The Bridge on the Drina - PDFDrive.com Page 36

  schoolchildrentalkaboutit?'the hodja interruptedangrily.'Whathasthebridge

  todowiththeirwar?'

  'It has, Alihodja; it has very much to do with it,' said Branković, once again

  smiling.

  AndheexplainedtoAlihodjaamiablybutalittlecondescendingly,asifspeaking

  toachild,thatallthiswasprovidedforintherulesoftheservice,thatthiswas

  the duty of engineers and bridge-builders, and that in the Imperial Army

  everyone knew only his own job and did not concern himself in the affairs of

  someotherbranch.

  The hodja listened to him, listened and watched, but did not understand very much.Finally,hecouldnolongerholdhimselfin.

  'All that is very fine, my fine fellow, but do they know that this is a Vezir's bequest,builtforthegoodofhissoulandthegloryofGodandthatitisasinto

  takeevenastonefromit?'

  The sergeant-major only waved his hands, shrugged his shoulders, pursed his

  lipsandclosedhiseyes,sothathiswholefaceassumedacraftyandobsequious

  expression,unmoving,blind,deaf,suchasmencanonlyachievebylongyears

  ofpracticeinold-fashionedanddecayingadministrationsinwhichdiscretionhas

  long degenerated into insensibility and obedience into cowardice. A page of

  white unsullied paper is eloquent compared with the dumb caution of such a

  face. A moment later, the Emperor's man opened his eyes, let fall his hands,

  composedhisfaceandonceagainresumedhisusualappearanceofconfidence

  and serenity in which Viennese good-humour and Turkish courtesy met and

  mingled like two waters. Changing the subject and praising with well-chosen

  words the hodja's health and youthful appearance, he took his leave with the same inexhaustible amiability with which he had come. The hodja remained

  confusedanduncertaininhimselfbutinnowaylesstroubledthanhehadbeen

  before.Lostinhisthoughtshelookedoutfromhisshopattheshiningloveliness of that first day of March. Opposite him, a little to the side, stood the eternal bridge,everlastinglythesame;throughitswhitearchescouldbeseenthegreen,

  sparkling,tumultouswatersoftheDrina,sothattheyseemedlikesomestrange

  diademintwocolourswhichsparkledinthesun.

  XVIII

  The tension known to the outside world as 'the annexation crisis', which had

  thrown its ill-omened shadow over the bridge and the town beside it, rapidly

  subsided. Somewhere out there, by diplomacy and discussions between the

  interestedparties,apeacefulsolutionhadbeenfound.

  Thefrontier,alwayssoinflammable,foroncedidnotflareup.Thearmywhich

  hadfilledthetownandthefrontiervillagesinthefirstdaysofspringbeganto

  withdraw.Butasalwaysthechangeswhichthecrisishadbroughtremainedafter

  ithadpassed.Thepermanentgarrisoninthetownwasmuchlargerthanithad

  been before. The bridge remained mined. But no one gave it a thought except

  AlihodjaMutevelić.Thepieceoflandontheleftflankofthebridgeabovethe

  ancient retaining wall, which had been the town park, was taken over by the

  militaryauthorities.Thefruittreesinthecentreoftheparkwerecutdownanda

  fine building erected. That was the new officers' mess, for the former mess, a

  small one-storied building up at Bikavac, was now too small for the increased

  numberofofficers.Sothatnow,ontherightofthebridgewasLotte'shoteland

  onthelefttheofficers'mess,twowhitealmostidenticalbuildingsandbetween

  themthesquare,surroundedbyshopsand,onasmallriseabovethesquare,the

  great barracks which the people still called the Stone Han in memory of

  Mehmed Pasha's caravanserai which had once been there but had now

  disappearedwithouttrace.

  Prices,whichhadleaptupthepreviousautumnbecauseofthelargenumberof

  soldiers,remainedunchanged,withmuchgreaterlikelihoodoffurtherrisesthan

  ofreturningtotheirformerlevel.ThatyearaSerbianandaMoslembankwere

  opened.Thepeoplemadeuseofmoney-orderslikemedicines.Noweverybody

  incurreddebtsmorefreely.Butthemoremoneyamanhadthemoreheneeded.

  Onlytothosewhospentmorethantheygaineddidlifeseemeasyandgood.But

  the merchants and business men were worried. Terms of payment become

  shorterthanever.Goodandreliableeus-

  tomers were fewer and fewer. The number of articles

  whose price was higher than the people could afford to

  paywasevergreater.Businesswasonasmallscale,and

  cheaper and cheaper types of goods were in demand.

  Only bad payers bought freely. The only sure and safe

  business was army contracting or work for some

  government institution, but not everyone could get it.

  State taxes and municipal dues became larger and more

  numerous; the strictness of the collectors increased. One

  could feel from afar the unhealthy fluctuations of the

  exchanges.Theprofitswhicharosefromthemwentinto

  unseen hands, while the losses reached even the most

  remote corners of the monarchy and struck the retail

  traders,bothassellersandconsumers.

  Thegeneralfeelinginthetownwasneithermoreserene

  normorecalm.Thatsuddenslackeningoftensiondidnot

  resultinarealappeasementeitheramongtheSerbsorthe

  Moslems; it left to the first a concealed disillusionment,

  to the second distrust and fear of the future. The

  expectation of great events began to grow once more,

  withoutvisiblereasonordirectcause.Thepeoplehoped

  forsomethingorwereafraidofsomething(inactualfact

  some hoped while others feared) and looked on

  everything in the light of those hopes and fears. In a

  word, men's hearts were disturbed, even among the

  simple and illiterate, especially among the younger

  people, and no one was any longer satisfied with the

  monotonoussortoflifewhichhaddraggedonforyears.

  Everyone wanted more, asked for better or trembled in

  fearofworse.Theolderpeoplestillregrettedthat'sweet

  tranquillity'whichinTurkishtimeshadbeenregardedas

  themainaimofexistenceandthemostperfectexpression

  of public and private life, and which had still existed in

  thefirstdecadesoftheAustrianadministration.Butthere

  werefewofthese.Alltheothersdemandedananimated,

  noisy and exciting life. They wanted sensations or the

  echo of sensations or at least variety, noise and

  excitement which would give the illusion of sensation.

  Thatdesirechangednotonlythestateofmen'smindsbut

  eventheexternalappearanceofthetown.Eventhattime-

  honoured and established life on the kapia, that life of

  quietconversationandpeacefulmeditations,simplejokes

  and lovesick songs between the wa
ters, the sky and the

  mountains,begantochange.

  The coffee merchant obtained a gramophone, a clumsy

  wooden box with a big tin trumpet in the shape of a

  bright blue flower. His son changed the records and the

  needles and was continually winding this raucous

  contraption which echoed from both banks and made

  the kapia quiver.Hehadbeenforcedtogetitinordernot

  to be left behind by his competitors, for now

  gramophonescouldbe

  heard not only at meetings and in the reading rooms but even in the humblest

  cafés where the guests sat under a lime tree, on the grass or on brightly-lit

  balconies, and talked with few words and in low voices. Everywhere the

  gramophonegroundandchurnedoutTurkishmarches,Serbianpatrioticsongsor

  ariasfromVienneseoperettas,accordingtothetastesoftheguestsforwhomit

  played. For men would no longer go where there was neither noise, glitter nor

  movement.

  Newspapers were read avidly, but superficially and hastily; everyone looked onlyforthesensationalnewsprintedinlargetypeonthefrontpage.Therewere

  few who read the articles or the news in small type. All that took place was

  accompanied by clamour and the brilliance of big words. The younger people

  did not think that they had lived that day if by the evening their ears were not singingortheireyeshadnotbeendazzledbywhattheyhadheardorseeninthe

  courseoftheday.

  The agas and eSendis of the town came to the kapia, serious and outwardly indifferent, to listen to the latest news about the Turco-Italian war in Tripoli.

  Theylistenedavidlytoallthatwaswritteninthepapersabouttheheroicyoung

  Turkishmajor,EnverBey,whobeattheItaliansanddefendedtheSultan'slands

  likeadescendantoftheSokollisortheKuprulus.Theyfrownedattheraucous

  musicofthegramophone,whichpreventedtheirthinking,and,withoutshowing

  it, trembled deeply and sincerely for the fate of the distant Turkish province in

  Africa.

  It chanced that just then Pietro the Italian, Maistor-Pero, returning from work

  clothed in his linen overall, white with stone-dust and stained with paint and

  turpentine, crossed the bridge. He had grown old and bent and even more

  humble and timid. As at the time when Lucchieni assassinated the Empress, it

  seemed, by some logic incomprehensible to him, that he was again guilty of

  something which his Italian fellow-countrymen, with whom for many years he

  hadhadnocontact,haddonesomewhereintheouterworld.OneoftheTurkish

  youthsshouted:

  'So you want Tripoli, you bastard! You there, I mean!' and made obscene

  gesturesathim.

  ButMaistor-Pero,bentandtired,withhistoolsunderhisarm,onlypulledhishat

  furtheroverhiseyes,feverishlybitonhispipestemandhurriedhometoMejdan.

  TherehisStanawaswaitingforhim.Shetoohadgrownolderandhadlostsome

  of her physical strength, but she was still a formidable and outspoken woman.

  HecomplainedbitterlytoherabouttheyoungTurkswhosaidthingstheyshould

  not have said and had asked him about Tripoli, which until a few days ago he

  hadnotevenknownexisted.ButStana,asalways,wouldnotunderstandhimor

  consolehim,butwentonsayingthatitwashehimselfwhowasatfaultandeven

  deservedtohaveinsultsshoutedathim.

  'Ifyouwerearealman,whichyouarenot,youwouldhavehittheiruglyphizzes

  withyourchiseloryourhammer.Thenthoseragamuffinswouldnoteventhink

  ofjeeringatyoubutwouldgettotheirfeetwhenyoucrossthebridge.'

  'Eh, Stana, Stana,' said Maistor-Pero good-humouredly and a little sadly, 'how

  couldamanhitanotherinthefacewithahammer?'

  So those years passed in a succession of greater or lesser sensations, or in the

  constant need of them. So it came to the autumn of 1912; then 1913 with the

  BalkanwarsandtheSerbianvictories.Byastrangeexception,justthesethings

  whichwereofsuchgreatimportancetothefateofthebridgeandthetownand

  allwholivedinitcamesilentlyandalmostunnoticed.

  Flushed with red at sunrise and sunset, golden at midday, the October days

  passed over the town, which was waiting for the maize crop and the new

  season'splumbrandy.Itwasstillpleasanttositonthe kapia inthenoondaysun.

  Time, it seemed, was holding its breath over the town. It was just then that it

  happened.

  Even before the literates in the town could find their way through the

  contradictory newspaper reports, the war between Turkey and the four Balkan

  States had already broken out and followed the well-worn paths across the

  Balkans.Beforethepeoplehadfullygraspedthesenseandimportofthiswarit

  was practically over as a result of the victories of the Serbian and Christian

  armies;allwasendedfarfromVišegrad,withoutfiresonthefrontiers,without

  the grumble of the guns and without heads on the kapia. As it had been with trade and money, so it was with those more important things also; everything

  happenedfarawayandunbelievablyquickly.Somewherefarawayintheworld

  thedicehadbeenthrown,thebattlesfought,anditwastherethatthefateofeach

  oneofthetownsfolkwasdecided.

  But if the outward appearance of the town remained peaceful and unchanged,

  these events stirred up in the minds of men whole tempests of the greatest

  enthusiasmandthedeepestdepression.Asinthecaseofeverythingelsethathad

  happened in the world m recent years, they were looked on in the town with

  diametrically opposed feelings by the Serbs and the Moslems; only in their

  intensity and depth were they perhaps equal. These events surpassed all the

  hopes of the one; all the fears of the others appeared justified. Those desires

  which for hundreds of years had flown before the slow pace of history could

  now no longer keep pace with it but outdistanced it by some fantastic flight

  alongtheroadtothemostdaringrealization.

  Everythingthatthetowncouldseeorfeeldirectlyofthatfatefulwartookplace incrediblysimplyandwiththeswiftnessofanarrow.

  At Uvce where the frontier between Austro-Hungary and Turkey followed the

  littleriverUvac,andwhereawoodenbridgeseparatedtheAustriangendarmerie

  barracksfromtheTurkishblockhouse,theTurkishofficerwithhissmallguard

  crossedtotheAustrianside.There,hebrokehisswordwithatheatricalgesture

  ontheparapetofthebridgeandsurrenderedtotheAustriangendarmes.Atthat

  momentthegrey-cladSerbianinfantrycamedownfromthehills.Theyreplaced

  the old-fashioned askers along the whole frontier between Bosnia and the

  Sanjak. The triangle between Austria, Turkey and Serbia disappeared. The

  Turkishfrontierwhi
chonlythedaybeforehadbeenaboutninemilesfromthe

  town was suddenly withdrawn more than 600 miles, somewhere far beyond

  Jedrene(Adrianople).

  Somanyandsuchimportantchanges,carriedoutinsoshortatime,shookthe

  towntoitsfoundations.

  For the bridge on the Drina this change was fateful. The railway link with

  Sarajevohad,aswehaveseen,reduceditsconnectionwiththeWestandnow,in

  amoment,itsconnectionwiththeEastalsoceased.InfacttheEast,whichhad

  createditandwhichhaduptothedaybeforestillbeenthere,greatlyshakenand

  weakened no doubt, but still as permanent and real as sky and land, had now

  vanishedlikeanapparition.Nowthebridgeinrealitynolongerlinkedanything

  savethetwopartsofthetownandthosedozenorsovillagesononeortheother

  sideoftheDrina.

  Thegreatstonebridgewhich,accordingtotheideasandthepiousintentionsof

  theGrandVezirfromSokolovići,wasmeanttolinkthetwopartsoftheEmpire,

  and 'for the love of God' make easier the passage from West to East and from

  East to West, was now in fact cut off from both East and West and abandoned

  likeastrandedshiporadesertedshrine.Forthreewholecenturiesithadendured

  and experienced everything and, unchanging, had truly served its purpose, but

  human needs had altered and world conditions changed; now its task had

  betrayedit.Byitssize,itssolidityanditsbeauty,armiesmightpassacrossitand

  caravansfollowoneanotherforcenturiestocome,butthus,bytheeternaland

  unforeseen play of human relations, the Vezir's bequest suddenly found itself

  abandonedand,asifbysomemagicspell,outsidethemainstreamoflife.The

  present role of the bridge in no way corresponded to its eternally young

  appearance and its gigantic but harmonious proportions. But it still stood the

  same as when the Grand Vezir had seen it in his inward vision behind closed eyes and as when his masons had built it; powerful, beautiful and enduring,

  beyondallpossibilityofchange.

  Itneededtime,itneededeffort,beforethetownspeopleunderstoodallthathas