“In other words, Father, you are comparing us to piano-tuners,” said Stefan with an inward smile, though he maintained his serious expression. “Perhaps you’re right,” he went on. “A nineteenth-century theologian is said to have stated that the telodendria, the edges of nerve cells, are immersed in the universal ether—except that physics had already disproved the existence of the ether.”
“Not long ago there was a different note in your voice,” the priest said sadly. “Please excuse the obsession of a former patient, doctor, but it seems to me that Mr. Sekułowski has acted on you like wormwood. You are naturally good-hearted, but seeing him has given you a bitter streak that, I am sure, is foreign to you.”
“Good-hearted?” Stefan laughed. “Me? That is a compliment I have usually been spared, Father.”
“I do hope that you will come on Sunday. It only remains for you to give me your recommendation as to which of the patients should be allowed to take part in the Mass. On the one hand I would like as many of them as possible to be there, since it has been so many years, while on the other…” He hesitated.
“I understand,” said Stefan. “In my view, however, the plan is inadvisable.”
“Inadvisable?” The priest was visibly disheartened. “Don’t you think that…”
“I think there are times when even God could compromise Himself.”
The priest looked down. “Indeed. Unfortunately, I know full well that I will be unable to find the right words, because I am just an ordinary village priest. I admit that when I was in school I dreamed of meeting an unbelieving but powerful spirit. So that I could harness it and lead it…”
“Harness it? That sounds strange, Father.”
“I was thinking of harnessing it with love, but that was a sin. I only realized that later: the sin of pride. Then I discovered that living among people teaches us many other things. I know very well how little I am worth. Every one of you doctors has a whole battery of arguments that could demolish my priestly wisdom.”
Stefan was annoyed by the priest’s mawkish tone. He looked around.
The patients were walking along the paths to the building; it was dinner time.
“Let’s keep this between us,” Stefan said, starting to leave. “And you know, Father, our bond of secrecy is as strict as yours, leaving heaven out of it. But tell me something. Have you ever had doubts, Father?”
“What kind of answer do you want, doctor?”
“I would like to hear the truth.”
“Forgive me: it seems that you seldom open the Gospels. Please take a look at chapters 27 and 46 of Saint Matthew. More than once, those have been my words,”
The priest left. The yard was almost empty. The cherry-colored robes moved so evenly that an unseen force might have been combing them out of the gold-tinged gardens. Last of all came an orderly smoking a cigarette. As Stefan walked past a bare lilac bush, he saw someone crouching behind it. He wanted to call the orderly, but stopped himself. The patient, bent low, was clumsily stroking the silvery grass with a stiff hand.
ACHERON
Stefan was coming back from a walk. Fluffy gold filled the roadside ditches, as if Ali Baba’s mule had passed, spilling sequins from an open sack. A chestnut tree burned against the gray sky like an abandoned suit of armor. In the distance, the forest seemed to be rusting. As Stefan walked, the leaves thickly layered underfoot were alternately yellow and brown, like musical variations on a red theme. Twilight smoldered orange at the end of the path. Faraway orchards faded against the horizon. Leaves blown into a hissing cloud raced among a herd of tree trunks. Stefan was still dazzled by the colors when he entered the library to pick up a book he had left there.
Pajpak was standing at the telephone on the wall, pressing the receiver so hard that his ear had turned white. He was hardly saying anything, just mumbling, “Yes… yes… yes.” Then he said, “Thank you,” and replaced the receiver with both hands.
He stood there, still holding the telephone, and Stefan hurried over.
“My dear, dear colleague,” Pajączkowski whispered, and Stefan’s heart went out to him.
“Are you feeling weak, professor? Do you want some coramin? I’ll run to the medicine room,”
“No, it’s not that. I mean it’s not me,” the old man mumbled. He stood up straight and guided himself along the wall like a blind man until he reached the window.
The autumn red, laden with the smell of mold and speckled yellow among the leaves, broke against the window like a flood tide.
“It’s the end,” he said abruptly, then repeated: “The end.”
He lowered his gray head.
“I’ll see the dean. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. What time is it?”
“Five.”
“Then he’s sure to be… home.”
The dean was always home.
Turning as if he had just noticed Stefan, he said, “And you’re coming with me.”
“What’s going on, professor?”
“Nothing so far. And God will not allow it. No, He will not let it happen. But we’ll… You come with me as a witness. It’ll be easier for me that way, safer to talk, because you know how His Excellency is.”
A spark of Pajpak’s humor shined in his use of the dean’s ceremonial title, then disappeared.
Going to a doctor’s apartment was one thing, but going to the dean’s was another. The door was plain and white, like all the others. Pajączkowski tapped too softly to be heard inside.
He waited and tried again, louder. Stefan was about to knock himself, but the director skittishly pushed him away: You don’t know how to do it, you’ll screw it up.
“Come in!”
A powerful voice. It was still reverberating as they entered.
Stefan had seen the room before, but it looked different in the sunset light. The white walls had taken on a fiery color. It looked like a lion’s den. The old gold on the spines of the books seemed like some exotic inlay. The sun tinged the veneer of the sideboard and shelves with a deep mahogany. Pools of light shimmered in the grain of the wood; sparks glinted in the dean’s hair. He was behind his desk as always, leaning over a thick book, staring at Pajpak and Stefan.
Pajączkowski stammered through his introduction. He apologized, he knew they were interrupting, but vis maior—for the general good. Then he came to the point.
“I just had a telephone call, Excellency, from Kocierba, the pharmacist in Bierzyniec. At eight o’clock this morning a company of Germans and Cossack police—Ukrainians—arrived in the village. They were ordered to be silent, but somebody talked. They have come to liquidate our asylum.”
Pajpak seemed somehow diminished. Only his crooked nose moved. He was through.
The dean, as befits a man of science, questioned the reliability of the pharmacist’s information. Pajączkowski spoke in his defense.
“He is a solid man, Excellency. He has been here for thirty years. He remembers you from the times of the servant Olgierd. You wouldn’t know him, because he is a little man”—Pajączkowski measured out a modest height above the floor—“but he is honest.”
He took a breath and said, “Excellency, this news is so terrible that I would prefer not to believe it. But it is our—I mean, it is my obligation to believe it.” Now came the hardest part of his speech. However humble and unsure of himself, he realized how cold their reception had been: the dean had not even invited them to sit down. Two chairs by the desk stood empty, shadowed in the gold reflection of the setting sun. The dean sat waiting, his large, veined hand resting on his book. This meant that the entire scene was an interlude, an interruption of more important business beyond the ken of his guests.
“I have learned, Excellency, that these soldiers are commanded by a German psychiatrist. In other words, a colleague of ours. A Doctor Thiessdorff,”
He paused. The dean was silent. He merely raised his gray eyebrows as if to say: I don’t know the name.
“Yes. A young man. Member of the SS. And thou
gh I realize what a thankless undertaking it is—what else can we do? We must go see him in Bierzyniec today, Excellency, because tomorrow…” His voice failed. “The Germans have notified Mr. Pietrzykowski, the mayor, that they need forty people for a labor detail tomorrow morning.”
“This news is not entirely unexpected,” the dean said quickly. It was strange that such a big man could speak so quietly. “I have anticipated it, though perhaps not in this form, ever since Rosegger’s article. Surely you remember it.”
Pajpak nodded vigorously: he remembered, he was listening, he was paying attention,
“I do not know, however, what my role in all this might be,” the dean went on. “As far as I know, the staff and the doctors are in no danger. Whereas the patients…”
He should not have said that. Accustomed as he was to preparing his words well in advance, he must not have been thinking this time.
Pajączkowski appeared no different, but though his thin hand was still an old man’s hand, it did not tremble as it rested on the comer of the desk.
“These are times,” he said, “in which human life is losing its value. These are horrible times, but Your Excellency’s name should still be able to guard this house like a shield and save the lives of one hundred and eighty unfortunate people.”
The dean’s other hand, which had remained behind the desk as if not taking part in the discussion, now intruded in a vigorous horizontal gesture where meaning was clear: Silence.
“I am not, after all, the director of this institution,” he said. “I am not even listed as an employee. I hold no position here. My presence is entirely unofficial, and I believe that serious problems may arise for me—and for you—on that account. However, I will remain here if you so wish. As for my mediation, the Germans have already evaluated what services I have performed. In Warsaw. And you know to what effect. The wild young Aryan who, as you say, intends to kill our patients tomorrow is following the orders of an authority that respects neither age nor academic reputation.”
Silence fell, a change coming slowly over the room. The last rays of the setting sun moved across the cabinet by the window in a red, weeping stain so delicate that Stefan, though riveted by the conversation, could not help following it with his eyes. Then a blue veil dropped over the room like clear water. It got darker, and sadder, the way the lighting announces a new scene in a well-staged play.
“I am going there now,” said Pajączkowski, who stood erect and looked quixotic with his small beard. “I thought that you would accompany me.”
The dean did not move.
“In that case, I’ll be off. Good-bye, Excellency.”
They left. In the corridor, Stefan felt very small beside the old man. The tiny, withered face bore a great deal of pride at that moment.
“I’m going now,” he said, as they stood at the top of the light-dappled staircase. “I trust you will keep everything you have just heard to yourself until I return.”
He put his hand on the rail. “The dean has been going through a difficult time. He was thrown out of the laboratory in which he laid the groundwork for electroencephalography. His work was important not only in Poland. Still, I didn’t think…” Here a shade of the old Pajpak returned, but only for an instant: his beard trembled. “I don’t know. Acheronta movebo
“You want me to go along?” Stefan suddenly asked. Fear swept over him. He felt stunned, just as he had when the German kicked him, and he took a step back.
“No. What could you do? Only Kauters, perhaps.” He added, after a long pause, “But he wouldn’t go. I’m sure of that. The scene in there was enough for me.”
He started down the empty stone staircase with strides so firm that it was as if he wanted to refute all the rumors of his poor health.
Stefan was still standing at the top of the stairs when Marglewski appeared. The scrawny doctor was in bubbling spirits. He grabbed a button of Stefan’s shirt and drew him to the window.
“Have you heard that the priest is saying Mass tomorrow? He needs altar boys and I promised Rygier that I would find some for him. You know who’s going to serve? Little Piotr from my ward! You know who I mean?”
Stefan remembered a small blond boy with a face like a Murillo angel and a shock of gold hair. A drooling, retarded cretin.
“It’ll be out of this world! Listen, we absolutely have to…”
Stefan sacrificed the button, shouted that he was in a hurry, and left Marglewski in mid-sentence. He ran out of the building and down the road to Bierzyniec where Pajączkowski had gone. As he flew downhill, barely seeing the road, he heard a sound above the crunching of the leaves. He stopped and looked up. It was a motor. Someone was driving up the hill. A cloud of dust drew nearer behind the trees. Stefan could not help shivering, as if an icy wind had blown over him. He turned back quickly. He had almost reached the stone arch with its worn inscription when the engine roared past him. He leaned against the pillar.
It was a German military vehicle, a slab-sided Kübelwagen, rocking as it climbed in second gear. The driver’s helmet showed dark behind the windshield. The vehicle turned and stopped at the gate with a clatter.
Stefan walked toward it.
A big German was standing at the wall, wearing a camouflage cape, dark goggles pushed up onto his helmet, and black gloves with embroidered labels. Patches of mud were drying on the folds of his cape. He was saying something loudly to the gatekeeper. When Stefan heard his question, he answered in German: “Unfortunately the director is not here at the moment. May I help you?”
“Things have to be straightened out here,” the German replied. “Are you the vice-director?”
“I’m a doctor here.”
“All right, then. Let’s go inside.”
The German walked in decisively, as if already familiar with the place. The driver remained behind the wheel. Stefan noticed that he kept his hand on an automatic pistol lying on the seat beside him.
Stefan led the German into the main office.
“How many patients are here at present?”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t know if…”
“I’ll decide when you should apologize,” the German said sharply. “Answer me.”
“About a hundred and sixty.”
“I must have the exact figure. Let me see the papers.”
“That is confidential.”
“Don’t give me that shit,” answered the German. Stefan took the book off the shelf and opened it. The hospital population was 186.
“So. You’re sure you’re not lying?”
Stefan’s cheeks felt numb. He couldn’t take his eyes off the German’s sharp chin. His cold, sweaty fingers were clenched into fists. Those washed-out German eyes had seen hundreds of people strip naked at the edges of ditches, making meaningless movements as, understanding nothing, they tried to prepare their living bodies to tumble into the mud. The room spun—only the tall figure with the green cape thrown over his shoulders remained fixed.
“What a disgusting backwater this is,” the German said. “Two days hunting down those swine in the woods. A special committee is coming here. If you hide one single patient, that’s it.” No explicit threat, no gestures, no expression. Yet Stefan still felt numb inside. His lips were dry. He kept licking them.
“Now show me all the buildings.”
“Only doctors are allowed in the wards,” said Stefan, barely above a whisper. “Those are the rules.”
“We make the rules,” said the German. “Enough stalling.”
He pushed past Stefan, staggering him. They walked across the yard at a brisk pace. The German looked around, asking questions. How many beds in a given ward? How many exits? Are the windows barred? How many patients?
Finally, on his way out, he asked how many staff and doctors there were. He stopped at the broadest stretch of lawn and looked both ways, as if taking its dimensions.
“You can sleep easy,” he said when they got back to the vehicle. “Nothing will happen to you. Bu
t if we find a bandit here, or a weapon, or anything like that, I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes.”
The vehicle started as the German settled his enormous bulk into the backseat. Only then did Stefan realize two peculiar things: he had seen not a single doctor or nurse, even though they were usually out walking in the evening, and he had no idea who the German was. His cape had covered his insignia. He remembered nothing of his face, just the helmet and dark glasses. The man might as well have been a Martian, Stefan was thinking when the sound of light footsteps ended his reverie.
“What was all that about?” Nosilewska, her eyes more beautiful than usual, stood before him, flushed from excitement and from running. She was not wearing her medical smock. Confused, Stefan explained that he did not know himself—a German had wanted to look around the hospital. Apparently they were scouring the woods for partisans, so he had come here.
He was careful not to mention Pajpak.
Nosilewska had been sent by Rygier and Marglewski, who, though they had watched from an upstairs window as the vehicle left, did not want to come out. Nor had they let her come downstairs earlier: they were playing it safe.
Leaving her rather impolitely, Stefan started back down the path.
He looked at his watch: seven. It would be getting dark soon. The German had spent almost half an hour there. Pajpak should be back soon. Everything seemed strange, alien in the gloom. He looked at the asylum. The dark contours of the buildings rose against clouds which, backlighted by the moon, looked as if they had lamps in them.
He had gone several hundred steps when he heard someone coming toward him through the leaves on the opposite side of the road. It was dark; the clouds obscured the moon. Stefan, guiding himself by sound, crossed the road, and recognized the director only when they were just three steps apart. “There was a German at the hospital, sir,” he began, but broke off.
Pajączkowski said nothing. Stefan walked beside him, now a little ahead, now slightly behind. They reached the gate and went to Pajpak’s office. “This is it,” the professor finally said, unlocking the door and going in. Although they both knew where the furniture was and the switch, they bumped into each other three times before turning on the light. Then Stefan, who had been burning with questions, stepped back in fear.
Hospital of the Transfiguration Page 17
