With this Letter I enclose two Letters from Lady Hana to Lord Jacob, and some Drawings by little Eva. Kindly Encourage that esteemed Gentleman to send her just a Line or two, lest she cry her pretty dark Eyes out, for she misses him so. She is such an exotic Woman, she has not yet grown accustomed to the Cold in our Homes here, nor to our Cuisine . . .
What is served for Christmas Eve dinner at Mrs. Kossakowska’s
A Christmas wafer star hangs over the Christmas Eve table. Two soups are served—almond and mushroom. There is herring in olive oil, sprinkled with chives and diced garlic. There are peas and puffed wheat with honey. There is kasha with mushrooms, as well as steaming dumplings.
A sheaf of grain has been placed in the corner of the room, and hanging over it, a paper star painted gold.
The guests give each other Christmas tidings, and they are all kind to Hana, speaking softly to her in Polish, now serious, now laughing. Little Avacha is perplexed and looks frightened, which must be why she does not let go of her mother’s dress. Hana gives little Immanuel to the nanny, the neat and clean Zwierzchowska. The boy squirms out of her arms to get to his mother, but he is too small to take part in the holiday meal; Zwierzchowska disappears with him into the back rooms of the Kossakowskis’ great estate. Unfortunately, Hana understands little of what is being said to her. She nods and smiles vaguely. The inquisitive gaze of her tablemates, disappointed by her silence, creeps greedily—so it seems to Hana—to five-year-old Avacha, who is dressed as beautifully as if she were a princess, and watches mistrustfully as this company warbles over her.
“I had no idea a human being could have such enormous eyes,” says Castellan Kossakowski. “She must be an angel, a forest fairy.”
It’s true that the child is uncommonly beautiful. Seemingly serious, but also wild, as if snatched out of some pagan, Arabian splendor. Hana dresses her little girl like a lady. She is wearing a dress the color of a blue sky over stiff petticoats, covered in white lace, and white stockings and little navy-blue satin shoes adorned with pearls. She won’t make it to the carriage in them, through all the snow. She’ll have to be carried. Before everyone sits down at the table, Castellan Kossakowski sets the little girl up on a footstool so that everyone can admire her.
“Curtsy, little Eva, my dear,” Mrs. Kossakowska says. “Go on, make a nice little curtsy, like I taught you.”
But Avacha stands motionless, stiff as a doll. The guests, a little disappointed, leave her in peace and sit down at the table.
Avacha sits beside her mother and looks down at her petticoats, carefully correcting the stiff hems of the tulle. She refuses to eat. Several dumplings have been placed on her plate, but they are already cold.
There is a silence between the next round of well-wishing and sitting down to table, but then the castellan makes a very amusing statement, and everyone laughs except for Hana. The interpreter they have hired, a Turkish-speaking Armenian, leans in to her and translates the castellan’s joke, but in such a chaotic way that Hana still has no idea what’s going on.
Hana sits stiffly and cannot take her eyes off Katarzyna. She is revolted by these dishes, although they look appetizing enough, and she is very hungry. But who made them, and how? How is she to eat pierogi with sauerkraut and mushrooms? Jacob has told her not to feel disgusted and to eat like everyone else, but these pierogi are a problem for her, she cannot swallow them—the cabbage has gone bad, it seems, and there’s a fungus on top. And what are these, she thinks, these pale noodles, this sickly color, with poppy seeds that make it look like they are covered in insects?
She revives when they bring in the carp, although instead of being encased in gelatin, it is baked. The smell of fish fills the room, and Hana’s mouth begins to water. She isn’t sure whether to wait until she’s served it or to go ahead and help herself.
“You just go ahead and act like a lady,” Mrs. Kossakowska instructed her recently, “and don’t stand on ceremony. You are what you believe you are. And you consider yourself a lady, right? You are the wife of Jacob Frank, not just any old Shlomo, you understand? People like you don’t have to worry about politeness. Hold your head up high. Like this,” and saying that, Katarzyna tilted Hana’s head back and patted her on the rear.
Now Katarzyna tries to convince her to eat the Christmas Eve delicacies. When talking about her she calls her Lady Frank, but talking to her, she says, “my dear.” Hana looks at her trustingly and turns away from the pierogi, reaching for the carp. Oh yes, she serves herself a huge piece with the toasted skin attached. Kossakowska blinks in surprise, but the others are busy with their conversation—no one is watching her. Hana Frank casts a quick glance at Mrs. Kossakowska, feeling pleased with herself. For who is this woman so intent upon ordering everyone around, so imperious and so boisterous? She speaks loudly and in a deep, resounding voice, and she interrupts everyone, as if, just like land and privileges, the right to speak were hers as well. She is wearing a dark gray dress with black lace on it, and on that lace a wayward thread—Agnieszka did not see to her mistress’s toilette. That thread disgusts Hana, just like this meal. Like Mrs. Kossakowska, and her Agnieszka, and her limping, hunched-over husband.
How did she find herself in this prison of slimy courtesies, of gossip, of whispers she can’t even understand? She tries to lock those angry thoughts deep inside herself, she has a special place for them, where they can stalk back and forth like animals in a cage. And she won’t let them out, at least not yet. For now, she is dependent on Mrs. Kossakowska and maybe even likes her a little, although her touch disgusts Hana, and she is always patting her and petting her for some reason. They have separated her from everything she ever knew. All she has left are Zwierzchowska and Pawłowska. And she can only think about them now without their first names. Their first names stayed Jewish in her head. The rest of the company is still waiting in Lwów. Hana cannot fully communicate here, she’s always trying to think of words, this language brings her to despair; she’ll never learn it properly. What is going on with Jacob, why has she had no news of him? Where has Moliwda gone? If he were here, she’d feel a little more secure. Where is everyone else from their group, and why have they taken her away from them? She would rather be sitting in a smoky room in Ivanie than here on the estate of Katarzyna Kossakowska.
For dessert they serve cheesecake with marzipan and a layer cake with lemon and hazelnut filling. Avacha’s little hand removes stores from the table and stuffs sweets into the pockets of her pretty blue dress. They will eat their sweets during the night, when they are alone.
They sleep curled up together here. Avacha’s little hands hold her mother’s face when the child sees Hana crying. Hana hugs this giant-eyed child tight, clinging to her the way an insect over water holds on to a blade of grass; she holds tight to that delicate little body, and together they float through the night. She often also picks up Immanuel from his crib and breastfeeds him at will, since she still has milk, although Mrs. Kossakowska interferes even in that. She thinks that feeding should be done by wet nurses. Hana is disgusted by the wet nurse Kossakowska has found her: her white skin, her light-colored hair, her thick legs. Her great pink breasts overwhelm Immanuel; she is afraid that one day, this village girl will smother him to death.
And look, as she is thinking of it during the holiday meal, a splotch of milk slowly expands upon her dress, and Hana covers it deftly with her Turkish scarf.
Avacha and her two dolls
For little Avacha, however, this evening will be unlike any she has ever had before—as a matter of fact, every previous evening will be made null and void by tonight. All that will be left of them is a sort of streak in time, foggy, blurred.
After dinner, Kossakowska leads little Avacha into the next room and has her close her eyes. Then she leads her a little farther and has her open her eyes. Avacha sees two beautiful dolls seated before her. One is a brunette dressed in turquoise, the other a blonde in elegant aquamarine. Avacha looks at them without a word as a flush s
preads over her cheeks.
“Choose whichever one you prefer,” Kossakowska whispers into her ear. “One is yours.”
Avacha shifts her weight from foot to foot. She takes in every tiny detail of each doll’s outfit, but she cannot choose. She goes to her mother for help, but her mother merely smiles, shrugging her shoulders, relaxed by wine and by the fact that she can finally light up a Turkish pipe with Mrs. Kossakowska.
This goes on for some time. The women begin to prod the girl; the women giggle. They find the child’s gravity amusing, laugh at her inability to choose. Avacha is told that dolls from Vienna are the finest crafted, that their bodies are made out of goatskin, their faces out of papier mâché, and that they’re stuffed with sawdust. But Avacha still doesn’t know which one to pick.
Tears well up in her eyes and spill over. Enraged by her own indecision, she dives straight into her mother’s skirts and sobs loud, heaving sobs.
“What’s wrong, what’s wrong?” her mother asks her in their own language, in Turkish.
“No, no,” answers Avacha in Polish: “Nothing.” She keeps her face hidden in her mother’s dress.
She would like to hide there inside those soft folds, crouch down and wait for the worst to pass. For there is too much world, and there are too many tasks ahead of little Evunia. She has never felt this miserable before. She feels as if someone were clutching her heart, and she cries, but not like when she cries because she’s scraped her knee—it is a despair that happens deeper inside, at the very bottom of her being. Her mother pats her head, but this doesn’t bring any relief; Avacha feels that she has gotten very far from her mother somehow, and that from here it is going to be very hard to get back to her as if nothing had ever even happened.
Now she can trust only that strange man with the beard who, on Christmas morning, brings her a little puppy with curly red fur; this pup is lovelier, without a doubt, than any Viennese doll.
A doll for Salusia Łabęcka, and Father Chmielowski’s tales of a library and a ceremonious baptism
After Christmas, Kossakowska and her husband go and pay visits to the neighbors. In doing so, they also carry out their mission to transfer the Puritans jammed into their barns to Wojsławice, and to send those who won’t fit around to the estates of various nobles. Agnieszka goes along with a bag full of tinctures—since Mr. Kossakowski has been complaining of pain in his bones—and their writing chest, with everything they need to write their letters, and two fur-lined cloaks. The dictation of letters takes place in the carriage; Agnieszka commits the letters to memory, then writes them down when they come to a stop. Kossakowska thinks of those under her care as “converts,” but she tries not to use this word in writing or in speech, since it carries negative associations. It is better to call them “Puritans,” a word that came from France or maybe England and that His Lordship Łabęcki has just reminded her of, and now everyone is using it. It has good associations, containing the suggestion, pleasing to the ear, that they are pure.
She is taking a lovely gift: a doll. The doll is dressed exquisitely, like the ladies at the imperial court. She has flaxen hair curled into ringlets and topped with a shapely little lace cap. Kossakowska has taken her out of her box in the carriage—the snow has melted, and they have put away the sleighs—and is now holding her on her lap as though she were a child, twittering to it as adults do when bending down over a child. This is all to entertain her husband. But he is in a bad mood today in spite of this, annoyed that his wife is dragging him around to see the neighbors. His bones hurt—he has long suffered from arthritis. He would gladly stay at home and let the dogs come inside, which his wife has strictly forbidden. It’s a long way to Rohatyn, and he doesn’t care for Łabęcki, he’s too learned for the castellan’s tastes and too intent upon pretending he is French. Kossakowski, on the other hand, is dressed in the Polish fashion, in a woolen kontusz and a fur.
The little girl at the Łabęckis’ is named Salomea. For now she keeps quiet—so far she has not uttered a single word, although she has a Polish governess who tries to help her. What she likes to do is just sit and embroider. She has been taught to curtsy and to lower her eyes when her elders are addressing her. She wears a pink dress with a magenta ribbon in her black hair. She is tiny and extremely lovely. Mrs. Łabęcka says she never smiles. Which is why they watch her so closely when they give her the doll. After a moment’s hesitation, she sticks out her hand for it, then draws it in tight to her chest, pressing her face into the doll’s flaxen hair. Mr. Łabęcki looks at her with a kind of pride, then quickly forgets about her. The girl takes her doll and vanishes like a dust ball.
At the sumptuous lunch that turns imperceptibly into dinner and falls only a little short of rolling on into breakfast, Father Chmielowski, the vicar forane, turns up. Kossakowska greets him warmly but also seems not to recognize the poor man, which saddens him visibly.
“From Rohatyn—I saved your life when you were ailing,” the priest states humbly, while Łabęcki shouts over him that he’s a famous writer.
“Ahh,” Kossakowska remembers, “this is that brave and gallant priest who fished me out of the crowd when I was stuck in that half-brokendown carriage and brought me in here, to this refuge of yours! The author of New Athens, which I have read from cover to cover.” She slaps the priest’s back relentlessly and tells him to sit down next to her. He blushes and initially declines—this woman, with her masculine behavior, frightens him—but in the end he does sit next to her, and slowly his courage returns with the help of the Tokay. His health has declined, he’s gotten skinnier and weaker, and his teeth must have decayed, for he struggles with the chicken placed before him, although he eats the boiled vegetables and the soft pâtés of wild game, dishing more and more of them onto his plate. From the white rolls, he selects the soft center, assembling the harder outsides carefully in a little pile and furtively passing them under the table to the Łabęckis’ shaggy dog, who—very much like his mother—inspires great affection in the priest. He’s happy he managed to house this dog with such a fine family. And he even feels a little bit like he is part of the Łabęcki family now, as well.
“I hear, Father, that you’ve just returned from Warsaw,” Kossakowska says to him.
Father Chmielowski blushes slightly, which makes his face seem younger.
“The wonderfully erudite Bishop Załuski had been inviting me to go for quite some time, and if he knew, of course, that I was sitting now with Your Benevolent Ladyship, he would no doubt have sent his very fondest regards from Warsaw, for he spoke of you in only the most glowing terms.”
“Like everyone else,” interjects Łabęcki, a slight irony in his tone.
Father Chmielowski continues:
“Warsaw itself didn’t interest me, just that library. A city is a city, anyone can see what it is. It is the same wherever you go—the roofs are the same, the churches, and people all look alike. It’s a bit like Lwów, just with more empty squares, which makes the wind all the more vexing. I was taken there by that vast collection, and as I am already considerably weakened, and I have little health left . . .” Here Father Chmielowski falters, reaches for his wine, and takes a big gulp. “On account of that library of theirs I was unable to sleep, and I still cannot . . . What an enormity . . . Tens of thousands—they themselves do not even know how many volumes . . .”
Father Chmielowski had stayed in a monastery, and every day he’d walked quite a bit in that freezing air to get to the library, where he was permitted to poke around in the stacks. He had intended to make notes, for he has not yet completed his work, but that multitude of books had an unexpectedly depressing effect on him. Father Chmielowski actually spent all that time—almost an entire month—going into the library to try to understand what organization prevailed there. But with everincreasing anxiety, he became convinced that there was no organization to it at all.
“Some books are sorted by author, but then suddenly it changes and is according to the ‘abecedary,’ alph
abetically. And then there are books that were purchased together just piled up, and then there are some that on account of their larger format would not fit onto the usual shelves, and so they have been separated onto other, more capacious shelves, or they lie around as if ailing in some way,” Father Chmielowski says indignantly. “But books are like soldiers. They should always be standing at attention, one after the next. Like an army of mankind’s wisdom.”
“Well said,” comments Łabęcki.
It seems to Father Chmielowski that a whole team of people ought to be deployed and ought to act as they would in an army—establish a hierarchy amongst themselves and divide into regiments, give the books ranks according to value and rarity, and finally supply them with provisions, gluing together and sewing up those that are ailing and damaged. It would be a great undertaking, but how worthwhile it would be. For what would we do without books?
What irritates the priest most is that this is supposed to be a public library, meaning an open library, which he cannot understand—for what can they mean by it? That just anyone can come and take a book back to his home? This seems to him a mad idea, one of those Western ones, French, which will bring greater harm to book collections than it will benefit anyone. He has observed that the books at the Załuskis’ are borrowed via a rotten lending form, which then, put away in a drawer, might get mislaid or disappear forever, as slips of paper have the habit of doing. And when a more distinguished guest comes in, they will just give him a book without even having him sign the lending form, out of timidity. There is no record of where the borrowed books have gone or of who has them.
The Books of Jacob Page 65
