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XXI
ONE OF THE
pleasures and challenges of "concierge duty" was
a competition among all the children -- this duty was almost
exclusively the work of the children -- to be sufficiently alert on
this job to have the gates, through which the automobiles had
to pass, opened in time for Mr. Gurdjieff to drive through
them without having to stop his car and blow the horn as a
signal to the gatekeeper.
One difficulty with this was that the entrance to the Prieure
was at the foot of a long hill which descended from the railway
station; the streetcar to Samois also passed directly in front of
the gate where the highway made a wide turn in the direction
of Samois, away from the Prieure. Frequently the noise of the
"tramway" obscured the sound of cars coming down the hill,
and interfered with our game. Also, once Mr. Gurdjieff
became aware of the competition, he would usually coast down
the hill so that we would not be aided by the sound of the
motor.
It was mostly thanks to Philos, the dog, who often followed
me around during Mr. Gurdjieff's absences, that I was usually
able to get the gates opened in time for him to sail through
them, a big smile on his face. By watching Philos, whose ears
would prick up at the sound of any passing car, but who would
jump to his feet at the sound of Mr. Gurdjieff's car, I was
almost always successful.
Amused by this game of ours, Mr. Gurdjieff once asked me
how it was that I was able to, practically unfailingly, have the
gates open in time, and I told him about Philos. He laughed
and then said that this was a very good example of cooperation.
"Show that man have much to learn, and can learn from many
unexpected places. Even dog can help. Man very weak, need
help all time."
Late that summer, I was on concierge duty when Mr. Gurd-
jieff was to leave on a trip. For some reason, it was a particu-
larly important departure, and everyone was gathered around
his automobile when he was about ready to leave. I was among
the leave-takers, and when he had finally started the motor
of the car, I ran to the big gates to open them. In my haste,
I stumbled and fell, and one of my knees hit the heavy iron
catch, just above the level of the ground, which served to hold
one of the gates open. It was rusty and, as I had fallen hard,
it penetrated rather deeply. As Gurdjieff was about to drive
through the gates, he looked at me, saw the blood running
down my leg, stopped, and asked me what had happened.
I told him and he told me to wash it off, which I did as soon
as he had left.
By the middle of the afternoon
-- he had left about noon-
my leg was very painful, my knee swollen, and I had to stop
work. The work I was assigned to that afternoon was cleaning
the parquet floors of the salons, which meant scraping the
floors with heavy steel wool to remove the old wax and accumu-
lated dirt ; this was done by standing on the steel wool and
pushing it back and forth, with the grain of the wood, with
one's foot.
By evening, my knee had swollen alamlingly, and I was not
well enou,gh to eat dinner. I was put to bed and various
treatments began. Different people had different ideas about
the treatments, but it was decided that the knee was badly
infected and that the proper remedy was a hot onion poultice.
Baked or perhaps boiled onions were placed on the open wound,
which was then wrapped in heavy, transparent oiled cloth,
and then wrapped again with a bandage. The purpose, of
course, was to draw the poison out of the infected knee.
Although I
received constant attention and the best of care --
there was a resident doctor at the Prieure who had supervised
the treatments given me -- my leg did not improve. By the
following day it was enormous and small boils began to appear
on my body, extending from well below my knee almost to my
waist. I was delirious all day, coming out of my delirium
occasionally when additional and more frequent poultices
were applied. But nothing seemed to help.
It was late that afternoon when Gurdjieff returned from his
trip. Some time after his arrival, when he inquired about me,
he was told about my condition and he came to see me in my
room. He removed the bandage and poultice and sent someone
to the local pharmacy at once. They brought back a remedy,
then called "Ouata-plasme", apparently also some form of
poultice, and Gurdjieff had them build a fire in the stove in
my room on which he could boil water. When the water was
boiling, he dipped a small square of this impregnated cotton
into the water, and then applied it immediately to the affected
knee, again wrapping it in the oiled cloth and a bandage.
He insisted that it be applied at once, directly from the boiling
water, and I remember these applications as being excrucia-
tingly painful. Instructions were given to someone to stay the
night in my room and to apply these new poultices every four
hours or so; which was done.
By the following afternoon, I was much better, and the
poultices, when removed, were black with gelatinous, infected
matter. That evening, Mr. Gurdjieff came to visit me again.
As it was a Saturday and there was. to be a demonstration in
the study-house, he insisted that I should attend along with all
the others, and had his nephew carry me there and back
"piggy-back". When we arrived at the study-house, he placed
me in the small cubicle, where I sat behind him, during the
demonstration. When it was over, I was carried back to my
room. There was nothing very spectacular about the treatment
or the cure, but Gurdjieff had something to say to me about it
when I was on my feet again.
He asked to look at my leg, on which I was still wearing a
small bandage, and when he had pronounced it cured, he
asked me if I remembered what he had said about Philos
helping me to identify his car when he arrived at the Prieure
gates. I said that I did, of course, and he said that these two
things -- the help of the dog, and the infection in my knee-
had one thing in common. They were proof, of a kind, of
man's dependence on other creatures. "To dog, you owe
thanks, because he help you with small thing; to me you owe
more than this, perhaps owe life to me. They try when I not
here, even doctor try, fix your leg, but only get worse. When
I come, I fix leg, because only I know about this new medicine
which have in France now. I know this because I interested in
everything, because necessary know all things for self in life.
Just because I know this thing, and because I come back in
time, you now well. You all right."
I said that I realized this and I thanked him for what he
had done. He smiled, indulgently, and said that it was impos-
sible to thank him for what he had done for me. "Cannot give
thanks for life, not possible give enough thanks; also perhaps
will be times when you wish I not save life. You young now,
you glad not die -- this serious thing, because illness like you
have very dangerous, can even kill. But when you grow, you
not always like life, and maybe you not thank me, but make
curse on me because I not let die. So do not thank now."
He went on, then, to say that life was a "two-edged sword.
In your country, you think life is only for pleasure. You have
saying in your country: 'pursuit of happiness', and this saying
show that people not understand life. Happiness is nothing,
is only other side of unhappiness. But in your country, in most
of world now, people only want happiness. Other things also
important: suffering important because is also part of life,
necessary part. Without suffering man cannot grow, but when
you suffer, you think only of self, you feel sorry for self, wish
not to suffer because this make you feel not comfortable, make
you wish escape from thing that make you feel bad. When man
suffer, he feel only self-pity. Not so if real man. Real man also
sometimes feel happiness, real happiness; but when he also
feel real suffering, he not try to stop this thing in self. He
accept this because he know is proper to man. Must suffer to
know truth about self; must learn suffer with will. When
suffering come to man must make intentional suffering, must
feel with all being; must wish with such suffering that it will
help make conscious; help to understand.
"You have only physical suffering, suffering of body because
of pain in leg. This suffering also help if you know how to use
for self. But this is suffering like animal, not important suffering.
With other suffering, suffering in all self, is possibility under-
stand that all people suffer this way, is possibility also under-
stand how depend on Nature, on other people, on everything,
for help in life. Cannot live life alone. Aloneness -- not loneliness,
which is bad thing -- but aloneness can be good thing for man,
very necessary for life, but also necessary learn not live alone
because real life depend on other human being and not just
on self. Now, you still boy, cannot understand what I talk --
but remember this thing; remember for time when you not
thank me because I save life."
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