BRUNO SCHULZ
75
ga lax ies of black stars and dust specks. Behind his back, without hi s
participation as it were, the great battle for the shop was being fought.
Oddly enough it was fought o n a painting hanging behind hi s head,
between the filin g ca binet and the mirror, in the bright circle of the
lamp li gh t.
It
was a magic painting, a tali sman , a riddle of a pi cture,
endless ly interpreted, and passed on from one generation to the next.
What did it represent? That was the subj ect of unending disputa tions
cond ucted for yea rs, a never ending quarrel between two oppos ing
points of view. The painting represented two merchants facing one
ano ther, two opposites, two worlds.
" I gave credit," cr ied the slim, down-at-heellitLl e fell ow, hi s voice
breaking in despa ir.
" I so ld for cash ," answered the fa t man in the armchair, cross ing
his legs and twiddling his thumbs above hi s stomach .
How my father hated the fa t one! He had known both since hi s
ch ildhood. Even as a schoo lboy, he was full of contempt for any fat
egoist who devoured innumerable buttered rolls in the middl e of the
morning. But he did no t quite support the slim one either. Now he
looked amazed as all initia tive slipped from hi s hands, ta ken over by
the two men a t loggerheads. With ba ted brea th , blinking his eyes from
which the spectacles had slipped, my fath er now tensely awaited the
result of th e dispute.
The shop itself was perpetual mystery.
It
was the center of all
Father's thoughts, of hi s nightl y cogita tions, of his frighten ing si–
lences. Inscrutable and all embracing, it stood in the background of
daily events. In daytime, the genera tions of fabri cs, full of patriarchal
dignity, lay in order of precedence, segrega ted according to their
ances try and or ig ins. But a t ni ght the rebellious blackness of the
materials broke out and .sto rmed about with sil ent tirades and hellish
improvisations. In the fa ll the shop bustl ed, overflowing with the da rk
stock of winter merchandi se, as if whole acres of fores t had been
uproo ted and were marching through a windswept landscape. In the
summer, in the dead season , the shop retreated to its dark reservations,
inapproachable in its thi ckets o f cloth. The shop ass istants banged a t
ni ght with their wooden yardsti cks a t the dull wall of bales, listening as
the shop roared with pain , immured in the cave of cloth.
In the surrounding darkness my father ha rked back to the past, to
the abyss of time. He was the last of his line, he was Atlas on whose
shou lders rested the burden o f an enormou s legacy. By day and by
night , my fa ther thought about the meaning of it all and tried to
understand its hidden intention . He often looked askance, full of
