Читать книгу Hamam Balkania - Vladislav Bajac - Страница 10

Before his death, of course, there was a life. A long and rich one. Powerful, but also insecure. As much his own as someone else’s. From time to time, the ownership of his own life slipped away from him. If it had only been a matter of God himself – the Lord of lords or God’s emissary, the choice would have been simple: Mohammed or Christ. Or both of them at the same time. However, someone, or more likely something, took over his life occasionally and left him without the essential possibility of choosing for himself to what or to whom he belonged.

Perhaps this in itself would not have been such an enigma if it had not kept imposing itself so often and so persistently, and with increasing intensity as he grew older. Even to the point of exasperation. Since he was unable to find logical reasons for it, he was also unable to solve the problem. And when the Secret was heaped onto the burden of so many years, life became a nightmare. It is possible that his approaching death (or, more likely, his wish for it) had an effect; the smell of its proximity could change his view of the world – accepted and proven a thousand times over – to turn it inside out into its own opposite and transform it into a completely repulsive truth. And yet, he could not reach even such a truth! So he thought that it would be easier to accept even the worst of truths, driven by his inability to capture any of them.

In no way could he take two possible explanations into consideration.

The first was understood: It was Allah’s will! One dared not and could not contradict him publicly. In any case, since this was a conversation he kept within himself, the public had nothing to do with it, nor did Allah.

The second explanation did not lead far away from the Almighty. It could be said that it was moulded for him: it was his Destiny. This he could not accept because it was an invention of the powerless to justify their weakness.

He experienced the truth – oh the irony of it! – as the blade of the knife buried itself in his chest: he was the lord of his life only halfway. The other half was ruled by the other half of his personality: the first part of his personality, the one that belonged to Serbia and Bosnia.

He was both a Turk and a Serb. Both a Serb and a Turk.

What a relief.

To die.