The Drowning Of A Goldfish Read Free

village, a real one, with whitewashed Baroque farms, vegetable gardens in front of the sheds, stables full of cows and horses, farmyards swarming with cackling chickens, strutting geese, and ducks tottering on orange feet, like little boats on a sea. Sometimes, I even saw some squealing piglets, very gay and very dirty.
    The church, perched on a green slope, dominated the calm and rustic landscape.
    Everything breathed the gentleness of life: the streams, teeming with fish, the lavish groves, concealing mushrooms with velvety heads and the trees, offering—according to season—red, yellow, and blue gleaming fruit.
    Prim little girl, I would scurry beside my grandfather who would show me all these beautiful things, and we would be happy. We felt part of this sunny serenity and feared nothing.
    The steeple of the church, whose shape became clearer and clearer as we approached, reinforced our impression of everlastingness.
    The foundation of the church itself dates back to the sixth century when Byzantian monks built a monastery in the forest above the Sázava river. On the twelfth century portal there are majestic birds, bizarre animals, and profiled letters that Grandfather could read. He explained everything to me. We thus possessed the secret of eternity and, as a particle of it, would exist forever.
    Educated by Jesuits, Grandfather manipulated the absolute with virtuosity. He tamed reality, suppressed the facts that he could not control, and turned the truth to suit himself. His truth was pure and calm.
    He made me feel good. I learned to assimilate my suspicions as I pushed back Father’s world, too brutal to be rendered tame.
    I could feast on gold-brown, roasted squab, savor the tender crust of broiled lamb, relish the veal melting on my tongue, muffle up in the fur of wild cats, my intimate friends.
    I would kneel beside Grandfather at the base of a pillar in the last row of the church. How hard the prie-Dieu would be without our embroidered cushions!
    I would mimic diligently Grandfather’s gestures, while keeping an eye on the priest who moved about with dignity. Anticipating his slow movements, his robe would shimmer under the sunbeams, which lost their intensity as they passed through the stained glass windows.
    The sound of the organ, deep and majestic, would collide with the dissonance of human voices, lamentable in their imperfection.
    The people in front of me would offer, to my wandering eyes, thick, wrinkled necks and flowered scarves.
    I sensed that we occupied a privileged position although we would be sitting, by pure chance, with the crowd. We could have been celebrating mass in the sole company of the priest. Grandfather was fluent in Latin, and I knew what was being said as he had elucidated the mystery for me.
    But to what avail was all this wisdom, all this complicity, if it did not help me to find Myšák?
    One day he disappeared without leaving a trace. I spent days searching after him, calling him, asking all the neighbors if they had not seen a black and white kitten. My nights were filled with ghosts, plaintively mewing to be rescued.
    Later I learned that Grandfather, who had seen enough of this “dirty beast,” asked my father either to take “it” to Prague with us or dispose of “it” in another manner.
    Father gave Myšák away to a man who ate cats.
    This person received Myšák from the hands of my grandmother.
    That did not pose any problem.
    The kitten trusted her blindly.

CHAPTER II
    IRIS
    When Iris entered my life, I was playing the part of a lady-spouse.
    It was not that I had given in to the world of my grandmother; I had adapted myself to circumstances.
    My first year of high school coincided with the last years of the German occupation.
    How could I, so delicate and fragile, have passed the entrance exams, consisting mainly of physical exercises?
    I still carry within me those three days of humiliations, calculated to erase all