The Last Season (51 page)

He licks at his lips. “The work of
smantek,”
he says.

That word I know well enough.
Devil.

“Why?” I ask.

Old Frank spits out green slime and admires it for a moment before running a boot over it to smooth it into the rest of the grime on the floor.

“A true
vjeszczi
is a vampire. So is
wupji.”

“They mean the same?” I ask.

He shook his head. “Both monsters, but they are
not
the same at all! A
wupji
is far more dangerous. You can do nothing until a
wupji
is dead to make sure.” He shrugged. “If a
wupji
does not lose its colour, you can always fix him in the box.” He chuckles at the thought.

“I don't understand.”

“Many ways. Put a half nickel in his mouth. Put a brick under the chin. Turn him upside down so he claws out the wrong direction. Throw a net over him so he has to unite all the knots. There are many things you can do if you're sure it is a
wupji.”

“Do? But why?”

He looks at me as if I am crazy. “
Why?
So he won't come back for you, that's why.”

“But there's no such thing,” I say.

Frank shrugs. “Suit yourself. I have known them. I have seen them. I have dealt with them many times. Just as I know your grandmother would have. Is that why you have come to me, to tell me there is no reason for any of this?”

“I want to know about
vjeszczi
.”

The smile, glistening.

“Much easier. The
wupji
is born with two teeth. You must immediately check the baby's mouth. A
wupji
you can do nothing about until he is dead, and by then there may not be anyone around who remembers how he was born. A
vjeszczi
is a much simpler matter. The baby is born with a caul.
Mucka.”
— Yes, another of Marie's words — “You simply scrape the little cap off the head and save it. When the child is seven years old the caul is ground up and fed to the child in his food. He never even needs to know. Once he eats it he is no longer
vjeszczi,
see?” The smile.

“How would he know if he had or hadn't?”

“He wouldn't.”

“Why when he's seven? Is that important?”

A shrug. “Seven is the lucky number for the Poles. Maybe only for extra luck. You should wear that number when you play your hockey, Batterinski.” The smile, dripping.

“It's mine.”

Again the hands on my hands, strangely warmer. “Then you will always have luck with your hockey.”

I ask him before bed, over his final coffee. “Poppa, was I born with a caul?”

“A
what
?” The spoon rattles against the cup, splashing.

“A caul. You know, a
mucka
, a cap of extra skin. On my head.”

“How would I know?” He continues stirring, calmed now and methodical, deliberately paying little attention to me.

“You were here. I was here. You would have known.”

“So what if you were? What difference would it make?”

“Was I?”

He lifts the spoon and taps it dry on the oilcloth before looking up. “What is the point, Felix?”

“I want to know.”

“You're talking stupid, son.”

“Just tell me, yes or no. I have a right to know for myself.”

“Well, then you were.”

He is asleep now and I can hear him moaning. I should go up and fluff his pillows, turn him a bit, perhaps bring some Vaseline, but I cannot bear to see him now. His coffee still sits here, cool now, untouched since our conversation ended with him standing up and heading straight for bed.

Not even a grunt for goodnight.

I am thinking crazy thoughts. Poppa has turned into Jaja. I am turning into Poppa, a dragonfly shedding the shell of the waterbug to find his wings have already been pinched off. I feel the way Poppa looks to me — defeated. Now it is me sitting here alone, just as Poppa would, me drinking his
sliwowica
prune vodka. The only light is the coal oil lamp on the kitchen table. The spoon has stuck fast to the oilcloth where he tapped the coffee off. I am even sitting in his chair.

Look, he has had my scrapbook out again, leafing through the Flyer years like I am forever skating around, Schultz and me, the Stanley Cup over our heads while Philly fans erupt in appreciation. The book is less thumbed after the Flyers. Poppa looks just so far and then quits.

He turns to something else like this damned paperback on Lech Walesa and the Solidarity movement. Walesa and his big walrus moustache staring out like he's the Black Madonna himself, for Christ's sake. Poppa is obsessed with Walesa, praying for him, praying
to
him, for all I know. All he wants to talk about is Poland and Walesa and the goddamn Russians. It is as if he sees the Russians holding Walesa captive on the evidence they found in Jaja's memoirs.

Only a Pole could hold himself so responsible.

He reads up the Flyers and the Cup, and then turns to Walesa, leaving little doubt in my mind just who Poppa believes is the champion of the world today.

Fine, Poppa, fine. You lie up there and you moan like a baby. And if you cry loud enough maybe Walesa will hear you and come running with comfort.

Me, I'm going out.

The moon is like a nail clipping, but enough. I can pick my way up behind St. Martin's with ease. I know the ground; I know the trail from a dozen funerals; I know where she is and what she is doing. I hear the bitch laughing.

No one sees me. I leave the car in the hardware lot and walk up the school kids' trail back of the store, cut across the Schama side road and through the cedars to the church. I scare up a hare coming through.

Batcha would say that was bad luck. But this time for her, not for me. I am sick of her controlling my life. Sick and tired and fucking well finished with it.

The ground is frozen stiff, our tramping three days ago into the graveyard has turned the scabs of snow. It is impossible to step without slipping or stubbing, so I go up high on the bush side and circle around on Batcha. This way the bitch won't see me coming.

She really is a
c
àrov
n
ica.
A true witch. Not just a
jiza
with folk medicines and superstitions, but a true witch with real powers. Evil powers. I know that now. The poplar crosses, the pins, the evil eye, the mole claws to scratch cow udders, the buried hearts — it all makes perfect sense to me now. It began with Matka's death. My fault. And Jaja wouldn't let her take over when they saw what I was. That's why she hated me. Why he wrote it all down ... It should have been me pouring the wax into
her
keyhole. Bitch.

And I can see now that she never let up. Kristiina, for sure. Batcha was there too. The night in the cottage with Pekka and Pia in the next room. Of course. It would have been that night that Kristiina became pregnant. And Batcha killed the baby, sure as shit. Why didn't I ask Kristiina if it had been a boy or a girl? Would they tell her? Would they know? Was his little heart still pumping when they dropped him in the garbage? He was a boy. I know that now. He was Jaja's dream of the Batterinski name continuing. That's what the painting told me in Leningrad, sure. He was my gift back to the family and Batcha couldn't bear it that I would take over from her, that
I
would control what became of us all. Bitch.

She was behind Wheeler too. She fucked Philadelphia. She fucked L.A. She fucked Helsinki. She fucked me in Leningrad. It was always her, always at the window, laughing. Just like I heard her the other day. Wasn't the water at all. And she's still laughing

Bitch!

Laugh, you fucking bitch! Laugh all you want!

I knew there would be no key needed. A thumb starter, hand clutch, four-gear snap shift on the floor, scoop-operated by swivelling the joystick. Not much different from what they had in Sudbury. I still remember.

I press the starter and the battery turns the starter engine, but it will not catch. Of course, the choke. I have to wait for the moon before I can find it. I slide it out to full and push again. The starter engine whirrs, then catches, and the main engine coughs into action. I push in the choke to quieten it, but kill the engine. Again, and again they catch. I let it idle loudly, then slowly press in the choke. Check to see that the scoop is up, then shift into first, release the clutch, step on the gas and the John Deere moves into action, howling across the crust.

But I could care less. This has to be done.

I have the decency to skirt the other graves. I came in on Batcha from behind, grateful there is not yet a marker. I dare not try the headlights, but it doesn't matter. In the thin moon I can make out the mound and the flowers, frozen in full bloom. I back the John Deere in, swivel the scoop and shift seats to work it.

This is far more difficult. There are three joysticks, and with the scoop switched over I find one operates the up-and-down motion. One the scoop itself, and one the thrust. But I cannot coordinate them! I bump against the grave and the frozen earth knocks the John Deere straight back. I have not put down the pods. I turn back to the seat, search out a lever and press it. Hydraulics hiss into action and I feel the machine rising. I move the lever and the machine settles as if in water.

Back to the scoop. I pull it in tight, then press straight down. The blade hits badly. I try again and this time the scoop bites in. I push and it moves stiffly into the earth and bounces off. I try again, and this time it bites deep. But I lose it on the lift. I try again, and this time, finally, I come up with earth. It rises high over Batcha's grave and I feel like cheering.

But why am I doing this? What the fuck am I doing here? What good will this do?

I don't want the bitch up. I want her gone forever. I don't even know now what I was going to do to her.

I shake my head. Poppa's vodka. I am not quite right. I feel cobwebs wrapped around my body. I squirm.

Of course!
She
is doing this to me. She
wants
me to dig her up! She's not yet through with fucking me around.

“You can't fool meeee!”

I pull up the scoop and dump the earth. It falls badly, spreading over Jaja's snow clean grave.

“You goddamn bitch!”

I pull the scoop to its rest position, change chairs, work the hydraulics so the pods vanish, shift gear and turn the John Deere completely. I put it into bull low, crank up the gas, and grade straight up into the grave mound.

The John Deere hangs there a moment, weaving, then the earth gives, sinks and the big machine settles.

I am sure I hear the box crushing below.

Fools! How can they expect to catch the person who made the trails? I saw the cops' lights flashing long before they made the turn at St. Martin's. I saw Father Schula scurrying out to point. By the time they headed up toward the graveyard I was long gone, tucked into the cedars like a partridge.

Batterinski has a few moves yet.

Poppa is still asleep but the moaning has stopped. And I know why too. I know now what took me to the John Deere: not me, but her, but I fixed her proper. The bitch. His moaning had to stop. And now it is time to fix my own.

I just have to find that goddamn caul.

I must remember all that Old Frank told me.

Chłopa pjisca mjerza.
A man is measured with his fists. I have been measured. I came out all right.
Wupji.
No, that is the teeth. You can do nothing about the
wupji
until he is dead. And I am most certainly not dead. The bitch is dead. I cannot control my hand. It moves on its own, thumb hooking in under the belt, the sign against
wurok
. So I am still afraid of her. But just for a little longer.

But where is it? Where is the caul? I know she kept it.
That
was what gave her power over me.
That
was what she used to fuck me around with. But where is it?

In her room! Poppa won't hear me. I can hear him snore now, deep in sleep, the sound like the starter engine on the John Deere. I will look and find it and eat the cursed thing and then everything will be fixed right. The bitch will be entirely dead.

Poppa has fixed up Batcha's room just as I last remember it. The bed is made. Her rabbit-fur slippers are even on the throw mat. There is no over-head light — she wouldn't let the electrician in, would she? She knew I would try one day. The only light is her Christ table lamp. I turn it on but the light below is cut off by the shadow cast by the dresser. I have to grab Christ around his wounded chest and lift him, knocking off the red shade as I do. The cord, fortunately has enough slack that I can aim the light around like a mechanic's lamp. But there is no longer anything stored under her bed. Nothing. Holding Christ in an armpit, I go through her drawers but there is nothing here but the smell of cedar boughs and the pitch black of Batcha's inside: stockings, underwear, slips, shawls, sweaters, all black and formless as herself. In the top drawer there is a heavy old Bible with a carved wooden cover and underneath it a small chest, but it is only a tangle of hair nets, some manicure scissors and a small pouch filled with nail clippings.

The closet is more difficult to search. I have to lift the door and slide the lamp cord under it to gain enough length, and the door snaps at the lowest hinge, cracking through the house. I freeze and listen. Poppa snorts, coughs, catches and is off again snoring. I move and realize I am soaking with sweat. My shirt grabs across the shoulders, my pants catch at the knee. My heart pulses in my neck and I can feel it against the starch of the shirt collar. It is too close in here. The closet is filled with dark garments, dresses, coats, vests. On the floor there is a yellow chamber pot, matched and stacked black shoes, a single pair of unused winter boots. On the shelf only hats, toques, muffs, gloves. A hat box in one corner contains dozens of poplar crosses, pins, paper, two old and blackened Polish books.