Jakubowski looks at him in some surprise, touches his chin with its several days of stubble. He knows he will have to listen to the whole tale, until the very end. Moliwda says:
“And I abandoned them.”
After the miller Berek Kozowicz sent off his daughter Małka and the young Kossakowski to Lithuania, the couple sought lodging with a cousin of Małka’s who collected bridge tolls, a busy man with an enormous family. Right away they understood that it was only temporary, although they were given their own chamber by the cowshed, heated by the bodies of the cows. The whole family, including the little children, never took their eyes off Kossakowski, as if he were some freak of nature. It was unbearable. Antoni helped his cousin by marriage with his paperwork, dressed in Jewish attire handed down to him by one of the toll collector’s teenagers, and would go into the village or conduct his arguments about the toll right there at the bridge. He feared, however, that his language would betray him, and so he intentionally muddled it with different sorts of accents, throwing in words from other tongues: Lithuanian, Ruthenian, Yiddish. When he returned, his heart would tighten at the sight of Małka, suddenly heavy, terrified, surprised by her own condition, childish. What could be done? The toll collector, who smelled of arak, always asked him to read the same thing, pointing with his black-nailed finger to that same part of the scripture with which Antoni was as yet unfamiliar—and at last Małka told him that it was the story of Dinah, daughter of Leah and Jacob, who in spite of being warned went far from her home and was raped by a foreigner, Shechem.
“You are Shechem,” she added.
And when some boy at the bridge started jamming his finger into Antoni’s chest and demanding to know who he was, a crummy Jew or a crummy Pole, he started to be afraid, as if he were swimming in a river and had lost the ground beneath his feet, as if the water were carrying him now, as if he were defenseless, going into the unknown. He became more and more anxious, and then he panicked, perhaps already sensing what was going to happen. Then he remembered that in Trakai he had some family on his mother’s side, some relatives of the Kamińskis, and he fantasized about going to them and asking for help.
And he did set off, in fact, in January, having changed his attire from Jewish to Polish and noble. In three days, he found himself in Trakai, but he found no one there by a name like Kamiński. That aunt had died several years ago, her daughters had gone off with their husbands, one of them to someplace in Poland, the other deep into Russia. He learned, however, by accident, that there was a certain merchant from Trakai who was seeking a Polish tutor for his children in Pskov, where he operated his business.
And so Antoni sent the toll collector all the money he had, and in a generously apportioned letter to him, and a separate one to his wife, he promised to send more just as soon as he had earned it, and he entreated that foreigner to take care of Małka and the child until his return. Then everything would work out. Let the child be an ordinary mamzer from an illicit relationship, albeit a lawfully wed one; let that Christian wedding be respected.
On a gray winter day, as he was setting off for Russia, he received a letter at the address he had given in Trakai. In an untrained hand, the toll collector had written to tell him that both Małka and the child had died during labor, and he wished with his whole heart that the image of those two would not leave Kossakowski until the end of his days, that he would forever be haunted by the knowledge that he had been the cause of their deaths, and that nothing would ever free him from that sin. He read this letter under the great winter sky, in a cart where he was squeezed in among his fellow passengers, and he felt simultaneously despair and relief—as a swimmer borne by the river’s current feels terror until he reconciles himself to his own smallness and helplessness and becomes like a little twig upon whom nothing depends. And then comes peace.
The journey to Pskov lasted a month. Mostly he walked; sometimes wagons picked him up. He slept in stables, and sometimes he had the feeling that in his brain there was now a painful ulcer, but that he would be able to go on living with a brain ulcer so long as he didn’t disturb it in any way. This was in fact possible, aside from certain moments that came up without warning, and then the pain seemed to escape its magically defined borders, overwhelming him completely. There were also situations like those when he was traveling by sleigh with some Ruthenian peasants, freezing and filthy, and he cried the whole way, until finally the carter reined in his horse and went back to him, to hold and rock him. They stood intertwined like that in that great white emptiness, the horses steaming in the cold, the peasants in their warm wrappings waiting patiently. The carter never even asked him what was wrong.
In Pskov it turned out that he had come too late, and that there was already a tutor, who was also far more qualified than he.
After a long journey, he made it to Petersburg and realized that he could keep living just like this—being always in motion, in a cart, on a horse, every day with different people. He was pleasant, intelligent, conversant. People liked him right away, and, as if sensing that he was younger than he claimed, they looked after him, as well. He made the most of that care without ever crossing any boundaries. If you look at the matter honestly, a person needs little to live on—just a meal of some kind, and some clothing. You can sleep anywhere—and he was always being taken in by some merchant or other, for whom he would translate, do the accounting, tell some humorous tale. He was also taken in by ordinary peasants, to whom he pretended to be a mysterious nobleman in some difficulty, always treating them with the same respect he would have if they had had their own noble titles. Nor did he shy away from Jews or Greeks—he learned their languages and was always pleased to work as a translator. Sometimes he would say his name was—after his mother—Kamiński, sometimes Żmudziński, or he would invent some new surname for just a night or a couple of days. Since he expressed himself well, since he was polite and well mannered, the merchants he got to know on his travels would recommend him to their friends, and so he journeyed in caravans all over the Turkish lands. Tormented by his recurring melancholic moods, he enlisted at last in a Black Sea fleet. For almost three years, he sailed and visited many ports. He survived a shipwreck in the Aegean Sea, was confined to a Greek prison in Salonika—on a rigged conviction, of course. When he got out, he set off for the holy Mount Athos, believing he would find some solace there. But he didn’t find it. Then he was a dragoman in Smyrna, until finally he wound up with the Bogomils in Craiova, where he intended to spend the rest of his life.
“Until Jacob showed up. Until you discovered me,” Moliwda says now. They have drunk two jugs of wine, and Moliwda feels very tired. Nahman is silent for a long while, and then he rises and embraces Moliwda as the peasant once had in that barren winter.
“What do you think, Jakubowski, have I lived a good life?” Moliwda mumbles into Nahman’s collar.
As he staggers home, he sees a fire. He stops, and for a long while he stares into the burning building, which had held a musical instruments workshop. The guitar strings snap from the heat, and the tense skins of the drums shoot up into the air—the fire plays an infernal music, overheard by passersby, until with great pomp the fire brigade arrives.
29.
Of the little insect-like people who inhabit Offenbach am Main
The sight is so surprising that the local carriages on their own initiative pull over to the side of the road to let this bizarre cavalcade of men on horses and vehicles pass. At its head is a squad of soldiers made up of six men on horseback, armed with pikes and colorfully attired. They have bushy mustaches, and in spite of their serious, even threatening faces, they resemble town criers announcing the arrival of some circus. They are led by a man, also armed, whose mustache is twirled around fancifully, almost like a treble clef. After this front guard goes a sumptuous carriage with an elaborate coat of arms on the door, so elaborate it is hard to remember, and after this there are still a dozen multi-passenger carriages drawn by heavy, eastern horses. Last in li
ne are full carts covered in tarps. After them there are just men on horseback—young, handsome men. The cavalcade is moving from Frankfurt over the bridge over the Main toward Oberrad, on the outskirts of Offenbach.
Mrs. von La Roche, who is visiting her family in Offenbach and close to deciding to settle down in this exceptionally tranquil little town that reminds her of a sanatorium, also tells her coachman to pull over. She looks on in curiosity: What can this be, these strange people traveling in this strange manner? The guards are wearing gaudy uniforms, as if they were Uhlans, mostly in shades of green and gold, covered in aiguillettes and buttons. Their tall hats are decorated with peacock feathers. These very young men, almost boys, remind Sophie von La Roche of longlegged, hopping insects. She would love to take a look inside that most lavish carriage, but the curtains on its windows are tightly drawn. She can, on the other hand, examine the new arrivals in the following carriages—they are mostly women and children, all of them dressed up and colorful, smiling and probably a little bit embarrassed by all this commotion they have caused.
“Who is that?” an intrigued Mrs. von La Roche inquires of a townsman who is staring at this procession.
“They’re saying it’s some Polish baron with his sons and his daughter.” The cavalcade goes slowly through the city’s outskirts, squeezing onto the narrow cobbled streets. The men on horseback shout back and forth in some foreign language, and their whistles can be heard. Mrs. von La Roche feels as if she’s watching a performance at the opera.
When Sophie gets together with her equally excited female cousin, her stay in Berlin quickly retreats into the background of everyone’s mind. They are all talking about that Polish baron with the beautiful, mysterious daughter he brought here at the archduke’s invitation, renting from him the house in Oberrad where the newcomers will stay first.
Her cousin rented a carriage especially to go to Oberrad and saw the whole ceremonious process of getting everyone out of their carriages. Now she says excitedly:
“Those two sons led out a tall old man in red wearing a Turkish hat. He had a diamond star pinned to his chest. From the second carriage his daughter got out, dressed like a princess. I saw diamonds in her hair. You can’t imagine, they looked like an imperial couple. You will be neighbors, once they’re installed in the castle.”
Since March 1786, Offenbach has been gripped by light to moderate hysteria. As bricklayers work in the castle, dust flies out the windows. Enormous quantities of wallpapers, carpets, materials for the walls, furniture, and bedding are brought in—all the things you would need to create a comfortable residence worthy of a Polish baron.
Sophie von La Roche, who is a writer and whose custom it is to write, is careful to note down in her diary everything she sees:
It is very interesting how our dear co-inhabitants of Offenbach are dealing with the scant information with which they have had to content themselves on the subject of these Poles. The human mind cannot tolerate uncertainty or things left mostly unsaid, and so right away every possible history began to be invented regarding these insect-like people. According to the rumors, the old man in the Turkish costume is some sort of alchemist and Kabbalist, like that Saint-Germain, and he owes his fortune to the gold he has produced in his own workshop, which workers have confirmed on carrying inside some secret crates filled with glass, and jars and little bottles. Our dear Mrs. Bernard told me that this Baron Frank-Dobrucki is none other than Tsar Peter the Third, miraculously saved from death, which explains the arrival of all the barrels of gold from the East, for the maintenance of this court of Nebuchadnezzar. I permitted myself to take part in the game and informed her she was wrong. This supposed daughter and her two brothers are in fact the children of the previous tsarina, Elizabeth Petrovna, by her lover Razumovsky, and the baron is actually just their tutor. She nodded, and that very same day, come evening, the rumor returned to me through the lips of the doctor who came to let my blood, in no way altered.
Of Isenburger Schloss and its freezing residents
The castle stands just above the water, and on a number of occasions it has fallen victim to flooding. Careful recording of the water level can be seen in two places inside. The highest one was from two years ago. Hence, no doubt, the lichen on the walls, from the moisture. Eva spends a long time selecting her room, wondering if she would rather have a view of the river, in which case she would have a balcony, or perhaps a big window looking out on the city. In the end she decides on the river and the balcony.
The river is many colors here, soft and gentle. It is called the Main, but her father stubbornly insists on calling it the Prut—the name of the river that divided Turkey from Poland, where so many of his followers had once camped in anticipation of him. The sight of the barges and the boats with double sails floating down this river—the Main—soothes Eva. She can just sit like this on the balcony, looking out over the water, which she experiences as a kind of tender caress, the fluid motion, the movement of the sails, all of it in some way touches her body and leaves a pleasant streak along her skin. She has already ordered furniture: a desk and two wardrobes, as well as sofas upholstered in bright material and a coffee table. Her father takes two rooms with a view of the Main. She went especially to Frankfurt to order him carpets, as her father will no longer recognize any sort of chair. The most beautiful room, with a string of stained-glass windows, will be a temple, she has decided that already. This is where the brothers and sisters will gather.
The castle is impressive—it is the largest building in the area, and it makes a bigger impression than any church would. From the flat bank it is separated by a road that is eternally wet, reinforced every year by stones workers bring in. There is also a harbor for the ferry that can be taken to the other side. Near the harbor there is an inn and a smithy. On tables assembled from wooden boards, fish from the river are sold, mainly pike and perch. They, the Polacken, as they are called in town, also buy whole baskets of fish.
The castle has five floors. Eva and Matuszewski have sketched out the use of each. On the first floor, then, will be the ceremonial halls, on the second she and her father as well as the oldest of the brothers and sisters will live, as in Brünn. Above, the kitchen and the women’s rooms, and the two final floors will be for the young people who will come. There will also be a kitchen and a laundry in the building next door. Eva, who has investigated the emperor’s palaces in Vienna, has a vision for how it’s all supposed to look. For her renovations, she has engaged the services of an architect from Frankfurt; sometimes it is hard to explain to him what it is they want—the meeting room is to be without furniture, just carpets and pillows, the home chapel is to be without an altar, just a dais in the middle. There are many things this man can’t understand. They spend the entire summer painting the walls and changing out the rotted floors. The worst is the first floor, where two years ago there was stagnant water. In all the windows they had to put new panes. They have already purchased in Frankfurt large quantities of rugs and blankets, because it is cold inside, even in the summer. The buyers hand over money with pleasure, without so much as a murmur. Frankfurt bankers turn up immediately to offer them loans.
By the time they move into the castle, there is no longer any pomp and ceremony. They move into the castle at the same time as Mrs. Sophie von La Roche, who has been widowed, settles permanently in Offenbach, in the winter of 1788.
The two staircases with their steep steps will pose a challenge to Jacob Frank—he has a hard time walking now. The long journey to Offenbach through wintry Germany caused him to come down with a cold. In Meissen, where they stayed for a few days, he had an attack of fever, was delirious and insisted again that they were trying to poison him with communion wafers. He recovered a little after visiting the manufactory and viewing all its porcelain.
Now, oblivious to the renovations, uninterested in wallpapers and upholstery, he spends whole days dictating letters that messengers deliver to Poland, to Moravia, to Bucharest—anywhere there are t
rue believers. He also summons all the elder brothers here. The first to arrive in the summer are Jakubowski with Jan Wołowski, and shortly after that they bring in the Łabęckis’ children, as well as the Lanckorońskis’, as well as the “Turkesses,” as they call the true believers of Wallachia. The house in Oberrad cannot fit them all, so, while the castle is still being renovated, they must also rent rooms in Offenbach, in those cozy, well-cared-for houses with their slate-covered walls.
Jacob is visibly revived by the visits he receives from Thomas, who comes to Offenbach during his frequent business trips to Frankfurt. Twice they have gone out together to the river, where Thomas has introduced his uncle to bankers and helped him secure yet more lines of credit.
Normally, however, they sit and talk. Now Jacob spontaneously orders his coffee served in the castle portico, where he can warm himself in the patches of sun, although what he really wants is no doubt for Thomas to be able to watch the handsome man in the elegant white uniform who is running the drills in the castle courtyard.
“That’s Prince Lubomirski,” says Jacob.
For a moment, Thomas says nothing, stunned, or maybe he doesn’t quite believe his uncle.
“Where could such a person have come from, all the way here? A real prince?”
Jacob tells the story with pleasure, enjoying his coffee. The coffee is imported from Turkey, and it makes a sensation in Offenbach. One of the true believers has already opened a small coffee shop in town, and sitting in it instantly became fashionable.
Jacob says that Lubomirski is bankrupt, and in order to avoid being imprisoned for his debts, he had to flee Poland. In Warsaw, he met the lovely Tekla Łabęcka, the orphaned daughter of Moshe Łabęcki, and, having fallen in love with her, followed her all the way here. Jacob gave him employment, appointing him commander-in-chief of the guard. The prince even helped design its uniforms, making use of his great knowledge of such matters.
The Books of Jacob Page 94
