of courtship. Then you were always following after her, now she follows after you. But do you know what is a sad thing.”

“Well, what,” enquired old Loyka.

“That it is only grey-headed eld which tramps it to that dog kennel which you call a pension house. It were better to begin more timely when a man is yet stout enough to bear his ills. But for an old man to take up his wallet and go a-begging—fie!”

“How am I going a-begging?” retorted Loyka, and here he felt as though he were dying of impatience to hear a little more.

“You? God protect you? In your family begging and being pensioned off are one and the same thing. And in order that I may prove to you that even without begging you can steal a march upon your son, intercede with him in my behoof that I may not be expelled from those two chambers by the coach-house. For, if not, you will not have a single living soul in whom to confide your sorrows.”

“So, then, you think, Vena, I shall want someone in whom to confide my sorrows.”

“That you will, pantata, that you will. I know it from your own poor father. When he suffered most at your hands, and got a sight of me it was just as though he had bitten honey. Oh! You have no idea at all how I sweetened his life for him. I was more than sauce and seasoning,” said Vena proudly.

“Listen, aged wife of my bosom, this affects your credit in the kitchen,” laughed old Loyka.

“It affects you both, pantata,” said Vena, quickly correcting him. “But, of course, you will soon understand it all yourselves. When your dinner is brought to you up aloft yonder without salt or sauce or seasoning, neither your son nor your son’s wife will salt or sauce it for you; then you just call down the back stairs ‘Oh! Vena, come and be our sauce and seasoning!’ And I shall understand all that you have need of. Only, prythee, guarantee me those two chambers, or verily it will go hard with you.”

“The two chambers? If I had to take thee with me aloft into the pension house, thou should’st never quit the estate, Vena,” answered Loyka sententiously.

“I have your word, at all events,” said Vena, thanking him. “So now we may proceed with your banishment. I thought it important to insist upon the matter of my two chambers, because it is possible that to-day you will march across yon courtyard for the last time in your life.”

“And, prythee, how may that be I should like to know, thou sapient Solomon?” asked Loyka.

“As thus. If you have not in your written agreement reserved to yourself the right of walking across your son’s courtyard, who knows whether he will permit it. You will have to creep along the roof like grimalkin when she goes to the witches frolic,” and Vena laughed.

“It is not necessary to put such things into a written agreement,” said Loyka, with a kind of angry fervour.

“Oh! of course not, of course not, seeing that what stands in the written agreement is never carried out, the less there the better. Your own father never dared to draw water from your well, and I think his right to do so was reserved in the written agreement.”

“It wasn’t,” cut in Loyka.

“Oh! it wasn’t; then see here. No doubt of it you have it in your agreement that you may draw water, but have forgot in the same agreement to reserve to yourself the right of walking across the courtyard to fetch the water. But do you know what, pantata, if it comes to that, I will carry you across the courtyard on my back, for then no one will be able to prove that you walked across the courtyard, and as for me I have still the right to carry on my back what I please.”

“Thou art all salt and sauce, boy, sauciness and seasoning,” said Loyka to cut short the conversation, and for a moment his breast heaved as though he was on the point of weeping. But after all nothing came of it except laughter, only that behind this laughter that weeping was quite apparent: tears and weeping looked through a curtain of laughter, and whoever saw it felt little disposed to laugh.

And so they were banished from the farm house. Loyka and Loyka’s wife cast a last lingering look over that apartment where from their youth until now they had tasted all the sweets and sorrows of life, and which they were perhaps leaving for ever. On some estates a beggar has easier access to the farm house than the vejminkar (pensioner). And if he goes there once in a way, even his step, even his look seems to sicken everyone—without careful fostering, his inclination to repeat the visit soon languishes.

“There is only one thing I am sorry for,” said Vena, when the greater part of the furniture had been already carried out before the threshold. “And that is that there are no longer any musicians at the farm—how they would have beguiled our transit to the pension house! Those were the times! When at a touch of those strings everything was tootling and jigging on the farm, and even sorrow put on a smart frock!”

“Dost think those musicians remember me?” enquired Loyka, who to-day, as he had been for some time, was as it were held a prey to a sort of childish meekness.

“Do I think they remember you? They put you into popular songs. The song of the vejminkar (pensioner) will be given at every market in the district, and then they will point to Frank as a living witness of the truth of the ballad. And the kalounkar and the rest of them will equally testify to its truth. And so, then, the Lord help us on our way without music since there is none to be gotten. Well-a-day, I should have been glad to have seen one thing. That is I should have liked to see you either laugh or cry, for in heaven, ’tis said, tears and laughter are worth just as much as music. But there is no laughter in you, and crying is not worth while.”

Thus the Loykas were banished from the farm house in sorrow, which they sought to screen with laughter, but did not much succeed.

In the meantime, the young folks were shifting their quarters in a very different frame of mind. Yonder from the pension house, the servants were dragging down furniture of all sorts, and laughter—genuine laughter—accompanied every step. Joseph looked as though he had been polished for the occasion. Barushka was just as if it were her wedding day. Their every step, their every word betrayed that they were the victors, that the old people were vanquished and subjugated. Learn it ye aged! ye are vanquished and subjugated! Here every shadow of tenderer feeling was out of place, Barushka and Joseph had won a preconcerted game, and the player who has won is always the only one who laughs.

Even Kmoch, Barushka’s father, had already received intelligence that they were shifting into the farm house, and already betook himself thither and helped the young folks to laugh. He went to old Loyka and with a sleek smile expatiated on the wisdom his friend had shown in this step. “You know,” says Kmoch, “the hospodarship should always belong to the young folk who have energy and versatility; but old people, you know, ought to rest, they deserve a brief breathing space before they go hence——” and more to the same effect.

Old Loyka at this speech collected a few words as we collect out of our pockets a few spare kreutzers wherewith to rid ourselves of a beggar. “I had already firmly decided upon this,” said he, “and, what is more, I never alter my mind.”

“I trust not, indeed,” said Kmoch, “for what end will it serve to change your mind yet again.”

“He thinks, I beg his pardon, pantata Kmoch thinks that only from to-day you have grown wise enough to know from its beak where the chaffinch is sitting and how to sprinkle salt on the hare’s tail,” put in Vena. “It is dearly bought praise, pantata, when you must deprive yourself of a farm house to get the reputation of being a wise man. As soon as the sacrifice is made, then all goes well, then all men praise you who haven’t a notion after all why all the fine estates are in the market.”

“What do you mean?” said Kmoch, turning angrily to Vena; “a pretty notion: a fine estate in the market. I must say, pantata, you have harboured a very impudent gang of servants here, and glad I am that the young folk have made a clean sweep of them.” “As for thee,” said he turning again to Vena, “thou art not hammered on to the house with a nail nor glued there with mortar so as to be irremovable.” A pretty notion. “His fine estates in the market!”

“For all that you will not oust me just yet,” said Vena proudly. “I and your good gossip Loyka have made a compact, and I am not to venture to leave the house, and if it comes to that he goes and I stay here. Isn’t that true?” said he, appealing to Loyka.

Nothing was left for Kmoch but to disdain to carry on the conversation further which, indeed, he did: only he still hinted almost involuntarily that Loyka ought not to lower himself with such a man.

This provoked Vena. “Not lower himself. If no one had picked you out of the mire, you would never have passed for so much. Only do not imagine that I do not see through you. I know you by heart, carry it off how you will. Look you! you have got your daughter on to a farm just as if a servant had made his daughter a queen, and now to-day my lord has a hundred tastes to sit on the throne himself also. Not lower oneself, indeed!” and similar things said Vena, though now Kmoch no longer heard them. He had again departed to the young folk where they looked on the world with a different pair of eyes.

It seemed as though only to-day the new mistress celebrated her entry into the farm house. As it fell out, so it fell out. Hogsheads of beer were rolled into the courtyard; rosolek was produced, the servants were invited to it, drank, whistled, laughed, and sang, so that even people from the village collected about the courtyard, placed themselves in the gateway, and some even posted themselves in the courtyard, just as on the day when the news of the death of Frank’s grandfather lured them hither, and they had talked to another about the life of the deceased.

They came just as if to-day there was another corpse at the farmstead, and it was old Loyka who was being buried in the pension house; perhaps he was not much unlike, not much better off than a corpse.

To-day it seemed as though the farmstead of the Loykas had regained its old appearance. For a good year or more the neighbours had disaccustomed themselves to come to the farm as they used to come in times gone by. To-day, just as though the word had been passed round, they were all here, in order to be witnesses of Loyka’s banishment from the farm house. Did they come to soothe or to pity him?

And by something more than accident the musicians had also gathered here in order to celebrate the memory of the day. But you may be sure that they did not place themselves on the side of the noisy, laughing youth, but beside the two silent old folk and endeavoured to open their hearts by strains of melody and cheerful songs. They posted themselves beside that time worn furniture, beside which sat the time worn Loyka and his time worn wife. Here they played and sang, as if conscious that they did so for the last time, as if to-day they would fain pay off a debt long due, and would show their gratitude once more.

And thus the personality of old Loyka was, as it were, completed. On one side stood Vena, in whom, as it were, were embodied his bitter moods. On the other side stood the musicians in whom, as it were, were embodied all the gentleness and gaiety of his mind. Each formed, as it were, a single wing, and on these wings Loyka felt himself for the moment resigned to rest.

“It comforts me, lads, to think that you do not quite forget old Loyka, it does indeed comfort me,” said Loyka to express to them his gratitude. “Truly, it does indeed comfort me. Only that now I have no place for you as formerly, and my heart is but poor accommodation. But come, lads, let us be merry, let us celebrate this one little day that it may never drop out of our recollection.” And old Loyka showed his old self once more. All his old hospitality emerged in him in its full vigour and in full self-consciousness, and thus his old friends could still recognise face to face the image of his former self, pure and uncorrupted.

And when people standing by the gate and in the court saw him thus, their old courage came back to them, the young lads insinuated themselves thither where the music sounded, where the cheery songs were hummed and chanted, and thus old Loyka for this one day had still the consolation of seeing that every one was on his side, and that the young folk had not a single living soul except the servants to take their part.

This aspect of affairs pleased him; just as if the blood of his young days circulated through his veins, just as if it all depended on him how long the merriment should last, just as if he was not the least aware that Joseph by a single nod could make an end of all.

But we must add that Joseph did not by any such nod make an end of all. He pretended to see nothing of it at all, and was for all the world like a gamester who, having won, also throws a few kreutzers under the table for luck’s sake.

Moreover, with all his faults, Joseph was not so foolish as not to perceive that he would give general offence if he was to-day to thwart old Loyka. On the contrary, it was his cue to make the whole village believe that after all the new vejminkar (pensioner) was really not so badly off, and that evil was the tongue which asserted anything else. It was his cue to let the whole village see what peace and comfort were reserved even for a drivelling father, to let them see how true was the announcement of that father’s dotage which had been made publicly and privately, and to make them feel how much he had suffered from it.

And so, then, to-day on the farm were two sorts of gaiety: one like the fire flickering in the embers, and that was the gaiety of the old folk; the other like a fire just emerging from the faggots, and that was the gaiety of the young folk, and the one sort of gaiety—the gaiety of the old folks was extinguished that very day. When evening spread itself above the patriarchal acres and above the farmstead, and the musicians were departed thence and the old folk crept into their isolated hall, to their pension house, it seemed to them as though around them and within their heart yawned a mighty void which could not be filled by any sounds of earth. No expansiveness of heart was possible, and every hearty expression died away upon their lips. And when they glanced fearfully around, it seemed to them as though the spirit of the aged grandfather entered into them, and said “I am freed at last from these torture chambers, ye have entered into them.”

The other gaiety, the gaiety of the young folk, lasted long into the night, and when they stepped into the hall of their farm house they seemed to hear even the walls re-echoing with mirth and jollity, and they had but to lightly hint their will and all was full of merriment. And they did hint their will: and it was as though the tutelary deity of the place threw wide the doors, and said “Ye enter here omnipotent; so, then, tarry not, but enter.”