Julio Cortazar Axolotl There was a time when I thought a great deal about the axolotls.

I went to see them in the aquarium at the Jardin des Plantes 1 and stayed for hours watching them, observing their immobility, their faint movements. Now I am an axolotl. I got to them by chance one spring morning when Paris was spreading its peacock tail after a wintry Lent. I was heading down the boulevard Port Royal, then I took Saint Marcel and L'Hpital and saw green among all that grey and remembered the lions. I was friend of the lions and panthers, but had never gone into the dark, humid building that was the aquarium. I left my bike against the gratings and went to look at the tulips. The lions were sad and ugly and my panther was asleep. I decided on the aquarium, looked obliquely at banal fish until, unexpectedly, I hit it off with the axolotls. I stayed watching them for an hour and left, unable to think of anything else. In the library at Sainte-Genevive, I consulted a dictionary and learned that axolotls are the larval stage (provided with gills) of a species of salamander of the genus Ambystoma. That they were Mexican I knew already by looking at them and their little pink Aztec faces and the placard at the top of the tank. I read that specimens of them had been found in Africa capable of living on dry land during the periods of drought, and continuing their life under water when the rainy season came. I found their Spanish name, ajolote, and the mention that they were edible, and that their oil was used (no longer used, it said) like cod liver oil. I didn't care to look up any of the specialized works, but the next day I went back to the Jardin des Plantes. I began to go every morning, morning and afternoon some days. The aquarium guard smiled perplexedly taking my ticket. I would lean up against the iron bar in front of the tanks and set to watching them. There's nothing strange in this, because after the first minute I knew that we were linked, that something infinitely lost and distant kept pulling us together. It had been enough to detain me that first morning in front of the sheet of glass where some bubbles rose through the water. The axolotls huddled on the wretched narrow (only I can know how narrow and wretched) floor of moss and stone in the tank. There were nine specimens, and the majority pressed their heads against the Paris Botanical Garden glass, looking with their eyes of gold at whoever came near them. Disconcerted, almost ashamed, I felt it a lewdness to be peering at these silent and immobile figures heaped at the bottom of the tank. Mentally I isolated one, situated on the right and somewhat

apart from the others, to study it better. I saw a rosy little body, translucent (I thought of those Chinese figurines of milky glass), looking like a small lizard about six inches long, ending in a fish's tail of extraordinary delicacy, the most sensitive part of our body. Along the back ran a transparent fin which joined with the tail, but what obsessed me was the feet, of the slenderest nicety, ending in tiny fingers with minutely human nails. And then I discovered its eyes, its face. Inexpressive features, with no other trait save the eyes, two orifices, like brooches, wholly of transparent lacking any life but looking, gold, letting themselves be penetrated by my look, which seemed to travel past the golden level and lose itself in a diaphanous interior mystery. A very slender black halo ringed the eye and etched it onto the pink flesh, onto the rose stone of the head, vaguely triangular, but with curved and triangular sides which gave it a total likeness to a statuette corroded by time. The mouth was masked by the triangular plane of the face, its considerable size would be guessed only in profile; in front a delicate crevice barely slit the lifeless stone. On both sides of the head where the ears should have been, there grew three tiny sprigs, red as coral, a vegetal outgrowth, the gills, I suppose. And they were the only thing quick about it; every ten or fifteen seconds the sprigs pricked up stiffly and again subsided. Once in a while a foot would barely move, I saw the diminutive toes poise mildly on the moss. It's that we don't enjoy moving a lot, and the tank is so cramped we barely move in any direction and we're hitting one of the others with our tail or our head difficulties arise, fights, tiredness. The time feels like it's less if we stay quietly. It was their quietness that made me lean toward them fascinated the first time I saw the axolotls. Obscurely I seemed to understand their secret will, to abolish space and time with an indifferent immobility. I knew better later; the gill contraction, the tentative reckoning of the delicate feet on the stones, the abrupt swimming (some of them swim with a simple undulation of the body) proved to me that they were capable of escaping that mineral lethargy in which they spent whole hours. Above all else, their eyes obsessed me. In the standing tanks on either side of them, different fishes showed me the simple stupidity of their handsome eyes so similar to our own. The eyes of the axolotls spoke to me of the presence of a different life, of another way of seeing. Gluing my face to the glass (the guard would cough fussily once in a while), I tried to see better those diminutive golden points, that entrance to the infinitely slow and remote world of these rosy creatures. It was useless to tap with one finger on the glass directly in front of their faces; they never gave the least reaction. The golden eyes continued burning with their soft, terrible light; they continued looking at me from an unfathomable depth which made me dizzy. And nevertheless they were close. I knew it before this, before being an axolotl. I learned it the day I came near them for the first time. The anthropomorphic features of a monkey reveal the reverse of what most

people believe, the distance that is traveled from them to us. The absolute lack of similarity between axolotls and human beings proved to me that my recognition was valid, that I was not propping myself up with easy analogies. Only the little hands . . . But an eft, the common newt, has such hands also, and we are not at all alike. I think it was the axolotls' heads, that triangular pink shape with the tiny eyes of gold. That looked and knew. That laid the claim. They were not animals. It would seem easy, almost obvious, to fall into mythology. I began seeing in the axolotls a metamorphosis which did not succeed in revoking a mysterious humanity. I imagined them aware, slaves of their bodies, condemned infinitely to the silence of the abyss, to a hopeless meditation. Their blind gaze, the diminutive gold disc without expression and nonetheless terribly shining, went through me like a message: "Save us, save us." I caught myself mumbling words of advice, conveying childish hopes. They continued to look at me, immobile; from time to time the rosy branches of the gills stiffened. In that instant I felt a muted pain; perhaps they were seeing me, attracting my strength to penetrate into the impenetrable thing of their lives. They were not human beings, but I had found in no animal such a profound relation with myself. The axolotls were like witnesses of something, and at times like horrible judges. I felt ignoble in front of them; there was such a terrifying purity in those transparent eyes. They were larvas, but larva means disguise and also phantom. Behind those Aztec faces, without expression but of an implacable cruelty, what semblance was awaiting its hour? I was afraid of them. I think that had it not been for feeling the proximity of other visitors and the guard, I would not have been bold enough to remain alone with them. "You eat them alive with your eyes, hey," the guard said, laughing; he likely thought I was a little cracked. What he didn't notice was that it was they devouring me slowly with their eyes, in a cannibalism of gold. At any distance from the aquarium, I had only to think of them, it was as though I were being affected from a distance. It got to the point that I was going every day, and at night I thought of them immobile in the darkness, slowly putting a hand out which immediately encountered another. Perhaps their eyes could see in the dead of night, and for them the day continued indefinitely. The eyes of axolotls have no lids. I know now that there was nothing strange, that that had to occur. Leaning over in front of the tank each morning, the recognition was greater. They were suffering, every fiber of my body reached toward that stifled pain, that stiff torment at the bottom of the tank. They were lying in wait for something, a remote dominion destroyed, an age of liberty when the world had been that of the axolotls. Not possible that such a terrible expression which was attaining the overthrow of that forced blankness on their stone faces should carry

any message other than one of pain, proof of that eternal sentence, of that liquid hell they were undergoing. Hopelessly, I wanted to prove to myself that my own sensibility was projecting a nonexistent consciousness upon the axolotl. They and I knew. So there was nothing strange in what happened. My face was pressed against the glass of the aquarium, my eyes were attempting once more to penetrate the mystery of those eyes of gold without iris, without pupil. I saw from very close up the face of an axolotl immobile next to the glass. No transition and no surprise, I saw my face against the glass, I saw it on the outside of the tank, I saw it on the other side of the glass. Then my face drew back and I understood. Only one thing was strange: to go on thinking as usual, to know. To realize that was, for the first moment, like the horror of a man buried alive awaking to his fate. Outside, my face came close to the glass again, I saw my mouth, the lips compressed with the effort of understanding the axolotls. I was an axolotl and now I knew instantly that no understanding was possible. He was outside the aquarium, his thinking was a thinking outside the tank. Recognizing him, being him himself, I was an axolotl and in my world. The horror began I learned in the same moment of believing myself prisoner in the body of an axolotl, metamorphosed into him with my human mind intact, buried alive in an axolotl, condemned to move lucidly among unconscious creatures. But that stopped when a foot just grazed my face, when I moved just a little to one side and saw an axolotl next to me who was looking at me, and understood that he knew also, no communication possible, but very clearly. Or I was also in him, or all of us were thinking humanlike, incapable of expression, limited to the golden splendor of our eyes looking at the face of the man pressed against the aquarium. He returned many times, but he comes less often now. Weeks pass without his showing up. I saw him yesterday; he looked at me for a long time and left briskly. It seemed to me that he was not so much interested in us any more, that he was coming out of habit. Since the only thing I do is think, I could think about him a lot. It occurs to me that at the beginning we continued to communicate, that he felt more than ever one with the mystery which was claiming him. But the bridges were broken between him and me, because what was his obsession is now an axolotl, alien to his human life. I think that at the beginning I was capable of returning to him in a certain way, only in a certain way and of keeping awake his desire to know us better. I am an axolotl for good now, and if I think like a man it's only because every axolotl thinks like a man inside his rosy stone semblance. I believe that all this succeeded in communicating something to him in those first days, when I was still he. And in this final solitude to which he no longer comes, I console myself by thinking that perhaps he is going to write a story about us, that, believing he's making up a story, he's going to write all this about axolotls.

Ostrvo

podne

Kad je prvi put ugledao ostrvo, Marini je bio utivo pognut nad seditima sa leve strane; nametao je plastino postolje da na njega postavi posluavnik sa rukom. Putnica ga je ve vie puta zagledala, dok se on udaljavao i opet vraao, nosei asopise ili ae sa viskijem. Marini se ba zaustavio i nametao postolje, pitajui se u dosadi da li vredi odgovoriti na uporni pogled putnice, jedne od mnogih Amerikanki, kada je u jajasto plavetnilo prozoreta upala obala ostrva, zlatna rojta plae, breuljci koji su se uzdizali sa puste zaravni. Nametajui loe stavljenu pivsku au, Marini se nasmeio putnici. Grka ostrva, ree. Oh, yes, Greece, odgovori Amerikanka toboe zainteresovana. Kratko odjeknu zvuk zvona i stjuard se uspravi, zadravajui profesionalni osmeh na svojim finim usnama. Zatim je priao da uslui neki sirijski brani par koji je traio sok od paradajza, ali je ipak u repu aviona priutio sebi nekoliko asaka, zaustavio se i pogledao nanie. Ostrvo je bilo malo i usamljeno, a Egejsko more ga je opasivalo postojanim plavetnilom okrunjenim zaslepljujuim obodom poput okamenjene beline, to je tamo dole mogla biti pena koja se lomila o koralne sprudove i morske zatone. Marini opazi da se pusta ala proteu du severa i zapada: ostalo je bila planina koja se strmo sputala u more. Krevito i pusto ostrvo, mada je olovnosiva mrlja uz severni al mogla biti kua, a moda i grupa primitivnih kua. Poe da otvara konzervu soka i kada se ispravio, ostrvo je nestalo iz prozora; ostalo je samo more, beskrajno zeleno obzorje. Ne znajui zbog ega, pogledao je na sat; bilo je tano podne. Marini je voleo to mu je dodeljena linija Rim-Teheran, jer je putovanje bilo manje sumorno od severnih linija, a devojke su uvek izgledale srene to idu na istok ili to e upoznati Italiju. etiri dana kasnije, priskaui u pomo jednom deaku koji je izgubio kaiku i neuteno pokazivao svoj tanjir sa slatkiem, po drugi put je prepoznao rub ostrva. Razlika u vremenu je bila nekih osam minuta, ali kada se nagnuo nad jedan od repnih prozora, nije bilo nikakve sumnje: ostrvo je imalo nekakav nezamenjiv oblik, poput kornjae koja se jedva izvlai iz vode. Posmatrao ga je sve dok ga nisu pozvali, uveren da sivkasta mrlja predstavlja grupu kua. Uspeo je da razazna glavne poteze nekoliko obraenih zaravni koje su dopirale do plae. Prilikom uzletanja iz Bejruta, pogledao je u stjuardesin atlas elei da sazna da li bi to ostrvo moglo da bude Horos. Radio-telgrafist, neki nezainteresovani Francuz, bio je iznenaen njegovom znatieljom. Sva ostrva meusobno lie; ve dve godine sam na ovoj liniji i vrlo malo za njih marim. Da, pokai mi ga sledei put. Nije to bio Horos nego Ksiros, jedno od mnogih ostrva po strani od turistikih puteva. Nee proi ni pet godina, rekla mu je stjuardesa uz pie u Rimu. Ako misli da ide, pouri, horde e tamo stii svakog asa, Dingis Kuk vreba. Marini je,

meutim, nastavio da misli o ostrvu, posmatrajui ga uvek kada je to mogao se bi da priuti, ili kad bi se naao pokraj prozora, gotovo uvek na kraju sleui ramenima. Nita od toga nije imalo smisla; preletanje Ksirosa tri puta nedeljno, u podne, bilo je toliko nestvarno kao san da se tri puta nedeljno u podne prelee Ksiros. Sve je bilo izoblieno u toj beskorisnoj, izmiuoj predstavi; osim, moda, elje da se ona ponovi, osim prepodnevnog gledanja na sat, kratkog i bolnog dodira sa zaslepljujuom belom rojtom na ivici gotovo crnog plavetnila i sa kuama, dok su ribari jedva dizali oi da pogledom otprate promicanje ove druge nestvarnosti. Osam ili devet nedelja kasnije, kada su mu predloili liniju za Njujork, uza sve pogodnosti, Marini je rekao sebi da je to prilika da raskrsti sa ovom nedunom i dosadnom manijom. U depu mu je bila knjiga u kojoj je nekakav geograf istonjakog imena iznosio mnogo vie pojedinosti o Ksirosu nego to je uobiajeno u turistikim vodiima. Odbio je ponudu, sluajui svoje rei kao iz daljine, i poto je umakao sablanjivoj zapanjenosti jednog efa i dve sekretarice, otiao je da jede u kantini kompanije, gde ga je ekala Karla. Njena zbunjenost i razoarenje nisu ga uznemirili; juna obala Ksirosa je nenastanjena, ali su na zapadnoj strani preiveli tragovi lidijske ili moda kritsko-mikenske kolonije, a profesor Goldman je bio pronaao dva glaana kamena s hijeroglifima koje su ribari koristili kao potporne stubove malog mola. Karlu je bolela glava i ubrzo je otila; hobotnice su glavni izvor ivota aice stanovnika, svakog petog dana dolazi brodi da ukrca ulov i da ostavi neto namirnica i robe. U putnikoj agenciji su mu rekli da e morati da zakupi posebnu lau od Rinosa, a moda se moe putovati i trabalukom koja prikuplja ulov hobotnica, ali e o ovom drugom nainu moi da se obavesti jedino kada bude na Rinosu, na kome agencija nema predstavnika. U svakom sluaju, ideja da nekoliko dana provede na ostrvu bila je u planu tek za junski odmor; tokom narednih nedelja morao je da zameni Vajta na liniji za Tunis, a onda je poeo neki trajk i Karla je otila kod svojih sestara u Palermo. Marini se nastanio u jednom hotelu blizu Pjaca Navone, gde je od davnina bilo knjiara; zamajavao se, bez mnogo volje, traei knjige o Grkoj, povremeno je prelistavao prirunik za konzervaciju na grkom jeziku. Dopadala mu se re kalimera, koju je u jednom kabareu isprobao s crvenokosom devojkom, docnije je spavao s njom, govorila mu je o svom dedi na Odosu i o nekim neobjanjivim tegobama u grlu. U Rimu je poela da pada kia, u Bejrutu ga je uvek ekala Tanja, bilo je i drugih pria, uvek roaci ili tegobe; a jednog dana opet linija za Teheran i ostrvo u podne. Marini se toliko dugo zadrao pokraj prozora da ga je nova stjuardesa procenila kao osobenjaka i premila mu je da nosi itav niz postavljenih posluavnika. Marini je te noi pozvao stjuardesu da zajedno veeraju u Firouzu i nije trebalo mnogo truda da mu prepodnevna rasejanost bude oprotena. Lusija mu je savetovala da se podia po ameriki; on joj je na asak govorio o Ksirosu, ali je potom uvideo da ona vie voli

hiltonsku votku s limunom. Tako je vreme proticalo u beskrajnim posluavnicima s jelom, uz osmeh na koji je putnik imao pravo. Avion je na povratku preletao Ksiros u osam ujutru; sunce je jarko sijalo u prozore s leve strane i doputalo da se tek nazre pozlaena kornjaa; Marini je radije ekao podne prilikom leta u odlasku, znajui da tada moe da provede jedan dugi minut uz prozor, dok bi Lusija (a zatim Felisa) pomalo ironino obavljala svoj posao. Jednom je fotografisao Ksiros, ali je slika ispala mutna; ve je znao neke pojedinosti o ostrvu, u nekoliko knjiga je bio podvukao retke komentare. Felisa mu je ispriala da su ga piloti prozvali ludak za ostrvom. Nije se naljutio. Karla mu je najzad napisala da je odluila da ne rodi i Marini joj je poslao dve novanice uz pomisao da mu ostatak nee biti dovoljan za odmor. Karla je primila novac i stavila mu do znanja, preko neke prijateljice, da e se verovatno udati za jednog zubara iz Treviza. Sve je tako malo znailo u podne ponedeljkom, etvrtkom i subotom (i dva puta meseno nedeljom).

Vremenom je shvatio da ga jedino Felisa donekle razume; postojao je preutni dogovor da se ona u podne pobrine oko putnika, im bi se on priljubio uz prozor u repu. Ostrvo se videlo tek nekoliko minuta, ali je vazduh uvek bio tako prozraan i more je tako potanko i okrutno ocrtavalo otro da su se i najmanje pojedinosti neumitno uklapale u seanje sa prethodnih putovanja; zelena mrlja severnog uzvienja, olovnosive kue, mree koje se sue na pesku. Kada nije bilo mrea, Marini je to doivljavao kao neko osiromaenje, gotovo kao uvredu. Palo mu je na pamet da kamerom snimi promicanje ostrva, da bi sliku ponovio u hotelu, ali je vie voleo da umesto za kameru novac pritedi za odmor, do koga je preostalo samo mesec dana. Nije vodio suvie rauna o danima; ponekad bee Tanja u Bejrutu, ponekad Felisa u Teheranu, gotovo uvek njegovm mlai brat u Rimu, sve to pomalo maglovito, ljubazno, lako i srdano i kao u zamenu za neto, da popuni sate pre i posle leta; za vreme leta sve je takoe bilo maglovito, lako i glupo, sve do onog asa kada bi odlazio u rep i priljubljivao se uz prozor, oseajui hladnou stakla kao ivicu akvarijuma u kome se sporo mie pozlaena kornjaa sred debelog plavetnila. Tog dana su se mree jasno ocrtavale na pesku i Marini se mogao zakleti da je crna taka s leve strane, uza samo more, bio ribar koji zacelo gleda u avion. Kalimera, proe mu odnekud kroz glavu. Vie nije imalo smisla da i dalje eka, Mario Merolis bi mu pozajmio novac za putovanje i za nepuna tri dana bi bio na Ksirosu. Nasmeio se, usana pripijenih uz staklo, mislei kako e se uspuzati do zelene mrlje, kako e go zaroniti u more severnih zaliva, kako e s metanima loviti sipe, sporazumevajui se mimikom i osmesima. Konano se odluio, a posle nita nije bilo teko: noni voz, prva laa, zatim jo jedna stara, prljava laa, iskrcavanje na Rinosu,

beskrajno cenkanje sa kapetanom trabakule, no na komandnom mostu, zurenje u zvezde, ukus anisa i loja, svitanje meu ostrvljem. Iskrcao se im je svanulo. Kapetan ga je predstavio jednom starcu koji je zacelo bio glava porodice. Klajos ga je uzeo za levu ruku i polako govorio, gledajui mu u oi. Dola su dva deaka i Marini je shvatio da su to Klajosovi sinovi. Kapetan trabakule je iscrpeo svoj engleski: dvadeset itelja, sipe, ribarenje, pet kua, Italijan platiti Klajos smetaj. Deaci su se smejali kad je Klajos pogaao drahme; smejao se i Marini, ve prijatelj najmlaih, dok je gledao kako se sunce pomalja iz mora svetlijeg od noi; jedna siromana i ista soba, krag s vodom, miris alfije i tavljene koe.

Ostavili su ga samog da bi natovarili trabakulu. Poto je na brzinu skinuo putnu odeu i obukao pantalone za plau i sandale, krenuo je ostrvom. Jo nikoga nije video, sunce je polako osvajalo, a od ipraga se dizao pomalo otar, poseban miris, pomean sa jodom i noen vetrom. Moralo je biti oko deset kada je dospeo do litice na severnoj strani i prepoznao najvei zaliv. Vie je voleo da ostane sam, mada bi se radije kupao na peanoj plai; ostrvo ga je zaokupljalo i on je u njemu uivao tako znalaki da je gubio mo rasuivanja ili poreenja. Sunce i vetar su mu prili kou kada se svukao da sa jedne stene skoi u more; voda je bila hladna i godila mu je, prepustio se da ga prepredene struje nose do ulaza u jednu pilju, a zatim je isplivao na otvoreno more i izvrnuo se na lea. Sve je to pomirljivo prihvatio znajui da prihvata svoju budunost. Pouzdano je znao da nee otii sa ostrva i da e na neki nain zauvek ostati na njemu. Uspeo je da zamisli svog brata, Felisu, zraze njihovih lica, kada budu saznali da je ostao da ivi od ribarenja na nekoj samotnoj hridi. Kada se okrenuo i zaplivao kao obali, ve ih je bio zaboravio.

Sunce ga je odmah osuilo, potom se spustio do kue gde su ga dve ene posmatrale u udu pre no to su potrale i zatvorile se u kuu. Pozdravio je u prazno i siao do mree. Jedan od Klajosovih sinova ekao ga je na plai i Marini mu je pokazao znakom na more, pozivajui ga. Deko je oklevao, pokazujui svoje platnene pantalone i crvenu koulju. Zatim je otrao do jedne kue i vratio se skoro sasvim nag; zajedno su se bacili u gotovo mlako more, koje je bljetalo pod suncem u jedanaest.

Suei se na pesku, Jonas poe da imenuje stvari. Kalimera, ree Marini, a malian se zasmeja toliko da se presamitio. Onda je Marini ponovio nove izraze, nauio Jonasa italijanskim reima. Trabakula se sve vie smanjivala na obzorju. Marini oseti da je sada zaista sam na ostrvu sa Klajosom i njegovima. Pustie da protekne nekoliko dana, platie smetaj i nauie da lovi ribu; jedne veeri, kada ga ve dobro upoznaju, kazae im da eli

da ostane i da radi sa njima. Pruio je Jonasu ruku dok se dizao i lagano se uputio ka breuljku. Padina je bila strma i on se verao na svaku uzvisinu, osvrui se tu i tamo da pogleda mree na plai i siluete ena koje su ivo razgovarale sa Jonasom i Klajosom, pogledujui ga kradomice i smejui se. Kada je stigao do zelene mrlje, stupio je u neki svet gde se miris majine duice i alfije meao sa vatrom sunca i morskim povetarcem. Marini je pogledao u svoj sat, a zatim ga, nestrpljivim pokretom, strgao sa zgloba i stavio u dep. Nee biti lako ubiti strarog oveka, ali je tu, na uzvisini, napet od sunca i prostranstva, osetio da je i to bilo mogue. Bio je na Ksirosu, bio je tamo gde je toliko puta posumnjao da ikada moe dospeti. Svalio se na lea izmeu toplog kamenja, naslonio rebra i opaljenu kou i gledao pravo u nebo; izdaleka je doprlo do njega zujanje motora. Sklapajui oi, rekao je sebi da nee gledati u avion, da nee dopustiti da ga okalja onaj najgori deo njega samoga to e jo jednom preleteti preko ostrva. Ali je u polutami kapaka zamislio Felisu kako ba u tom trenutku postavlja posluavnike, i svog zamenika, moda ora ili nekog novog s druge linije, nekog ko e se takoe smeiti dok bude pruao boce vina ili kafu. Nemoan da se izbori protiv toliko prolosti, otvorio je oi i uspravio se, istog trenutka spazivi kako se desno krilo aviona, skoro nad njegovom glavom, neobanjivo naginje, zauo je promenu zvuka turbina i video gotovo vertikalni pad u more. Svom brzinom sjurio se niz breuljak, udarajui o stene i ranjavajui ruke o trnje. Ostrvo mu je zaklanjalo mesto gde je avion pao, ali je pre nego to je dospeo na plau skrenuo jednom nesluenom preicom i probio se preko prvog ogranka padine da bi izbio na najmanju plau. Na nekih stotinak metara odatle tonuo je rep aviona u potpunoj tiini. Marini se po nagonu bacio u vodu, jo se nadajui da e avion ponovo isplivati; ali se nije videlo nita sem gipke linije talasa, jedne kartonske kutije koja je besmisleno plutala blizu mesta pada i, gotovo na kraju, kada dalje plivanje vie nije imalo smisla, pojavila se na asak jedna ruka iz vode, to ga je navelo da pomeni smer i da zaroni. Dograbio je za kosu oveka koji se borio da ga epa i koji je, krkljajui, gutao vazduh to mu je Marini omoguavao da udahne, ne primiui mu se suvie. Dovukao ga je do obale, uzeo na ruke telo u beloj odei i, polaui ga na pesak, pogledao lice obliveno belom penom gde se smrt ve ukotvila, a krv liptala iz ogromne rane na vratu. Nita nije vredelo vetako disanje, jer je pri svakom gru izgledalo da se rana jo vie iri, nalik nekim odvratnim ustima koja su zvala Marinija, vukla ga prema njegovoj maloj srei za to malo sati na ostrvu i dovikivala mu usred krkljanja neto to on vie nije mogao da uje. Dojurili su Klajosovi sinovi, a za njima i ene. Kada je stigao Klajos, deaci su okruili telo oprueno na pesku, ne shvatajui otkuda mu toliko snage da dopliva do obale i da se, krvarei, izvue na pesak. Sklopite mu oi, plaui je molila jedna ena. Klajos je gledao ka moru, traei pogledom jednog preivelog. Ali, kao i uvek, bili su sami na ostrvu, a le otvorenih oiju

bee jedina pridolica meu njima.