The Day of the Lie (13 page)

The quick shove was soon
ended by a deafening assault from tanks and planes and hammering rifle fire.
The buildings seemed to spit out their broken teeth. Their bones were cracked
and splintered. Róża had never seen so much death: on street corners, by
heaps of rubble — the bodies sometimes splayed in the most awful shapes, so
strange they seemed not to be human. She felt utterly abandoned. Where was the
Red Army? Why had the Soviets urged them to rise up if they were not going to
come?

In the scorching heat of
this beating, Róża crouched by Otto in a makeshift hospital by the Old
Town walls. There was no ammunition left to carry so they were ripping
bandages from the clothes of the dead. Suddenly Róża gripped Otto’s hand.
They were going to die and she didn’t want to go without giving the best of
herself to someone. With shocking violence she pressed into his palm all the
love she had left.

And he began to talk.

As if a door had been
blown off its hinges, he began to speak about what he’d seen through the window
in the attic, tears pouring down his face.

‘My father used to make
me toys out of wood and bits of plumbing, pipes and joints, fantastic things, a
musket, a revolver, a sword … they looked real, honestly people used to stop
and stare. He’d take me fishing, bird watching, camping, hiking and when I lost
a tooth he’d put a coin under my pillow in an envelope with a funny drawing of
a mouse waving at me, my name written all over the page. For years I thought
the mouse came for my tooth. My mother used to cook fish in lemonade, really I’m
not joking,
lemonade,
and it made the trout all sweet, a special kind of
sweet. She was always
there,
always—’

He stopped abruptly as
if he’d run out of things to say The wall behind soaked up a bang and seemed to
bend inwards.

‘Where are they?’

‘Don’t know …
deported.’

‘Why were you hiding?’

‘My father was a
communist.’ He spoke with a savage, loud pride. ‘He believed in a better world
for everyone, for you, for me, for them—’ He ducked the crack of an explosion.
Chunks of plaster bounced on the floor; an eerie white dust floated down.

‘Where are you from?’
The conversation was in pieces. They were getting it all in before the ceiling
came down.

‘Polana.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Near the Ukraine.’

The ground made a judder
as if the world had just been smashed off its axis. Then Róża thought of
the sewers. They’d been used for gun running and messages. Pulling Otto she
stumbled into the open, head low, making a scream to batter down her terror.
Two hundred yards later they lifted a cover and scrambled into the hole. Thirty-four
rungs down, Róża and Otto slid waist deep into the water and filth.

High, high above, the
din continued. Otto struck a match. The cavern appeared.

Corpses floated silently
by like sleeping watchmen. Róża and Otto began wading east, the black
bricks shuddering overhead. The match died. Otto lit another. The smell of gas,
spent grenades and dirt made them wretch. On they went, pushing aside the dead.
The match slowly faded. Róża whispered to the darkness, not expecting a
reply:

‘The Red Army Why didn’t
they help us?’

The question echoed down
the reeking corridor. When it died there was a silence and lapping and then
Otto made a murmur.

‘I thought they’d come,
but now I understand.’ Otto was near. She felt his breath on her neck. ‘Sometimes
watching is waiting.’

Róża blanked from
exhaustion. Then she gradually understood, unable to accept that he meant it,
wanting to believe that she’d misheard the tone of approval.

‘You mean they’re
watching while we die?’

There was no more
murmuring.

‘You mean they’ll only
come when we’ve been wiped out? When there’s no more resistance?’ She found
some energy and it made her voice jagged and loud. ‘You mean they’ll come when
they can take over?’

Otto struck a match. His
face lit up, covered in grime, his cheeks muddied from his dried tears.

‘I mean the future lies
with Moscow A new future, without chains. Sacrifices have to be made.’

‘A future without
chains?
Where did you get that from?’

This wasn’t Otto. Not
the boy who had been hurt and hidden. It was the ghost of a man … his father;
it had to be his father. Otto was repeating speeches heard while they’d hiked
and camped. He sloshed forward, reaching for Róża’s hand, the hand he’d
held up there where the bombs were falling. He raised the flame to illuminate
her face.

‘We’re going to get out
of here.’

Róża glared at his
mask of disarranged dirt.

‘Choose the right side,’
he whispered.

‘What?’

‘There’s going to be
another struggle.’ His cracked lips barked out the memory. ‘
Choose the right
side.’

Róża yanked her
hand free and swung around. She could just make out a T-junction ahead: the
tunnel joined another route heading north-south.

‘I’ve made a choice
already’ Even though she was worn out and could hardly think straight, she
could grasp a basic truth. Mr Lasky used to say that what you believed was
everything. It changed who you walked with and where you went. He was right. It
had roused a visceral loyalty to those disfigured bodies among the rubble. ‘I’m
going north, Otto,’ she gasped. ‘You go south.’

Róża pushed her way
through the water, holding on to the mental image of the junction. A small
flame burst behind her and Róża felt a flash of grief. Not so much for
losing her friendship with Otto or for having given him her love. No, she was
devastated because she’d told him about the red dress, the green jacket and the
shoes. She’d given him her dreams.

Six years later those
two tunnels came to another junction in the Mariensztat District when Otto and
four men in long coats broke down her front door.

Róża lifted her face off the cell
floor. The prisoner with the grey hair was sniggering into her hand, pointing
at some fragment of her imagination. The others were like crouched gargoyles on
a forsaken church. When Róża had first entered this hell she’d understood,
on a primitive level, that to survive she would have to keep soft some part of
her heart. Which was why she’d said nothing about her previous friendship with
Otto. The revelation could put him in a cell of his own. Association was
suspicion. So it was at this juncture of her fidelity to him and his
abandonment of her that Róża chose to keep alive her humanity. Whatever
power Major Strenk might have over her, she would remain above him, through
Otto.

It was only when Róża
was in the cage with water thundering upon her, when she was in this, the
lowest gutter of human existence, that Róża realised what had really been
happening throughout her interrogations: Otto had already told Major Strenk
about their shared past. And it was precisely because Róża never referred
to it that the major knew Róża could break down and still keep important
information to herself; that she might well know how to find the Shoemaker.
Otto had been the man behind the questions. From that moment, Otto ceased to
exist for Róża. He became Brack.

Chapter Fourteen

Two weeks later Róża was brought back
to the interrogation room. There, behind the desk with the small lamp, sat
Brack, opening and shutting a drawer. He started asking questions even before Róża
crouched on the footstool.

‘Ink. Ink stains. You
must have seen stains. Tell me about stains. He was on to something. It was how
Róża discovered that Pavel was involved. She’d seen that incredibly black
crescent under a thumbnail. She’d found out later that part of Pavel’s role
within the Shoemaker organisation was the obtaining of vital supplies. Without
wearing gloves, he’d handled a leaking tin.

‘People disappear, Róża,’
he’d said, gripping her hands. ‘They vanish. Accept my silence. It protects
you.

His dark eyes had been
wide with feeling, his fair hair ruffled. He’d shoved her gently on the bed.

‘Stains,’ repeated
Brack.

‘I never saw any.’

Brack opened and shut
the drawer, tension gouging out his eye sockets. He had to find a way of
breaking her. But there was nothing in the desk. It had to be something worse
than the cage. He changed subject.

‘When did you first hear
of the Shoemaker?’

‘When I was child.’

‘I want the name.’

‘Mr Lasky He read us
stories every— ‘Don’t play with me … Comrade.’ The words left his mouth like fibres
spat from one of his cigarettes. ‘I have the power of life and death.’

Róża dared to
laugh. He had nothing of the sort. He was wearing Major Strenk’s shoes, that’s
all.

‘The Shoemaker,’ he
repeated. ‘When did you first learn that your husband was an associate?’

Pavel had told her after
she’d swung her legs off the bed. She’d insisted on knowing about the ink. His
risk was her risk. He’d thought for a long while first, getting dressed
distractedly, confusing the buttons and holes. When he was done he’d put on his
coat and thrown Róża’s across the room.

‘I’m going to introduce
you to someone. I call him the Threshold.’

It was night. They went to a church that
backed on to a railway line. Most of the surrounding buildings were incomplete,
the reconstruction slowed by cost and a lack of materials. Heaps of rubble had
still not been cleared away Frameless windows cut black squares out of the sky
Pavel knocked on a door. After a moment he tried to light a cigarette, giving
up after three strikes of a match. After several minutes a bolt slammed back
and a man in a cassock pulled them inside, swearing under his breath. He was in
his mid thirties. His hair, short and black, gave prominence to a large
forehead. He’d shaved roughly leaving small red cuts on his chin and neck.

‘What the hell are you
doing here?’ he snapped.

Pavel drew the priest
down the low lit corridor, whispering urgently After listening for a few
seconds the priest’s mouth slowly fell open and he swore again. Róża
caught their talk.

‘You’re
married?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?
If I’d—’

‘I couldn’t. You know
the rules.’

‘Rules? You break them
all the time.’

‘Look, stick to the
point. What do you think?’

The priest drew a hand
across his jaw, checking the cuts. Glancing at Róża, he shook his head in
disbelief and condemnation.

‘I had to find someone
from outside the Friends,’ argued Pavel, frustrated. ‘You agreed. You said we
need a sleeper. Someone who can wake the dead and shatter the illusions of many.
Someone who can take up where we left off, if I’m caught. Someone who can
restructure a new group of Friends. These are your words.
You agreed.’

‘Damn it, I thought you
meant a man. But a young woman, your wife?’

‘They’ll arrest her
anyway If they pick
me
up, they’ll pick
her
up.

‘Which is why you
shouldn’t have got married.’

‘But I did. Look, they
wouldn’t expect her to know anything. Like you, they wouldn’t think I’d tell
her.’

‘Have you
any
idea
what these people can do?’ The priest pointed towards Róża as if she was a
joint at the butchers. ‘They don’t hand out questionnaires. They—’

‘They’ll do all that
anyway.’

‘Oh, fine. That’s all
right then. So let’s just—’

‘Excuse me.’ Róża’s
soft voice took them by surprise. They’d forgotten she was there. ‘This is my
choice. I accept the risk.’ She walked down the corridor to join the
conspirators. ‘Think about it: if they believe I’m your sleeper they won’t kill
me. I’d be the only one who could lead them to what they want. They’ll keep me
alive.’

The priest clawed at his
neck, seeming to weigh her femininity and her resistance. She knew too much
already At length he murmured, ‘I hope you’re right.’

They moved quietly to
the door and the priest drew back the bolt.

‘Will the Shoemaker
agree?’ asked Pavel. He wanted to know that the matter was settled.

‘It’s not for him to
decide.’ The priest reached for the switch. ‘And he wouldn’t want to know If he
did, he might never write another word. It’s our responsibility We decide and
we live with the consequences. He writes.’

The priest flicked the
light dead. Slowly he opened the door, keeping it ajar by an inch. Leaning
towards the crack, head bowed, he listened, not seeming to breathe. Finally
without a word, he pushed them both outside and the bolt slipped home.

That night, Pavel
explained how the organisation was structured and what she was to do in the
event of his arrest. She listened until morning, clocking the detail.
Throughout she watched herself with a kind of third eye, the eye of the secret
sleeper. She watched Róża Mojeska fall helplessly in love again, only this
time far more deeply than before. It frightened her. She found herself
bottoming out, reaching the soft sea bed; a place reserved for the elderly and
those who know that their time together has been cut short.

‘When did you first learn that your husband
was an associate?’

Róża was being
interrogated again. Once more Brack was in the major’s shoes, one arm dangling,
his hollowed eyes levelled upon her. The pond green jacket of the secret police
didn’t sit well on his shoulders. He was still thin, seemingly undernourished.

‘I first heard words to
that effect one hundred and fifty-four days ago.’ She’d scratched them on the
wall with the nail of her thumb. Brack frowned. It sounded like an admission,
that he might be getting somewhere, but he knew something was wrong. Róża
explained. ‘You told me on the night of my arrest.’