The Day of the Lie (2 page)

‘The Shoemaker was the
voice behind
Freedom and Independence,’
resumed Sebastian, as if Róża
didn’t know already ‘The paper published his essays every two weeks, beginning
in nineteen thirty-eight. For no apparent reason, he fell silent after twelve
years … in nineteen fifty-one, during the Stalinist Terror.’

Róża nodded,
feeling her throat go dry.

‘Most people think he’d
said all he had to say but then, out of the blue, he spoke again … thirty-one
years later, just after martial law had been declared.
Freedom and
Independence
suddenly appeared on the streets as if there’d been no hush.
This time he dried up after eight months.’

‘That’s right,’ said Róża,
finding her voice, thinking the best line of defence would be a passive
contribution. She ate the cherry to do what normal people do when they’re not
worried.

‘Again, the view of
historians and critics is that there was nothing else to be said — he’d been a
writer with a sense of economy … no wasted words, no repetition. Why go on?
He’d sent out his ideas and he was content to wait for the harvest.’

‘Exactly,’ said Róża.

‘No one seriously
considered that he might have been betrayed. Twice. In fifty—one and
eighty—two.’

‘No.’ Her throat was
drying again.

Sebastian paused for a
while, waiting for the received version of history to fall apart without any
help from him. He sipped his tea, as if leaving Róża’s arms to weaken;
waiting for her to drop what she was carrying.

‘The Shoemaker didn’t
operate alone,’ he said, casually ‘The entire operation depended on a group
around him called the Friends. No one knows how they were structured or how
they’d organised the printing and distribution of the paper. In fact no one
knows how many of them were involved and who they might have been. Like the
Shoemaker, they appeared with the paper and they vanished with the paper. Which
brings me back to the archive found in Dresden … and a file on the Shoemaker.’

Róża nodded, her
resistance beginning to flag, the very sound of the words seeming to press down
upon her.

‘The file contains
documents compiled during an operation to catch him in nineteen eighty-two
after the breaking of his long silence.’

‘Yes.’ Again, the act of
speaking gave Róża something to lean on, something to hide behind.

‘The operation was run
by Otto Brack.’

‘Yes.’

‘It was called
Polana.’

Róża, already
reeling, frowned at the name; she felt a kind of tug on the line, but the hook
was snagged deep in the past. Something stirred but slipped away.

‘It failed,’ said
Sebastian.

‘It did.’

‘He only caught you …
the only known Friend. The papers call you “the pre-eminent Friend”. You were
betrayed.’

Róża waited, her
gaze falling on to Sebastian’s lips. He’d fished out the slice of lemon and was
eating the fruit, wincing at the bitter taste. After placing the rind on the
saucer, he said, ‘But you see Róża, I’m not here to talk about what
happened in eighty-two. What interests me is fifty-one. The really dark year
that no one knows about, except you and Otto Brack.’

Róża froze. She
hadn’t expected this. The letters, calls and messages had all been vaguely
about justice, forgotten wrongs and the strength of the law Cleaning up the
past. She imagined he’d come across some slip of paper that mentioned her name;
that he’d wanted her to fill in the gaps … but not this. He’d found his way
into the cellar of Mokotów prison.

‘Róża, we have a
vast archive at the IPN,’ said Sebastian, like a man laying his cards upon the
table. ‘It’s the paperwork of the old secret police machinery. But it was
cleaned up. Officials like Brack took the opportunity to get rid of
incriminating material before going home from the office for the last time.
They went away with smiles on their faces. But these lost documents, now found,
change all that. Or to be precise, they change everything in relation to you.
The file opened on the Shoemaker in nineteen eighty-two has an enclosure: the
file opened on you in nineteen fifty-one. In it are the transcripts of your
interrogations carried out in Mokotów, when they asked you about the Shoemaker.
I’ve read them, Róża. I’ve read between the lines. I know that off the
page the gravest offences took place.’

Róża didn’t dare to
lift her cup of tea for fear her hand might shake. All at once she felt
terribly old, too old for this. And Sebastian didn’t understand that no lawyer
could penetrate that lost time; no one could cross the divide constructed by
Otto Brack. Sebastian was leaning forward, unaware of the abyss yawning in
front of him.

‘Róża, there’s
hardly anyone left who survived the Terror,’ he said, quietly ‘You’re the only
one alive who knows what happened in fifty-one. Strenk is dead. Only you know
what crimes took place when the questions were over … you and Otto Brack. He
was there, too, at the beginning of his career. He’s still alive.’

Their eyes met. Oddly it
gave Róża a kind of support; she held on to the gaze as if she might fall
over.

‘Do you know what Otto
Brack did after the fall of Communism?’

Róża shook her
head. She’d often wondered, not wanting to know; yet wanting to know, with the
terrible heat of an old, quiet fire.

‘He took early
retirement and began stamp collecting: He nodded at Róża’s vacant face,
crediting a surprise that she hadn’t shown. ‘Yes, that’s what he does to while
away the hours. He collects little pictures of days gone by the good old
communist days. That’s what he was doing when I asked him to comment upon your
interrogation papers. He was going over his stamp collection.’ Sebastian came
an inch or two closer. ‘He regrets nothing, Róża. He remains convinced of
the cause and the merit of the cost. It’s as if he’d done nothing wrong …

Sebastian’s eyes dropped
remorselessly upon Róża’s left hand. They both stared at the two wedding
rings on her third finger, the one public avowal of what had happened in
Mokotów when Róża was barely 22.

‘Róża, help me
bring him to court.’

‘Why?’ The whispered
question was patently disingenuous born of a desperate longing to not know the
answer.

‘For murder and torture.
Your torture. And the killing of two men … one of whom was Pavel, your
husband.’

The sun had slipped away A pink light
warmed the apartment, illuminating a shabby brown sofa, a landscape painting
hung askew, a half empty bookcase, an oval dining table and three matching
chairs: the detritus of a life crushed by the secret police. Róża looked calmly
upon her new inquisitor. She’d been in this type of situation before. After the
exhaustion that comes with dodging questions, there’s a strange second wind, an
energy born of knowing you’ve won, at least for the time being. Róża knew
when it was time to make a controlled confession, and it was now. It was time
to give the other side a little bit of what they wanted so as to keep back an
awful lot more.

Chapter Two

Róża fetched out the bottle of Bison
Grass. With two small glasses cupped in her other hand, she resumed her place
at the oval table. A feeble light trapped by a thick orange shade just about
reached them from the standard lamp in the corner. It picked out strands of
Sebastian’s roughly parted black hair. There was a pallor round his eyes and Róża
concluded he didn’t eat many vegetables. She filled each glass.

‘How old are you,
Sebastian?’

‘Thirty-six.’

‘You were fifteen when
the Wall came down:

‘Yes.’

Róża sniffed at the
coincidence. ‘My age when Stalin replaced Hitler.’

This was an apt meeting
point. At fifteen Róża had seen the birth of totalitarian communism while
Sebastian, at the same age, had seen its death: the corpse seemed to lie
between them, stretched out on the table.

‘I didn’t join the
resistance immediately’ said Róża, her mouth and tongue warmed. ‘But one
day I was given a secret. I was brought as close as you could get to the
Shoemaker. And, like it or not, that made me a Friend … shortly afterwards, a
Friend in prison.’

‘Róża, who was the
Shoemaker?’ asked Sebastian, tentatively ‘That era has been and gone. They
lost, we won. The fight’s over, isn’t it?’

‘No, not mine.’

‘Even though it’s—’

The question died on
Sebastian’s lips. He was looking over Róża’s shoulder as if Otto Brack had
stepped from behind the curtain.

He’d seen the bullet.

Róża kept it
standing upright on a shelf beneath a wall mirror. Most people didn’t spot it;
and if they did few dared or wanted to venture a question. But that little
brass jacket with the lead on top, once seen, grew large and filled the room. It
changed those who saw it: changed how they saw Róża. And Sebastian’s eyes,
finding again the old woman in the white blouse with a silver brooch clipped at
the collar, were no longer so sure of themselves. He’d just learned something
new about surviving the Terror.

‘They came for me in
November nineteen fifty-one and took me to Mokotów prison,’ continued Róża,
as if the air between them had been cleared. ‘I remember the night even now,
the biting cold, and the snow crunching underfoot. They’d already lifted my
husband and others whom I’d never met or even heard of … people who’d never
been told the secret. Maybe that’s why Otto Brack thought of me. He was a young
man, then. An angry, unquiet man. He’d just joined the secret police.’

Sebastian nodded. Impatiently,
to clear his line of vision, he flicked back his fringe.

‘He asked your question,’
said Róża. ‘He wanted to know about the Shoemaker and
Freedom and
Independence.
He, too, said the fight was over, though it had only just
begun. And I didn’t give him any answers either.’

Róża took the
smallest sip, letting the heat suffuse her lips and attack her throat. She
couldn’t continue with the chronology of her confession. To do so would only
bring back the dim grey cell, the sound of thundering water in the cellar. To
do so would only bring back the sound of the pistol.

‘They let me out in
nineteen fifty-three,’ she said, airily vaulting the years. ‘All I had left was
a secret. I came out burdened by knowledge of the one thing that Otto Brack
had wanted to know Only I could bring him close to the Shoemaker.’

The muffled sound of a
television came from the flat below, a smudge of noise made of high voices and
laughter. Observing Sebastian, Róża sensed his disappointment: he was
still in Mokotów; he wanted a statement about the torture and the killings. He
was trying to find a way into the cellar.

‘I was helped by good
friends, continued Róża, drawing him on. ‘Ordinary, decent people whose
names will never be immortalised by the IPN. People I would defend with my
life. But I did nothing for the struggle, not for thirty years. And then, one
morning, I went back to the Shoemaker.’

‘Why?’

‘The time was right.’

‘And the Shoemaker …
he’d been waiting?’

‘No. Grieving.’

Sebastian nodded,
outmanoeuvred. ‘And this brings us to nineteen eighty-two?’

‘Yes.’

‘The year when
Freedom
and Independence
reappeared on the streets?’

‘Yes. Eight months later
Otto Brack came to arrest me again. Oddly enough, it was a freezing cold
November. Once more I was taken to Mokotów.’

Only there was no cage;
no endless interrogations during that eternal twilight that emerges when you’ve
no idea whether it’s night or day This time it was a single session like a
brief visit to an undertaker. Unknown to Róża, the coffin had been sized
beforehand. Brack was simply waiting with the lid in his hands, a hammer on the
table, the nails in his teeth.

‘I’ve read the papers, Róża,’
Sebastian said with a note of warning. He’d picked up the crisp edge to Róża’s
voice. He’d seen her face stiffen. ‘I’ve reviewed the operational file from
eighty-two. It was cleansed. Brack got there first. All that’s left are a few
vague clues, marks on the wall … Brack looked after his informers. He made
sure they were safe, that no one could trace them. You’ll have to accept that—’

‘I’m not bothered about
the file,’ said Róża, suddenly brittle. ‘If you’re really interested in
what happened off the page, listen to me. If you want to understand how crimes
can be protected by silence then give me your undivided attention.’

The orange light fell
upon Sebastian’s slightly parted lips.

‘I’m going to tell you
my only other secret,’ continued Róża. ‘You’ve been chasing me for weeks
and now I’ll tell you why I run away This is my confession. It explains why I’ve
done nothing about the murder of my own husband.’

For a brief moment, Róża
lost her thread. She reached for her glass to get rid of the bitterness in her
throat. Recalling that last interrogation in 1982, Róża began hesitantly
trying to erase the memory of Otto Brack’s ashen face.

‘When I entered the
room, I thought I’d won. He’d wanted so much more, and all he’d got was me.
Again. He’d got nothing the first time and he was going to get nothing now I
was so much bigger than the prison system, so much taller than its walls. He
couldn’t contain my spirit. Or so I thought: Róża paused, smiling at her
foolishness. ‘I hadn’t realised that on this occasion he didn’t intend to ask
any questions.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Polana
wasn’t
simply about catching the Shoemaker and suppressing
Freedom and
Independence.
He wanted to find
me,
to tell me that if I ever sought
justice in the future, it could only be bought at a heavy price … a price I
wouldn’t pay He’d found a means of silencing me for ever.’