Florian's Gate

by T. Davis Bunn

  “Of course,” Jeffrey replied. He allowed himself to be ushered from the room. “But you have to realize that there is a very big difference between the price paid for a good imitation and the value of an original antique. A world of difference. And I won’t know for sure what these pieces are until I have completed a full evaluation.”

  “This is clear,” she replied through Katya. “But I believe you will tell me the truth. You gave back money when you did not need to. You did not try to first tell me that the antiques were fake. The quality of honesty is very rare when such sums are involved. You must come back again. There will be other opportunities for business.”

  “I’d like that very much,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm. “Thank you.”

  She flipped off the cellar lights, started up the stairwell, and continued to talk over her shoulder. Katya translated. “The next time you come the new autobahn to Schwerin will be open, and the power lines will loom like metal giants over the land. And with the coming of all that wealth and ease and comfort, something will be lost. I am not sorry to see communism go. It had to be. But with this blind rush to join to the West, I tell you that something truly will be lost.”

  * * *

  Jeffrey strode back toward Schwerin’s old town as though he were walking on air. His first find. His first buy. He filled his lungs to bursting, feeling as though he were breathing champagne.

  The family would receive an initial sum sufficient to cover the downpayment on their house—the safe’s facades were worth that much alone. Once the pieces arrived in London and authentication was completed, another fifty percent of the minimum estimated value would be sent via the lawyer. Upon sale, the remainder minus commissions.

  As they strolled back toward the center of town Katya said softly, “I am very proud of you.”

  “For what?”

  “For the offer of help.”

  He shook his head. “It was Alexander’s idea and Alexander’s money.”

  “I think maybe you had a little to do with it.”

  “Well, with the arrangement, yes. A little.”

  She pointed to where a red-brick spire rose above the old city’s rooftops. “I’d like to go in there and pray for the people before we leave. Do we have time?”

  “If we hurry.”

  The church was erected around the year eleven hundred, a vast structure of red brick and stone and floored with colored tile. The forty-meter-high domed ceiling took a tour-guide’s voice and bounced it back in rolling echoes; the guide paused with practiced cadence to allow the reverberated tones to silence between his phrases.

  Jeffrey sat beside Katya as she knelt and prayed. He was content to spend his time looking about the chamber, happy to have the trip behind him, enormously pleased to be at peace with Katya.

  The former Communist masters had stripped the churches of their finery and painted the ornate interiors a blank-faced white. All that was left were two wooden crosses, the altar panels, the empty bishop’s chair, and a painting of Christ on the cross. All the stained-glass windows had been blown out during the war, replaced with simple translucent glass panels. Stripped of its multicolored lighting, the vast whitewashed chamber held all the warmth and hope of a tomb.

  “I love these old churches,” Katya said as they left. “It’s as though I can feel in my heart the centuries of prayer.”

  Jeffrey pointed over his shoulder at the church entryway. “Did you see that kid there by the doors?”

  “Which one?”

  “He was standing at the announcement board when we went out. He was looking at that poster, the big one. It was a Bible verse, wasn’t it?”

  Katya nodded. “John 3:16. I saw it.”

  “He was just standing there. I’m pretty sure he was the same one I saw when we went in. I noticed him because of the expression on his face. A kid of fifteen, maybe sixteen years old, standing in front of a church reading and rereading a Bible verse.”

  Katya pulled Jeffrey to a stop, gave him a very tender look. “What was his expression?”

  “Total confusion,” Jeffrey replied. “Can you imagine? He had no idea what it meant. His face was all furrowed up as if he was trying to figure it out.”

  The light in her eyes reached out, caressed him, drew him to look both without and within.

  “What does that mean, Katya? That he’d never even heard the concept of salvation before? Is that really the truth?”

  “All but two of the city’s churches have been closed for the past fifty years,” Katya told him. “Two churches in a provincial capital of over one hundred thousand inhabitants.”

  He shook his head. “It’s one thing to hear about it, another thing to see it.”

  “You couldn’t belong to both a church and the Party,” Katya went on. “You couldn’t be seen in church, not even for a friend’s wedding, and hold a government job. You couldn’t go to church and apply for a government pension. To be a practicing Christian meant that at retirement age you received no social security, no payments of any kind.

  “If you joined a church in spite of all this, your children were ostracized. Your home was threatened—remember, there was a terrible housing shortage. Some church members were simply tossed out on the street with nowhere to go. There was no social safety net for a believer. Your requests for anything—a new home, a passport, sometimes even a driver’s license—were automatically turned down. You couldn’t teach. You couldn’t study at a university. You couldn’t hold a management job or be an engineer or work at a sensitive position. You were always suspect. You were liable to be arrested at any time, charged with sedition and sentenced to long terms in prisons too horrible to describe. You were persecuted, Jeffrey. You and your family. You weren’t wanted. The Communists did their best to grind the church and all believers into dust.”

  “This really happened,” he said quietly.

  “Just because it wasn’t your family or your backyard doesn’t make it any less real, Jeffrey. These are real people with real needs who have never even heard that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”

  CHAPTER 11

  Their plane to Poland was delayed, a common occurrence according to Alexander. Jeffrey had ample time to see Katya off. When they arrived at her departure gate, she lifted her face for a kiss. “I’ve really enjoyed the trip, Jeffrey. It was very difficult at times, but I’m glad I came.”

  “Too short, though.”

  “Anything that is not for forever is too short,” she replied.

  “I wish you really meant that.”

  Katya enfolded him in a fierce embrace, mumbling into his chest, “I wish . . .”

  “You wish what?”

  “Sometimes I wish for too much,” she said, releasing him and turning swiftly away. “Goodbye, Jeffrey. Have a safe trip. I will wait for your return.”

  When he returned to the Hamburg airport’s first-class lounge, Alexander said, “You must forgive me this morning. I do not feel quite myself.”

  “You’ve had a pretty bad shock,” Jeffrey replied.

  “More than you perhaps will ever understand,” he agreed. “It appears that some things one is not ever able to completely leave behind.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “No matter.” Alexander cleared the air with a weary wave. “Let us change the subject, shall we?”

  “Fine with me.” Jeffrey allowed the smile to break loose. “I have some good news.”

  “Excellent. I cannot recall a time in recent years when good news would have been more welcome.” Alexander made a visible effort to pull himself together. “I take it that this beaming visage of yours is not due solely to your departing lady friend.”

  Jeffrey shook his head. “I made a buy.” He related the story of the two pieces.

  Alexander listened in silence, then replied, “And on your first trip. Remarkable.”

  “I couldn’t say for sure if they were genuine articles.”

  “Of course not. There is always the r
isk that the safe is decorated with stones of paste and tinsel. But you explained this and hinged payment upon authentication.” He gave Jeffrey a respectful look. “I am surprised. There is very little these days that surprises me. And I am most pleased.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It is I who must offer the thanks. And I believe it is now time for me to divulge some matters of my own.” Alexander sipped at a glass of water. “I am indeed grateful for the patience you have shown. It is most unusual for a man of your years to be willing to wait for an explanation about mystery trips to unknown lands.”

  “I figured you would tell me when it was time.”

  “Indeed. And that time has now arrived.” Alexander inspected him solemnly. “I do not need to tell you how confidential these matters must remain.”

  “No,” Jeffrey replied, his voice rock-steady. “You do not.”

  Alexander gave his head a single nod. “Very well.” He looked around the almost-empty room, removed a silver tube from his pocket, unscrewed the cap, drew out a slender Davidoff cigar. “I hope you don’t mind.”

  “You know I don’t.”

  The lounge steward bustled over and lit the cigar with a long wooden match. Alexander nodded his thanks, waited for the man to depart, then said, “Approximately one third of our purchases come from the open market—auctions or public sales or through other dealers, usually in this latter instance from other countries. One third come from my own acquaintances and friends, built up over the years. And the final third, the source upon which we rely the most, is the East.”

  “The East?”

  “Several places, but all channeled through one man. A relative of mine—ours, I should say. He escaped with me to London, then decided to return to Poland.”

  “Uncle Gregor?” Jeffrey made round eyes. “The priest?”

  “He is not a priest, nor has he ever been. He is what is known as a lay brother, which means that while he does not reside in a monastery, he has made a formal commitment to live a life of service and poverty. Gregor is a most remarkable man, as you will soon discover. He lives according to rules which I have never fathomed. Yet I admire him tremendously, and rely on him completely. You should as well, Jeffrey. You may trust him with anything.”

  “Uncle Gregor deals in antiques?” This did not fit with what little the family had told of his long-lost relative. “I don’t understand.”

  “I don’t expect you to. Not yet. I will ask you to wait until we arrive in Cracow, and see for yourself how our arrangement operates. It would take too long to explain here, and even if I did, you would still not understand until you had seen it for yourself.”

  Jeffrey nodded. “So these long trips you make are to Poland?”

  “Some of them, yes. I choose to cloak all of my trips under the same veil of secrecy, so that none draws more attention than any other. But yes, I do spend a considerable amount of time in Poland and some of the neighboring lands.” Alexander smiled. “You have recently spoken with Gregor, by the way.”

  “When—” He made round eyes. “The blessing?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “The man I told you about, the one who knew my name and left the message that the shipment was ready.” Jeffrey smiled at the memory. “He blessed me before he hung up.”

  “Yes, well, Gregor is known to do such things.” Alexander drew on his cigar and emitted a long plume of smoke before continuing. “It is important for you to understand that while there, I wear two entirely different labels. Or have, so long as the Communist regime was in power. So much has changed in recent months that my new roles have not yet been defined. But my former status I must take time to explain now, if you would please be so kind as to bear with me.”

  Kantor paused to sip from his glass. “First of all, it is important for you to know that under the Communists it was illegal to export anything from Poland that was more than forty years old. To be precise, the law read that nothing made before 1947 could leave the country. But as with any totalitarian government—and believe me, young man, no matter what guise the Communists may have operated under, they were true totalitarians—the concentration of power within a few hands meant that any law could be circumvented if it suited the power-holders. The question was, how to make the power-holders see that my interests coincided with their own.

  “By establishing this export law, Poland sought to preserve its historical heritage, or what was left after both the Nazis and the Soviets had ransacked the country from end to end. The problem was, only so many items of furniture or paintings or jewelry could be purchased and housed in a museum. And since there was no access to the outside markets, the prices for Polish antiques was set by the internal market. And this market, young man, was barely above starvation level.

  “The summer before the Communist regime was toppled, a doctor in the capital city of Warsaw earned the equivalent of forty dollars a month. He or she survived by receiving gifts of food and services from clients who sought preferential treatment and medicines that were not out-of-date. That small example illustrates how close to collapse the occupying forces had brought my homeland. I could give you a thousand others, but you will see these for yourself soon enough. Forty years of Soviet oppression is not going to be wiped out in just a few months.

  “As for antiques, the market barely existed at all. Pieces that caught the government’s eye—which meant anyone from a museum director to a greedy official—were sometimes purchased. But just as likely the owner would be questioned as to how he or she came to own such an item of capitalist wealth, and then it would be requisitioned. End of story.

  “The result was that few pieces ever made it to the open market, and when they did they were available at prices that to our eyes would scarcely be believed. As recently as three years ago, I walked through an antique store in Cracow and spotted items that were selling for less than one-fiftieth of the price they would bring in the West. A nineteenth-century Biedermeier cabinet for one hundred dollars. An eighteenth-century Florentine writing desk for about twice that.

  “Again, you must remember, prices were so low because most people were so poor, and the nation repeatedly suffered from economic turmoil. Money was set aside for purchasing food when shop shelves were empty, not luxuries like antiques. And the fortunate few with extra money usually desired something new, something manufactured, something that appeared vaguely Western. There was simply no market for old furniture. None.”

  Alexander rolled his cigar around the ashtray until its tip was a brightly smoldering cone. “More than twenty years ago, I began advising the Polish government on items of national and cultural heritage. I will not bandy words with you, young man. I despise the Communists and their Soviet masters for what they have done to my homeland. But I am a Pole, and as you will soon discover, the Poles are some of the most patriotic folk on earth. They love their country, and it is only with great agony and despair that they will break with the land of their birth. I began this work as a means of maintaining some contact with Poland, and to help preserve a few of the remaining historically important antiques. Five years later Gregor developed his brilliant scheme. Not me, you see. Gregor.

  “For over two decades now I have sought both inside and outside Poland to discover items that are closely linked to our history. Jewelry, paintings, ceramics, porcelain, amber, drawings, and furniture. Limited funds were placed at my disposal. I refused to either requisition pieces or identify my sources inside or outside of Poland. Inside the country I paid a fair price—what to the seller no doubt was a fortune. Outside Poland I bought on behalf of the Polish nation, if necessary using my own funds.

  “In return for this, the Polish government began granting me export licenses for high quality pieces that I felt would fetch handsome prices in the West. I have been scrupulous in my dealings with the government. Absolutely scrupulous. I take out nothing that could even vaguely be described as a part of our heritage.”

  He puffed a few times on his cig
ar before continuing. “But there is so much that remains in our land from the centuries of invading armies and occupying forces. So very much. The history of our nation is not a happy one, and for a long and tragic time Poland even ceased to exist as an independent country. It is these items in which I deal, foreign-made goods if you will, and with which I have managed to create this little empire.”

  * * *

  It was long after dark by the time their plane touched down in Cracow, yet even so the transition was very harsh, very sudden. In the space of less than an hour, the Lufthansa plane had transported them from the efficient glitz of a new West German terminal to the dusty haphazard grayness of Socialism. The Cracow Airport was little more than a dilapidated warehouse with ugly appendages and gave no concern whatsoever to artistic appeal or passenger comfort.

  Alexander was in his usual querulous bad humor upon their arrival. He passed through customs in utter silence, allowing Jeffrey to assist with his baggage. He then proceeded through the terminal and past the unshaven men offering taxis and hotels, and walked out into the night without saying a word.

  A slender young man with jet-black hair stepped from the shadows, gave a formal half bow toward Alexander, and said something Jeffrey could not understand. Alexander replied with a brief word, then said to Jeffrey, “Our driver. His name is Tomek. Almost no English, I’m afraid.”

  Tomek met Jeffrey’s gaze, solemnly shook his hand, motioned for them to remain where they were, and disappeared into the darkness. Beyond the airport’s perimeter there were almost no lights.

  “Things are certainly much simpler now since the Communists have been removed,” Alexander murmured, staring out at nothing.

  “What things?”

  “Oh, logistics for one. Visas took a month to obtain without connections or bribes or both. Airport arrival formalities took two hours, departures up to five.” He wiped a shaky hand across his forehead. “Waiting for taxis that never arrived. Being thrown out of hotels because a powerful Party official arrived unannounced with forty of his closest friends. Changing money illegally because the black market paid ten times the official rate. Waiting in line half a day to purchase a train ticket, only to find once boarding that your place had been sold to three other people as well. Standing in crowded train gangways choked with smoke, having your journey extended by hours because your train had been sidetracked to allow a freight train right-of-way. Shortages of everything and lines everywhere. Public drunkenness wherever you looked.”