TE17 Mysterious Montenegro

Aleksandar Bečanović

He saw the figure that had come to visit him: none of the senses, howevercomposed, howeverdiscerning, werecapableof revoking it. Nothing could disprove the phenomenon. I saw her! In the morning, hewould immediatelywritea letter to hismost frequent correspondent, feverish in his drive to capture the event once more that might fade in the morning sun, but certain that no one would be able to reject it as mere chimeras of an overwrought mind; he was convinced of the authenticity of the figure that had come from the beyond, with surprise, fear, and excitement. How should he receive the visitor after somuch thought had been spent, after so much history had been explored, after so many nights had passed in retelling, in remembering the details that impart a life-giving profile to the portrait? With tears in his eyes, on his knees: the hands that just a moment earlier had passed the words written out with the care of a devotee who cultivated the mystery of that woman—ancestress and divine inspiration— were now able to touch her body. A body, such as only dreams can bring, but not engrave it or give it ultimate form to; a body that had come from the furthest past to make the book more credible than an individual’s destiny could achieve. The visitor was here to point her finger at the wide open chasm, to bear witness to the abyss that lay behind. With tears in his eyes, on his knees: from the dark of the book leafed through from beginning to end, from the dark of history that cannot be made good, from the dark of a mind that has sunk beneath the waves, now came his protector—the deepest notch in the family tree. The figure hovered for a moment in the space because every fantasy needs just the blink of an eye for the age-old fetters to burst asunder, and then she took a step, at the distance 90