CHAPTER 10. NAIVE DREAMS.

January 10, 1949.

Slightly agitated, the sixteen-year-old boy slowly, with frantically trembling hands, brought a snow-white envelope to his no less trembling lips—diligently moistening the elongated flap, which was located on one of the sides of that means of communication, with his tongue, a taste that was, it must be noted, not very pleasant, this dark-haired boy, with unusually rough facial features due to everything he had for some reason witnessed throughout his relatively short life, slowly, in an exceptionally elegant manner, wrote the name of the addressee on that envelope, which was the publishing house named after Samuel Fischer: suddenly, after performing that action, his eyes for a few moments shone with an unusual, silent flame—never before... had he dedicated anyone else to his innermost, to his deep thoughts, and accordingly to his sacred secrets. The first one he entrusted with them was the publisher. But could, could the aforementioned boy tell anyone else about all that had in one way or another tormented his still, despite everything, young soul? Lately, he had no mother, just as he had no father—his innocent twenty-year-old sister had been kidnapped four years earlier by soldiers who seemed to have finally gone insane from the power they had at their disposal: he was alone, always alone, alone with his thoughts—he was alone even when he was in a gradually reviving human society. Why did he live? Why did he continuously, ten hours a day, work? What was the engine of his life? This was unknown to him. He thought little about the future—no, he didn't think about it at all! He thought, lately he had thought only about one thing: for several insanely long, of course, in the understanding of his being, months, a certain not uninteresting thought had reigned in his mind, formed by reading a very curious book, a book about the former Roman rulers—it was that very thought that he had put into those very lines, which now, it must be noted, not without reason, were in the depths of the aforementioned white-faced envelope...

“Away with doubts! The die is cast!”
Spoke Julius’s father to his son,
Whose face was brave and resolute:
In his dreams a crown would be won—
Cohorts! Horsemen! To the road!
An arduous path lies ahead—
To change once more a coat of mail for a toga,
And to breathe in the laurel wreath to the full!
The Senate did not accept the hand of peace,
Nor did Pompey wish it either,
Betraying the foundations of the duumvirate—
Betraying the people, betraying mankind!
Just look into the waters of the Rubicon,
And you will be able to behold,
That the death of madmen is
Our messenger of freedom,
In whose thoughts only pretexts matured,
How to incite a war.
But are our gods with them now?
Jupiter, the ruler of the world,
And accordingly of Rome,
Eternally honors his priests,
Whose thought is swift and indestructible,
Whose destiny is the grandeur of the clouds!
He entrusted many days to Fulgur,
Having been a Flamen not for a year—
He will support my figure:
His turn has come to serve!
An omen in the temple of Hercules,
In Hades—in the city of usury—
Revealed to me that without a processus[1],
The blessings of glory would not be visible to me!
The divinations of Somnus are countless,
Long ago, recently and... now:
A figure is tall and huge,
The voice of a pipe it creates,
Which loudly calls,
The common people from all over the country,
Suddenly... in a moment!.. deprives the pipe,
Of one from that rank.
Then, with stubborn fury,
He rushes to the water,
The lituus repeats a minor cry,
And here—the madman is on the brink,
Which is proudly called the Rubicon:
The opposite bank, which with a slope,
Kisses the charm of the nereids,
Unceasingly beckons him.
Friends! Comrades! Veterans!
I was recognized as an enemy in Rome!
But what are the intriguers of the rear to us?
Their thoughts are an amphora with wine!
Their thoughts are clinia and lectus!
Their thoughts are gold and flesh!
Their feelings are that serpentine nexus[2]!
Like the Light, I intend to rip open,
His facelessness—having struck a targeted blow...
The cut knot will be entrusted,
To the one who created it!
And everyone will loudly respond,
Who is now against us—
Their mouths will dry up from thirst:
With the desire that I save them,
That I grant them forgiveness—
But the powerful gaze and powerful finger,
Do not tolerate late humility.
Their lot is simple—chains, a cross!
Brothers of the Thirteenth!
So realize now—
That the choice now is: either with an army,
To make for ourselves a frame of power...
Or not to engage in the matter at all,
Or to turn the horses back!—
Exclaimed Julius in a fatherly manner,
While fixing his gaze on the Romans—
We do not need eternal glory:
We have achieved it so far—
Having defeated the Goth, the Saxon, the Gaul.
Is our lot not already in books?
Having zealously conquered nations,
We could not realize,
Having deified Rome a lot,
That we ourselves were involuntary!
Having left our native halls,
In the name of the honors of war,
We zealously cut down those whose gods,
Are dissimilar to the gods of Rome!
But enough about past deeds!
We must move forward!—
Said that one to them, instantly breathing,
Into their hearts—flame, into their minds—ice.
And so, stepping one step at a time,
Further and further into the depths of the river,
Taming the feelings of cold with heat,
He went against the law.
But what are laws to the Great?
Nothing more than a tool:
Nothing more than a pitchfork and spears,
For a slave and for him who brings death!
Having overcome the middle of the path,
Julius suddenly felt,
That the cold no longer tormented his back—
He had hardened his essence with pain!...”