by Sue Gee
He laughed. ‘I’ve been trying to answer that all my life. I don’t know how to answer it now.’
Elizabeth came running down, holding out a thick blue jumper.
‘Are you sure –’
‘Of course.’
Danuta pulled it on. ‘Thank you.’
Jerzy said: ‘I’ll walk you to the station.’
‘No, please don’t bother.’
‘Let him,’ said Elizabeth. ‘It’s late, he’s right, you shouldn’t be out alone.’
‘Well – goodbye.’
‘Goodbye.’ They kissed, lightly, on both cheeks. Then Elizabeth held open the door, and the wind blew in again, and Jerzy and Danuta hurried out, into the lamplit street.
‘I shan’t be long,’ said Jerzy.
‘Don’t worry.’
She climbed the stairs again, more slowly. When she was in their flat again, she went to the sitting room window overlooking the street, to wave, as Anna and the grandparents always did, when they visited. She pulled back the curtain, and looked down, but Jerzy and Danuta had already rounded the corner, and there was no one else about.
Warszawa
30 October 1981
‘Kochany Stefanie, ‘Thank you for your letter. I was worried at not hearing from you for so many weeks, and especially without a phone call. We miss you, too. Olek is talking quite a lot, now, not sentences yet, but a lot of words, and he has grown. I have to tell you that he does not use the word Tata so often, now. I show him the photograph of us, most days, and tell him that the funny-looking guy underneath the Pope is Tata, but of course he doesn’t understand. Mama says she has not had a letter for weeks, and she worries more than I do. I know you must be very tired after work, but even so …
‘Do you follow all the news from Poland? I’m sure you do. You know what they have started showing on the television? The countryside swarming with army personnel. They show us officers in the villages, talking to the peasants as if they were old friends, helping to mend tractors, checking the stocks of grain. They are “earning the confidence of the people”. I can imagine your face, if they were to visit your factory, with their comradely smiles.
‘Another thing: people from Szpitalna Street drop flysheets and bulletins in here from time to time, for me to put up in the library, and pass round. You remember that the Solidarity News Agency has always had that heading “Against Solidarity” in its regular statements? A couple of weeks ago there was an item which we all found a little sinister: Jaruzelski has formed a Committee of National Salvation. Six men. What does that mean, exactly?
‘Oh, Stefan.’
Here there was something heavily crossed out.
‘I know how much you want to stay for a little longer, and of course it has been wonderful to have the parcels. Olek looks sweet in the pyjamas, and what he really needs is something warm for the winter, a new, thick snowsuit, size 2–3, all right, because he’s so enormous. Cigarettes doubled the price at the beginning of the month. Can you imagine? So Tata was very pleased with the Marlborough. And all the tins … I cooked a meal for all the parents when the last parcel came, and your father and Tata were drinking your health, and all we women were looking at each other and thinking we’d rather have you home again.
‘Please – couldn’t you just get your passport from the Home Office and come home in time for Christmas? I can’t bear the thought of Christmas without you.
‘Who is the friend you’re staying with? Aren’t you on the phone? It was bad enough not being able to phone you when you were in that hostel, but now … Is it a woman – no, I don’t even want to ask. I know you, Stefan, but I know you wouldn’t want to do anything to hurt us, so I won’t ask.
‘I’ll let Olek give this letter a kiss – there, he’s done it, you can see the mashed potato. And I kiss it too, with all my heart. I wish we hadn’t quarrelled, before you left. Write again soon.
Your Krysia’
The post office in William IV Street was always crowded, the floor littered with cigarette butts, bits of string, scrunched-up bits of paper. Also, there were often drunks in here – there was a hostel for the homeless round the corner, and another at the far end of Covent Garden. Stefan stood reading the letter in a corner, by the long counter running the length of the plate-glass window. He lit a cigarette and read it again. Then he looked at the clock on the wall. Six-thirty. Ewa would be already ahead of him, on the train from Charing Cross by now: sometimes they met after work, but usually he worked overtime, and she went on ahead to be there, in the attic flat, when he got home. He rubbed his face, thinking. An hour behind in Warsaw, so Krysia would be just leaving the library, she would be at her mother’s to pick up Olek in half an hour? An hour? There was the chance, just, that she hadn’t gone to work, or that she had left early, and was already home.
He felt in the pocket of his overalls, pulled out a five-pound note, and went to queue for change. They didn’t like it when you asked for change for the phone, but to hell with that. He stood in the queue, watching the office workers weigh their parcels. When he got his change, he went out to the phone booths, and dialled the number of their apartment in Warsaw. It took three attempts to get a ringing tone. When he got it, he stood, listening, for a long time. He imagined the living room, all tidied up before Krysia went to bed last night, Olek’s toys in a cardboard box; their photograph on the mantelpiece, the Solidarność posters on the wall. Outside the window was the park, with the swings and silver birch trees; the graffiti on the wall of the nearby apartment block. What were they writing now? He imagined the tiny kitchen, and the bathroom where the water pressure was low, and their bedroom, Krysia asleep in the double bed alone, Olek sucking his thumb in the cot beside her. Or perhaps she took him into bed with her, now?
The phone rang and rang.
‘Excuse me, mate, you going to hang on all night?’
‘What?’ He turned round, saw another guy in overalls, looking impatient.
‘No. Sure – go ahead.’
He put down the receiver and came out. He lit another cigarette and read the letter again. Quarter to six. He could phone Ewa, and tell her he was working late, have a drink, and read the paper, and come back here to phone. Then he thought: I’m already deceiving one person. That’s enough. He put the letter in his pocket, and buttoned it, and went out, and across the Strand to Charing Cross.
November, and very cold. Grey skies. Occasionally, the clouds were diffusely lit by a pale and watery sun. At the weekend, at the end of the garden behind the Blackheath house, Stuart made bonfires of the leaves from the bare trees, and the smoke drifted over the grass, the straggling michaelmas daisies, the tight-petalled dahlias, over the wall into other gardens, and into the wintry sky. He came in for an early tea by the fire, and television, bolting the french windows.
At the Academy cinema in Oxford Street, they were showing Man of Iron. Ewa and Stefan stood in the queue after work one evening, arm in arm. It had rained this afternoon, and the puddles on the pavements and in the gutters gleamed in the lights from the shop windows. Taxis swished past, and buses, with the lights on. The queue was long: it was a Friday night, and Wajda was talked about a lot, these days. Outside the cinema was a large blow-up of the leading actor, in his overalls and cap, smiling up at the sun. In the papers, in the reviews, there were photographs showing scenes from Gdańsk. A bus went past, very close to the kerb, and splashed up water. Ewa jumped, and moved away. Stefan looked down at her wet feet.
‘Okay? Are you okay?’
‘Yes. It wasn’t very much.’ She leaned against him, the collar of her coat turned up, brushing his cheek with her hair. ‘Does it feel strange, to be going in to watch this here?’
‘A little.’ He turned to brush her hair with his lips.
There was a movement at the head of the queue, and a voice, and they looked up and saw a tall man with a beard, wearing a T-shirt over his sweater stamped with the Solidarność logo. He was calling out and waving copies of a magazine, moving
slowly down the queue.
‘Would you like to help us help the struggle for freedom in Poland? Profits from Polish Solidarity Campaign News go to Solidarność in Poland.’
‘That’s our magazine,’ said Ewa.
‘Yes.’
‘We should have taken out a subscription. Or joined. Or something.’
‘We can buy it now.’
The man was taking money, giving out copies. He drew near to them and Stefan felt in his pocket.
‘How much?’
‘Twenty pence,’ said the man, and gave them their copy, and moved on. ‘Would you like to help us help the struggle …’
They looked at it, quickly, as the queue began to move towards the box office. The front page was headed: Solidarity’s First Year. There was a picture of a street blocked by buses and cars decked with the Polish flag, watched by thousands of people. The caption read: Hunger marches block Warsaw city centre.
Ewa watched Stefan flick quickly through the pages. Anna Walentynowicz had visited London, just a little while ago. He moved along the pavement, scanning the headlines, not looking up. At the box office, Ewa said: ‘Stefan? Where do you want to sit?’
‘What? Oh – sorry.’ He lowered the magazine. ‘I don’t mind – somewhere not too close to the front, that’s all.’
She bought the tickets, and they went inside. When they had found their seats, and sat down, she asked carefully: ‘Stefan? If anything happens – I mean in Poland … could you go back? What would happen to you if you went back?’
He rubbed his hand across his lips. ‘I don’t know. I don’t imagine I would be very popular. None of us who did anything active would be.’
Ewa was silent. Then she said, not wanting to know, but suddenly feeling she had to: ‘When does your return ticket expire?’
‘At the end of the year.’ He put down the magazine, and turned towards her, putting his arm round her shoulders. ‘There is perhaps a possibility … that I should go back by the end of the year. At least for a visit. You understand?’
Ewa looked at him, and saw in his eyes an expression she had seen before: tender apology. She turned away, feeling her own eyes fill with tears, and then the lights went down, the curtains drew back, and the film from Poland began.
12. London, December 1981
Sunday 13 December Jerzy woke early, from a dream he couldn’t remember. He lay next to Elizabeth, feeling his heart racing, knowing only that the dream had been something about his father, not wanting to know more than that. He opened his eyes. It was still dark, and cold outside the bed, but he had to go for a pee. He waited until his heart had slowed down, pushed back the bedclothes and stumbled out to the bathrooom. God, it was cold. The house was absolutely soundless, deep in sleep; when he came out, he could just hear the milk float whining along the street at the far end. He was thirsty; he went into the kitchen, and opened the fridge. It began to hum, spilling a patch of light on to the floor, and he had a drink of juice, still half asleep. In the light from the fridge he saw the radio on the table, yawned, and switched it on, to get the news before he went back to bed. And stood there, rigid, still holding his glass, the fridge door still swung open.
‘Good morning, this is Pauline Bushnell.
‘Poland is in the grip of a major crisis. The country’s leader, General Jaruzelski, has declared a state of emergency, the government’s been taken over by a military council, there’ve been arrests. The move follows a crackdown by riot police on the Warsaw headquarters of the union Solidarity.’
‘Oh, Christ. Oh, my Christ.’
‘Britain faces another day of icy weather – after a night of record low temperatures.
‘And the American authorities are having second thoughts about a visa for the Reverend Ian Paisley.’
Jerzy kicked the fridge door shut and sat down at the kitchen table. He turned up the sound.
‘… About two hours ago, the Polish Prime Minister and Party Leader, General Jaruzelski, went on the radio to announce that a state of emergency was being declared, and that the country was being taken over by what he called “a military council of national salvation”. As he spoke, police were occupying Solidarity’s main offices in Warsaw after a raid there at around midnight in which there were arrests and documents were seized …’
The bulletin was a long one. There was a report from Kevin Ruane: ‘Solidarity extremists’had been interned, with dozens of others, including ex-First Secretary Gierek. Phones and telexes were cut off – Tim Sebastian had managed to telex a message describing security men in steel helmets with visors, armed with truncheons, on guard outside the Solidarity offices in Warsaw. When the bulletin had finished, Jerzy realized he was shivering violently. He got up, and carried the radio out and down the corridor to the sitting room, and dialled Ewa’s number. He stood shivering in the dark, hearing her phone ring, and voices on the radio, turned down, discussing the British weather.
‘Hello?’ Her voice sounded cracked with sleep.
‘It’s me. Something – something’s happened. Poland’s under martial law. It’s just been on the news.’
A long, shocked silence.
‘You’d better listen – the bulletin’s over, I had to listen to it all before I rang you, sorry. There’ve been masses of arrests, it all happened in the middle of the night.’ His teeth were chattering. ‘Is Stefan asleep?’
‘Of course.’ Her voice dropped. ‘I’ll … I’ll wake him up. Oh God. He was supposed to be going home for Christmas.’
‘You didn’t tell us.’
‘No. I … I couldn’t.’
‘I’m freezing,’ said Jerzy. ‘I’ve got to go back to bed. Ring me later, okay?’
‘Okay.’
‘Tell Stefan they said all the phones were cut off.’
‘What, from outside, you mean?’
‘Everywhere, I think. I might have got that wrong. Talk to you later.’
‘Will you ring Mama?’
‘Yes, in a bit. Goodbye.’
He put the phone down and went shivering out and into the bedroom, still carrying the quiet voices on the radio, and fell into bed. He huddled next to Elizabeth and she woke up, and turned over, saying sleepily: ‘You’re frozen.’
‘Hold me, hold me.’ He buried his face in her neck, her hair.
‘What’s happened? Are you ill?’
‘Poland’s in a state of emergency – martial law. It’s on the news.’
‘Oh, my God.’
‘Hold me. I’m so cold.’
She rubbed his back, his arms and chest, until he was warm again. There was nothing more on the radio about Poland, and after a while she leaned over and switched it off.
‘I’ll hear it all later, okay? Have you rung Ewa?’
‘Yes.’ He was drowsy again, longing to go back to sleep, he couldn’t help it. They lay very close, under the rugs and the duvet, hearing the first few winter-morning birds begin to call as darkness faded, and then they fell asleep. When Jerzy woke again, he thought perhaps he had dreamed about Poland, too. Then he heard Elizabeth in the kitchen, listening to the news, and the bulletins repeated, and he thought of Warsaw, snowbound, cut off, patrolled by tanks, and felt a great weight begin to crush him: a sense of shame which he knew was absurd, and misplaced, but which nonetheless overwhelmed him – that in Poland the iron curtain had slammed down, and he was outside it, safe, cosseted, free.
She stood by the low bed, looking down at his sleeping face turned towards where she had been lying before the phone call: inside, next to the wall beneath the uncurtained stained-glass window. The medallion was buried in the pillow, but in the light from the desk lamp she’d left on she could see the chain round his neck, beneath rough brown hair. His skin was rather coarse, open-pored, unremarkable features thick and blurred with sleep – such an ordinary face, but she felt as if it had always been beside her on the pillow, that that was where it belonged; impossible that he should ever be somewhere else, somewhere without her. The dressing gown sh
e had bought him lay sprawled across the foot of the bed, soft dark blue wool, incredibly expensive.
‘Ewa! You shouldn’t buy me something like this. You know I can’t do the same for you.’
‘But do you like it?’
‘Of course I like it, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever had, but you know I won’t be able to –’ He didn’t finish the sentence. He wouldn’t be able to take it with him. Then she would keep it, for when he came back. She had refused to think he might not come back.
And now he might never be able to leave her.
She crept into bed beside him. He murmured – ‘Kochana?’ – and put out an arm and pulled her close. ‘Who was that?’ She shut her eyes, thinking: I needn’t tell him, not yet. Let me have just one more hour, just that, before I tell him, and see what it does to him. Let me protect him, and be protected. She kissed his lips, his cheeks, put her arms round him and held him, and he began to kiss her, opening her lips with his tongue, moving to lie on top of her, naked, pulling up her nightdress, covering her face with his warm hands, his eyes still closed, still half asleep. She felt him begin to push his way into her, and all she wanted was to open herself to him, to be his woman, and she found the strength to say to herself: This is the ultimate deception, and to push him away and sit up, clasping her knees, shaking.
‘Hey.’ He lay on his back, rubbing a hand across his eyes. ‘What did I do?’
She buried her face in her knees.
‘Ewa?’ He sat up beside her, put an arm round her. ‘What’s the matter? Something about the phone call? Was there a phone call?’
‘Yes, there was. It was Jerzy.’ She couldn’t raise her head.
‘Someone is ill? Your mother?’
‘No.’ She took a deep breath and looked up, into his kind, concerned, sleepy face, and said flatly: ‘Poland’s under martial law.’
