Island of The World

  Josip is blinded with tears as he slides from his back.

  You will ride upon me again, and I will come forth with all the white horses in the armies of heaven. In battle array shall the armies ride, for the One who is Faithful and True is coming upon his white horse, and it is he whom we follow.

  “Who is he?” Josip cries out with his voice.

  He is coming! He is coming! He is coming!

  And though Josip does not understand anything of these words, this much he retains: the horse upon which he has ridden is not Pegasus, but something greater. And even in its greatness, it is but one of the many who will ride forth in the armies of heaven. Then it gallops away into the fog and never again appears.

  So memory fades, and life resumes. Now he is a man; now he lives in Split. It is an ordinary Saturday. Josip’s term examination is over, a major paper handed in, he is confident of the results, he has had a good breakfast, and last week his team won the university swim meet. Soon they will take on the city. After that, maybe the whole country. Who knows, maybe someday the Olympics! It’s a great feeling, this. And today the weather is the finest—high blue skies, cloudless, with a cool mistral breeze blowing in from the northwest, bringing with it the salt smell of the ocean.

  Josip decides to stroll down to the harbor. A week of dusk-to-dawn studying has left him more tired than usual. A walk will warm him up for the big run to the height of the Marjan. He can afford to while away a few hours looking out at the Adriatic, which he knows will be unusually turquoise on such a day. He walks past the imperial palace of Diocletian and proceeds along the promenade toward Trumbićeva, which will take him to the street that leads to the park.

  As he approaches the spot where he should begin his ascent, he happens to glance down at the last wharf on the bay. Near it is a smaller quay, lower to the water, where little boats can tie up. Indeed, there is a boat there now, a red and green open-top craft, bobbing up and down. Crouched between the seat boards, a girl is untangling a black squid from her net. She pulls it out and thwacks it down on the bow. It’s not a big one, but it’s enough to make a meal for a household. The few times he has eaten this delicacy have made him want more. He could pretend to himself that the squid attracts him now, but it is the girl’s presence that draws him closer. She is dressed in sea gear: a green rubber slicker, rough trousers, black boots. Her blond hair is flying in the breeze. She moves briskly, with a subtle smile of internalized victory, for she has caught a monster of the deep and now someone will eat it—her family perhaps? Or will she sell it? She is in her late teens or early twenties, rather pretty. The university is crowded with such beauties, a good number of them more attractive than she is. In his experience, female students are more open to conversation than working girls. Perhaps working men find working girls more open than students. As always, it depends on your loyalties, your familiarities. The city is a collection of villages. Even so, he approaches, if only to admire for a moment another way of life.

  Arriving at the steps leading down to the water, he notices another figure there, a man standing alone by the edge of the wharf, looking out at the shimmering sea beyond the harbor mouth. The girl lifts the squid, steps from the boat, and passes by the man without a word. Carrying the squid before her as she comes nimbly up the stairs to the street, she passes Josip without a glance. He pays her no notice now, for his attention is fixed on the man below.

  Wearing peasant clothing, woolen trousers, dusty shoes, a brown jacket, and a small black cap on the crown of his head, he is average in height. His hair is gray, and his face is darkened by long exposure to the sun. By his feet lies a burlap sack, fastened at the top by a loop of rope. As Josip watches him, a feeling grows that has no clear cause. It is as if he knows this man, though in what portion of his past he cannot begin to guess. Perhaps he has never met him before, and it is merely something about the way the figure holds his body. The tilt of the head, the arms dangling straight down at his sides, the stillness—nothing remarkable, yet somehow familiar.

  Josip goes down the steps and halts a few paces from the man. A swift glance at the side of the other’s face produces no sharpening of memory, no recognition. Yet there is cognition on another level. He does know him, but from where?

  The man, noticing Josip’s presence, turns to face him.

  For a long moment, they study each other. Then the man smiles.

  “Ah, Josip”, he says in a voice that is deep, yet so quiet that it is just above the surface of sound, as sea-swallows in the evening will skim the waves.

  “Have we met, sir?”

  “You did not fly away”, says the man.

  Then Josip steps closer, his mouth dropping open.

  “It’s you!”

  “Yes, it is me.”

  “S-Sarajevo!”

  “Yes, Sarajevo.”

  “It is so long since that time.”

  “Many years. Is it ten?”

  “But how did you recognize me?”

  “How did you recognize me ?”

  “But I was young. I looked different then.”

  “I too looked different.”

  Josip glances down at the arms. The hands at the end of them are gloved, the thumb and forefinger on each hand have been cut away, revealing hooklike clamps.

  Again the man smiles. “You see, the wind decided.”

  It was indeed the wind, the allure of the mistral conspiring with the sun.

  “But, how did you recognize me?”

  “Do you think I would not recognize the Lastavica of the Mountains?”

  Josip laughs, though still somewhat in awe. “You remember that? All this time and you remember?”

  “I remember. And you—do you remember?”

  “Yes. You are the Lastavica of the Sea.”

  The man’s right arm lifts a little. “I would shake your hand, if I could, but as you see I have not grown new arms. These are made of wood and wire.”

  “Yet it seems to me that you still fly, for you have wings that none can see.”

  Now the man of the sea gazes fondly at Josip.

  “And by those words I know that you still fly, Josip, and that you too have wings none can see.”

  Josip drops his eyes.

  “I don’t know”, he shakes his head. “Maybe—”

  “The wings are there.”

  “Are they?”

  “They are. Have you forgotten?”

  “There were times when those days in the cellar were more real to me than anything else that followed. But less and less, it seems, as I grow older. When I am alone—when I feel entirely alone in this world—I think of what we spoke about. It has faded a little, yet it always returns. But now my life is full of other things.”

  “Your mind is full of ideas. You are a student.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “It is in your face. Still, your eyes have remained the eyes of the lastavica.”

  “Is it so? Is this true?”

  “It is so. It is true.”

  Josip can think of nothing more to say. Nearly half the length of his life has been lived since they last met. But what has filled those years? He sees all of it in a flash, in its richness and complexity, its terrors and consolations. Yet to describe it might widen the space between himself and the man of the sea.

  “Would you like to walk with me?” asks the man. He bends at the waist and with a metal finger hooks the rope of his satchel. Directing his wooden arms by a jerk of his body, he deftly swings the sack over his shoulder.

  “So, shall we go?”

  Josip nods, and together they walk up the steps to the street.

  There are so many questions to ask, so much information he desires in order to fill out the space within himself that he has kept clean and waiting for the Lastavica. Now he has returned. But is it necessary to know such details? Much can be deduced from his clothing and manner.

  “Tell me about your life”, says the man, solving the problem for both of them. A
s they walk toward the promenade, Josip describes what came after their first meeting. His aunt, the factory, school, swimming, fish, soccer, running, university, and finally, a walk in the mistral, which has brought him to this moment. Omitting unnecessary details, especially avoiding the topic of his uncle’s death, he describes everything with utmost simplicity, so as not to complicate their way of speaking. And all the while, he is aware that his voice is as deep as his listener’s and that he is a head taller. He wonders if these changes seem odd to the man, for when they last spoke Josip was a child and somewhat insane. Now he is robust and confident. If life is still dangerous, at least he has learned how to survive.

  “And you?” he asks when finished. “How do you live?”

  “I travel here and there.”

  “But how do you earn a living? Do you have a home? Does the government help you?”

  “The government no longer knows of my existence.”

  “But how do you eat?”

  In front of Diocletian’s palace, the man of the sea stops by a bench overlooking the water. He and Josip sit down on it.

  “Can you open my sack? It is easier if you are my hands.”

  Josip unties the knot and opens the top. Exploding upward from inside come marvelous smells and colors.

  “You may look.”

  Josip thrusts his hands inside. The sack contains packages of yellow and green and red and turquoise and pink and purple paper tied with yarn.

  “What are they?” he asks.

  “Open one.”

  The package contains a little wooden fish, painted bright colors. It is very pretty. “Now, another.”

  The next contains a handful of dried lavender. Josip inhales the scent, closes his eyes, and sighs. “Another, if you wish.” The next contains sage. “Do not be shy.”

  Finally, a carved wooden horse. The horse is white, and it stirs a memory. Josip strokes its back with a finger. He once rode a horse like this—years ago in Sarajevo. The horse spoke to him. Or had he imagined it? He was still sometimes crazy in those days.

  “You sell these?” he asks. The man nods.

  “But how do you make them?”

  “I cannot make them. Along the shore of the sea are old people beyond numbering, in whom such beauty has not died. They give me these carvings, and also their flowers and herbs. On the islands, herbs grow with great potency and purity of color. I take these things out into the world and sell them. Then, with the money, I buy paints and wood and threads and paper and tools, and when I return to the people, I give them what they need to make more, and some of the money. I purchase food for myself along the roads where I travel, but more often I am given enough to eat, a meal, a blanket, a room on a cold night. It is a fine way to live.”

  “But you have nothing.”

  The Lastavica turns his eyes to Josip and says, with great seriousness. “No, Josip, I have everything. And more than everything. Have you not yet learned this?”

  Ashamed, Josip looks away.

  The man of the sea stands and says, “Shall we go on?”

  It’s not certain what exactly he means. Go on with the discussion, continue walking, resume their friendship?

  “Of course”, Josip replies to all three possibilities.

  He re-ties the packages and puts them into the sack. The older man hoists it to his shoulder and begins to walk back in the direction of the little wharf.

  “Where are we going?” Josip asks.

  “Where have we come from?” replies the man with a smile.

  “We know where we have come from,” Josip replies, “but where are we going?” By ignoring the other’s inference, Josip is insisting on a routemap, and saying at the same time that he is no longer a boy, no longer confined to the cryptic language they shared so long ago.

  “We will go where the wind takes us”, replies the man of the sea, refusing to be drawn into this. “For to act with our own purpose, though not wrong, is to limit the actions of life. And for purpose to be true purpose, it must be contained within submission.”

  “Is not all choice a limiting of possibilities?”

  “Yes. This is necessary. We cannot do or be all things. And within the identity that is our own there are a multitude of choices.”

  Without warning, certain advanced equations spring to Josip’s mind, and he wonders if his old friend—so mysterious, so quintessentially a wanderer-mystic of some kind—is also educated.

  “You are a philosopher”, he says, with a whimsical smile.

  “You think I am a man who sells toys and herbs, and you wish I would be a philosopher.”

  “No—well, maybe. If so, I suppose it’s the university. It gets into your blood. Everything becomes knowledge after a while. I am a mathematician.”

  “You are not what you do, Josip. You are what you are.”

  “You are a philosopher, that is plain to see.”

  “These terms—”

  “I’m sorry, have I offended you?”

  “No, it is interesting to see your mind work, and for this I am grateful. Yet I wonder—how easily the important thing gets lost.”

  “In me, you mean.”

  “In everyone.”

  “Even in you?”

  “I remain with nothing in order not to lose the riches that have been given to me.”

  Josip notices that they have come to a halt before the little church of St. Francis. Its name is the same as the church of Rajska Polja. He looks away. It is better to forget all that. During the few seconds that it takes Josip to stop the rapid blinking of his eyes and to turn toward the street, his back to the open doorway, the man of the sea regards him thoughtfully.

  “Let us go inside”, he says.

  Josip stuffs his hands deep into his jacket pockets, his fists clenched. He shakes his head.

  “Only for a moment”, says the other.

  Josip hesitates, might even follow him up the steps, but his lungs begin to ventilate rapidly, his heart pounding with sudden terror. Lying on the steps is a naked giant with holes in his hands and feet, his bloody face obliterated.

  “No”, he gasps. “I cannot.”

  “Why can’t you?” asks the man, with a curious look. “I . . . I . . . because the watchers will see. They report everyone who goes to church. My studies, my future.”

  “Very well”, says the man of the sea. “We do not need to go in.”

  They slowly walk on, side by side, as Josip’s breathing steadies and his heart calms down. The man of the sea asks no more questions.

  Now they are crossing Trg Republike, the big square devoid of republican activity but crowded with old women, selling flowers, and a few younger ones sitting on the flagstones beside open bags of black-market wares, mostly vegetables and sea-shells—in full exposure to the eyes of the state. Their boldness stems from desperation or perhaps from a misplaced optimism about the “Visible Hand” reforms. Doubtless, these furtive capitalists believe that the eyes of the watchers have turned elsewhere. They know themselves to be small fry, not worth the trouble of harassment or imprisonment.

  Through a maze of side streets they come to the old Roman “golden gate” and enter into the walled compound of Diocletian’s palace. Without knowing where the man of the sea is leading him, Josip simply follows. He then sees that they have arrived at the peristyle and are standing before the emperor’s mausoleum. It is also, he recalls, the Catholic cathedral. Bells are ringing in its tower.

  The man of the sea makes no move to enter or to leave. Josip looks up the stone staircase to the big wooden doors, which are covered with carvings of the life of Christ. He remembers what he has not thought about for many years—his father kneeling before those doors with a look of fear in his eyes—a look the child Josip had never before seen in them.

  His heart beating wildly again, hands in pockets, he turns away and leaves the peristyle. Oblivious to his companion, he goes quickly through the tunnel under the walls and bursts out onto the open promenade by the waterfr
ont. The sun is shining brightly there, the breeze is fresh, the palm trees are swaying. He stops to catch his breath and calm his heartbeat. The man of the sea, he notices, is beside him.

  “I-I-have to go”, Josip stammers.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Back to the university. I . . . I must study.”

  Though he has throughout his life guarded himself from telling lies, failing only during the most dangerous moments, he has never before lied to an honest man. Most terribly, he has now lied to the very person with whom he has shared the language of truth in its highest form. Josip is shaken by his own behavior, which has erupted without warning from within. He wishes only to flee from the face before which he can feel nothing but shame.

  “I have a gift for you”, says the man of the sea. “In my coat pocket.”

  Hesitantly, his face strained with remorse and confusion, Josip reaches into the pocket and takes from it a package wrapped in turquoise paper and tied with red yarn.

  “What is it?” he asks, because it is necessary to fill the void that has opened in the very center of his chest.

  “Unwrap it when you have returned to the place where you live.”

  Josip stuffs the package into his pocket, nods his thanks, murmurs good-bye, and hurries away down the street.

  He knows he is running away, running from what he has remembered, what he has loved. And he runs, most of all, because the resurrected presence has proved to be a gate into an ancient ruin.

  Later that day, after an irritating discussion with a political toady who lives in his building, a distracted hour or two rummaging in the library, and a supper that sits in his stomach like a stone, Josip returns to his room. In his absence, it has become hollow, dark, cold. He closes the door behind him, jumping at the sound. For a few minutes he paces back and forth, back and forth, in the enclosed space.

  He recalls that when they were in the cellar together those many years ago, he had asked the man of the sea to tell him his name, and the names of his wife and children. And the man had promised that if he and Josip were ever reunited, he would tell the names. Now they have met, and Josip realizes that he did not think to ask. How could he have forgotten to ask! Was it because he was in haste to escape from the man? Or was it, on the other hand, a subconscious desire to retain the cryptic quality of what they had shared in that time of suffering? And even if he had remembered, would he have absorbed the specific data—so vital, so personal—and then shelved it like a book that has been read and is soon forgotten? Or would he have been afraid to find out what is in the book? He does not know. He cannot explain any of his behavior.