He pulled himself together and went on counting and testing the stairs until he successfully reached the bottom.
The cellar was surprisingly big, it stretched under the whole of the building and it was empty except for some wooden crates in the corner, which reached up to the first window. Here too, everything was covered in dust, proving nothing had been touched — there were no footsteps either. Alfonz put down the beer and picked up the torch. He shone it around the room, mostly onto the crates, made of oak planks roughly nailed together. He went closer and bent over them. BOMBAY was burnt on the side of one. God knows what was in them when they first came over on a ship.
And what was in there now?
He touched the wood. It was old and dry, without a trace of wood-worm even though it was not painted or varnished. He tried to move the lid and managed easily. It was not nailed down.
He lifted it a few inches and shone his light inside.
Old junk. Clothes.
He tried another crate.
Old newspapers and letters.
And then…
Plastic?
He lifted the lid off and leaned it against the wall. The dark surface was completely even and smooth.
Plastic?
Why would they keep something like that in a crate? And the stuff seemed as if it was a part of the crate itself. It stretched from one edge to the other without any gaps, it looked as if it was moulded into the wooden planks. So smooth.
He put his palm on the surface. It was warm compared to the temperature of the room.
He moved the source of light nearer and whatever it was acquired a yellowy glow around the edges while remaining dark in the middle. Wasn’t there something in there, something long? He moved the torch even closer but he still could not make anything out. He only managed to see that the material was not as smooth as he had first thought. Now he could see the inner composition of the mass, full of densely intertwined veins, which somehow kept escaping the light.
What if he turned the crate over and tipped out the contents? He pushed against the side and after a lot of effort the crate started to lift off the floor. He turned it almost completely over but the strange thing showed no sign of detaching itself from the wood. Alfonz performed the task with the determination of somebody used to working in mountain conditions. He has found a task he has to complete before the winter snow and cold sets in, when nothing else can be done except to sit inside by a burning stove. The plan in his head was growing bigger and more complex by the minute. He would turn the crate upside down, get some tools, pull the nails out of the wood, then bang on it here and there until… and then he stopped.
The house belonged to Max and he was just a guest. He remembered how he had feared that Max would leave him out! He had seen him conferring with Samo and he had known immediately that they were discussing holidays. Then Max spoke to Raf (just think!) and finally to him. Alfonz looked at him as if Max was an approaching angel and Alfonz was sure he would ask him something silly and not what he so much wanted to be asked. Even after he had heard the question, Alfonz hesitated. Not because he needed to think but because he was not sure he had heard right.
And there he was on his first evening — only hours after arrival — messing around with somebody else’s things, planning how to break and damage them.
He sighed with shame, looked around himself — darkness — and slowly released the crate into its previous position. Just before it touched the floor the over-burdened fingers let go, the crate slid and hit the floor so that clouds of dust came up at the sides looking like the steam from a locomotive which is just about to set off. The noise it made seemed so loud that he expected to see his friends rushing in, but nobody came.
Again he kneeled next to the monolith’s surface and put both hands on it. Warmth. He could not get rid of the memory of walking to school in the snow in the winter. The darkness surrounding him just like in that cellar. Only his fingers were in a warm place, like in the bed which he had had to leave at half past five in order to get to school on time.
What was he going to do after the holidays? His mother most definitely would not let him go to university. She already viewed him as no better then his father who spent his days just wandering around the place. He was just another parasite, wasting his time at school. He was the youngest son, there were three others above him — not counting the invalid brother — and they had let him stay on at school just to get him out of the way. But subsequently all his older brothers had left for the city one after another and each one of them had later sent a letter saying he was not coming back, restaurant or no restaurant. One of them then got killed by an electric cable after he had jumped off a train before it reached the platform.
Mother had probably already read the note he had left on the kitchen table written on a sheet of paper torn out of one of his notebooks. He had written in pencil that he was going to the seaside for a week and that he would definitely return. He promised to come back. He underlined the last sentence with such ferocity that the pencil end broke and he finished the line with just the leftovers of the graphite embedded in the wood.
Alfonz sighed and returned his attention to the crate. He had a feeling that he was trying to immerse his hand in water which was so thick that he could not break the surface. That shadow in the middle, the denser bit or… He strained his eyes… To no avail.
He heard steps above him. His friends were back. One set of steps lost their rhythm, crashed against the floor, then moved quickly again before returning to a steady pace. Raf had tripped again. How clumsy he was! Even though he was the one that Alfonz liked most. Max was all Alfonz was not and never would be. How he could talk to women! How he could seduce them! No, Max was no virgin, like Alfonz who would probably remain one for ever. And to top it all, Max always did and said the right thing. Raf was more like Alfonz and therefore Alfonz had nothing to learn from him.
How he had looked forward to this trip! He imagined that everything would be different after it. Like some sort of ordination. You went away as a boring and innocent youth and you returned as an experienced and confident man. At least that was how those from his village who had already done it, seemed to him. He used to look at them carefully, trying to guess from their faces what it was that had changed inside them, made them different.
And now he was there and there was no sign of anything changing inside him. On the ferry, he felt like he had been stabbed by hope when he saw that girl. But he immediately became aware of Max, Samo and even Raf and realised he did not stand a chance next to them. It was hopeless.
He was just wasting time with that old crate, like a lunatic. Max would never do anything like that. But why should he do just like Max, why should he look up to Max? He became embarrassed — yes, he was a real arselicker. He remembered the journey and nearly bit his lip. His birthday! He had moved his birth date by nearly a month, just to attract some attention and take part in the conversation. He had feared they would see he was lying but nobody did. Birthday indeed!
He got up swiftly and wiped his hands against the corduroy. Without thinking, as there was no need for it. He returned to the stairs and started walking up, examining each stair with his torch.
Raf really was brushing dust from his knees when Alfonz walked into the hall. Raf’s lips were still pursed after he had just, as always in such cases, exclaimed the name of the Saviour, even though he did not seem to be a believer. Alfonz went to church with his parents, but he did not believe. Neither could he remember ever believing a word said by the chaplain in the village lower down the hill where everybody walked for Sunday school. What he hated most about his own village was its position. Wherever you went you had to put on heavy boots and coats and then trudge through the snow, apart from in the short summer, when walking was easier but the distances stayed the same.