‘Sex is instant love,’ said Beba.
‘Sex is a quick lottery, a shortened version of the search for the egg,’ said Arnoš.
‘Oh, don’t say that, I’m a child of the sexual revolution…’ said Beba, biting her tongue.
‘Just as well that revolution didn’t catch you as a child,’ said Kukla wickedly.
‘Every revolution devours its children,’ said Arnoš.
‘I am the victim of the sexual revolution,’ Beba corrected herself.
‘You don’t look like a victim to me,’ said Arnoš agreeably.
‘What do you know about victims and sacrifice? You’re a man. Sacrifice is a strictly female accessory,’ said Kukla.
‘Perhaps. But since you’ve mentioned Russian fairytales, here is another Russian example. Pushkin’s poem Ruslan and Lyudmila. You know the story: brave Ruslan sets out in search of the beautiful Lyudmila, who has been snatched by the magician Chernomor. But actually I’ve always been intrigued by a secondary story in the poem,’ said Arnoš Kozeny.
‘Which one?’ asked Beba, although she hadn’t the remotest knowledge of either Pushkin or his poem.
‘On his journey Ruslan comes to a cave,’ Arnoš went on, ‘and in the cave there is a wise old man. The old man tells Ruslan his life story. When he was a young shepherd, he fell in love with the beautiful Naina. But Naina rejected his love. In despair, the shepherd left his homeland, founded a fellowship, put out to sea and fought wars in foreign lands for ten years. And then, tormented by longing, he returned and brought Naina gifts: his bloodstained sword, coral, gold and pearls. But Naina rejected him again. Humiliated, the “parched seeker of love” as Pushkin calls him, decided that he would conquer Naina with spells and so he spent his time alone, learning the secret art of wizardry. And when he finally discovered the last “terrible secret of nature”, there was a flash of lightning, a fearful gale began to rage, the earth shook beneath his feet – and before him appeared an old hunchbacked woman with sunken eyes and grey hair. “The embodiment of senile blight,” says Pushkin. That was Naina,’ said Arnoš, pausing significantly.
‘And what happens next?’ asked Kukla and Beba impatiently.
‘Horrified, the old man bursts into tears and asks whether it is possible that it is her, and where has her beauty vanished, is it really possible that the heavens have changed her so terribly? And he asks how much time has passed since their last meeting. Naina replies:
Arnoš recited in Russian with a strong Czech accent. Perhaps it was because of the accent that Kukla and Beba had no problem understanding him.
‘And what happens next?’ they asked.
‘Next? Um…’ said Arnoš, ‘next we have an interesting and psychologically most satisfying situation. Naina says that she has only now realised that “her heart was fated for tender passion” and invites him into her embrace. However, the old man is profoundly revolted by the physical appearance of his “wizened idol”:
My wizened idol warmed to me
With passion, started to importune,
On withered lips a ghastly smile,
In churchyard tones she would beguile,
Avowals, hoarsely wheezed, she offered…
‘The old man refuses to acknowledge reality,’ continued Arnoš. ‘He flees from Naina and resolves that he would prefer to live as a hermit. What is more he accuses Naina in front of Ruslan of transmuting “thwarted love’s belated flame to ire”.’
Arnoš puffed impressively on his cigar.
‘Why yes, the old witch!’ said Pupa, rousing herself from her slumber.
They all laughed, apart from Beba…
‘Naina apologises for her ugliness. But the old man does not see himself as either ugly or old!’ said Beba.
‘What misogyny!’ said Kukla. It seemed that she too had taken Naina’s story to heart.
‘I agree,’ said Arnoš.
‘Women are more compassionate than men in every way!’
‘You’re right,’ said Arnoš.
‘What a moron!’ said Beba bitterly, still mulling over the character of the wise old man.
‘What else could she do but become a witch!’ said Kukla, who was still protesting in Naina’s name.
‘Our whole life is a search for love, which you, Kukla, based on the example of a Russian fairytale, have identified as – an egg,’ concluded Arnoš. ‘Our search is frustrated by numerous snares that lie in wait for us on our journey. One of the most dangerous snares is time. We need only be one second late and we will have lost our chance of happiness.’
‘That right moment is called death, my dear Arnoš, an orgasm from which we no longer awaken. Because the logic of love is to end in death. And as none of us accepts that option, we all bear the consequences. Old age is simply one of them,’ said Beba.
They were all astonished by Beba’s eloquence.
‘All that is left us is the art of dignified ageing,’ said Arnoš.
‘Dignified ageing is crap!’ announced Pupa, putting an end to the discussion.
It was already quite late and the little group decided to disperse. Arnoš Kozeny saw the ladies to the lift, kissed each one’s hand and, before the lift door closed, he blew them a kiss for good measure.
In the lift Beba said:
Kukla and Pupa listened in surprise.
‘You know Russian?’ asked Kukla.
‘No. Why do you ask?’ asked Beba.
Beba had quoted a stanza from Pushkin’s Ruslan and Lyudmila. Aside from her occasional lapses, this was another of her quirks: she would from time to time blurt out something in languages she otherwise had no mastery of. These attacks occurred to Beba out of the blue, as in a dream, and so Kukla and Pupa did not wake her.
And what about us? We carry on. While in life we stop to greet a friend, the tale speeds to embrace its end.
8.
A girl was standing beside the town fountain. Her head was turned towards it and she was leaning all her weight on one hip. The young man could see her luminous complexion, pink ear, which seemed to him as fresh as a segment of orange, and a copper-coloured curl that had caught on her ear like an unusual earring. The girl was wearing a simple little floral sleeveless dress. The dress revealed the girl’s plump shoulders sprinkled with rusty freckles, her broad hips and the chubby calves of her legs.
All around, in the tops of the old plane trees, whose leaves had acquired a pale grey-green colour in the bright sun, birds were chirping. The young man walked round the fountain and stopped opposite the girl. Now he could see her face. She had a regular, full little face, almost child-like, with bright green eyes, quite wide set. The neckline of her dress gave the young man a glimpse of her ample bosom and the freckles, like an army of pale orange ants, disappearing into the shadowy dip between her breasts. The girl was licking ice cream out of a crunchy cornet. She ran the tip of her tongue round its edge, as though she were making a little pit, tidily licked up the drips of ice cream that were sliding down the outside of the cornet, pushed the foamy mass towards the top with her tongue, and then, with her full, pink lips, she sucked up the peak. The girl was licking her ice cream so carefully and with such concentration that she might have been solving a difficult mathematical problem. From time to time she took her right foot out of her clog and scratched her left ankle. And then she tucked her right foot back into its clog, took out her left foot and used it to scratch her right ankle. All this time, she did not for a moment lose her focus on the ice cream. As though the ice cream was a tiny wild animal she had caught. She played with the ice cream like a cat with a mouse.
4
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