Three Arched Bridge Read online

  Copyright © 1993, 2011 by Librairie Artheme Fayard

  English-language translation copyright © 1997, 2011 by Arcade Publishing, Inc.

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Arcade Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

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  10 9876543 2 1

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

  ISBN: 978-1-61145-591-5

  ALSO BY ISMAIL KADARE

  The Concert

  Elegy for Kosovo

  The File on H.

  The Palace of Dreams

  The Pyramid

  Spring Flowers, Spring Frost

  The Successor

  O tremble, bridge of stone,

  As I tremble in this tomb!

  (Ballad of the Immured)

  1

  I THE MONK GJON, the sonne of Gjotg Ukcatna, knowynge that ther is no thynge wryttene in owre tonge about the Brigge of the Ujana e Keqe, have decided to write its story, especially when legends, false tales, and rumors of every kind continue to be woven around it, now that its construction is finished and it has even twice been sprinkled with blood, at pier and parapet.

  Late last Sunday night, when I had gone out to walk on the sandbank, I saw the idiot Gjelosh Uk-Markaj walking on the bridge, He was laughing to himself, guffawing, and making crazy signs with his hands. The shadows of his limbs pranced over the spine of the bridge, stretching down past the arches to the waten I struggled to imagine how all these recent events might have imprinted themselves on his disordered mind, and I told myself how foolish people are to laugh whenever they see him crossing the bridge, bellowing and waving his arms, thinking he is riding a horse. In fact, what people know about this bridge is no less confused than the inventions of the mind of a madman.

  To stop them spreading truths and untruths about this bridge in the eleven languages of the peninsula, I will attempt to write the whole truth about it: in other words, to record the lie we saw and the truth we did not see and to put down both the daily events that are as ordinary as stones and also the major horrors, which are about as many in number as the arches of the bridge,

  Muleteers and caravans are now spreading all over the great land of the Balkans the legend of the sacrifice allegedly performed at the piers of the bridge. Few people know that this was not a sacrifice dedicated to the naiads of the waters but just an ordinary crime, to which 1 will bear witness among other things before our millennium. I say millennium, because this is one of those legends that survives for more than a thousand years. It begins in death and ends in death and we know that news of death or rumor leavened by the yeast of death is the least likely thing of all to fear death itself.

  I write this chronicle in haste, because times are troubled, and the future looks blacker than ever before. After the chilling events at the bridge, people and the times have calmed down a little, but another evil has appeared on the horizon — the Turkish state. The shadows of its minarets are slowly falling over us.

  This is an ominous peace, worse than any war. For centuries we had been neighbors with the ancient land of the Greeks; then suddenly, insensibly, by subterfuge, and as if in a bad dream, we awoke one morning to find ourselves neighbors of the Empire of the Ottomans.

  The forest of its minarets grows darker on all sides, I have a premonition that the destiny of Arberia will soon change^ especially after what happened this winter,, when blood was shed for the second time on the newly finished bridge — this time Asiatic blood, But everything will find its place in my chronicle.

  2

  AT THE BEGINNING OF MARCH in the year 1377, on the right bank of the Ujana e Keqe, no more than fifty paces from the stakes half-embedded in the ground to whose iron cleats the raft that traversed the river was moored every night, a traveler whom nobody in this district knew fell in an epileptic fit, The ferryman, who had seen everything with his own eyes, said that this unknown vagrant of half-saintly and half-crazy appearance, after wandering along the riverbank for a stretch between the jetty and the spot where the river is fordable in summer, gave out a sudden shriek as if his throat were cut and fell face down in the mud.

  Even though this was the spot on the bank where people and livestock crossed the river by raft, it was still a mere backwater, unused to sensational events. Of course such things had happened, as at every river crossing, and especially such a crossing as this, where the ever-changing but ever-constant waters of the river suddenly cut across the ancient highway, which was of such great length that nobody knew where it came from. Yet such events had been rare. Usually, people who gathered to cross the river simply waited as people do at such times, in silence. In bad weather, wrapped in sodden black skins, they mutely watched the swirling, dun-colored waters of the river. Even the harness bells of the horses alongside them had a muffled sound, as did the voices of the small children, who would grow increasingly distressed by the appearance of the raft as it approached, with its hunchbacked ferryman.

  A kind of wilderness stretched all around; the low riverbank, sometimes sandy, sometimes muddy, receded into the distance, patched here and there with reeds. There was not the smallest house to be seen; even the walls of our presbytery were not visible, while the nearest inn was some thousand paces off.

  There was a metal plaque by the stakes where the raft was moored at night, on which the words “Boats and Rafts” were inscribed in crooked lettering. For many years since such plaques had been put up everywhere, not only in the lands of our own liege lord, Count Stres of the Gjikas, or Stres Gjikondi, as they call him for short, but also far away, even beyond the borders of the state of Arberia, in other parts of the peninsula. This had started in the winter of the year 1367, ten years earlier, when all the rafts used as ferries across rivers, estuaries, and lakes were bought up by a peculiar person who came from God knows where, and whose name nobody knows. They even say that he has no name apart from the phrase “Boats and Rafts,” which has sprouted up everywhere like a plant that takes root wherever there is water and moisture. They say that he has the same plaque with the same words even at the great house from which he manages his affairs, and that he even signs the documents of court accounts “ Boats and Rafts, almost as if the words were his emblem, just as a white lion with a flaming torch between its teeth is the emblem of our own liege lord.

  After this new master bought the rafts and boats, the ferrymen and boatmen became his employees, apart from the odd rare exception such as the wretched ferryman at the Stream of the Tree Stumps, who would have starved sooner than accept a wage from this damned Jew. Just after the winter of 1367’, this metal plaque appeared on our riverbank too, with the tolls for crossing inscribed on it: “For persons, one-half grosh; for horses, one grosh.”

  In times of droughty when the Ujana e Keqe subsided and ran low, travelers, even when laden with sacks, would cross the river on foot, ford or no ford, to avoid paying the toll But they were n
ot uncommonly drowned, deceived by the river, which was not for nothing called Ujana e Keqe, “Wicked Waters.” Weather-blackened memorial crosses were still visible on both sides of the river. They say that the owners of “Boats and Rafts” were careful to affix such crosses on the bank for every person drowned, with the aim of reminding other travelers what trying to cross the river without the aid of “ Boats and Rafts” might mean.

  Together with the raft, “Boats and Rafts” also bought the old jetty, a relic of Roman times. Blacksmiths had repaired after a fashion its bent iron cleats, so that the ferryman could tie his hawser more easily, especially in winter.

  The raft brought in large earnings, not only from the passage of men and livestock but from the caravans that carried from Arberia to Macedonia the salt from the great coastal salt pans and especially from the carts that supplied the Byzantine naval base at Orikum near Vlore. There had been detailed agreements dividing this income between our liege lord and “Boats and Rafts.” In fact there had never been the least hint of a quarrel over this pointy a rare thing on the face of this earth, It seems that “Boats and Rafts” was always reliable down to the last penny.

  3

  ASMALL CROWD OF PEOPLE, both familiar faces and strangers, had gathered round the man who had fallen in a fit, He shook and foamed, as if straining to thrust his limbs right across the Ujana e Keqe, while stretching his neck in the opposite direction. Someone tried two or three times to hold his head, as they usually do in such cases, so that he would not crack his skull in his convulsions, but it was impossible to hold still that half-bald cranium,

  “It is a sign from on high,” said one of the bystanders. This was a thin man who, when we later asked what his business was, said he was a wandering fortune-teller,

  “And what sort of sign is it?” someone else asked.

  The man’s blank eyes gazed at the trembling victim, then at the surface of the river,

  “Yes,” he muttered. “A sign from on high, Look how his movements span the waters, and the waters pass on their movements to him. My God, they understand each other.”

  Those standing around looked at each other. The man on the ground seemed somewhat calmer now. Someone was holding his head,

  “And what sort of sign is it, in your opinion?” someone asked again.

  The man who said he was a wandering fortune-teller half closed his lifeless eyes.

  “It is a sign from the Almighty that a bridge should be built here, over these waters,”

  “Abridge?”

  “Didn’t you see how he stretched his arms in the direction of the river? And that his body shook, just as a bridge shakes when a number of carts pass over it together?”

  “Brr … It’s cold,’ someone said.

  The sick man was quiet now’ his limbs only occasionally twitching in their last spasms, as if they had wound down. Someone bent over and wiped the foam from the edges of his lips. His eyes were desolate and dull

  “This is a holy sickness,” the fortune-teller said. “In our parts, they call it the foaming. It always comes as a sign. The sign can portend evil and warn of an earthquake, for instance, but this time, praise God, the omen was a favorable one.”

  “A bridge … this is strange,” the people standing about started saying. “Our liege lord must be told of this.” “Who is the lord of these parts?” “Count Stres of the Gjikas, long life to him. Are you a foreigner then, not knowing a thing like that?” “That’s right, brother, from abroad. I was waiting for the raft when that wretch …” “This must certainly reach the ear of our liege lord. Well, a bridge? To be honest, we would never have thought of such a thing!”

  4

  THREE WEEKS LATER I was summoned urgently to the count. His great house, fortified at every corner with turrets, was only one hour’s journey away. When I arrived, they told me to go straight up to the armorial hall, where our liege lord usually received princes and other nobles whose journeys brought them through his lands.

  In the hall were the count, one of his scribes, our bishop, and two unknown houseguests dressed in tight-fitting jerkins, in fashion who knows where.

  The count looked annoyed. His eyes were bloodshot for lack of sleep, and 1 remembered that his only daughter had recently fallen ill. No doubt the two strangers were doctors, come from who knew where*

  “I can’t get through to them at all,” he said as soon as I entered. “You know lots of languages. Maybe you can help.”

  The new arrivals did indeed speak the most horrible tongue. My ears had never heard such a babble. Slowly I began to untangle the strands. I noticed that their numbers were Latin and their verbs generally Greek or Slav, while they used Albanian for the names of things, and now and then a word of German, They used no adjectives,

  With difficulty 1 began to grasp what they were trying to say. They had both been sent by their master to our liege lord, the count of the Gjikas, with a particular mission. They had heard of the sign sent by the Almighty for the construction of a bridge over the Ujana e Keqe, and they were prepared to build it — or in other words he, their master, was — if the count would give them permission. In short, they were prepared to build a stone bridge over the Ujana e Keqe within a period of two years, to buy the land where it would stand, and to pay the count a regular annual tax on the profits they would earn from it. If the count agreed, this would all be laid down in a detailed agreement (item by item and point by point, as they put it) that would be signed by both sides and confirmed with their seals.

  They broke off their speech to produce their seal, which one of them drew from inside his strange jerkin.

  “We must heed the sign of the Almighty,” they said, almost in one voice.

  The count, with weary, bloodshot eyes, looked first at the bishop and then at his own secretary. But their gaze appeared somewhat blurred by this mystery.

  “And who is this master of yours?” our liege lord asked.

  They started off again with a tangle of words, but the threads were this time so snagged that it took me twice as long to comb them out. They explained that their master was neither a duke, nor a baron, nor a prince, but was a rich man who had recently bought the old bitumen mines abandoned since the time of the Romans, and had also bought the larger part of the equally ancient great highway, which he intended to repair. He has no title, they said, but he has money.

  Interrupting each other, they noted down on a piece of paper the sums they would give to buy the land and the sum of the annual tax for the use of the bridge.

  “But the main thing is that the sign sent by the Almighty must be obeyed,” one of them said.

  The sums noted on the paper were fabulous, and everyone knew that our liege lord’s revenue had recently declined. Moreover, his daughter had been ill for two months, and the doctors could not diagnose her malady.

  Our liege lord and the bishop repeatedly caught each other’s eye. The count’s thoughts were clearly wandering from his empty exchequer to his sick daughter, and the bridge these strangers were offering was the sole remedy for both.

  They started talking again about the heavenly message conveyed by the vagrant. In our parts, they call that wretch’s ailment moon-sickness, one of them explained, whereas here, as far as I can gather, it is called earth-sickness. However, it is virtually one and the same. These very names show clearly that everywhere they consider it a superior disorder, or divine, as one might say.

  Our count did not think matters over for long. He said that he accepted the agreement, and gave the order to his scribe to put it down in writing, in Albanian and Latin. He then invited us all for luncheon. It was the most bitter luncheon I have ever eaten in my life, and this was because of the houseguests, whose speech became more and more tangled, while I had to unravel it for hours on end.

  5

  IN THE AFTERNOON I had the misfortune to accompany the strangers as far as the bank of the Ujana, I consoled myself that I was at least not obliged to translate the confusion that issued from th
eir mouths. This road bad because non maintain, mess complete. Water smooth itself, road non, routen need work, we has no tales, has instruct, we fast money, give, take. Water different, boat move itself graciosus, but vdrug many drown, bye-bye, sto dhjavolos, Funebrum, he, he, road no, road sehr guten but need gut repair…

  Fortunately, now and then they shut their mouths. They followed with their eyes the flight of the thrushes. Then’ seeing the granaries^ they asked about the quantity of wheat and the cattle that were taken to market and the route they took

  I noticed that as we drew nearer to the river, not only their desire to talk but their spirits declined precipitously As they waited for the raft that was to carry them across, they did not conceal their terror of the waters, This was evident from their faces’ without their saying,

  Dusk was falling when they finally left. I stared after them from the bank for a short while. They were explaining something to each other,, making all kinds of hand signs and pointing to each bank of the river in turn. It was cold. In the fast-falling darkness, they looked from a distance like a few black lines scrawled on the raft, as mysterious and incomprehensible as their inhuman gabble. And suddenly, as I watched them disappear^ a suspicion crept into my mind, like a black beetle: the man who had fallen in a fit on the riverbank, the wandering fortuneteller who had been close by him, and these two clerks with their tight jerkins were in the service and pay of the same master,…

  6

  AS EXPECTED, the news of the bridge to be built over the Ujana e Keqe spread rapidly. Bridges had been built now and then in all sorts of places, but nobody remembered any of them causing so much commotion. They had been built almost in silence, with a noise of tools to which the ear became accustomed^ because it scarcely differed from the monotonous croaking of the nearby frogs. Then’ when they were finished., they did their duty in similar obscurity until they were carried away by high water, were struck by lightnings or still worse, until they decayed to the point that a traveler, having taken a first step on the rotten planks, would stand hesitating to take a second, and turn back in search of a nearby raft or ford by which to cross, This was because all these had been wooden bridges’ while the one to be built would be a real bridge with piers and strong stone arches,, perhaps the first of its kind in the whole land of Arberia.