I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness
“She wanted to watch as Bernadeta was denied divine grace and salvation for having had so many dealings with the devil.”
MAY 13, 2025
DAWN
gonosznak látszott, pedig csak öreg volt*
ANNA T. SZABÓ
* it looked evil, but was only old
The darkness was purple and fidgety, opaque, buzzing and speckled, blind and thick, at once gleaming and fathomless. It was infested with worms, branches, tremors, veins, blotches. Impalpable stains formed the bulging walls of a room, its ceiling, a bed, a night table, a dresser, a door, and a window. The shadows crackled. They vibrated, they murmured. They snored. The snoring was nasal, muffled and serrated. It grated, it gulped, and it choked. That rumbling emanated from the bed, and the bump that slept in the middle of it. An old woman. A portly old woman. Bernadeta’s eyes were closed, her lizard lids lashless, her mouth open, her gossamer lips splotchy and lilac, her long, greasy hair splayed across the pillow. She was ugly. Or that’s what the other woman, Margarida, was thinking as she sat beside her in a wicker chair, hands clasped in her lap, twiddling her thumbs.
In her bed, Bernadeta swallowed an ungainly exhalation, went quiet midway through a violent snore, and ceased breathing. Outside, owls sang, and then it was quiet. Margarida’s thumbs stopped. She craned her neck and observed the old woman, and for a moment she thought that was it. That the time had come. But the dark chasm of Bernadeta’s mouth sighed, inhaled, and the whole racket started up once more. Margarida again settled back in her chair and continued her twiddling. She was a puny woman with the head of a sparrow, severe eyes, a rigid mouth, lean cheeks, a parched throat, and curved shoulders. And she was praying. Poor Margarida prayed all through the night. Because the Lord commands us to pray and to bid others to pray. But since Margarida couldn’t bid others to pray—because the tongues of her relatives, or at least those who had tongues, were mere lumps, incapable of saying anything helpful—Margarida prayed herself, in the hopes that, if she prayed hard and long, sooner or later God would hear her. Surely He would make out her voice amid all the sins and all the sinners. He would gather her up in His paternal arms, and He would say that He should never have abandoned her, my daughter, that Margarida was good and saintly, and that she was forgiven. Forgiven for the things she’d done, and the things the other women had done.
Margarida had awaited death with exhilaration. Her own, that is. She’d imagined it would be a luminous flare, a spasm of glory, a conclusive joy, a smothering ecstasy accompanied by the sound of an army of angels playing lutes and trumpets.
She prayed for those who weren’t there. For those who’d gone and not come back. For her husband, Francesc. For her sons, Bartomeu, Esteve, and Guilla. And for her father, Bernadí. She didn’t pray for Martí the Tenderhearted or Martí the Lame, for they were nothing to her. She prayed for the women of her house. For her mother, Joana, even though she was contemptible, and for her sister Blanca, even though she was deviant. For her niece, Àngela, even though praying for Àngela was a complete waste of time, and for her great-great-grandniece, Dolça, even though Dolça should rot in hell and be heard shrieking down there below the stones, for being the daughter of whom she was the daughter of. She even prayed for Elisabet, who wasn’t a relative of hers, but every Our Father she said for Elisabet counted triple. She prayed for Bernadeta too. But mostly she just watched over that old woman, who slept like a rotten fruit fallen from a tree. Because Margarida wanted to be there when Bernadeta died. And she wanted to see it. She wanted to watch as Bernadeta was denied divine grace and salvation for having had so many dealings with the devil.
Margarida had awaited death with exhilaration. Her own, that is. She’d imagined it would be a luminous flare, a spasm of glory, a conclusive joy, a smothering ecstasy accompanied by the sound of an army of angels playing lutes and trumpets. Hallelujah! Blessed be the designs of the Almighty! Praised be Our Creator! She had glimpsed it so many times in her mind’s eye that it was as if it had already happened. The gates of heaven opening to welcome her. Cherubs singing, their mouths pink and plump, their cheeks velvety, their eyes damp with joy. They were barefoot and wore gold crowns and silk tunics bound to their chests with cords that were also golden. And amid the angels was Our Lord. Our Lord, who had a face like Francesc’s, with a dimple in the middle of His chin. His rough hands, covered in rings, grasped her face to kiss her as her husband had kissed her on their wedding day. Welcome to my Eternal Glory, He would say to her. And then, when amid the joyous, gleaming light Margarida again saw the Lord’s mouth before hers, the Lord’s eyes like two gleaming spoons, His gaze so close upon her that He could see every single thing that poor woman had had to bear, He cried tears that looked like milk.
But alas!, my girls, what a disappointment. Because when Margarida died, hands clasped, her fingernails first pink, then white, her mouth open, and her snowy eyes fixed on everlasting joy, every bit of her was prepared—panting, desirous, and whipped—yet there were no cherubs, no trumpets; there was no luminous flare, no spasm of glory, no conclusive joy, no smothering ecstasy. Just a circle of dirty, surly women. Grotesque and ordinary. That’s right. As sad as it sounds. Because when Margarida’s little three-quarters heart finally cried enough!, when it failed, knotted up, that’s all, folks, fare thee well!, her relatives encircled her. And instead of heaven and the angels and God’s hands wiping her cheeks, she was surrounded by her mother, Joana, like a toothless mare, her sister Blanca, who was the only one she was at all happy to see and even then not so much, her niece, Àngela, who in death still looked like a wild boar, and Elisabet. Had Margarida not been so stunned and diminished, she would've ripped every last hair out of Elisabet's head. But they were dead! All four of them. Holy Mother of God, some of them had been dead for many years. Souls sent to damnation! Margarida twisted and turned, unable to say a word, so terrified and bewildered was she. Nobody would've heard her anyway, because her relatives were all screaming, Margarida, Margarida, MARGARIDA! as they lifted her up by the armpits and cackled, and her mother was smiling at her with holes where her teeth should have been and saying, Welcome, Margarida, welcome back!, as if the devil himself had opened up the gates of hell for her. Poor Margarida, still warm, looked at them with eyes narrowed to the size of pine nuts, as terrifying as her relatives were, horrific!, even uglier than she’d remembered, and she thought she must be dreaming, this couldn’t be, she hadn’t died, not yet, not that, impossible, no, no, no, please, Lord, please, for the love of God, for the Virgin and all the saints and all the angels.
If it were up to Margarida, when old Bernadeta died, because it couldn’t be long now, there would be no festivities. The only thing her useless relatives thought about and talked about lately—on and on they’d go about silverware, about the nursling goat, about the glasses with blue stems, about the fritters and the gravy stew—was the party, the party, the party, every single thing was about the godforsaken party. Joana would sit in the kitchen, presiding from her bench and giving orders, over here, over there, do that and do this, and the women wandered through the house, conspiring. If Margarida had her way, when that old woman died, they would organize a sober welcome, austere, respectful, and serene. Not like the one she’d had.
The house creaked as if cracking its knuckles. Then there was a long silence, broken by the owl outside, followed by more silence. The night curled up inside the farmhouse like a small beast, and shadows moseyed through, footless.
How she’d cried. How poor Margarida had cried when, instead of rising up to heaven to be received by the shepherd of souls, she was dragged downstairs by the ghastly, insufferable women of her house, who were always sticking their fingers in wounds. They dragged her, when they could’ve just rolled her down. They lugged her to the kitchen and they sat her at the table set with plates, cups, and bowls. And then they opened their mouths and drank and ate and howled and clapped and made toasts and celebrated and sat up and straightened their necks and lifted their arms into the air. The repulsive dish they placed before Margarida filled with tears. Like a soup. But not a single one of her relatives was able to console her. Not a single one tried. Not her mother. Who’d ripped her from her entrails. All her mother did was fribble away the time, shouting and drinking and telling jokes and pounding her cup against the table. Joana was pure uproar and revelry, there on her bench, her place at the table. Margarida watched her in terror. The others shrieked and egged her on. She was dancing! As if she had no memory, or as if she wanted to obliterate it. As if she didn’t remember the things she didn't want to remember. As if in that gruesome kitchen, filled with ghosts, she no longer cared about the things of the past. Entire lives. Daughters and mothers.
The house creaked as if cracking its knuckles. Then there was a long silence, broken by the owl outside, followed by more silence. The night curled up inside the farmhouse like a small beast, and shadows moseyed through, footless. Each corner had its own deep, heavy, cavernous blackness. The room where Bernadeta slept was doleful. The sitting room was lugubrious. The stairs were like a well. The entrance was sinister. The kitchen was a wolf’s throat. Bottomless. The walls, the hearth, the window, the table, the chairs, and the sink couldn’t be seen. As if they weren’t there. As if there were no kitchen, no house. Just dusk and gloom. Joana was sitting on her bench. She was very old. She had a horse face, one eye opened wider than the other, her shambolic gray hair like a mane, her arms thick and her belly wide. That was her spot. The bench beside the fireplace, even though the fire was never lit anymore.
Before they reached Mas Clavell, Bernadí, taciturn and pragmatic, said they’d been five siblings in that house, but the other four had been carried off by wolves.
Joana had married the heir to Mas Clavell in Sant Miquel dels Barretons long ago, more years ago than anyone could count. The ceremony was simple, austere, and took place at midmorning, so the newlyweds would have time to get back to the house before nightfall. Husband and wife climbed along rugged paths and craggy slopes featuring every shade of green. They crossed mountain ranges, hills, canyons, gullies, and lush, moist ravines among beeches and aspens, birches and almond trees, holm oaks, elms, and chorleywood bushes that grew denser in a stifling embrace until light fell upon the newlyweds’ clothes like a handful of spare coins. Joana and Bernadí spent an entire day making their way through those secluded and snarled mountains, stopping only whenever they came upon a wayside shrine. Bernadí would lower his head, close his eyes, and ask the Lord to keep his path clear of wolves and evildoers. Joana would be beside him with her palms pressed together, but she didn’t pray. She was watching him. They were already married, but they'd met only three days earlier, and she had scarcely had a moment to look at him. She studied his purple hands, covered in calluses, his fingers like fat sausages, his hairy nape, his oversize back, his nose like a turnip, his forehead full of rolls of fat, and his thick beard, which climbed his cheeks like brambles all the way up to his eyebrows. But Bernadí’s prayers were in vain, and Joana barely had time to conclude that her husband looked like a hog, because not long after midday, those evil beasts began their howling. It froze the blood in your veins. Each howl was like a cold dagger dragged down your back and to your belly; if you didn’t breathe, it wouldn’t pierce you, it would just roil the contents of your stomach. And Bernadí, who had sensed the beasts for a while now, anxiously surveying the greenness and the blueness between the trees and the sudden movements of the branches, cursed and spat. He walked, leading the way, and Joana watched. She was rattled to see him kicking at rocks and trees, and then, without slowing his hurried pace, he turned his left foot inward as if it weren’t his and brutishly dragged it across the ground. They hadn’t taken even a hundred steep steps after the howling had begun, when, grinding his teeth, Bernadí threw himself onto his knees beneath a wild thicket, and from his espadrille freed a gray foot with thick yellow nails, then frantically scratched and scratched and scratched. And that was when she saw it. Saint Lucy! Holy Mother of God! Bernadí’s stinky, hairy foot had only four toes. Only four toes! Joana’s heart nearly leaped out through her mouth, such was her joy. She could hardly resist the urge to kneel down beside him and cover that trotter with kisses, like Mary Magdalene. But then Bernadí grew calm. He slipped his reddened, inflamed foot back into his espadrille, and man and woman continued walking, the dusk and the shrieks of the beasts nipping at their heels. Before they reached Mas Clavell, Bernadí, taciturn and pragmatic, said they’d been five siblings in that house, but the other four had been carried off by wolves. First they’d eaten the sheep. When there were no more sheep, they snuck into the house and devoured his siblings whole, but for one arm and a piece of his sister’s head. Yet Bernadí, the eldest, had twisted and thrashed maniacally, screeching like a soul damned to hell, and he wasn’t eaten by the wild beasts. He’d seemed to them like too much work. They’d managed only to tear off his left pinkie toe in a single clumsy bite. And now, instead of a pinkie toe, his foot had a bumpy, shiny white scar that itched like hell when he heard them howling.
Bernadí’s mother had fallen ill. After the wolves devoured four of her children as if they were chickens, she’d swelled up. First her feet, purple. Then her knees, black. Then her belly, like a bird fallen from the nest. And she died. Then the beasts, as if they understood affronts and grudges, dug up her grave and ate her face and hands. Bernadí and his father, having been left alone together, exclaimed, That’s it! That’s the final straw! And they started a war. They placed themselves in the hands of the Holy Spirit Our Defender, Saint Blaise the Glorious, Saint Paul, Saint Agatha, and Saint Anthony, keep us safe from evil and the devil, the wolf and the hound and the beasts who confound, and they set out to find dens. Which are always southward facing and near water. They schemed about how to destroy litters that nurse until they’re twenty-five days old. And about how to make rope snares and trick planks. They placed some bait on the far end of a board hanging over a cliff. The plank was held in place by a rock covered with branches. And when the animal climbed out onto it to fetch the food, it would fall off the cliff. They bound arrow points two by two with horsehair. They tied six or seven in a row, turned them in alternating directions, and when they were well spiky, they inserted them into a piece of meat, bigger than the arrow points but small enough to be gulped down in one bite. They left a bit of gristly meat here, a bit there, and the wolves swallowed the bait without chewing. When they digested it, the arrows would open into the shape of a cross and puncture their guts.
One day, near Seva, a cornered beast pounced on the old man and bit his face in such a way that even when they’d managed to kill the wolf, its snout was still clamped on the man’s mouth. As if they were kissing.
During the good years, in the township of Dosrius, father and son killed wolves eight by eight. In Vilamajor, seven by seven. Near Sant Hilari, by the half dozen. In Espinelves and Viladrau, they trapped the biggest she-wolves; beneath Les Agudes mountains, the largest litters; and in Sant Sadurní d’Osormort, and in Sant Celoni, and in Vilanova de Sau and Rupit and Folgueroles, they killed so many they lost count. Bernadí and his father located the beasts and warned the families in the concerned houses, who gathered up the nearby folk. When given the sign by Bernadí'‘s father, the master wolfhunter, they shouted and clanged chains to tighten the scope of the drive and lead the wolves down narrow tracks, toward the trapping pits and to the cliffs where they would fall to their death. Where they were killed with rocks, pikes, hand slings, javelins, and wolf gibbets, where they were flayed end to end, or left for the dogs to tear apart. Bernadí’s father enjoyed the drives. For the company, for the men’s shouts and laughter, and for the wolves’ terror and howling at the mob. But one day, near Seva, a cornered beast pounced on the old man and bit his face in such a way that even when they’d managed to kill the wolf, its snout was still clamped on the man’s mouth. As if they were kissing. Bernadí’s father was left with a maimed jaw and holes in his cheeks, and he could scarcely swallow, although soon that wouldn’t matter. Because that she-wolf was rabid. And rabies makes you detest food and water. First he complained of headaches. Later the muscles of his face began to move of their own accord, and you could see his teeth through the holes in his cheeks. Then the writhing began. After that he turned furious. Foamed at the nose and mouth. And Bernadí thought, horrified, that if those treacherous beasts had trapped him, too, if they’d attacked him from behind and eaten him in some cave, then they would have won the battle. He put an end to his father’s suffering and rushed to the nearest town, which was Seva, to find a woman to marry.
Joana perspired and panted as she tried to match the vigorous strides of her groom, thinking how she’d awaited him for so long! For she had, indeed. Oh, how she’d waited for him! Because Joana had asked for a man in every possible way one can ask for a man. To no avail. She had asked God and the Virgin and Saint Anthony, but they didn’t listen to her. Until one day Garreta—an old woman who toiled with her in Seva, who ate only bread soup with milk, because she lacked even a single tooth, and Joana would look at her and think, Good Lord, please don't let me be like Garreta, alone and old and toothless, eating bread soup with milk—asked her, Why are you crying, dearie? Joana replied that she was crying because she had the face of a horse. The face of a mare. And saying it made her cry even harder, because God and the Virgin and Saint Anthony had turned their backs on her and left her to bolt like lettuce, with no suitor who wanted her. But Garreta tempted her: If One doesn’t listen, why not ask it of the Other? Joana replied in a thin wisp of a voice that she didn’t know how to ask something of the Other. Garreta offered her help. She said that if Joana wanted, she could explain it to her. She said that if she was asking for only one thing, it was best to go alone, at daybreak. That she had to kill a cat. Not too small and not too big. Medium-sized. And stick a fava bean in each of its eyes, a fava in its mouth, and a fava in its asshole. And that she had to bury it, and on the mound she had to draw a cross, and on the cross she had to piss. Then the devil would come and she could ask for what she needed.
Joana saw him as she was shaking the piss off her legs. Amid the trees. First his eyes. Because they sparkled. Then the blotch that was his thick neck and hump and back. Then the rest of the bull. Because he was a bull. Magnificent. All black, like the blackest thing. His horns were black; the flesh inside his eyes was black; black were his eyelashes; black were his ears; black was his snout, filled with snot, his forehead covered in cowlicks, his veiny neck, his legs, his hooves, his belly, his backside, his pudenda: black. So dark that the night seemed pale. And he approached. His fur gleamed as if it were water. Hot vapor poured from his nostrils, and he stank, as if the water were dirty and stagnant. It was a living stink, piercing. Joana let her skirt drop and stood up. The bull asked, in a sweeter and more wistful voice than she could ever have imagined, What dost thou want, Sovereign Mistress? Joana replied like a little bird singing, I want a full man, she said, a man of my own, an heir with a patch of land and a roof over his head. The devil accepted the terms. Joana’s soul in exchange for a husband. Then he left beneath a sliver of moon in search of a cow. The next day, Bernadí Clavell asked for Joana’s hand.
Bernadí preferred cleverness to brute force. Stealthy silence. Solitude. After his father died, he’d hunted the wolves alone, using snares and traps with arms of nails and spikes that snapped shut. He would dip them in manure juice so the wily beasts wouldn’t smell the scent of iron and of men. And he followed trails and searched out turds. The mountains were full of big piles of turds. Stone martens would shit on the roads haphazardly: the females, thin little poops; the males, thick ones. Genets would lay their loads on craggy rocks, making piles, always in the same places. Badgers would dig latrines. Foxes shat wherever they wanted. If he caught any of those creatures, he would kill them too. Delicately. He would place his foot on their neck, squeeze their ribs, and choke them. The genets and the stone martens died quickly, without a fight. The badgers and the foxes required more patience, waiting a good long while before they suffocated. Once they were dead, he would pull their bones, flesh, and innards out through their mouths, without tearing the skin. He would fill the hides with forest hay until they were taut and wrinkle-free, and then, when he went down into the towns, he’d sell them.
There was no need for delicacy when it came to killing wolves. They shat everywhere. Out in the open. Like a sign. At crossroads, on cliffs. So you would see it. So you would have to acknowledge them. Those damn bastards knew precisely how to attack each living thing: sheep by the neck, pigs by the belly, cows by the udder to make them kneel, horses and donkeys any way they could—because those back legs really kicked—and it was best to grab the young ones. Children by the head. And if they found an animal who’d just given birth, they knew they had to yank on the placenta and the cord, to wound them on the inside. If they’d just had a kill, they shat soft, dark liquid, because the first thing they ate was the blood and entrails, which dyed their shit black, and if they had been picking at the carcass, they produced dry, hairy, white piles of dung. They were the demons of those mountains, and Bernadí killed them without a second thought.
For a wolf or a she-wolf, they would give him a silver coin worth five sous. For a litter, five more. And after paying him, they would give him a certificate with a seal, so he could go off happily and pass the hat in the villages. Here you have the traitor who emptied your corrals. This is the nasty beast who did so much harm and tore out the throats of your flocks. All those who want to give, give. People would offer him round cakes and dried fruit and nuts, and Bernadí would return to Mas Clavell with his hands covered in nicks and cuts, a bag full of silver coins and another filled with sweets. He sat down at the table, famished, as if he hadn’t eaten the whole time he’d been gone, and he devoured the victuals Joana placed before him, roaring with gratitude, his face right up close to the plate and his eyes misty with the steam. Broth from the hearty soup dripped from his beard and fingers and elbows, and when he’d finished, he hugged his wife with greasy hands, like someone newly fortified. And Joana, beneath that pine tree of a man, uncovered a fly agaric like no other. A toadstool, the size of her hand, that she stroked delicately, careful not to break its buttery stalk. Because Bernadí was ugly as a wart, Joana could admit that, but oh, what a sweet toadstool he had! Holy Mother of God, what a toadstool. Velvety and hard and pretty as all get-out. Red and white and shiny with dew. As if he were hiding all his delicacy, all his beauty, all his joy down there below in the form of a hat, ring, spores, and stalk, rooted in the dark earth. Toadstool, toadstool, who planted you there? The Holy Virgin with her five fingers, amid the maidenhair!
She saw that everything has a price. And that the price is too high, every time. And that after the pact she’d made with the devil, and then unmade, thanks to her husband’s missing pinkie toe, all her progeny would be missing something.
The second time, the devil showed up in the guise of a man. One hooded night he went to the farmhouse to collect on the debt. But Joana loved that house so very much, like a snail loves its shell, like a soul loves its body, that it was as if she were gazing out at him from within armor, from behind a fortress wall. He was an ugly, haggard, bald man, with a white face and a huge mouth. And he stank as much as the bull, but now, in the stench, Joana could also make out traces of goat, asscrack, and bonfires. She did not invite him in. The demon greeted her with a voice both measured and pompous: Good evening, Sovereign Mistress. She did not respond in kind. She blurted out, Bernadí is not a full man. But it seemed that the evil beast did not understand, and Joana had to explain it to him: I asked for a full man, who owned a patch of land and had a roof over his head, but Bernadí is not a full man. The Great Spit-Roaster looked at her incredulously. Joana added, He’s missing his left pinkie toe. At that, there followed a clamor and a terrible crack, and then it rained cats and dogs for four days straight. The heavy downpour made the bridges of Sau, Querós, Sallent, and Susqueda crumble.
Joana put the devil out of her mind, convinced she’d gotten the best of him, until her eldest daughter was born. Margarida. A slender baby with a severe and reproving gaze, and a frenetic, frightened blue chest. Joana put an ear to her ribs and shuddered. Because even though it wasn’t visible, if you listened you could hear it: There was something wrong with the baby girl’s heart. It was missing a piece. Which didn’t mean that Margarida had a bad heart. No. Or a delicate heart. Not that either. It meant her heart was small, tough, stringy. Hard to chew. Rancorous. The size of a hare’s. After Margarida, Joana gave birth to Blanca, who was born without a tongue. Her mouth like an empty nest. And Joana again felt a prickle of suspicion, but she didn’t put it all together. Then came Esperança. Her poor little Esperança, who was born without a liver and died yellow as a little chick. And it felt impossible, leaving that bundle all alone, at night and secretly, in a cold, dark hole in the ground, near the wall of Sant Miquel dels Barretons, so she would be close to God. But Joana still didn’t want to believe it. And then came her firstborn son. Whom she would have named Bernadí, like his father, if not for the fact that he was born without a hole back there and died, stuffed like a sausage. His flesh hard and purple. And as Bernadí carried that second bundle to Sant Miquel, Joana understood. She got it. She saw that everything has a price. And that the price is too high, every time. And that after the pact she’d made with the devil, and then unmade, thanks to her husband’s missing pinkie toe, all her progeny would be missing something. She looked at her house, her man, her severe daughter, her mute daughter, and she thought how it was still much more than Garreta had. And by dint of willow, ivy, almond tree root, pennyroyal, and hemp, she quelled that flow of defective babies.
Excerpted from I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness. Copyright © 2023 by Irene Solà, English translation copyright © 2025 by Mara Faye Lethem. Used with the permission of Graywolf Press, www.graywolfpress.org.
✺ Published in “Issue 28: Spectacle” of The Dial
