Jarmila by Ernst Weiß Read Free Book Online

only by the glow from the fire. The flickering seeped through the window, falling on the couple’s bed and the child’s cot and lit up the second farm-hand’s long, bearded face with its simple expression. Actually older than the first farm-hand but never having attained that position due to his retarded mind, he was doggedly devoted to Jarmila. His apparent simpleness hid a profound craftiness, a talent for lying, and a stubborn streak. He would confess to nothing, and swear to anything. Thus he had often rescued Jarmila and me from the jealous husband’s reprisals.”

 
    XII
    “ I CLIMBED UP the small staircase, its wooden steps luminous in the fire’s glow, and opened the door to the upper storey. I called my love’s name. There was no reply. Where the unwieldy trap-door used to be, there now was nothing but a few broken paper-thin slats. A dreadful thought that she might have fallen through the skimpy planks took hold of me. How this could have happened, however, was beyond me for the bright slats which had only recently been cut were gleaming in the dark. On the other hand it was only now the barn was on fire that its glowing flames illuminated the room. Now I could even sense the fire’s heat and hear its roar in the wind. A ferocious cry rose from the people outside, as if in unison. I did not understand why. I stood transfixed, spellbound. Jarmila! I called out for her once more, louder this time. I shouted as though to rouse her from an unconsciousness. I pressed my hand to my heart which beat so heavily and savagely, as it did when Jarmila tried to suffocate me in her arms.
    I lay down flat on the floor and saw her immediately. She was lying below, prostrate in her white night-dress with its embroidered neck-line. She was unconscious,her arms spread-eagled, her feet naked, bare. She did not move. I was leaning over her and she looked straight up at me.
     
    The lower storey was only about three or four metres below and usually it was piled high with feathers which created a soft mattress. Now only naked flag-stones glared at me. The feathers had been stacked in the corner in a few coarse, grey sacks which reflected the golden light of the fire. I jumped down quickly, but landed so awkwardly with my left knee on her right hand that it cracked beneath me. Not even that woke her up! I didn’t feel any pain then, it was only much later that I noticed my knee was bleeding, not the left one, but the right. Jarmila’s eyes were still open, one wider than the other, and looked at me with a gaze both troubled and mischievous. ‘What’s the matter, you little tease?’ I asked, stroking her silvery little hand, warm to the touch as ever. ‘For Christ’s sake, Jarmila, you frightened me!’ I wanted to kiss her, but something held me back.
    I didn’t know she was dead, but something in me must have sensed it. Her protruding stomach bulged out like a hillock. The room was now entirely lit up. I had grown accustomed to the darkness. Kneeling in front of her I could see the stretch-marks we had talked about in this very place. Now they werestill, nothing moved, as if chiselled in stone. Desperately I crudely sought the beating of her heart beneath her warm, heavy breast for that is where the heart is, under the breast! Was it still beating? When I pressed my ear against her, she was still warm, warm with life. But her heart was frozen still, silent as the grave.
    Outside people were shouting and running backwards and forwards between the village and the fire. I was all alone with her. ‘Jarmila?’ I shouted, ‘Jarmila, wake up! Do you hear me? Don’t scare me!’ I repeated the same three sentences over and over as I tried to get to my feet. I failed. Even that was beyond me now. Not because of any pain but simply because I felt paralysed. A little down feather had blown through the barn on the sharp draught and got caught in my hair. Very gently I placed it on Jarmila’s lips. It moved, it moved visibly. Was