In America (10 page)

*   *   *

MORTIFIED WHEN
he received Maryna's letter, and determined to do anything and everything she asked of him, Ryszard left Warsaw the next day. Arriving in Kraków, he called on Henryk to ask his help in arranging the trip to the village. Henryk not only accompanied him to the market to assist him in finding a reliable driver but decided impulsively that he would go, too. Surely Stefan's condition could not significantly worsen if he were gone for only ten days. If Ryszard were invited, and by Maryna herself, how could he stay away?

Ryszard took his room in the hut of the village bard, partly to continue the task begun last summer of making a compilation of the old man's tales, partly to escape Maryna's vigilant eye if, despite his best intentions, he should succumb to the unwashed charms of one of the village girls.

“Ah, communal life,” Henryk said to Bogdan when told there was a mattress waiting for him in the men's sleeping room. “Please don't be offended if I stay at Czarniak's place.”

“The hotel?” said Bogdan. “You can't be serious. I trust you carry a disinfectant in your physician's satchel for the mattress you'll be given there.”

Except when he was called to some medical emergency (a breech birth, a smashed leg, a ruptured appendix), Henryk was almost always at the hut, available to Maryna, entertaining Piotr. The boy seemed bright to him, and so he decided to teach him about the new doctrines of evolution.

“If I were you,” he said to Piotr, “I'd think twice before you tell the priests at school that a friend of your illustrious mother has even mentioned the name of that great Englishman, Mr. Darwin.”

“But I can't tell them,” said the boy. “Mama says I'm not going back to that school anymore.”

“And do you know why you're not going back?”

“I think so,” said Piotr.

“Why?”

“Because we're going on a ship.”

“And what will you do on the ship?”

“See whales!”

“Which are what kind of creature?”

“A mammal!”

“Excellent.”

“Henryk!” It was Ryszard, who had just sauntered over. “Don't fill the lad's head with useless facts. Tell him stories. Stimulate his imagination. Make him bold.”

“Oh, I'd like a story,” cried Piotr. “Tell one about a witch and how she gets killed. Fried. In a stove. And then she—”

“You should be telling the stories,” said Ryszard.

“I have stories, too,” said Henryk. “But they don't make me bold.”

*   *   *

SHE WAS GROWING
silent, she who had always been so talkative. How those who had gathered here wanted to please her!

Maryna watched Tadeusz and Ryszard watching her with adoring eyes. She wished she were in love, for being helplessly in love awakens one's better self. But when marriage puts an end to that, it is a deliverance. Love makes men strong, self-confident. It makes women weak.

Friendship, though … that was another matter. Friends make you strong. How was she to do without Henryk? They were in the forest sitting on the stump of a fir tree near a berry patch. Piotr was playing with his full-size bow and arrows nearby.

“I've never liked forests,” said Henryk. “But I'm starting to. All I have to do is imagine that each tree is a fellow creature. Stuck in this gloomy forest. Rooted here. Waving its leaves about. Help! Help! cries the tree, I'm—”

“Don't be pathetic, dear Henryk.”

“Why not? I'm enjoying myself.”

“Be pathetic, dear Henryk.”

“Good. Where was I? Oh, my trees. No Birnam Wood to Dunsinane for them. And then they're cut down, which is not the escape they had in mind. Try some of this.”

Maryna took the proffered flask of vodka.

“Imagine,” she said after a while, “what it is to have got in your head that there is something your Fate has willed, that you must obey your star. Whatever others think.”

“Maryna, you speak about yourself as if you were completely alone. But what strikes me is how set you are on bringing others along with you.”

“One can't do plays without other people.”

“Actually, I was thinking of Zakopane. You are vexed that you can't keep the Zakopane you discovered, but you have to know it can't remain what it was. I think it shouldn't. The lives of people here are hard. But they're not a tribe of nomadic Indians in North America. They're a hemmed-in settlement of shepherds in Europe whose miserable livelihood is shrinking. The land has always been too poor for serious farming, and you know, don't you, the iron mine is bound to close within the next few years. How will they live then if they don't peddle their humble finery and wooden geegaws, their mountains, the views, the good air?”

“Do you really imagine I don't care about—”

“And, as I've often pointed out,” he continued heatedly, “you, abetted by the dear indispensable Bogdan, set all that in motion. Though it was bound to happen anyway. How could more and more people not hear about Zakopane? You wanted others around you. Your community.”

“You think me naïve.”

He shook his head.

“You think I'm being pretentious.”

“Oh”—he laughed—“there's nothing wrong with being pretentious, Maryna. I confess to the adorable failing myself. It's a Polish specialty, like idealism. But I do think you shouldn't confound a spartan house party with a phalanstery.”

“I know you don't like Fourier.”

“It's not for me to like or dislike your utopian sage. I can't help it if I know something about human nature. It's hard for a doctor to avoid that.”

“And you think I could be the actress I am without knowing something about human nature?”

“Don't be angry with me.” He sighed. “Maybe I'm jealous, because … I can't be a member of your party. I have to stay here.”

“But if you wanted, you could, when we—”

“No, I'm too old.”

“What nonsense! How old are you? Fifty? Not even fifty!”

“Maryna…”

“Do you think I don't feel old? But that doesn't stop me from—”

“I can't.” He raised his hand. “Maryna, I can't.”

*   *   *

THE WEATHER
turned warmer, and the whole party, except for Henryk and Ryszard, had spent the afternoon in the forest and were now assembled outside the hut in the failing light. Pleasantly tired, more than a little talked out, they were looking forward to their dinner of soup and two kinds of mushrooms, the delicately shriveled brown ones they had found in a grove of firs today and the savory dark-orange pickled
rydz
they had harvested on forest excursions last September. Bogdan had laid down a track on the grass for Piotr to play with his wooden trains. Maryna was writing a letter at a little table by the oil lamp Tadeusz had lit for her: a crescent moon and a pair of planets had appeared in the pale sky. Wanda was changing the buttons on an embroidered flax shirt she had purchased for Julian. Józefina and Julian were having a whispered dispute over a card game. Jakub was sketching the cardplayers. The screech of an owl heralded the baaing of some wayward sheep, while from indoors came the sound of sizzling butter in Mrs. Bachleda's crude skillet—delicious noise!

Henryk had strolled over, poured himself some arrack, sat down in the extra chair at the cardplayers' table, and was trying to concentrate on a book. Ryszard, who'd elected to spend his forest day with his landlord (killing animals in the company of another man was the most enjoyable way of staying clear of the temptations alluded to by Maryna), arrived last. He had pulled up a chair to Maryna's table, taken out his notebook, and was writing up a hunting tale the old man had told him after they'd shot their second fox.

Bogdan was pacing. “I've done nothing strenuous but I am tired,” he said.

Henryk snapped the book shut. “You're not feeling ill?”

“I don't think so.”

“You didn't sample any strange mushrooms today?”

“I did,” said Tadeusz.

“And how are you feeling, young man?”

“Couldn't be better!”

“Because you're not supposed to eat whatever looks enticing to you in a forest.”

“Everyone knows that,” Bogdan muttered. “But should someone have been imprudent, we have a doctor among us for the week.”

“If I were you,” said Henryk, “I'd place no more confidence in doctors than in mushrooms.” He was toying with his empty glass. “Would you like to hear a cautionary tale about both?” He laughed. “It's a dreadful story.”

Ryszard looked up from his notebook.

“You probably never heard of Schobert. Nobody plays his compositions now, which were written for the harpsichord.” He paused. “He lived in Paris. He was famous throughout Europe.”

“Don't you mean Schubert?” said Wanda.

“Don't answer her,” said Julian.

“I'm afraid it's Schobert,” said Henryk.

He stood, slowly lit a pipe, and buttoned his jacket, as if he were off for a stroll.

“So at last,” said Ryszard, “you're going to tell us a story.”

“Well, this is quite an unpleasant one.” Henryk sat down again. “I wonder why I thought of telling it.”

“Henryk, don't tease us,” Maryna said.

Henryk knocked his pipe against the sole of his boot. “Could it be,” he said, “that I'm a little thirsty?” Józefina fetched him the bottle of arrack.

He took a swig. “Courage,” said Maryna.

Henryk looked about at his expectant auditors and smiled.

“Well, it seems that this man, this valuable man, this admirable artist, was extremely partial to mushrooms, and so had arranged a day's outing in the country, I think it was the forest of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, no matter, with his wife, the older of his two small children, and four friends, among whom was a doctor. They arrived in two carriages at the edge of the forest, descended, and began to walk. Schobert started scouting for mushrooms, and during the course of the day picked what he thought was a choice basketful. Late in the afternoon, the company went to Marly, to an inn where Schobert was known, and asked for a dinner to be prepared to which they would contribute the mushrooms. The cook at the inn glanced at the mushrooms, assured his guests that they were the wrong sort, and refused even to touch them. Schobert told the cook to do what he had been asked. But could they actually be the wrong sort, asked one of the friends. Nonsense, said the friend who was a doctor. Nettled at the cook's obstinacy, though of course it was they who were being obstinate, they left and went to an inn in the Bois de Boulogne, where the headwaiter also refused to prepare the mushrooms for them. More obstinate than ever, for the doctor still insisted that the mushrooms were good, they left that inn, too.”

“Heading for disaster,” murmured Ryszard.

“Night having fallen and everyone admitting to being very hungry, they returned to Paris, to Schobert's house. There he gave the mushrooms to his maidservant to cook for supper—”

“Oh,” said Wanda.

“—and all seven of them, including the doctor who claimed to know all about mushrooms, as well as the maid, who must have nibbled while cooking, and the dog, who must have begged a taste from the maid, were poisoned. Since they succumbed together, they were without any assistance until the following midday, a Wednesday, when a pupil of Schobert, arriving for his lesson, found them all thrashing about in agony on the parquet floor. Nothing could be done for them. The child, who was five years old, died first. Schobert survived until Friday. His wife did not die until the following Monday. Two lived as long as ten days more. Of Schobert's little family only the three-year-old, who hadn't been taken along on the outing and was asleep when everyone returned, was left.”

Piotr giggled loudly.

“Go inside and wash your hands, Piotr,” said Bogdan.

The child went on pushing his trains about. “Crash!” he said. “It's a train wreck.”

“Piotr!”

“What a grisly story,” said Jakub, who had been standing in the pegged doorway of the hut. “They had only to listen to the cook at the first inn, or the headwaiter at the second.”

“Servants?” Ryszard exclaimed. “Who then did not feel superior to servants? It's a perfect story of the
ancien régime.
”

“Imagine placing such faith in a doctor,” said Henryk.

“Imagine a doctor being so confident he was an expert on mushrooms,” said Ryszard.

“But Schobert was the one who was so fond of mushrooms,” said Bogdan. “It's Schobert's fault. He was the head of the family, he was in charge of the excursion.”

“But a doctor,” Wanda said. “A man of science.”

“While I suppose I should protect my wife's illusions about men of science,” said Julian, “the truth is, both are equally to blame.”

“No, the responsibility has to be Schobert's,” Józefina said. “Nobody wanted to contradict him. Think of the force of his personality. A great musician, a man admired by everyone…”

“What do you think?” Tadeusz said, the first to feel uneasy that Maryna was not taking part in the conversation. She shook her head. “If someone said that the mushrooms we had picked were poisonous but
you
wanted to eat them—”

“Surely you would not follow me.”

“Perhaps I would.”

“Bravo!” said Henryk.

Everyone looked expectantly at Maryna.

“But I am not so stubborn,” she cried. “I would never insist on eating mushrooms that someone said were poisonous.” She paused. “What do you take me for?” (What did they take her for? Their queen.) “Oh, my dear friends…”

*   *   *

MARYNA HAD
no desire to linger beyond early June, when the first summer tourists would be arriving. The men spent their last hours in the village purchasing sheepskin blankets and six of the sturdily crafted hatchets that double as weapons for the highlanders. Back in Kraków she visited Stefan, now alarmingly paler and thinner, before continuing on with Bogdan and Piotr, accompanied by Ryszard and Tadeusz, to Warsaw. There Tadeusz learned that he was finally to be offered a contract at the Imperial Theatre, which Maryna, seeing how much he dreaded disappointing her, warmly counseled him to accept, and abandon all thought of joining them. She did Tadeusz the honor of accompanying him when he signed the contract, and stayed on for a quiet talk about her own plans with the Imperial's blustering, kindly managing director, who would not hear of anything but a year's leave of absence, no more. Bogdan was busy raising the money needed for their great venture, and this furnished the detective assigned to follow him everywhere with a new list of names for other detectives to follow: those who came to look at their apartment and its furnishings, which Bogdan had put up for sale.