Report to Grego by Nikos Kazantzakis Read Free Book Online Page B

sword, mumbled a couplet beneath his mustache, and began to play. Feet tingled, bodies fluttered their wings, men and women looked at each other and jumped to their feet. The first to step out was a pale, slender woman, about forty years old, her lips tinted orange because she had rubbed them with walnut leaves, her jet-black hair anointed with laurel oil and glistening sleekly. I was frightened when I turned and saw her, because her eyes were circled by two somber blue rings, and the dark, dark pupils shone from deep within; no, did not shine, burned. I imagined for a moment that she glanced at me. I clutched my mother’s apron, feeling that this woman wanted to seize my arm and take me away with her.
    â€œBravo, Sourmelína!” shouted a robust old man with a goatee. Jumping out in front of her, he removed his black kerchief, gave one corner to the woman, took the other himself, and the two of them—transported, their heads held high, their bodies as slender and straight as candles—gave themselves over to the dance.
    The woman was wearing wooden clogs; she beat them against the floorboards, beat them down forcefully, and the whole house shook. Her white wimple came undone, revealing the gold florins decorating her neck. Her nostrils flared, sniffed the air; the masculine exhalations all around her were steaming. She bent her knees, pivoted, was about to fall against the man before her, but then all at once with a twist of her hips she vanished from in front of him. The elderly dance-lover neighed like a horse, grasped her in midair, held her tightly; but she escaped again. They played, they pursued each other, thunder and rain vanished, the world sank away, and nothing remained above the abyss except this woman, Sourmelína, who was dancing. Unable to remain on his stool any longer, the rebecist jumped to his feet. The bow went wild, gave up trying to stay in command, and began to follow Sourmelina’s feet now, sighing and bellowing like a human being.
    The old man’s face had turned savage. Blushing deeply, he eyed the woman, his lips quivering. I felt that he was about to pounceon her and tear her to bits. The rebecist must have had the same foreboding, for his bow stopped abruptly.’ The dance came to a standstill; the two dance-lovers remained motionless, one foot in the air, the sweat gushing off them. The men ran to the old dancer, took him to one side, and massaged him with raki; the women surrounded Sourmelína to keep the men from seeing her. I worked my way in among them; I wasn’t a man yet, and they did not stop me. Opening her bodice, they sprinkled orange-flower water over her throat, armpits, and temples. She had closed her eyes and was smiling.
    It was then that the dance, Sourmelína, and fear—the dance, woman, and death—blended within me and became one. Forty years later, on the high terrace of the Hotel Orient in Tiflis, an Indian woman got up to dance. The stars shone above her. The roof was unlit; some dozen men stood around her, and you saw nothing but the tiny red lights from their cigarettes. Loaded with bracelets, jewels, earrings, and golden ankle bands, the woman danced slowly, with a mysterious fear, as though performing at the brink of the abyss, or of God, and playing with Him. She approached, retreated, provoked Him, while trembling from head to foot lest she fall. At times her body remained stationary while her arms wrapped and unwrapped themselves around each other like two snakes and coupled erotically in the air. The tiny red lights died out; nothing remained in the whole of the vast night except this dancing woman and the stars above her. Immobile, they danced too. We all held our breath. Suddenly I was terror-stricken. Was this a woman dancing at the brink of the abyss? No, it was our very souls flirting and playing with death.

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THE SON
    W HATEVER fell into my childhood mind was imprinted there with such depth and received by me with