"You shall stay tomorrow too. You're not going. You've still things to tell."

My grandfather had never left his village. He had never been even to Candia or Canea. "Why go there'?" he would say. "There are Candians and Caneans, peace be with them, who pass here- Candia and Canea come to me, so why need I go to them?"

On this Cretan coast today I am perpetuating my grandfather's mania. I have also found a guest by the light of my lantern. I do not let him depart. He costs me far more than a dinner, but he is worth it. Every evening I wait for him after work, I make him sit opposite me and we eat. The time comes when he must pay, and I say to him: "Talk!" I smoke my pipe and I listen. This guest has thoroughly explored the earth and the human soul. I never tire of listening to him.

"Talk, Zorba, talk!"

When he speaks, the whole of Macedonia is immediately spread before my gaze, laid out in the little space between Zorba and myself, with its mountains, its forests, its torrents, its comitadjis, its hard-working women and great, heavily-built men. And also Mount Athos with its twenty-one monasteries, its arsenals and its broad-bottomed idlers. Zorba would shake his head as he finished his tales of monks and say, roaring with laughter: "God preserve you, boss, from the stern of mules and the stem of monks!"

Every evening Zorba takes me through Greece, Bulgaria and Constantinople. I shut my eyes and I see. He has been all over the racked and chaotic Balkans and observed everything with his little falcon-like eyes, which he constantly opens wide in amazement. Things we are accustomed to, and which we pass by indifferently, suddenly rise up in front of Zorba like fearful enigmas. Seeing a woman pass by, he stops in consternation.

"What is that mystery?" he asks. "What is a woman, and why does she turn our heads? Just tell me, I ask you, what's the meaning of that?"

He interrogates himself with the same amazement when he sees a man, a tree in blossom, a glass of cold water. Zorba sees everything every day as if for the first time.

We were sitting yesterday in front of the hut. When he had drunk a glass of wine, he turned to me in alarm:

"Now whatever is this red water, boss, just tell me! An old stock grows branches, and at first there's nothing but a sour bunch of beads hanging down. Time passes, the sun ripens them, they become as sweet as honey, and then they're called grapes. We trample on them; we extract the juice and put it into casks; it ferments on its own, we open it on the feast day of St. John the Drinker, [9] it's become wine! It's a miracle! You drink the red juice and, lo and behold, your soul grows big, too big for the old carcass, it challenges God to a fight. Now tell me, boss, how does it happen?"

I did not answer. I felt, as I listened to Zorba, that the world was recovering its pristine freshness. All the dulled daily things regained the brightness they had in the beginning, when we came out of the hands of God. Water, women, the stars, bread, returned to their mysterious, primitive origin and the divine whirlwind burst once more upon the air.

That is why, every evening, lying on the pebbles, I impatiently waited for Zorba. I would see him suddenly emerge out of the bowels of the earth and approach with his loose-knit body and long striding step. From afar I could see how the work had fared that day, by his bearing, by the way he held his head high or low, by the swíng of his arms.

At first I also went with him. I watched the men. I endeavored to lead a different type of life, to interest myself in practical work, to know and love the human material which had fallen into my hands, to feel the long-wished-for joy of no longer having to deal with words but with living men. And I made romantic plans-if the extraction of lignite was successful-to organize a sort of community in which everything should be shared, where we should eat the same food together and wear the same clothes, like brothers. I created in my mind a new religious order, the leaven of a new life…

But I had not yet made up my mind to acquaint Zorba with my project. He was irritated by my comings and goings amongst the workmen, questioning, interfering and always taking the workman's part.

Zorba would purse his lips and say:

"Boss, aren't you going for a stroll outside? The sun and the sea, you know!"

At first I insisted, and would not go. I asked questions, gossiped, and got to know every man's history-how many children they had to feed, sisters to be married, helpless old relations; their cares, illnesses and worries.

"Don't delve like that into their histories, boss," Zorba would say, scowling. "You'll be taken in, with your soft heart, and you'll like them more than's good for them or for our work. Whatever they do, you'll find excuses for them. Then, heaven help us, they'll scamp their work, do it any old how. Heaven help them, too, you'd better realize that. When the boss is hard, the men respect him, they work. When the boss is soft, they leave it all to him, and have an easy time. Get me?"

Another evening, after work, he threw his pick down in the shed and shouted, out of all patience:

"Look here, boss, do stop meddling. As fast as I build, you destroy. Now what are all those things you were telling them today? Socialism and rubbish! Are you a preacher or a capitalist? You must make up your mind!"

But how could I choose? I was consumed by the ingenuous desire of uniting these two things, of finding a synthesis in which the irreducible opposites would fraternize, and of winning both the earthly life and the kingdom of the skies. This had been going on for years, ever since my early childhood. When I was still at school, I had organized with my closest friends a secret Friendly Society [10]-that was the name we gave it-and, locked in my bedroom, we swore that, all our life, we would devote ourselves to the fighting of injustice. Great tears ran down our faces when, with hand on heart, we took the oath.

Puerile ideals! But woe betide whoever laughs when he hears them! When I see what the members of the Friendly Society have become-quack doctors, small-time lawyers, grocers, double-dealing politicians, hack journalists-it rends my heart. The climate of this world seems to be harsh and raw. The most precious seeds do not germinate or are choked by undergrowth and nettles. I can see quite clearly today, as regards myself, that I am not stifled by reason, God be praised! I still feel ready to set out on Quixotic expeditions.

On Sundays we both performed our toilet with care, as if we were marriageable young people. We shaved, we put on clean white shirts, and went, towards the end of the afternoon, to see Dame Hortense. Every Sunday she killed a fowl for us; we once more sat down all three together; we ate and we drank; Zorba's long hands would reach out to the hospitable bosom of the kind woman and take possession of it. When at nightfall we returned to our part of the shore, life appeared simple and full of good intentions, old, but very agreeable and hospitable-like Dame Hortense.

On one of these Sundays, as we were returning from the copious feast, I decided to speak and tell Zorba of my plans. He listened, gaping and forcing himself to be patient. But from time to time he shook his great head with anger. My very first words had sobered him, the fumes left his brain. When I had finished, he nervously plucked two or three hairs from his moustache.

"I hope you don't mind my saying so, boss, but I don't think your brain is quite formed yet. How old are you?"

"Thirty-five."

"Then it never will be."

Thereupon he burst out laughing. I was stung to the quick.

"You don't believe in man, do you?" I retorted.