Free Valerie and Her Week of Wonders by Vitezslav Nezval

still haven’t embraced.”
    Valerie offered her cousin her lips. Elsa first touched her lips lightly. Then she pressed her own to them with such fervor that Valerie’s head spun. She tore herself from her cousin’s embrace and made her way limply to her own room. She was so exhausted she didn’t have the strength to undress. She lay down and fell into a deep sleep.
    She didn’t even observe the figure who bent over her, took her by the elbows and carried her off.
     
     
    Chapter XX
AWAKENING
     
    Valerie came to. She was surrounded by total darkness. No matter how she tried, she could not recognize the place where she lay. She strained to hear at least some sound that would tell her something about the place. Beneath her, as if underground, she distinctly heard the sound of human laughter. Then she caught snatches of a conversation, whose general meaning she sought in vain to comprehend. She heard these words:
    “... sometime.”
    “How so, Friday’s surely ...”
    “... I’m not wrong to consider you ...”
    “That’s not possible.”
    “... when girls like that ...”
    “Reason plays no ...”
    “... as if ...”
    “That’s delightful!”
    No matter how Valerie tried, the conversation’s meaning escaped her.
    “Where am I?” she shouted and pulled herself together. Her hand felt a beam covered in cobwebs. Terrified that she might discover something even more horrifying, she lay back down and tried to recall the last things that had happened. Not knowing where she was at that moment, all she had witnessed seemed even more incredible than before. Recalling the young woman and her kiss sent a shudder through her. She had no doubt who Elsa was, and she was afraid her grandmother, transmuted into a young woman, would take revenge on her.
    “Wherever I am,” she thought, “I’m not going to wait here idly for a miracle to happen.”
    She rose and her bare feet felt the cold, uneven brick floor. Like a blind man groping in the dark, she cautiously advanced. After the first few steps she again touched some cobweb-covered wood. She nearly tripped over an obstacle. It was, she discovered, a heavy beam. She followed it all the way to the slanting of the roof.
    “I’m in the loft,” she assured herself.
    Then she placed all her efforts into finding the small window that simply had to be there.
    She found it and, removing the piece of sacking covering it, managed to open it. She was amazed. Outside it was a starry night.
    How long had she been asleep?
    She tried to identify any object in the starlit darkness which would confirm where she was and give her some hope that she might eventually escape from this strange bedchamber. But no matter how hard she tried, she could see nothing but one corner of the sky. Yet the voices she had heard at first were becoming more and more distinct. There was the voice of a woman and the voice of a man.
    “On Friday,” the man said. “I’m sure it was Friday.”
    “It was Saturday. You’re wrong,” said the woman.
    “I’ll soon show you, young lady. Here’s the calendar. Look, the full moon was on Friday.”
    “Of course,” Valerie said to herself. “I was awakened on Friday by the noise of the hens and I remember the moon was full. But why does it matter so much to them?”
    She strained to listen.
    “But that’s our coachman, Andrei,” she told herself. “He was due back from town on Sunday evening.”
    “You’re right,” said the woman.
    “Pity we didn’t bet on it.”
    “How much would you want to win?”
    “A million.”
    “My, isn’t he the greedy one!”
    “If I had a million, young lady!”
    “What would you do with it?”
    “I certainly wouldn’t keep it stashed under the pillow.”
    “So what would you do, say, this evening, if you were a millionaire?”
    “I’d get all dressed up and court you.”
    “I say!”
    “Imagine me in a top hat.”
    “You look better in a cap. I’d want you to pick me up wearing your