Anarchistbanjo's World

Homo Sapiens: In the Maelstrom by Stanislaw Przybyszewski and translated by Joe E Bandel

II.

Hardly had he reached the street when he saw Czerski coming toward him. Both stopped and stared at each other. 

“You probably don’t know me?” Czerski finally said. 

“I think you are Czerski. Very nice, very nice, what do you want from me?” 

“You will soon find out.” 

“So, so… the night is very beautiful, we can walk together, although I would much rather walk alone.” 

They walked long beside each other without saying a word. Falk was very restless and struggled for composure. 

“So finally tell me what you want from me.” 

“What I want from you? Well, you see, you naturally know that I was engaged to Janina?” 

“No, I don’t know that at all. I learned today that you were practically engaged, but not engaged.” 

“Yes, for all I care practically engaged. But that doesn’t matter at all. Janina had the right to choose, and she chose.” 

“Yes, of course. That was her affair.” 

“Yes, yes, that was her affair,” Czerski repeated absently and was silent. “But just tell me, Herr Falk, you are married?” 

Falk started and stopped. “What business is that of yours?” 

“It is actually none of my business, or yes, it is very much my business. I don’t want to talk about you destroying my happiness, no, I don’t come into question at all, but you have dishonored the girl I loved, yes dishonored, that’s how our social conditions are. How do you come to seduce and dishonor this poor girl, you as a married man?” 

Falk laughed cynically. 

“How one comes to it? Good God, what a naive man you are! The question you put to me is as old as the world. He, he, how one comes to it? I have asked myself the question at least a thousand times…” Czerski looked at him darkly. 

“You are a filthy man, a scoundrel you are.” Falk laughed friendly. 

“But aren’t we all? Aren’t you a scoundrel too? By the way, you are a strangely insolent man. I would very much like to give you a slap in the face if I weren’t too limp for it. Go to the devil and leave me in peace.” 

“Leave your chivalrous impulses aside. Otherwise it could go very badly for you. But I have a moral obligation to Janina, and so I must know what you now intend to do. No, it is none of my business what you want to do, you must act as I want.” 

Falk stopped, looked at Czerski with the utmost astonishment and then began to laugh loudly. 

“Listen, Czerski, did you lose your mind in prison? I wouldn’t be surprised at all, I would find it very understandable… He, he, one must get strange fixed ideas in this hideous solitude. You had a cell to yourself? I must do what you want! Ha, ha, ha…” 

“Yes, you must do what I command you.” 

“So, so, you are starting to get cozy. Bien! So, what do you command?” 

“You must marry Janina.” 

“But you know that I am married. There is a law that punishes bigamy, don’t you know it? Did you forget all bourgeois institutions in prison?” 

“You must separate from your wife and marry Janina.” Falk stopped speechless and fell into rage. 

“Have you gone mad?” He could bring out nothing more. 

“No, I haven’t gone mad, but no matter how much I thought about it, I find no other way out. You must do it, I will force you to it. Your wife will make no difficulties for you. I don’t believe she wants to live with you further if she learns that you have a mistress.” 

Falk trembled inwardly so violently that he had trouble continuing to walk. His knees grew weak, he stopped and stared speechlessly at Czerski. Then he walked slowly on. 

“Why do you want to do that?” Falk coughed and collected himself with difficulty. “Because it is the only way out.” 

“You are mistaken, Czerski, I will not do what you want. You cannot force me to it either…” 

Falk spoke very seriously and calmly. 

“All you achieve with your plan is to destroy me and my wife. Your whole plan is built on my wife leaving me, and that is correct. I don’t doubt it for a moment. But the conclusion you draw from it is completely wrong. I will never marry Janina…” 

“Why?” 

“Because you shall not have the satisfaction that I acted under your pressure. Do what you want, it is naturally free to you, but I repeat, yes I assure you on my word of honor, that I will never marry Janina. You achieve nothing by it, on the contrary: I will naturally take revenge on you. The means are completely indifferent to me. For I hold very much to the word of God: Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. You see, you belong to the social-democratic party. But they don’t trust you, you actually count as an anarchist. And you know that for the social democrats every anarchist is a police spy. That you were in prison? Oh God, that means nothing. The social democrats don’t care about the logical consequences of such a trifle.” 

Czerski looked at him tensely. Falk laughed maliciously, but inwardly it boiled in him with fury and unrest. 

“You know that I am the chairman of the central committee. You also know that they have unlimited trust in me. But they know very little about you. You even have a powerful enemy in the party who slanders and suspects you… yes, it is Kunicki, you know it, you were so imprudent to demand his expulsion from the party because of the duel story… Now listen…” Falk stopped… “He, he… you seem very tense. Yes, I understand it. So I could say a word if asked about you, only a word,

actually no word. I would only need to raise my eyebrows, shrug my shoulders, shake my head thoughtfully… You know that such a thing has colossal significance in party life…” 

“That would be villainy,” Czerski shouted in utmost rage. 

“Why then?” Falk looked at him coldly. “I don’t know you. I did send you money for agitation often. But even in that the appearance speaks against you. Everything failed for you. You wanted to lead the book transport over the Russian border, the books were seized, you were also so imprudent as to incite the workers to violence once, which otherwise only an agent provocateur does…” 

Czerski seemed about to throw himself at Falk. Falk smiled. 

“Leave that, dear Czerski. I have unconditional trust in you. I know no person I trust more. I only want to make clear to you that I would take revenge in any case.” 

“You are a scoundrel,” Czerski shouted hoarsely. 

“Yes, you already said that once, and I answered you that I bestow this title of honor on you too. By the way, don’t get excited, otherwise you will draw the short straw. I was for a time so stunned that I thought I would sink to my knees, now I am quite calm and superior. You are also imprudent with words. You spoke of commands and forcing… That was too high-flown. You knew very well that I cannot be forced… Don’t go, we can speak very calmly, for me the story is at least as important as for you. I can just as well accompany you a piece, he, he…” 

“I want nothing to do with you,” Czerski said darkly, but stopped. 

They stood close under a lantern. Falk became very serious. 

“Listen, Czerski, you owe it to me to hear me now.” “I already told you what I want to do.” 

“But don’t you understand that it is madness? You look quite sick by the way. I saw you two years ago at the congress. Don’t you understand that it is madness? You achieve nothing by it. Nothing at all. You force me to a crime. Ha, ha, ha… No, Czerski,

you are a bad psychologist… You are actually a bit biased toward me, we had too much to do with each other… Just don’t believe that I want to beg you. Just don’t let yourself be deterred in your decisions. You are by the way a stupid man.” 

Now he began to laugh maliciously and placed himself quite broadly before Czerski, who stared at him with peculiarly absent eyes. 

“You got excited there over a quite clumsy story. Clumsy, unheard-of clumsy! Do you really believe that I would be capable of denouncing you as an unreliable man?” 

He became serious again and suddenly very limp. 

“By the way, I am not the central committee at all. Your whole party is as indifferent to me as you with your boyish intentions…” 

Czerski suddenly started. 

“So you don’t love Janina at all?” Falk looked at him in astonishment. 

“No.” 

“Listen, Falk, you acted villainously, I would never have believed it of you. I had boundless respect for you… You were the only person besides Janina’s brother…” He broke off and brooded further. 

Falk became very excited. 

“It pains me infinitely that I had to intervene in your life in this way…” 

Czerski suddenly interrupted him. 

“And you want to continue living with this lie? Want to continue deceiving your wife?” 

Falk looked at him in astonishment. 

“Dear Czerski, you now suddenly want to raise yourself to judge over me. That is quite ridiculous. I owe no person account for what I do, least of all you… By the way, we have spoken enough. Do what you want… You are a good man, and perhaps no scoundrel, it delights me immensely to have seen a non-scoundrel… But now good night…” He suddenly became raging. “Go to sleep, Czerski!” He was completely beside himself with rage. 

“Go to sleep, I tell you!” Czerski looked at him contemptuously. 

A police patrol passed and examined them attentively. 

“Go to sleep!” Falk shouted to him once more and walked slowly along the street. He was as if paralyzed. The artificial composure suddenly disappeared and the unrest grew so strong that his heart contracted as in a cramp and cold sweat broke out on his forehead. 

Then he walked faster and faster until he became completely exhausted. 

“Now it comes. Yes, now it comes for sure. The wheel has started rolling and it will roll on incessantly… Yes, naturally. This truth-fanatic will not let himself be deterred.” 

Falk wanted to think over the danger, but his brain was tired, only the idea of ruin, of being destroyed dominated him with unspeakable torment. 

A woman hurried past, and behind her ran two drunken students. 

“The dogs! No, how everything is disgusting, how disgusting! No, to thunder! That is unheard-of idiotic, to stake one’s whole life for a few seconds of animal pleasure. The whole life?” He laughed scornfully. “No, to the devil, one stakes only a few seconds for a few new seconds… Ha, ha, ha… One woman replaces the other… Long live the queen…” 

He stopped on a bridge and stared ahead. He had become as if blind, but gradually he saw an enormous black mass grow heavily and majestically over the whole sky, and gradually he recognized the mighty forms of the train station. Now and then he heard a shrill whistle of the locomotive maneuvering under the bridge. He went to the other side of the bridge. Before him stretched the wide terrain of the station grounds. He saw the enormous number of lights along the tracks, he saw the variously colored signal lanterns, he stared until all the lights flowed together into a great, trembling rainbow, no, a great thousand-colored light-sun…