Read Online An Ermine in Czernopol by Gregor Von Rezzori - Free Book Online Page B

somewhat mysterious circumstances. People spread all kinds of rumors about the true purpose of the devotions he used to say at night, in the presence of both coffins, while his extraordinarily mean coachman, a castrato of elephantine build, kept close watch on the building. In Romanian, “ taci mahala ” means “keep quiet, outskirts” and people found hidden meanings in the overlap of pronunciation.
    â€œDoes she see her father often?” we asked.
    â€œNever. She hates him.” Widow Morar closed her eyes and gave a gleeful smile. “She despises him. She calls him her mother’s murderer.”
    â€œDoes she cry much because of him?”
    â€œNever. She never cries. She is the kindest, happiest, wittiest creature, chirps like a little bird. Only now and then she …”
    â€œ What now and then?”
    â€œNow and then she locks herself inside. She reads in her books. Her rooms are full of books—books not even scholars can understand. No one understands them but her. She knows every author and every scholar, whatever language they may have written in. She can recite what they wrote word for word. They make her melancholic, and you can knock on her door and rattle the handle but she won’t answer. The orderly keeps having to break down the door to make sure she’s still alive, and then they find her lying on the floor, unconscious, or else she wanders out and speaks in tongues, words of deep meaning, just like the monks at the monastery where pilgrims visit, when they’re in a religious rapture. When she’s in that state she tells people their true names. To me she always says: I love you, for you are marked. And isn’t it true that I was marked by suffering on the day my blessed husband rolled on the ground like an animal attacked by wasps and tried to drink his death from a rifle? We saw it all through the keyhole, my sons and I, we bruised our heads trying to see, all the while wailing and screaming … ”
    â€œAnd her husband—Major Tildy?”
    â€œOh, he is a true cavalier,” said Widow Morar and opened her eyes wide, transfigured. “He stands before her like an angel dressed in armor and keeps silent. Even when she drums away at him with her fists, he stands there without moving and says nothing. Not until the devil inside her has been bested and she crumples onto the floor and whines. Then he orders what has to be done, in his calm and clear voice. And never a word afterward, never a complaint from his lips. Nothing happened. He speaks to her the way you would speak to a princess, to the Sturdza that she is. He approaches her like the imperial sword-bearer approaches the emperor, he opens doors for her and always lets her through first, he straightens the chair she sits in, and when she speaks to him, he stands at attention as if before his general, even when she’s being playful and joking with him—because she really is like a little bird. He bends over to pick up her book or handkerchief, when she willfully tosses it away, picks up the pearls from her necklace that she has torn because the mood struck her—he bears it all without a word, like a soldier, all you can hear is her little twittering voice and her laughter, not a sound from him, even his spurs jingle quietly—they have thick carpets—until she shuts her ears and locks herself back inside her room.”
    We listen in rapt attention. For a long time, whenever we were left to ourselves, we played out the image she had depicted: the princess and her knight, the angel dressed in armor, the imperial sword-bearer . I was completely at the mercy of my sister, Tanya, and I hated the fact that she always insisted on playing the major.
    What we learned about him on the side came from a different source. I say on the side because neither did our curiosity drive us to learn more about him than we knew, nor was it likely that our image of him could be more