The Motion Demon (14 page)

‘I understand,’ said Znieslawski. ‘Everything depended on the increase in the instinct of self-preservation, which, according to the tension, assumed various hues; in some persons it was emphasized strongly, in others, weakly. So, you believe that what we see and hear now can be explained in a similar manner?’

‘I don’t know. This association just occurred to me. Yet even if it were true, I’m glad an opportunity has arisen to observe this phenomenon. I actually should have got off at a previous station that was my destination. As you see, I’m going farther of my own free will.’

‘Splendid!’ remarked the engineer with approval. ‘I also will maintain my post—though, I admit, I’ve had a peculiar feeling for a certain time, something like an unease or a tense anticipation. Are you really free from these?’

‘Well . . . no,’ the professor said slowly. ‘You are right. Something’s in the air; we are not completely normal here. In me, however, the result manifests itself in an interest as to what’s ahead, what will evolve out of this.’

‘In that case we both stand on the same platform. I even believe that we have several companions. Wior’s influence, as I see, has encompassed certain circles.’

The engineer’s cry was interrupted by the grind of braking wheels: the train had stopped before the station. Multitudes of travellers poured out through open car doors. In the station’s pale lamplights one could see the faces of the railway official and the sole switchman for the entire way-station observing in amazement the unusual influx of guests for Drohiczyn.

‘Stationmaster, will we find sleeping accommodations here for the night?’ some elegant gentleman in a cylinder hat asked humbly.

‘Maybe on a block on the floor, my most-esteemed sir,’ the switchman offered in answer.

‘It’s going to be difficult getting some lodging, my dear Madame,’ the stationmaster explained to some ermined lady. ‘It’s two hours to the nearest village.’

The train moved. At the moment when the station was slipping into the obscurity of the night, Znieslawski, leaning out from a window, pointed to a group of people at the side of the station’s platform.

‘Do you see those persons to the left of that wall?’

‘Why, yes. They’re the conductors of our train.’

‘Ha, ha, ha!
Periculum in mora
, professor! The rats are deserting the ship. A bad sign!’

‘Ha, ha, ha!’ joined in the professor. ‘A train without conductors! All hell’s broken loose!’

‘No, no, it’s not that bad,’ pacified Znieslawski. ‘Two have remained. Look there—one has just closed the compartment; the other one I saw jumping on the running board at the moment of departure.’

‘The followers of Wior,’ explained Ryszpans. ‘It would be worthwhile finding out how many people have remained on this train.’

They went through several cars. In one, they came across an aesthetic-faced monk deep in prayer; in another, two clean-shaven men bearing the look of actors; a few cars were completely empty. In the corridor running lengthwise through a second-class compartment, several persons with luggage in hand were milling about, their eyes uneasy, their nervous movements betraying agitation.

‘For sure they wanted to get off at Drohiczyn, but at the last moment they changed their minds.’ Znieslawski threw out the assumption.

‘And now they regret it,’ added Ryszpans.

At that moment the hunchbacked railwayman showed up at the platform of the car. A sinister, demonic smile was playing over his face. Behind him was a drawn-out file of several travellers. Coming to the professor and his companion, Wior greeted them as if he were a familiar acquaintance:

‘The revue is over. Please follow me.’

A woman’s cry reverberated at the end of the corridor. The men glanced to that side and caught sight of a passenger’s body disappearing through an open door.

‘Did that person fall or jump?’ asked a few voices.

As if in answer, a second passenger plunged into the abyss of space; after him hurried a third; then the rest of the nervous group threw themselves in wild flight.

‘Have they gone crazy?’ someone asked from inside. ‘Jumping out of a train at full speed? Well, well….’

‘They were in a hurry to know Mother Earth,’ said Znieslawski casually.

Not attributing greater importance to the incident, they returned to the compartment into which had disappeared the trackwalker. Here, aside from Wior, they found ten people, among them two conductors and three women. Everyone sat down on a bench and gazed attentively at the hunchbacked railwayman, who had gone to stand in the centre of the compartment.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began, taking in those present with the fire of his glance. ‘All of us, including me, comprise thirteen individuals. A fatal number! No…I’m mistaken—fourteen including my engine driver, and he is also my man. A mere handful, a handful, but it is enough for me….’

These last words he finished saying half-aloud, as if to himself, and he became momentarily silent. One could only hear the clatter of the rails and the rumble of the car’s wheels.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ resumed Wior. ‘A special moment has arrived, a moment when the yearning of many years will be realized. This train already belongs to us. We jointly took possession of it; foreign, indifferent, and hostile elements have been eliminated from its organism. Here rules the absolute atmosphere and power of the siding. In a moment that power will manifest itself. Whoever does not feel sufficiently ready should withdraw now; later, it may be too late. Space. The space is free and the door is open. I guarantee safety. So?’ He threw a searching glance about. ‘So no one is withdrawing?’

The travellers were silent. Their restless eyes, smouldering with feverish light, did not leave the trackwalker’s face. One of the women suddenly got an attack of hysterical laughter, which under the steady, cold glance of Wior quickly passed. The railwayman drew out from his breast pocket a quadrangle paper with some drawing on it.

‘Here is the road we have so far been travelling on,’ he said, pointing to a double line that blackened the paper. ‘Here, on the right, this small point—that’s Drohiczyn, which we passed a moment ago. This other point, the large one at the top, is Gron, the last station on this line. But we will not reach it—that destination is of no concern to us now.’

He paused and stared intently at the drawing. A shudder of terror shook his listeners. Wior’s words fell heavily on the spirit like molten lead.

‘And here, to the left,’ he further explained, moving a pointed finger, ‘appears a crimson line. Do you see its red trail winding ever farther away from the main track? That’s the siding line. We are supposed to enter onto it.’

He became quiet again and studied the bloody ribbon.

From outside came the clangour of unleashed wheels. The train had apparently doubled its velocity and was speeding along in maniacal fury.

The trackwalker spoke:

‘The time has come. Let everyone assume a sitting or lying position. Yes…good,’ he finished up, passing a careful glance over the travellers, who had fulfilled his instructions as if hypnotized. ‘Now I can begin. Attention! In a minute we’ll be turning onto the siding….’

Holding the drawing in his right hand at eye level, he fixed his eyes on it one more time with the fanatical glare of his suddenly widened pupils. Then he stiffened like a board, letting the paper drop from his hand, and stood frozen in the middle of the compartment; his eyes rolled up so strongly that one could only see the edges of the whites; his face assumed a stony expression. Suddenly he started to walk stiffly to the open window. He propped himself against the lower frame and bounced off the floor with his legs, leaning out half of his body into space; his figure, stretched out beyond the window like a magnetic needle, wavered a few times on the edge of the frame, then placed itself at an angle to the wall of the car….

Suddenly a hellish bang resounded, as of cars smashing, a ferocious crash of crushed scrap-iron, a din of rails, buffers, a rattling of riotous wheels and chains. In the midst of the tumult of benches splitting into fragments, doors tumbling down, in the midst of the rumble of collapsing ceilings, floors, walls, in the midst of the clashing of bursting pipes, tubes, tanks, the locomotive’s whistle groaned in despair….

Suddenly everything receded, was driven into the ground, was blown away, and the ears were filled with a great, powerful, boundless noise.

And this noisy duration enveloped the world for a long, long time, and it seemed that every earthly waterfall was playing a song of menace and that all earthly trees were rustling scores of leaves. Afterwards, even this died down, and the great silence of darkness spread over the world. In the still and silent heavens, someone’s invisible, someone’s very caressing hands stretched out and stroked the palls of space soothingly. And under this gentle caress, soft waves were tossed about, flowing in by quiet pipes and rocking one to sleep…to sweet, silent sleep….

At some moment the professor woke up. He glanced half-consciously at the surroundings and noticed that he was in an empty compartment. A vague feeling of strangeness seized him; everything beyond him appeared somehow different, somehow new, something one had to get used to. But the adjustment was oddly difficult and slow. In effect, one completely had to change one’s point of view and the way one looked at things. Ryszpans gave the impression of a person who enters into the light of day after a lengthy wandering in a mile-long tunnel. He looked with eyes blinded by darkness, he rubbed away the mist covering his sight. He started to remember….

In his mind faded recollections followed each other, recollections that had preceded…this. Some type of crash, din, some type of sudden impact that had levelled all sensations and consciousness….

An accident!
—his haziness told him indistinctly.

He glanced carefully at himself, ran his hand about his face, his forehead—nothing! Not even a drop of blood, no pain.

‘
Cogito—ergo—sum!
’ he pronounced finally.

A desire arose within him to walk about the compartment. He left his place, raised his leg and—was suspended a couple of inches off the floor.

At that moment he discovered Znieslawski at the entrance, who, likewise raised a couple of centimetres above the floor, shook his hand warmly.

They looked out the window. Nothing. Emptiness. Only a strong, cool current blowing outside gave the impression that the train was running furiously along.

‘That’s strange,’ remarked Ryszpans. ‘I absolutely don’t see a thing. Emptiness above, emptiness before me.’

‘How extraordinary! It’s supposedly daytime, because it’s bright, but one can’t see the sun, and there’s no fog. We’re moving as if in space—what time could it be?’

They both glanced at their watches. After a moment, Znieslawski raised his eyes to his companion and met a glance that said the same thing.

‘Look,’ Znieslawski suddenly called out, pointing to the opposite side of the car. ‘I see someone from our group through the wall, that monk—remember him?’

‘Yes. That’s the Carmelite, Brother Jozef. I’ve talked with him. He’s already spotted us—he’s smiling and giving us signs. What paradoxical effects. We’re looking through that wall as if through glass!’

‘Our bodies’ opaqueness has completely gone to hell,’ the engineer concluded.

‘It’s no better, it seems, with our impermeableness,’ answered Ryszpans, passing through the wall to the other compartment.

‘Indeed,’ admitted Znieslawski, following his example. And they went through the wall and several others, until in the third car they greeted Brother Jozef.

The Carmelite had just finished his morning prayer, and, restrengthened, was sincerely pleased with the meeting.

‘Great works of the Lord!’ he said, raising distant eyes clouded over with the mist of meditation. ‘We are living through strange moments. We’ve all been wonderfully awakened. Glory to the Everlasting One! Let’s go and connect up with the rest of our brothers.’