‘You start. I’ll go upstairs and put on my other shoes,’ I said. My accusations about his lack of exercise had aroused something in Dicky’s metabolism, for he began running on the spot, and punching the air around him to fell imaginary assailants.
‘You’d better hurry,’ he called and, with no further prompting, went jogging across the cobbled courtyard through the gate and along the path that led through the woods. I watched him slow as he entered the meadow that was now knee-high with dead ferns and weeds. They produced a crisp puffing sound as Dicky jogged through them. The impression of a choo-choo train was completed by the white vapour his breath left on the cold air.
I went inside the house to the kitchen. There was no one in evidence. I helped myself to a cup of warm coffee and toasted a slice of dark bread before following Dicky down the forest path at a leisurely pace. There were starlings, blackbirds and sparrows foraging for food. I understood their shrill cries; being without food in Poland was a grim plight. I was moved enough to toss a few bite-sized fragments of my breakfast bread to them, and decided that if I started to believe in reincarnation I’d go for something migratory.
‘My God, where have you been?’ Dicky said when I got to him. He had joined some men standing around looking at a shallow ditch. It was where they had been digging when we passed them the previous day. Accompanying the men there was a brown shaggy-haired mongrel dog; presumably it was Basilisk, the noted truffle-hound. It was sniffing at Dicky’s running shoes that were now caked in mud.
‘I took it easy; it was icy,’ I explained.
‘I know, I know,’ agreed Dicky, gently kicking the dog’s nose aside. ‘I slipped on a patch of it near the stream. I went full-length and hurt my back. But still I was here half an hour before you.’
‘It’s just as well that one of us remains uninjured,’ I said.
‘Very droll,’ said Dicky. Then, turning his dissatisfaction upon the labourers, he said: ‘They say they got a part of a leg yesterday – not an arm, the old man got it wrong – but it’s gone off to the police station.’
‘What kind of leg?’ I kicked at the ground. Here under the trees where no sunlight ever came, it was hard, very hard.
‘What kind of leg?’ Dicky scoffed. ‘How many kinds are there? Left and right?’ He coughed. His exertions seemed to have exhausted him and now he stood arms akimbo and breathed in and out slowly and deliberately, smiling fixedly while he did it, like those girls who sell exercise machines on television.
‘Young? Old? Decomposing? Tall? Short? Hairy? Smooth?’
‘How do I know?’ said Dicky, abandoning his breathing exercises. ‘It’s gone to the police.’
I turned to the men and tried my inadequate Polish on them but got only vague answers. Their attitude to the dismembered corpse was not unlike Dicky’s; a leg was a leg.
‘You didn’t change your shoes,’ said Dicky accusingly.
‘No,’ I admitted. ‘I only brought the pair I’m wearing.’
‘You said you were going to change.’
‘I forgot I’d not brought spares.’
‘You’re a bloody scrimshanker,’ said Dicky.
I didn’t deny it. I singled out the German-speaking Blackbeard and said: ‘Show me the leg.’ Before he could start his excuses I added: ‘These are human remains. I’ll bring the priest. If you try to prevent me arranging proper Christian burial I’ll see you damned in hell.’
He stared at me angrily. After a moment in which we stood motionless he pointed to a battered old wooden box. I pulled the top off it to see a shoe, a wrinkled sock and a grotesque hunk of chewed flesh that was undoubtedly a leg.
‘The dogs got it,’ explained Blackbeard. I glanced at the sleepy Basilisk. ‘Not this one… dogs from the village. They run wild in packs at night.’
I leaned over to see the well-chewed piece of flesh the men had discovered. It was chafed and grazed as if it had been scraped with a wire brush. Chunks of flesh were bitten away deeply enough to reveal the tibia bone. The big toe had been entirely torn off, leaving some of the small neighbouring grey bones visible. The four other toes were intact, and complete with toenails. I reached into the box and turned the remains over to see where it had been detached from the upper leg. Surrounding the rounded stump of the bone there was a mop-like mess of ligaments, cartilage and tendon. ‘It’s a human leg all right,’ I said, carefully replacing it in the box. ‘And it looks like the dogs made a good meal of it.’
‘Uggh!’ said Dicky. ‘How repulsive.’
I picked up the shoe. Despite being damaged it was an Oxford brogue of unmistakably English origin. It was the expensive handmade sort of shoe that George Kosinski liked, and the leather had a patina that comes when shoes are carefully preserved by servants, as George’s shoes were. Such shoes, in such condition, were not commonly to be found in Poland even on the feet of the most affluent. The sock was silk, and although I couldn’t decipher all the markings, there was enough to establish that it was English too.
‘George Kosinski?’ said Dicky.
‘It looks like it,’ I said as I leaned over to estimate the size of the shoe against the foot.
‘You don’t seem very surprised.’
‘What do you want me to do…? No. In fact, someone in Warsaw told me he had been killed.’
‘In Warsaw? Why don’t you bloody well confide in me?’ said Dicky in exasperation.
‘You don’t want me to repeat every last stupid unlikely rumour I hear, do you?’
‘How did you know?’ Dicky turned to glance at the men. ‘That these buggers still had it, I mean. They told me the police had collected it.’
‘The police?’ I said. ‘You think the police would have come out here, parcelled up a bloodstained section of cadaver, said thank-you, and then gone quietly back to the barracks to think about it? In this part of the world, Dicky, the cops come complete with armoured cars and assault weapons. Fresh human remains dug up out here in the sticks would have had them interrogating everyone in the house. We would have been paraded in our night-clothes in the courtyard, while search and arrest teams tore up the floorboards and kicked shit out of the servants.’
‘Yes, yes, yes, you’re right.’
‘That’s why no one sends for the bastards. That’s why I knew they were still thinking about what to do with this.’ I tossed the shoe and the sock into the box with the severed leg, and then put the lid on it. I looked round and found the diggers looking at me.
‘Where did you dig it from?’ I asked them.
‘That’s the problem,’ said Blackbeard. ‘The dogs had it here, under the beech-tree. It could have come from anywhere. It could have come from miles away.’
‘So why are you digging here?’
‘The ground was disturbed. Shall we stop digging?’
I wasn’t going to fall for that one. ‘No, keep digging. We’ll keep it to ourselves,’ I suggested. ‘Tell no one. When Mr Stefan returns he’ll know what to do.’
This wait-and-see solution appealed to the men. They nodded and Blackbeard picked up the wooden box and placed it further back in the darkness of the forest.
‘Are you jogging back for lunch?’ I asked Dicky.
‘Can’t you see I’ve hurt my back?’
‘We’ll walk then,’ I said. ‘I’ll show you the ruins of the generator house and traces of what must be the German fortified lines from the Tannenberg battle in 1914.’
‘Tannenberg?’ said Dicky doubtfully.
I said: ‘Every German schoolboy knows about Tannenberg, just as every English boy is taught about Trafalgar. Fifty miles of Masurian lakes split the Tsar’s attacking army. The invincible General Hindenburg walloped one half and then the other, to win a classic victory.’ I stopped abruptly as I realized to what extent my upbringing at a Berlin school had caused me to forget that the Tsar and his army were fighting on the Allied side. In 1914 Hindenburg had been Britain’s deadly enemy.
‘Do you know why you’ve never got on?’ said D
icky in a friendly tone, while putting a hand on my shoulder. ‘You can’t distinguish the important things in life from self-indulgent trifles.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And anyway, it was General Ludendorff who did the work while Hindenburg snatched all the credit.’ Dicky smiled to show he knew which general he was.
Karol arrived back at the house just after two o’clock. Everyone was fretting for their lunch but it was delayed until he arrived. Dicky had somewhat overstated Karol’s riding attire. He came into the drawing-room dressed in stained slacks, scuffed high-boots and a baggy tweed jacket. He sat down after no more than a gruff greeting and we were served more soup made from unidentifiable vegetables followed by a plate of peppery mashed swede with onion in it.
‘Father Ratajczyk said he would come,’ Karol said suddenly. This seemed to be directed to Uncle Nico, but he turned to take in the whole family. ‘He had a christening and then he is coming directly here.’
‘There is no need for him to go into the East Wing,’ said Uncle Nico.
‘Every room,’ said Karol. ‘He said he would go into every room and that is what I want.’ Uncle Nico said nothing. ‘It’s what Stefan wanted,’ Karol added defiantly.
After the swede plates were cleared away, we were served a heavy pudding with a few raisins in it, and a sweet white sauce over it. There were murmurs of satisfaction from everyone and the pudding was devoured to the last drip of sauce and the final crumb.
‘I have saved some food for Father,’ said Aunt Mary.
‘Yes,’ said Karol. ‘He will be hungry. They never serve food at christenings.’
The priest arrived about an hour after lunch was eaten. He came striding through the house, a small scrawny figure who gestured extravagantly with hands high in the air. ‘I’ll start here,’ he said, looking into the dining-room and sparing no more than a glance at the big stuffed eagle. ‘We’ll bring the box.’ He said it as if to himself and then turned abruptly on his heel, so that the skirt of his ankle-length cassock swirled around him. He sped back to the hallway and shouted through the front door to the sweaty old chap he’d brought with him: ‘Bring the box, Tadeusz.’
It was a large wooden box and weighed heavily, judging by the panting, flush-faced old man who carried it into the house and put it down in the dining-room with a deep sigh.
‘I’ll need the second box too,’ said the priest. ‘It’s a big job.’
The priest looked around. As if seeing for the first time the crowd of spectators who’d gathered round him he said: ‘You must leave the house. All of you. Right away.’ He again made a fidgety gesture with his hands high in the air, as a child might shoo away worrisome hens.
‘What’s it all about?’ said Dicky.
I didn’t know. ‘What’s it all about, Uncle Nico?’ I asked.
It was Karol who answered. ‘Everyone must leave the house,’ he said. ‘There is a little cottage near the lake. I ordered that it should be swept and a fire lit to warm it. You will be comfortable there for as long as this takes.’
‘How long is that likely to be?’ I asked.
‘We’ll be finished by the time Stefan arrives,’ he replied. ‘Two hours… three at the most.’
‘I see.’ I looked at Dicky. We both knew that three hours in Poland could take you into the following week.
‘Why?’ said Dicky.
‘We mustn’t talk about it,’ Karol said. ‘Something happened… something bad. Each room must be restored to us.’
‘Restored how?’ said Dicky.
Karol looked to see if the priest was listening, but he wasn’t, he was opening his boxes and counting the contents. ‘There is an evil spirit in the house. He must be expelled… exorcized. You know this word?’
‘Yes, I know this word,’ said Dicky. ‘Bell, book, and candle. So that’s it?’
‘You’ll be comfortable in the little house,’ said Karol. ‘I must stay here to help.’
‘My God,’ said Dicky bursting with suppressed excitement by the time we were along the path on the way to the cottage near the lake. ‘Bell, book, and candle, eh?’
‘Not exactly,’ I said. ‘Bell, book, and candle is the ceremony of excommunication. This is exorcism. Expelling evil spirits by ringing a passing bell.’
‘Passing bell?’
‘A consecrated bell. Rung for people at death’s door who might have their soul snatched away as it passed from the body.’
‘Are you making this up, Bernard?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Yes, well you know all this foreign religious mumbo-jumbo,’ said Dicky. ‘Perhaps it doesn’t seem so suspicious to someone like you. But you’ve got to admit it, this is a damned weird set-up. Bells. Dismembered bodies. Priests exorcizing the rooms. He’ll start in the dining-room: it didn’t take him long to decide that, eh? So it’s obvious that George Kosinski was murdered in that dining-room. My God! Think of it. Why a dining-room? Because there are sharp knives to hand, right?’
‘They are doing all the rooms,’ I pointed out.
‘Maybe the Church figures it’s a sin that has spilled over and stained the whole house. In this part of the world, what the Church says goes.’
‘Maybe that’s it,’ I said.
‘Maybe that’s it.’ Dicky mimicked my words angrily. ‘Yes, maybe that’s it, and maybe you are holding out on me again. You’ve got your own theory, haven’t you? So why don’t you bloody well say so?’
‘I think it’s all a lot of bullshit. It’s just a way of getting everyone out of the house.’
‘Why? Why, why, why?’
‘I don’t know, Dicky. That’s why I didn’t say anything.’
‘What can that bugger Karol do when we aren’t in the house that he can’t do when we are in it?’
‘Listen, Dicky,’ I said. ‘I was looking around this morning, and there’s a room at the top on this side with a locked door. The windows are clean – I can see that from the outside – and the handle is well used. They are keeping the stove going there. Warming an extra room doesn’t come cheap. So why?’
‘Wait a minute! Wait a minute. What do you mean – when you were looking around this morning?’
‘I got up early. I couldn’t sleep.’
‘And searched the house? Bloody hell, Bernard. What if they had caught you?’
‘What could they do?’
‘They could chop you into pieces like they’ve chopped up poor old George Kosinski. That’s what they can do. Take it easy, Bernard. I don’t want to arouse their suspicions.’
What Dicky meant by not wanting to arouse their suspicions was not clear to me. I would have thought their suspicions were already sufficiently aroused by the unannounced arrival of two nosy foreigners. But I didn’t want to get sidetracked. ‘I think this is a good chance to take a look at that room,’ I said.
‘At the room you found?’
‘They won’t be expecting us to defy them and go through the house while they are going through it too. We know there are only the three of them and they’re bound to make a noise carting all that ecclesiastical paraphernalia from room to room and doing their phoney routine. The servants are all in the barn. We can get in and go up the back stairs, take a look, and be back in the cottage, twiddling our thumbs, within half an hour.’
‘No, Bernard. I don’t think so.’
‘Okay, I’ll do it alone. If you would keep a look-out for me downstairs there’s not much chance I’d be caught.’ Dicky came to a halt on the path and started kicking the toe of his cowboy boot into the dead vegetation. ‘We’d be in and out in a jiffy,’ I urged.
‘You’re a bloody maniac, Bernard. I must be mad, but okay. How do you want to do it?’
‘All the servants are in the barn. We won’t use the front door in case they hear us. If we go along the wooden veranda, and climb through one of the windows there, we can go up the back stairs that only the servants use. I know how to find the room.’
‘But it’s locked.’
&n
bsp; ‘I’ve got something with me that should do it. It’s not a real lock.’ I’d had a good look round the kitchen while eating with the servants. In my pocket I now had a fruit knife with a thin pliable blade, and a couple of long skewers.
Once Dicky had agreed, he became quite keenly involved in our caper. Warily we skirted the barn, where a crowd of pitiable servants were grouped around an inadequate open fire. We then returned to the big house and went up the steps to the veranda, where we soon found a conveniently loose window. I slid it open and let Dicky climb through first, in case something went wrong. Then I followed him and pushed the window closed. Once inside the house we could hear the voices of the three men. They were in the drawing-room now. The priest was talking very quietly in Polish and the man he’d brought with him was answering in monosyllabic grunts. I could neither hear clearly nor understand their words but it didn’t sound like any sort of religious ceremony.
Dicky and I climbed the back stairs very slowly. We both kept to the side where the staircase supporting beams fitted into the outside wall, for the stairs were at their most secure there, and least likely to creak. Once up on the top floor we stayed away from the windows in case one of the men in the garden looked up and spotted us. Then we were at the door of the room I wanted to investigate.
The lock was easily prised back with the thin knife-blade. Once we were inside, even Dicky could see that it was worth looking into. It was a double room separated by a folding screen which was at this time open. These two rooms were obviously the best-maintained ones in the house. Together they formed a self-contained unit with a private bathroom and a fine bed with a mattress so new it still had its transparent wrapping intact. There was new wallpaper too, and some of the household’s better antique furniture.
One room was furnished as a study, with extensive bookcases, a large gilt-framed mirror reflecting the whole room and a couple of landscape paintings. A lovely inlaid desk was placed diagonally so that someone seated at it, in the corner of the room, would get the light from two windows. A side-table was entirely occupied by family photographs of all shapes and sizes, some of them in elaborate silver frames. A series of deep shelves held dusty cardboard models of theatre sets with cut-out figures to show the effect of the costumes against the scenery.