Song of the Legions
Page 23
“Here we have Poland!” I exclaimed, “for here are both pike and carp, and both of them are roasting on the fire.”
The girl took a shine to Birnbaum – he was, as I have said, a wickedly handsome villain – and made him pike in grey sauce, a favourite Jewish dish. This pleased me greatly, for it annoyed Tanski immensely. He was a jealous soul, was Tanski. The womenfolk of Lwow seemed to prefer Birnbaum to him. So Tanski seethed at Birnbaum and we set about the food and drink with a will, like jackals. This tavern had a fine wine cellar, seemingly bottomless, and I could see the wheels of Birnbaum’s mind turning like clockwork.
Birnbaum asked the girl whose tavern this was. It was hers, she said. Her father, a volunteer, had died at Maciejowice, leaving it to her. She would not take payment for our lodge and board – “Sooner you boys drink the place dry and burn it down,” she said, “than let the invaders take a drop of mead or a bite of fish.” If only others were as faithful!
Thereafter, she collected our dishes. As she bent over the table, Birnbaum watched the crucifix bobbing on the girl’s bosom. There he sighed, defeated, for that immovable fortification was most likely the end of his campaign.
“Pike do not swim with carp, after all,” he said sadly, but he still ate every drop of his grey sauce, until his black beard ran with it. No sooner had we finished, than the church bells tolled.
“Time for mass!” Cyprian exclaimed, wrapping himself in a great fur cape. “Come with us, lads,” he said to Birnbaum and the other Beardlings. Birnbaum’s face fell, as did all of the Beardlings, thinking themselves ill-used by this.
“When in Rome, do as the Romans do,” I said. After some dark mutterings, they tucked their skullcaps under their hats and we all set off, pike and carp together. That day there were two reunions. Cyprian and I went off, arm in arm, to midnight mass. We had drunk somewhat of the vodka. Our drinking was medicinal, for it remained ferociously cold, and I was suffering from a fever. Drink stilled the pain. Even so, I ran with sweat even in the cold, such that the snowflakes steamed from my body as if from a hot anvil.
We trudged off to mass, a few at a time, to avoid suspicion. Had the Austrians but eyes to see, it should have been quite manifest as to what we were about. Yet no one molested us. The little stone church was heaving with a congregation of armed insurgents, such that they spilled out into the graveyard that stood beside it.
As we passed over the threshold, and doffed our czapkas. I dipped my hand in the freezing water bowl and made the sign of the cross. The holy water stung my brow, for my skin was burning hotter than gunmetal. By now I was fading fast, my head steaming and my nose and eyes streaming, so Godebski conveyed me to the front of the church. A few men recognised me and there were muted cries of joy and concern. For I read in their faces that I was in a bad way. My limp had returned now. A cold burning fire was spreading from the old wound in my leg.
“So you command all these men?” I asked Godebski, between coughs and increasingly violent sneezes.
“No,” Godebski shook his head, as we reached the front of the church, “here is our commander – Lieutenant Colonel Jablonowski.”
At the front, the wounded were seated, or kneeling, according to the severity of their injuries, and the strength of their piety. In the centre of the pew, swathed in bandages and sitting amongst the other wounded, was as a tall black gentleman. A handsome fellow, to be sure, but a black man all the same, with a head of hair of tight black curls swept back from a wide brow. He wore a bushy cavalryman’s moustache above full lips. His skin colour and features were all distinctly African. Who was this? To confound me even more, he wore the uniform of a lieutenant-colonel of the Republic. Could this blackamoor be Cyprian’s commander? Impossible! Still, I kept my mouth firmly shut, to avoid placing my boot in it. For the second time in our acquaintance, Birnbaum came to my rescue.
“Sir! I thought you were dead at Praga!” Birnbaum cried, in delight, much to our surprise. He raced forward and embraced the black colonel, who warmly embraced him in turn.
“Karol!” replied the black man, delighted. In spite of his injuries, he hauled himself to his feet, with some difficulty. Swaying on crutches, he and Birnbaum embraced. The black officer shook his head and pointed at his wounds.
“It was close! No, as you see, I escaped – along with your Colonel of the Beardlings.”
“Is the Colonel here?” Birnbaum asked eagerly.
“No,” the black officer shook his head. “He has gone to Paris, with Dabrowski. Perhaps they will raise another Jewish legion there!”
“Certainly there are enough moneylenders in Paris,” someone muttered unkindly.
The black officer grinned, his white teeth gleaming against his dark skin.
“But what is this – here you are in church! Have you converted, my dear Birnbaum?”
Birnbaum grinned back and shook his head vehemently. “No, Sir, I have not, but your Christian God has given me a great gift this day!”
When they mentioned Praga, my addled mind began to work at last. This unfortunate officer had been in command of Praga when it fell to Suvarov and his Cossacks, and given up for dead. This was Jablonowski. Everyone knew who Jablonowski was. For there was only one black officer in the Polish army, after all. Jablonowski was a rare bird – as rare as a white raven, but black, of course. He was known to all as the Little Negro.
Then the bells rang, and the singing began, and the priest walked in, swinging his censer over the huddled bodies of his congregation. After Mass was ended, we picked our way through the dark, some limping with wounds, others with drink, back to the tavern called Rome. Birnbaum lent his shoulder to the Little Negro, who had been shot to ribbons by the Russians, and was slowly healing his wounds. As we walked back to the tavern, we heard the wolves howling in the hills. So after they had serenaded us, we sang our cavalryman’s song back to them –
“O sacred love of the beloved country,
For thee, ‘twere nothing to live poor,
‘Twere nothing to die!”
This had been the anthem of our Corps of Cadets, and a great favourite of the army. Now our corps was gone. I thought many times of the dear old academy, ruined. Standing empty, the roof caved in, the doors barred, the armoury looted, spiders spinning webs in the halls. Worse, I thought of the classrooms full of Russians and their lackeys – a weapon of war to be turned against us, a school for murderers and torturers.
“Sto lat!” we cried. We shut the door on the dark and drank the first of many toasts.
“Damn it all,” Jablonowski said, throwing himself into a chair, “these wounds give a man a thirst,” and he filled his wineglass. At a draught he drained it, and drew another. This next he threw down his throat without it touching the sides. We were all heavy drinkers, but Jablonowski was prodigious. He drank like a priest.
There were no girls to be seen now. Our friends Tanski and Sierawski, who were in fine fettle, and full of beans, were dancing in the back room with them. Birnbaum’s comrades, like so many Jews, were apt musicians. In no time they were playing a storm of mazurkas and polonaises, and from time to time, their own mournful songs.
But we four sat apart – Cyprian, Birnbaum, the black colonel, and myself. For we had deadly serious business. Ostensibly, we were standing guard at the doorway, but our affair was far more important than that. As the wolves of the forest scent each other out, men of our stamp know each other instantly, without a word, merely by glance. We were card players.
“The game is whist, as always,” I said, pulling out a pack of cards. The deck was greasy, cracked, blacked with dirt and campfire-soot.
“I’m not playing with your lucky deck!” Godebski sneered, producing a fresh pack from behind the bar, and tossing it onto the table, together with another bottle of vodka.
“My dear Captain,” I said, in tones of mock horror, “are you implying that my deck is marked?”
For an accusation of cheating, even in jest, is not to be borne by a gentleman.
“Good,” I said, “now shut up and deal!” Then I let out a thunderous sneeze. Everyone called “Na zdrowie! Bless You!”
From time to time we heard Sierawski croaking out a Krakowiak, his dreadful voice keening like a crow. This was greeted with a gale of derisory laughter, and not the storm of acclaim that he expected. I did not see it that night, but I had seen it a hundred times before, in every village or tavern where Sierawski inflicted his atrocious singing. But otherwise our game was not interrupted. It was blissful.
“Here, Blumer,” said Godebski, cutting the cards, “the Beardling and I shall play together, and you shall play with the Little Negro.”
Thus my partner for the first hand of whist was the Little Negro. This epithet was the name by which Jablonowski was universally known. He seemed heedless of this usage by Godebski, but for myself I was very careful to defer to him as ‘Colonel’ at all times. For Jablonowski was an exceedingly dangerous man, quick to temper, and a fast blade. He had fought any number of duels and killed or wounded any number of men. Scarcely less dangerous in peace than in war, one should know better than to cross him.
At length, the Little Negro said to me, “Blumer – I have never heard this name. Have you foreign blood, by any chance?”
“That I do, Colonel,” I said, piqued, “although I’d wager I’m not the only one at this table that does.” Then I cursed myself for my impudence, but to my relief Jablonowski fell about laughing.
“Touché, my boy! Tell me, where are you from?”
“From the provinces, Sir,” I replied, “Podolia. Not so far from here.”
“Aha!” said Jablonowski, stealing a point, “then thou must be used to Turks, Tartars, and blackamoors, then, for they abound in these parts, as we are so near to the Ottoman lands. How fortunate for you that your mother did not have one serving in the house, like mine, or we might be blood brothers!”
We were all very drunk, and we roared with laughter. For this was how the Little Negro had been conceived, outside of wedlock. Everyone in the army knew it. For Jablonowski, his mother a Stuart princess, and her husband the inspector of the Royal Mint at Krakow, was the bastard son of a Negro footman. Black footmen were very much in vogue in Paris, and Polish ladies were wont to follow French fashions, as always. When his wife returned from a visit to Paris, pregnant, the cuckolded inspector found that his own marital treasury had been raided, and his coins clipped, and his stamp defamed! No man in Poland wore such huge horns as poor Prince Konstanty Jablonowski. For the boy wore his mother’s treachery on every inch of his skin.
The Prince, casting his eyes on the newborn baby for the first time, saw it black as a lump of Wielice coal. In consternation, he demanded to know where on earth the ‘Little Negro’ had come from. The lady coolly replied that in Paris, she had stopped in front of a tobacconist’s shop, to examine the wax effigy of a Negro holding a pipe in his mouth.
‘That’s fine, my lady,’ thundered the cuckolded Prince, ‘but where is the pipe? I don’t see anything in the infant’s mouth!’ This was the story.With such royals as we had, it was hardly a surprise that Poland was fallen! Catamites, cuckolds, cowards, and card sharps, all of them!
“Trump!” Godebski called, and Jablonowski the Little Negro, cursed, and slammed his purse on the table, and counted out the wager.
“Damn it all, my wallet sags like a widow’s tits. Lend a hand, my dear Blumer,” he said, blithely appropriating the last of my coins. I watched it go with sad heart, knowing I should not see it again, for without my lucky deck, Godebski was routing us all. The poet was a bold player, and that cautious cad Birnbaum complemented him perfectly, like musket and bayonet. The Little Negro, by contrast, played a wild and reckless hand, and the fates were against him that night. My heart was in it, but my head was swimming with a fugue of drink and sickness, and I could not keep up.
“Trump! Bad luck, there, fellows!” Cyprian crowed again. “I fear that you have no stomach for another hand!”
“Nor any gold, neither,” Birnbaum snorted.
“I’ll write you a promissory note against my arrears of pay,” I said solemnly. This was a remark that always brought a hoot. Our arrears were as dead as our state. It was said that the Prussians had even melted down the crown jewels.
So we played on, for paper. That night Godebski and Birnbaum won enough fortunes from the Little Negro and I to ransom the Pope. The sums were scrupulously written down, to the last zloty. Like a national debt, they were obviously never repaid.
“Tell me, Colonel,” I asked the Little Negro, feeling entitled to it, having paid so dear in my purse, and now being saddled with debts that would have made even the Bullock blush, “how goes Dabrowski with this Frenchman Bonaparte?”
For Bonaparte was the coming man. At this, the game was forgot, and the players clamoured for precious news. The Little Negro shrugged and drained his glass. He had been on many courtier’s missions to Paris. He knew the names of all the great ones, all the generals and officers of both the Polish and the French armies, and all their gossips and intrigues. The Poles and the French were alone in Europe – outcasts. Thrown together, we were unequal allies and uneasy bedfellows. We fought the same enemies – the Satanic Trinity of Prussia, Austria, and Russia. Or so we were led to believe.
“Ah, yes,” said the Little Negro, “my dear old friend General Bonaparte.”
“You know him, then?” I asked, avidly. The Little Negro chuckled bitterly, “I know him all right. We were at school together, in France. There, as you may imagine, I had to endure the taunts of my schoolmates, among them a short-arsed Corsican named Napoleon Bonaparte.”
“What is he like, this Bonaparte?” I asked.
The Little Negro’s eyes darkened. “A fine officer,” he replied, draining his glass. He was holding something back.
“Excellent! But what kind of a man is he?” I demanded.
“Put it this way,” Jablonowski replied, “better to be a Negro with a white heart than a white man with a black heart!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
WOMEN’S FASHIONS, LWOW,JULY 1796
Around the time we reached Lwow, in February, Bonaparte was appointed commander of the French Army of Italy. The same day of his appointment, he married Josephine Beauharnais, the future Empress. Then he marched over the Alps to face the Austrians, who occupied Italy. What the hell were the Austrians doing in Italy, you may ask? Well, I would answer, what the hell were those Hapsburg bastards doing in Poland?
We were sitting in a café in Lwow, kicking our heels. It was July. Bonaparte and Dabrowski were kicking the Austrians up and down the boot of Italy. We had nothing better to do than read of their exploits in the censored Austrian newspapers. For that year began Bonaparte’s miraculous string of legendary victories – he routed the Austrians at Montenotte, Dego, Mondovi, and Lodi. News took weeks or months to reach us here in Lwow. Thus, by the time we read in the newspapers of Bonaparte’s latest victory, the dead corpses would be long buried in the ground, and the French had marched on. Onwards with their Revolution! Liberty! Fraternity! Equality! And all of that nonsense.
“Where is Bonaparte now?” we asked Godebski, breathlessly. He sighed and rolled his eyes.
“Bonaparte is besieging Mantua,” Godebski replied, peering through his spectacles, and scouring the newspaper with his face screwed up. We could only read it with the greatest difficulty, for it was in German. As gentlemen, we spoke little German of course, for we were really only fluent in the civilised tongues – Polish, Latin, and the lingua Franca.
“Mantua!” Godebski repeated, “a great city, and the birthplace of Virgil, of course. I should like to go there.”
“So Bonaparte’s odyssey continues!” Sierawski grinned, delighted, and ordered another round of coffees which we laced with vodka.
“Virgi
l wrote the Aeneid, you buffoon, not the Odyssey,” Godebski snapped. “Besides, Mantua is defended by a strong Austrian garrison. A French victory is far from assured.”
“Bah!” Tanski sniffed at his glass of wine, “the Austrian papers would say that! Let us have another drink to toast the latest victory! To Bonaparte!” he shouted.
“The war will be over by the time we get to Italy,” I said, glumly. We had no victories in Lwow. Here we brooded and plotted in the shadows, conspiring in cellars by candlelight. We followed Bonaparte’s victories avidly, for they fell on us like shafts of light in the dark. In truth, it was merely the rays of the sun falling through prison bars. Cyprian perceived this, for he grew terse and angry.