Irina

by Philip Warren

  The day came when, once again, Berek kissed her. One kiss led to another and she did not refuse him. One touch led to another and she did not push him away. One afternoon of quiet passion led to many more. They felt no guilt or shame.

  At first, they had been like pups tumbling in a flour sack, but after a time, their love for each other seemed only natural, and hers for Berek grew to a passion she could barely contain. Cherished were her days in the Joselewicz household. Emotional intensity guided her every sense, awakened her curiosity, and allowed her mind to take in everything offered to her. Berek and Irina vowed their love, and when they spoke of it, they willed their youthful hearts into believing all would be well with the elder Kwasniewskis and Joselewiczes.

  So caught up was she in the pleasant daydream on her way toward the city, Irina didn’t immediately notice the wisps of an early-evening breeze that carried a scent neither pleasant nor expected. It came from a place she could not see, where the sun made its daily farewell, from the direction of Poznan.

  She was not far from Srodka, the market town where her mother had bargained her away, and on such a spring evening, she should have been sensing an earthy scent as new sprouts pushed up the dirt and felt air for the first time. She was not. Whatever it was, the smell became an unwelcome companion.

  …

  “Sire,” Madrosh began, noting the duke had not moved from where he’d been sitting earlier, “surely, you are aware that parts of the city are afire, that the people have broken your peace. Have you commanded your men to restore order?” Duke Zygmunt shifted in his chair, the fire in the hearth casting its light on the gold threads surrounding the embroidered Sokorski shield on his surcoat.

  “Who are you, good priest, to make demands upon my stewardship of Poznan?” The duke began giving his amber ring new rotations.

  “I make no demands whatsoever, Sire.” Madrosh stood a little distance from the fireplace inasmuch as his long, black woolen robes kept him well warmed. “It will not be good for the people to think you do not care about them, and if your men attack the Jews, your people might wonder if your men would turn on them, someday.”

  “Madrosh, I do not care what they think. What is more, you should counsel your own bishop before you presume to advise me in such matters.”

  “I beg the duke’s pardon if I have overstepped, but Bishop Tirasewicz is bound by the dictates of Rome in the matter of the Jews and he will, no doubt, conduct himself accordingly.”

  Duke Zygmunt snorted with disdain.

  “Do I misunderstand something, Sire?”

  “Your bishop has no love for the Jews, Madrosh, and I doubt if he will remember what Rome requires of him.”

  “Hmm!” Then he said, “When I saw the disturbance beginning, I sent a messenger to the bishop beseeching his action as a shepherd of the church.”

  “Hah! You might be surprised at what action he might take, my dear counselor! Indeed, how is it so wise a man as you does not know his own bishop?” Again, his focus was in the middle distance, as if an answer lay beyond the present. Without turning toward his priest, he asked, “But in truth, what would you have me do?”

  “Sire,” he continued, assuming the role of mentor as well as counselor, “you are the Duke of Poznan. Of the eight thousand souls surrounding your castle, many are Jews. They have been welcomed amongst us for over a century now, and you are well aware of their prominence in our merchant class.”

  “I do not care for your lecturing tone, Madrosh, and you have yet to tell me why I, as Duke of Poznan, should do anything for the Jews!”

  “You see, Sire, the people, all of them, want someone to give them guidance when it matters. When Kazimierz—Casimir—died and left his kingdom to Louis of Hungary, you know how that was viewed by the nobility. It left all of us wondering if we had a country, or if anyone cared about our nation. In the same way, the poor, the landless, and, yes, the Jews have been mere gamepieces in our sordid squabbles.”

  “And so?”

  “When the plague comes, Sire—if it is not already here—there will be many deaths, chaos, stealing, and godlessness. We know not how or why the Great Mortality pays us such deadly visits, but surely, it is not the fault of the Jews, or anyone else.”

  Duke Zygmunt’s eyes and brows rose a notch, as if he were still doubting Madrosh’s arguments.

  “The Jews would never do what that messenger accused them of—they have so much more to lose than others,” Madrosh continued. “And what is more,” Madrosh said, feeling the strength of his argument, “the Jews die from the plague, just as we do.”

  Grudgingly, Duke Zygmunt nodded in agreement. “You speak sensible words, Madrosh, yet I find them such a distasteful people. So, what must I do?”

  “You must issue clear orders to your men, especially Tomasz, your castellan, and his fool, the one they call Big Franciszek.”

  “Take care with your words, priest. I do not know why you speak so of them particularly. They are loyal to me, and they would do only what they think I would do.”

  “With my deepest respect, Sire,” Madrosh hastened to add, bowing as he spoke, “is it possible these men and others may have concluded you do not believe in Jewish liberties, that you harbor views, such as…?” Without completing the sentence, he jerked his head back and to the side, a reference to the messenger from Gniezno.

  “It is not for you to remonstrate with me. I will do what I think best, as I am sure my men will.”

  A verbal slap is far less a sting, Madrosh thought, than the knowledge I have failed in my pastoral duty to my duke. In one sweeping motion, Madrosh bowed once again, more deeply this time, and attempted a humble demeanor, unusual though such a posture was for him. What came as a greater shock was what master said next.

  “None of that will matter, my good man. We are leaving tomorrow—or soon thereafter.” The ring on his finger found its rest. The amber glint held steady in the candlelight.

  Stunned, Madrosh awaited his master’s words.

  “This very day, not four hours before the rider from Gniezno arrived with his news, another messenger came to us from the west. It seems that the King of France, Charles V, has invited all the nobility between the Portuguese and the Russians, and between the English and the Italians, to convene in Paris before the year is out.”

  Dumbstruck, Madrosh could blurt only a feeble rejoinder. “Sire, such a trip requires weeks of preparation, and in any event, I must remain here with the people.”

  “We will consider the Great Mortality a bothersome visitor, but not for us.” As quickly as the duke’s affable composure had departed, it returned with his own reminder of a convenient reason to leave the plague behind him. “You will accompany me to Paris, Madrosh. I could not manage this journey successfully without you, though I would prefer you find softer ways to proffer your advice.”

  Madrosh chose not to respond, but to listen.

  “You may not have noticed, dear man, but ever since the first messenger gladdened my day, I ordered preparations begun. Now we will complete them in greater haste and decamp before we ourselves are overcome by the reaper.”

  “And your subjects here, Sire?” The priest could not hide the beseeching tone behind his words. The candlelight played on the wall, as smoky threads breezed in from without, animating the shadows into ghostly images.

  “There are plenty of priests and nuns to care for them in their last hours, Madrosh. There is nothing I can do to stop what must be God’s will.” Then he added, “As for the Jews, there is little I can do.” Duke Zygmunt paused. “In any case, Tomasz Wodowicz will see to them.”

  …

  At the crest above Srodka, Irina passed a rock outcropping, just before the cartpath dipped the last mile or so toward the Warta. The more she walked, the more doubt about Berek’s love shrouded her. What if my father spoke the truth? She brooded. If Berek will not have me, walkin
g into the swift waters of the Warta would be sure and final.

  Then, she doubted her own self-pity. If self-murder is a sin, wouldn’t it be a greater evil to take the life of my child? There were some, she had heard, who knew of potions strong enough to take the life of an unborn child, but she did not know such people. What God thought about such things, she did not know, but killing her child made no sense to her, and she resolved not to do so, no matter what her parents had demanded. It will be different for us!

  While she did not want her child to be the lure for marriage, she could not change that now. Guilt swept in. Did I let him touch me for my father’s dream of a pot of gold? As fast as the thought came, she banished it, and yet no one would make her marry a Jew. Likewise, she suspected, few Jews would want to marry a poor, landless girl born of the church. I will leave that choice to Berek, but I know what it will be.

  Her mother’s dictum sat in the forefront of her mind. Waste no time on sadness. Hurrying now as the setting sun cast long shadows of gloom, she took the first few steps down the Srodka Fareway, now empty of its stalls and market-day bustle.

  A cool breeze stirring in the air, she threw her blue woolen square over her shoulders. All at once, the smell she had for a moment forgotten swept up the Fareway, bringing with it a gust of smoky air and bits of cinder. She gagged, grasping her belly. Leaning on the nearest post, the scene before her came into focus. It was not the warming glow of a setting sun that she saw.

  Across the river, fires roared just beyond Sokorski Castle. They lit up the evening, a yellow-orange halo growing brighter over the city. Squinting in the stinging smoke, she tried to make out more of what lay before her. Then, as if the hand of the devil himself clenched her heart, she saw that many of the flames leapt from the part of the city where the Joselewicz family lived—on Jewish Street.

  …

  The black-robed man, taller than his visitor by a head and a half, tore the wax-sealed paper from the mud-spattered underling in front of him. As he did so, his gold, ruby-encrusted pectoral cross swung on the gold chain around his neck. “What is this you bring me, messenger? It is late!”

  “It is not for me to say, Your Grace.” The man’s eyes roamed the marbled entrance way of the fabled mansion where Bishop Antony Tirasewicz ruled the See of Poznan.

  “What are you looking at? Things you might steal?”

  “No, Your G-grace,” he stammered. “Duke Zygmunt would not be happy with me if I committed an offense against someone such as you.”

  “Just so. Wait while I read this.” His coal-black eyes narrowed as they flanked the pointed, hawk-like nose. Paper? Paper was expensive, and as such, used carefully. He had heard this convenience was readily available in Italy and France, but it most definitely was not in Wielko Polska—Greater Poland.

  His thin lips stretched into a barely visible line as he considered the contents of the message. Then he looked down at his visitor. “No one at the castle need be concerned.” He made the nameless man repeat his words, then dismissed him.

  “Josef, saddle my horse,” he yelled to his man when the messenger had departed.

  …

  At the castle gate, the man walked under the portcullis, abreast of the guard standing with his face to the city. Wearing a brown tunic with black hose above his leather boots, he startled the guard. “Ho, man!”

  The guard challenged him and reached for his sword, but relaxed when the stranger threw back his hood and stepped into the torchlight. “Why, Squire Brezchwa, I did not recognize you! Why are you not in the duke’s colors?”

  Breschwa chuckled to further put the guard at ease. “I am set with an errand for Father Madrosh, and I wanted you to see me so that I may return to the castle without incident.”

  “No need to worry, Squire, though I must report all comings and goings to Castellan Wodowicz.”

  “You should feel free to do so.”

  “That I will, when he returns.”

  “Is he out of the castle, then?” Brezchwa asked, to confirm what he knew. “So many others are hurrying here and there, as if to pack for a journey.”

  “Yes, Squire. The castellan and a few men are out to ensure order. Have you not noticed what is going on not a few streets over? It looks like the Jews are getting what’s coming to them.”

  Surprised at the man’s remark, Brezchwa started to put the man in his place, but saw it would be pointless. “I saw from up above, but I will not be out long.”

  “Be out with care, Squire, no matter what errand the good Father sends you on this night.”

  As Squire Brezchwa started without the castle walls to protect him, the guard called out, “And best not be long, good Squire. The gates will close if the trouble worsens or whenever Tomasz Wodowicz himself returns.”

  …

  Irina held her belly and began to trot her way down Srodka’s Fareway, looking neither left nor right until she stopped to catch her breath at the foot of the Mary and Josef, the arched stone bridge spanning the Warta and leading to the island in the center of Poznan. Firelight splashed the wet stones of the bridge.

  Crossing over, she made her way to the quay at the end of the shipping canal just below the castle rising high in front of her, its imposing cut stone deep in shadow of the advancing night. People streamed back toward the bridge scurrying toward Srodka, slowing her progress.

  The scene along the canal was one she had seen many times, but never at nightfall, and never in the midst of so much turmoil. Along the fortress’s eastern wall ran a wharf laid by the masons with rough-cut blocks of limestone. Thick poles sunk deep in the canal bottom allowed boats and barges of various sizes to tie up and disgorge their goods.

  The fortress itself served as one wall of a seemingly endless parade of wooden structures, simple warehouses stacked with every imaginable tradegood. Pan Joselewicz stored his merchandise in many of the sheds, convenient were they as staging points for goods moving into the city or moving them west via land routes.

  Activity continued along the frontage, but not much. Men unloaded sacks and bales from boats pulling at their ropes, as if in a hurry to be on another journey. Irina could see them struggle with the day’s final burdens, but she knew they would stay the night there protecting their masters’ wares.

  What she further noticed was the horde of rats scurrying across the tie-lines, their presence unremarkable because they and their human hosts shared the same spaces, day and night, sometimes scrambling for the same bits of food. The four-footed passengers easily traversed the short distance on the ropes, chirping amongst themselves as they scrambled across the gravel in search of food and nesting.

  Irina was headed to where the castle wall turned away from the river, cutting across the island known as Ostrow Tumski. Some of the rats made their way into the city ahead of her. Two squares further west lay another bridge crossing the Warta’s main course, and a short walk further would take her to ulica Zydowska, where the Joselewicz’s lived, where smoke and noise filled the air.

  Weary, hungry, and fearful, Irina paused before stepping past the castle gate. Two cart-widths across, the gateway was empty. A guard stood there, dumbly staring at the human stream hastening toward the bridges and away from the noise and chaos, their varied shapes creating distorted shadows from the firelight nearby. Irina paused. Fear must have many friends.

  To one of them, she called out, “Why are you leaving?”

  A voice shouted back, “Plague—again. It’s the filthy Jews!”

  “Plague?” she wailed in the din.

  Cried another, “People will be dying of it! Leave now if you want to live.” The words seemed rote, the tone, terrifying.

  Talk of plague was enough to make men say and do things—horrible things. St. Michael’s isolation spared her such fears. For a moment, she thought of her family who had that very day disowned her. At least they will be safe in St. Mi
chael. She could barely remember the last outbreak, yet knew it would be better for her—and her child—if she turned and left with the others.

  She touched her belly and knew she had no choice. She had to go on. As she made her way along the wall and into the city’s narrow streets, her felt boots, already damp from the dew along the cartpath, began to slide when they did not otherwise stick in the mud and animal droppings streaking the stony streets.

  The noise and the heat of the fires, along with the clatter of cartwheels and the hooves of horses assaulted her senses as she reached the head of ulica Zydowska.

  She could see people being dragged from their houses and beaten. There was a lifeless body not ten yards ahead, sprawled in the street. Is it a woman? Blood was everywhere. Someone attempted to heave the corpse out of the way, like one might deal with the carcass of a dog or a pony. The Joselewicz house was just beyond the curve in the street, where she could not see.

  Irina turned and ran back the way she came, and as she rounded the corner, she collided with a man there. He was standing still, watching. “Oh!” Jan Brezchwa put his hands on her shoulders to keep her from falling.

  “I am so sorry, Pan.”

  “This is not a night to be running in the city, alone. You should be with family.” He tried to look into her eyes, and in the flickering light of the nearby fires, he saw only the face of a frightened girl. “Is there some way I can help you?”

  “No, Pan. You are right. I should be with family.” She pulled free and ran back into Jewish Street.

  …

  The man astride the black horse was himself garbed in black, from his hooded cape down to his gleaming leather boots. From the far end of ulica Zydowska, he guided his mount around the rubble, human and other, but did not concern himself when the horse stepped upon the soft carcasses clinging to the cobbles. Which or what did not matter to him.

  Ahead, thirty or so yards from the walled house of Joselewicz, men fought with swords and implements of all kinds. A sheepdog ran through the melee, growling, biting, and barking.