by Louis Begley
“Bimber” was the wartime name for illegal, home-distilled vodka. This substance was not without danger to the drinker; lower grades caused blindness and paralysis. Manufacturers and sellers were preyed upon by the police, who did not permit the imminent collapse of established order to interfere with their enforcement, mostly through blackmail, of the state liquor monopoly. Small wonder, therefore, that the business was run from the top by big city slickers, cwaniaki, refugees from Warsaw, spreading out from G. into the countryside of the Mazowsze. Tania became Komar’s emissary to these dealers. She traveled to W. once a week in Komar’s cart to pick up the merchandise. Then she would visit, at first with Komar and later alone, peasants in villages near Piasowe who ran establishments similar to Komar’s, and offer her wares to them. The key to a sale was a sufficient level of confidence: the peasant had to feel certain that the bimber he was buying was safe to drink. Nothing built confidence more quickly than having the supplier down a glass of the liquor right under the buyer’s watchful gaze, certifying in this manner each bottle. Tania could sample as many bottles as she had the strength to carry, and still have the wits to drive a hard bargain on price and rush back to Komar for more bottles to carry to the next village. At first she trudged from village to village in her wooden clogs; quickly she was able to buy for herself knee-high leather boots, the mark of a successful black-market operator, and for me real shoes. Komar had been right about demand. Soon it was necessary to go to W. as often as every other day and sometimes to use the horse and cart for deliveries. It helped that Tania became friendly with the principal dealer, Pan Nowak. Now, when bimber was scarce, there was always enough for Tania and Komar. While Komar or his son-in-law took care of the horses and loaded the cart, Tania and Nowak discussed news from the front and speculated about when the Russians would attack again in Poland and in which direction they would strike.
Pan Nowak complained about being alone in W. with nobody to talk to except peasants and small-town ignoramuses; if Pani would only leave Piasowe, they could work together and make a fortune before the war ended. There wasn’t a village within a hundred kilometers in any direction from W. where he didn’t deal with the peasant who sold vodka and had the whole village under his thumb.
Tania told me that Nowak’s intentions were not confined to marketing bimber and having someone intelligent to talk to, and she decided she would flirt with him just a little, for the good of the business, even though he was a repulsive gangster. She was also using him for another purpose. Since he had all these connections, she gave him the name that grandfather had used in Warsaw and his description. Nowak swore to ask each of his peasants if there was such a man in his village. One could not tell; perhaps grandfather was somewhere near us; there seemed to be so many refugees from Warsaw in this wilderness. She had a feeling we could find him through Nowak. Finding my grandfather became a continuous and overwhelming fantasy for both of us. We would whisper about it at night, between anecdotes of bimber sales and Kula’s moods and Tania’s worried questions about my staying warm in the pasture. She wanted to get a sheepskin jacket for me, but they were hard to find; besides, I didn’t want one. I wanted to be dressed like the others, in layers of patched, cast-off coats, to look like a scarecrow.
LIGHT snow fell several times, but the cows could still graze. It was so cold in the pasture that we had to keep moving and stamping our feet, our arms crossed on our chests and hands buried in the sleeves. Kulowa wanted to start preparations for Christmas. Kula agreed and told Tadek to slaughter the biggest pig, a muddy, suspicious-looking animal. Kula didn’t intend to keep all the meat for himself; he would sell most of it in the village and to Komar.
Neighbors came to help and watch. First, they got the pig into the yard with pitchforks. He stood there grunting. A few times, he made a sudden rush to get away, but they always drove him back into the center. Then it was Tadek and Kula and Stefa’s brother, Jurek, who rushed the pig, stood him upright and tied him to a post. He was squealing now, the neighbors were pricking him with their pitchforks, and the other pigs in the pigsty were making a terrible noise. Everybody was joking that the pig must have been through this before to be so scared, and what a pity it was he would not be eating his own ham. Meanwhile Tadek got his knives and a big basin that he gave to Kulowa to hold. When he slit the pig’s throat, it made a coughing noise, and blood gushed so strongly that Kulowa had trouble catching it all in the basin. After they decided that the pig had done all his bleeding, Tadek shaved parts of him and skinned the others and, slicing very fast, began to separate the different cuts. Once in a while, he would throw a piece he didn’t want to the dog, who was dancing wildly on his hind legs, head held back by the chain. The dog’s antics began to annoy Tadek. He went over to the dog, a piece of meat in his hand, and when the dog opened his mouth to take it, he kicked him in the stomach. That made the dog crawl into his house and Tadek began to tease him. He would hold out a scrap, the dog would rush for it, and sometimes Tadek gave it to him and sometimes he kicked him or hit him with a meat mallet he had taken in his other hand and hid behind his back. This game went on for a long time, because the dog did not seem to catch on or know what to expect.
The women were in the kitchen, chopping and grinding meat for sausages. When he finished playing with the dog, Tadek set up the machine for stuffing sausage skins and got a couple of the women started on it. They made blood sausages first, having set aside just enough blood for the soup. Kula and the other men were drinking in the yard, passing the bottle from hand to hand. They became very loud. When the bottle was empty, Kula called to Tania and asked what was the use of having her and her bastard in the house if she did not even offer them a bottle of bimber when she saw that his bottle was dry. Tania thought that over and answered she wasn’t in the business of offering vodka to him any more than he was in the business of offering hospitality to her and her son. Still, she would give him one bottle if he bought two. That made the other peasants laugh and clap Kula on the back saying that the scythe had struck a hard stone. Kula began to laugh too and said he meant no offense. Tania held out her hand for him to shake, said she never stopped being grateful to him and the mistress, and went to Komar’s to get the bottles.
Meanwhile the soup and the plates of cubed bacon, fried until it rendered all the lard, had been set out, ready to eat. Even the children were given big slices of bread to eat with the bacon or dip into the boiling fat. A chorus of joyful shouts greeted the arrival of Tania with a bottle, which she immediately uncorked and handed to Kula. Behind her were Komar and another man I didn’t know, wearing high leather boots like Tania’s and a rich sheepskin coat that met his boot tops. Tania called me over and made the introduction. It was Nowak. He pinched my ear. Passing near Piasowe, he explained, he could not help dropping in on his friend Komar, and now he was lucky also to see the most beautiful woman of Warsaw. By pure chance, he had some trifles for us. He gave Tania a package with a red woolen scarf in it, which she immediately tied around her shoulders. While she was inspecting the effect in the mirror in the Kulas’ room, Nowak pinched my ear some more and gave me a large mouth harmonica. That was a present I was really glad to receive. As soon as Tania gave me permission, I said good-bye to Nowak and went to the barn with Stefa and the boys to try it out.
They drank until late. Nowak borrowed my harmonica; it turned out he could play very well. First, Tania and Komar danced. Then Komar played and Nowak danced with Tania. They even got Kula to dance with Kulowa and later with Tania. Stefa told me that the show in the barn had begun. Jurek and Masia were hard at it and Tadek was watching. Komar and Nowak brought more bottles. Many of the peasants were very drunk; they would rush out of the kitchen to vomit in the yard, stagger back, and, after eating a piece of bread with lard, drink again. Nowak wanted to show Tania the hat on the head of the man in the moon. This took quite a while. When they returned, Tania looked very serious. Then a second round of bottles was drunk. Tania alone still seemed sober. The peasants w
ere being dragged home by their wives. Shaking with hiccups, Nowak addressed long and gallant remarks to Tania, all about the absolute urgency of meeting again before the week was out. Then he and Komar also left.
When we went to bed that night, Tania told me not to pester her about Nowak’s man in the moon. Nowak had used the pretext about the man in the moon to be able to speak to her alone. She knew how to handle Nowak and would continue to handle him as long as it suited her. The important thing was that perhaps he had found grandfather. A peasant he had talked to a few days ago told him he had heard there was an older Pan, with a name that could be the right one, in a neighboring village. That Pan came in almost every day to have a glass or two of vodka with the man who sold vodka there. The name of the village was Bieda, less than thirty kilometers from Piasowe. It could all be a mistake, but she didn’t think so. She had decided how she would get there. Hiring a peasant with a horse and cart in Piasowe was out of the question. There were too many risks, whether it turned out to be grandfather or not. She didn’t want every gossip in Piasowe and Bieda involved in our affairs. Instead, she would start out on foot in the morning, before anybody else woke up. If she was lucky, she would find a peasant on the road to Bieda who would give her a lift. She would worry about how to get back once she was in Bieda; the only thing that mattered was that this man should turn out to be grandfather. It was impossible to let me come with her; I would slow her down.
I saw that her mind was made up and asked what I should say to Kula or Komar if they asked where she was. Tania had not thought about this. First she told me not to worry, nobody would ask, because she would have returned to Piasowe before I brought the cows back from the pasture. Later, when I was almost asleep, she said it would be best to pretend I knew nothing; let them guess she had gone to meet Nowak. She was too tired to think, but on her way back to Piasowe she would decide what story to tell, depending on whether she had found grandfather and what he thought she should do. After that, we tried to sleep, but we slept very little, we were so full of hope and so frightened. It was still dark when Tania tiptoed barefoot out of the kitchen. The dog recognized her; he made no noise.
The day passed slowly. Stefa said it was going to snow, but it didn’t. It just got colder and windier. All the good of our fire seemed to disappear in the gale. An old cow, almost entirely black, with heavy eyes, was my favorite. She liked being scratched and talked to. I would put my arms around her neck and stand for a long time pressed against her flank. When the warmth of her body had penetrated mine, I would go back to Stefa and the boys and our fire. We talked about the pig killing, about the hams and the sausages Kula would be selling, and about Christmas. I told them the Russians would soon be in Piasowe. Then the war would be over, and Tania and I would go back to the city. I still didn’t want to mention T.; that seemed like revealing too much of our story without need. Warsaw was destroyed; I knew we couldn’t go there. I said we would probably live in Cracow. That was where my grandparents were from. I told them grandmother was dead, but we would move in with my grandfather. We would invite them all to visit in the winter, when there wasn’t that much work in Piasowe. We would send a horse and cart to take them to G. and train tickets for Cracow. Or perhaps I would come to travel with them so they wouldn’t be startled by the railroad and the big city. They shook their heads and said I would be too far away to think of them, but I was excited by the vision of Cracow and being with my grandfather in his house and made more promises: I thought my grandfather would want to come with me from Cracow to Piasowe. Then they would see how strong he was and how he could handle animals. After a day of meeting everyone and wandering through the fields, we would all leave together.
All the while, fear like nausea was rising to my throat. What if the refugee in Bieda wasn’t grandfather? Where would we look for him? Would Tania be safe walking to Bieda? What would she do if she was stopped by a German patrol or if some peasant in his cart, seeing her on foot and alone, decided to rob her instead of letting her ride with him? Never, since Lwów, had she left me for a whole day or gone so far away from me. The boys in the pasture liked me, but they were not my friends. Only Stefa was my friend here, and perhaps Kulowa, but without Tania I was like a stray cat that anyone could stone. I decided to tell them about my father as well: I said I was sure he would return from the prisoner-of-war camp, in his officer’s uniform, to look for Tania and me as soon as the Germans left. He was a major; he would be wearing a pistol on his belt and perhaps a sword. The police would have to help in the search. He would not give up until he found us.
The wind was blowing harder. The cows became nervous; they stopped grazing and began to low and move about uneasily. Stefa said that if they were off their feed it was best to take them back, and that is what we did. I finished with the cows in the stable, but Tania still had not returned. Kulowa told me Kula was asleep; it served him right to be sick after all the vodka he had drunk; who did he think he was to be in his feather bed on a weekday? That scoundrel Tadek had also disappeared, busy vomiting somewhere. She was making cheese, pouring curdled milk into rectangular linen pouches. The whey had to be squeezed out carefully into a basin. Then the cheeses, in their pouches, were arranged on a board, covered by another board with a weight on it, and left to rest. I helped, holding the pouches for her. We tasted some of the moist, fresh cheese. We fed the poultry and the pigs, and I helped Kulowa milk the cows, putting hay into their mangers so they would keep quiet. Masia had also disappeared.
We ate the evening meal late, after Kula woke up. By then Tadek and Masia were also in the kitchen; only Tania wasn’t there. I told Kulowa I didn’t know where she was. The others didn’t ask; it seemed to me they didn’t mind being by themselves, with just their little cowherd keeping his mouth shut except to thank Kulowa for each piece of food. Then it was time for bed; Masia dragged in her bedding, I brought in Tania’s and mine, Kula said Tania must have found a softer mattress somewhere else, they snuffed out the lamp, and I was still alone.
TANIA woke me from a deep sleep. She was shivering from cold and sobbing terribly and kissing me. I kissed her too and stroked her hair and after a while she told me what had happened. Getting to Bieda had taken longer than she had expected. She must have walked two-thirds of the way before a peasant with a cart going in the right direction caught up with her. He was a quiet man with a good, fast horse; he refused to take money from her. When they got to Bieda, he showed her the house of the peasant who dealt in vodka and drove on. She had decided to start out by doing a little business and then casually asking questions about refugees from Warsaw or elsewhere who might be in the village. This peasant was very cautious. At first he wouldn’t talk about bimber at all, pretending he just sold regular vodka. He loosened up after she made it clear how well she knew Nowak, and they drank a glass of bimber together. All the while, she was telling him that she had many sources of supply and just wanted to know if he needed more bimber than he was getting from Nowak. He didn’t seem very interested, so she said that she regretted there was no business the two of them could do, but maybe, while she was in Bieda, she should see if there were any refugees who had jewelry to sell; she also dealt in that.
At that, the peasant laughed and said she had come too late, they had had a very fine refugee, with a gold watch and gold rings and money, but the Germans came last week and shot him right against the barn wall. He pointed to his own barn. He was here, that Pan—and the peasant named my grandfather—drinking with me just like you, when they drove up in a big car, four of them with Pan Miska, who has been living in Zielne, over that way. It seems this Pan with gold was a Jew who owned a big farm and two forests. Pan Miska was his estate manager. My Pan was always helping peasants here when a cow or a horse was sick, he knew more about it than a veterinarian, and one day he walked over to Zielne to give a hand with a calf being born. That’s where Miska saw him and right away decided this Jew shouldn’t live to go back to his estate; better give him to the Germans before the Ru
ssians come. Miska told it to the Pan right to his face, before all the peasants standing around in the stable, and my Pan got his hands out of the cow, wiped them on the straw and hit Miska across the face with the stick he always carried with him. Then he spat and said next time Miska wanted to talk to him he should remember to take off his hat first. The peasants were laughing so hard their stomachs hurt, but the Pan went on working with the cow as though nothing had happened. Some of us told the Pan to run away, because Miska wasn’t joking, but the Pan wouldn’t listen. So they came in the car with Miska, spoke in German, and shot the Pan in the head. Miska is still in Zielne, if you want to see him: he might want to sell the gold he took from the Pan’s body. Tania said she asked the peasant for another vodka and then yet another, she was so weak, and then she thanked him; she would see about going to Zielne. After she left him, she walked around Bieda, across the fields, in circles, realizing she had not asked what they had done with grandfather’s body but too scared to go back. Then she lay down in a pasture and fell asleep and woke up before she froze, and she wished she hadn’t awakened, except for me, because now I only had her left in the world. Night was falling. She began to walk back to Piasowe. She had not eaten and kept stumbling and falling down, and sometimes she wasn’t sure that she was on the right road. But she did make it, she kept on saying, more than five hours in the dark, but she made it. We were both crying now and we cried until the Kulas woke up and we had to get ready for work. This was the worst day in our lives.
