However, Piotr was often wracked by doubt; indeed, a dark bitterness would creep into his heart. For, actually, why was he not supposed to wear an Imperial cap, like other railway employees? Why was he not supposed to command respect? Why, despite so many years of faithful service, did he still have the appearance of just any civilian? Why was he never promoted? Was he merely some supernumerary who could be replaced at any time? Was he merely some base kitchen spoon, considered unsuitable for inclusion among the treasury’s grand dinner-service?
At such times, Piotr Niewiadomski indulged in self-pity, convincing himself that it would be better to give it all up, all these railway duties which just made him stoop-shouldered and gave him little pleasure. Perhaps it would be better, after all, to sell the house (with Paraszka’s consent, of course, though she wouldn’t be returning to it now), sell the orchard and go to Saxony.
However, these bitter thoughts never troubled him for very long. Such doubts were soon dispelled and his faith was restored that all was not lost, that the Emperor was good, God was just and that they would not harm their people. It was merely necessary to wait patiently, toil patiently, bear burdens patiently and patiently suffer abuse from conductors and senior porters. It was even necessary to put up with the stationmaster’s wrath. An Imperial servant had the right to strike another Imperial servant in the face, because he was doing so in the name of His Imperial Majesty. But civilians—hands off!
So for many years Piotr anticipated that the day would eventually come when he would be promoted, having done enough carrying to deserve a pay rise and a cap. Perhaps this dream of an Imperial cap was a reflection of his unhappy childhood, when he’d pretended that an old pot he’d found disposed of on a rubbish heap was his military cap. No doubt that childhood memory still retained in Piotr’s mind at the age of forty explains the undeniable fact that Piotr Niewiadomski would be delighted to be able to salute people instead of greeting them as a civilian would.
He would have liked most of all to be a railway crossing guard or an assistant guard on a goods train. Service on the railway was attractive to Piotr simply because he came into contact with trains leaving for far-off destinations. The whole wide world familiar to him from travellers’ accounts passed through Topory-Czernielica station along with those trains. Piotr had seen carriages in which you could sleep under a blanket as comfortably as in a soft bed, and he had seen carriages in which gentlemen sat at tables covered by white tablecloths, eating, drinking and enjoying themselves. Often, curtained saloon cars with flowers in little vases in the windows flashed past Piotr as he stood rooted to the spot. By one window he would see a thick-set man in a tall white chef’s cap leaning against the shiny bulkhead, pouring something from a copper saucepan.
Piotr also saw trains that had come all the way from Turkey, which is by the sea, where there are heathens who are permitted to have several wives at once, and he saw trains returning from Vienna, where the Emperor himself lives. True, he had little to do with those trains personally, as they naturally didn’t stop at Topory-Czernielica station, but on a number of occasions he had the job of striking the wheels that had run on foreign tracks with a hammer. When he touched the wheels of goods trains that were destined for distant, unknown parts, it was as if he was touching the very secret of a world he had never known.
Why should he not become a signalman or travel on a goods train to the Romanian border? After all, he could recognize colours and distinguish red and green, even though he could not read or write. He also knew how to look after the points. Did people say he was stupid? Well, what if he was? The saints couldn’t glue broken crockery together and King Solomon wasn’t a guard on the railway.
If Piotr became a signalman—now, that would change everything! He would no longer avoid the wedding ceremony, though Magda would be even less in the running than before. Piotr the signalman would be highly eligible for many a respectable widow or even an older spinster, but she would have to be some well-to-do farmer’s daughter, of course. Only then would he set up a home, a proper home with a proper woman. They would renovate the cottage, repair the leaky roof and thatch it with fresh straw, replace the rotten ceiling rafters and scrub the bedstead with a firm brush. Above the bed would hang a row of images of the Immaculate Mother of God, the Holy Virgin of Pochaiv, the Lord Jesus of Milatyn and various others. Above the icons there would be red paper roses on wires. They would buy a cuckoo clock, a mousetrap and some saucepans at the fair; on the windowsill there would stand flower pots with fuchsias, red as radishes. They would paint the whole living room sky blue. The wife would undoubtedly bring decorated cupboards from home, in which they would keep shirts, a sheepskin coat, their money and prayer books. Magda would be able to carry on working if she wished, but now it would be his own cow she would milk, the one his wife would have to include in her dowry. No, he would not turf Magda out on her ear—Heaven forbid! On the other hand, she could no longer sleep with him. She would find herself another fellow.
These thoughts, which he did not mention to the priest at confession, kept Piotr at Topory and prevented him from taking a decisive step with regard to Magda. They combined his two life’s ambitions in one joyful vision. Piotr always imagined his dilapidated house in a flourishing state, rebuilt and, in the absence of children, populated with chickens, ducks and even pigs, with which Bass got on famously. He always imagined his house as a place where happiness dwelt. At Easter, he would have sausages from his own pig, he would have a whole year’s supply of pork fat, and feathers for his matrimonial eiderdowns from his own geese instead of stolen ones.
One day, at 5.20 in the morning, the Topory-Czernielica stationmaster summoned Piotr to his office. As a rule the stationmaster was still asleep at this hour, but today, though he was still unshaven, he was already fully dressed and had had his breakfast, as could be seen from the empty cup and half-eaten bread roll on a metal tray. Why hadn’t the stationmaster finished his breakfast? This was Piotr’s first thought on arrival at the office. There was a considerable delay before it occurred to Piotr to wonder why the old man had summoned him at such an early hour. The stationmaster was sitting at his telegraph machine as it clicked away. The red colour on his official cap contrasted sharply with his pale cheeks covered in dark stubble. He paid no attention to Piotr’s arrival. He was engrossed in the long ribbon of paper he was feeding through his fingers, deciphering some secret messages. The machine clicked away incessantly. In the motionless silence that engulfed the office and the whole area surrounding the station, isolated among the fields, Piotr was alarmed by the dull, insistent clicking of the metal machine. He stopped observing the stationmaster, involuntarily turning his gaze towards the window, through which he had a view of the clear sky and several silent trees. The sky and the trees had a calming effect on him. All of a sudden, the machine stopped clicking. That was more ominous still. The stationmaster looked up. A great change seemed to have come over him. That severe, derisory expression that Piotr had found so daunting all those years seemed to have vanished overnight from his cold, gaunt, yet always contented features. Those eyes had so often caused him to endure hard times in his life. Piotr found them piercing even when, thankfully, they were closed. Those eyes were capable of stopping Piotr’s heartbeat, penetrating the innermost recesses of his conscience. Beneath their gaze, Piotr would cringe and squirm so much that he had developed that false smile simple people assume in order to shake off the burden of contempt. Of all the burdens he carried in his life, the most onerous was the eyes of the stationmaster he felt on his back. Today, these eyes were extinguished; they were like the empty barrels of a double-barrelled shotgun. What has happened to the stationmaster?—Piotr wondered. He isn’t looking at me as he usually does; he looks as though he has stopped being the stationmaster. Perhaps he is leaving for another position and his rule has come to an end here?