“Feeling sad, eh? Are you homesick? Have a drop to drink, dear boy.”
Kaytek stretches out a hand, but the wine smells the same as the time he was offered some at the cemetery, and the time at the circus in Paris too.
“Drink it up and you’ll sleep well,” says the man.
With an abrupt movement Kaytek knocks the glass from his hand and says: Vanish, you vile illusion!
The old man grabs the handrail, emits a lengthy groan as if starting to howl, and vanishes as suddenly as he appeared.
Kaytek looks around anxiously, but there’s no one else on deck. In the distance the Italian is standing with his back toward him, still singing; he hasn’t seen a thing.
Kaytek goes back to the cabin.
“Tonight you can sleep with us,” says one of the boys. “We’ve decided you’re a good pal. And it’s uncomfortable in the vestibule – you keep being woken up.”
“Thanks.”
Inside the cabin no one wakes Kaytek up, but he can’t sleep anyway.
So now he has recognized his enemy. He was trying to get him drunk again, and maybe drown him, or cause a new rumpus. “No, I won’t go crazy,” thinks Kaytek. “That’s not why I became a wizard. Any old clown can do that, even without drinking wine from a silver cup. He’s sure to get revenge. But I don’t care. Now I’m sure I’m stronger than him. What will happen tomorrow when they notice the old man has gone? Should I admit I was the last to see him and talk to him?”
But the old man in dark glasses is there at breakfast, just as if nothing ever happened, as if it wasn’t him at all.
“Why do you want to destroy me?” Kaytek angrily questions him.
“You must have imagined it, dear boy. I don’t know what you mean. I can’t remember a thing.”
He smiles, but he can’t fool Kaytek.
“Just watch your step. Don’t get in my way or you’ll be sorry,” whispers Kaytek.
On the last night on board, the ship radio announces that the latest hit movie, “Child of the Garrison,” the masterpiece of a mysterious star, is now on in Europe and will be shown in all the movie theaters.
“If he has been kidnapped, we will find him to take part in a new picture,” declares the bulletin. “If the sea has swallowed him, ‘Child of the Garrison’ will be the one and only memorial to his acting, all the more valuable for that.”
“Hey, sourpuss. We’ll buy you a movie ticket so you don’t think badly of us. We know you ain’t got no cash because you’ve lost it all playing cards.”
Kaytek smiles. He says goodbye and goes on his way.
Once again, he changed his face and clothing.
His train was due to depart in four hours. So what was he do in the meantime? He went to see the movie.
He thinks it might be grand to see himself in a picture. But it’s not in the least bit grand. He was naïve to dream of being famous. The flowers wilt, the applause dies down, the lights go out, and then you go home feeling tired, sad, and even more lonely than before. There’s only one good thing about fame: it entertains people and moves them, it attracts and captivates them, and brings them something positive. But that’s a benefit that can be quiet and intimate, that you give your loved ones and the people you meet in person, not one provided by your picture or your name.
In the crowd scenes, Kaytek recognizes the impoverished, pushed-around actors from the cruel city. And he finds himself watching his own memories, not the pictures on the screen.
Until he’s had enough.
He glances at his watch and leaves without waiting for the end. He walks down rich streets, and then poor ones.
“It’s the same everywhere. It is time I was at the station.”
He buys a newspaper and looks for news from Warsaw; tomorrow he’ll see it again.
As the train moves off, his heart is beating fast.
Maybe on the way he should drop in at Zofia’s mother’s retreat? They’d be sure to give him a happy welcome.
He’s on his way back – to his folks – to his home!
There’s just one other person sitting in the compartment, a man with a long black beard. There’s enough room for Kaytek to stretch out on the seat after all those nights spent in the uncomfortable ship’s vestibule.
He’s longing to sleep.
He takes a blow-up pillow out of his case, inflates it, stops it up so the air won’t escape, and lays it under his head.
The rail car is rocking, and the wheels are rattling over the joints. It’s a pleasant melody, a railroad lullaby.
Suddenly there’s a deafening crash, the car leaps in the air, comes to a halt and leans on its side, then shifts violently once more and turns over.
The lights go out. Screams and groans ring out in the darkness.
Kaytek has been thrown off the seat.
“I’m alive, I’m in one piece, and I’m not hurt.”
How is he to get out of there? The part of the car where the door is located has been smashed.
Kaytek climbs toward the window, which is now where the ceiling should be.
The moans and cries for help are getting louder. Until the worst thing happens: a fire breaks out.
Kaytek comes close to being burned alive, but the car breaks free and falls from the railroad embankment. The fall smashes a hole in the side of it.
Kaytek is just about to abandon the unlucky train, when suddenly he hears a voice begging him: “Antek, save me!”
Who could be here who knows him and is calling him by name?
“Save me! I’ll tell you everything.”
His traveling companion is groaning, crushed between two wooden boards. The firelight illuminates his deathly pale face. Kaytek stares at him in amazement. His beard has come unstuck, and he can see that the injured man is the Italian from the ship.
“Help me! It’s easy for you because you’re a wizard.”
Indeed, it’s true.
Shortly after, the stranger is lying on the grass, far from the burning train.
“Thank you. Listen. I am Detective Philips. You deserve a reward. I know everything. I sent a telegram to Warsaw to tell them to arrest you at the station. I wanted to make a deal with you, but he got in my way – the ‘blind man’ from the ship. I saw it all in my mirror – I always have it on me. Watch out for him – he’s traveling on this very train. I’ve been following you every step of the way. You drowned the island yourself, it wasn’t the cannonballs. The ticket clerk told me you tried to buy a ticket to Paris. You must have stopped somewhere along the way. I didn’t see the boxing match, but then came the swimming display and Hollywood. In your Cap of Invisibility you handed out golden coins to the unemployed . . . but they lost them. With one hand you pulled a car out of the mud. Then you vanished from sight. At Grey’s concert . . . our detectives were keeping an eye on you, and so was I . . . You escaped from them . . . but I was with you on the ship . . . Your collaborator . . . is sheer evil . . . He’s . . . following . . . Enemy . . . Derailed . . . It hurts. It’s not me . . . Don’t be mad . . . It’s a beautiful death . . . Even for a wizard . . . Yes . . . Report . . . You . . . Report . . . . Philips is dead.”
Kaytek unstuck the rest of the dangling beard, closed Philips’ eyes, and folded his hands across his chest.
Chapter Seventeen
Kaytek is arrested twice – Three times he avoids
death – The Cap of Invisibility improved –
Caught up by a whirlwind
Philips the famous detective had been killed in a train crash.
“That’s bad, it’s very bad. That’s sad, it’s very sad,” said the Chief of Criminal Police. “We’ve lost our most talented employee. No one can ever replace him.”
“That’s good, it’s very good. That’s amusing, it’s very amusing,” said the international criminals, con men, and burglars. “No
one can ever replace him.”
For twenty years Philips had tirelessly pursued and tracked down criminals. He took on the hardest cases. He worked alone. By train and plane, yacht and motorbike, from city to city, from hotel to hotel, he was always on the move. Often, no one knew where he was for whole weeks on end. Only when he had identified an entire gang and its ringleader did he give a sign of life.
When a case was hard, his jealous colleagues would say:
“Philips isn’t showing his face because he’s ashamed. This time he won’t succeed.”
Suddenly a telegram would arrive, saying:
Please send five yards of canvas and ten yards of cloth to such and such an address.
That meant they were to send five policemen and ten secret agents.
During the arrest he always stood at a distance, disguised as a woman in a dress. He always kept his revolver ready to fire, but he never did shoot.
He always used to say:
“Your task is quickly and firmly to catch whoever needs catching; my task is to make sure none of the rubberneckers gets a bullet.”
The rubberneckers are the curious bystanders who gather in a crowd whenever there’s a fuss – they’re the biggest obstacle.
“How can you catch a wolf when the trees in the forest are obscuring him?” Philips would say. He was proud that no one had ever been wounded during any of his arrests.
“A healthy police force should catch healthy criminals among healthy bystanders. I arrest people, not mincemeat.”
His colleagues didn’t like the fact that he held back for too long. Once he’d identified a bandit, he would follow him step by step, but he never let them lock him up in jail immediately.
“Their haste helps us to catch them, and our careful work prevents them from hiding. If we’re in a hurry we catch a less guilty person, but if we leave them at liberty for a while, we catch the guiltiest person possible. You have to cut wide across an abscess to let out all the pus.”
Once when the police were looking for two bandits in Berlin, Philips caught not two, but nine, and not in Berlin, but in Vienna. And it was always like that – more than they reckoned, and not where they thought.
The “dandy with the suitcase” was a dangerous criminal. He was the ringleader of a gang of conmen, and he always carried a small suitcase with a highly explosive bomb inside.
“There’s a high price for my freedom,” he threatened.
For two months Philips followed him, on foot and by car. Finally he caught him, with just one single policeman in uniform, at a theater, during a show.
“There he is – put the handcuffs on that guy.”
“Handcuffs on me?” said the dandy, showing his suitcase.
“No problem. I swapped cases. I’ve got your bomb, and my bomb won’t do anyone any harm.”
“You’re lying.”
“You can check. I’m not a conman. I even put my business card in there.”
The dandy went pale.
“Would you please be quiet? You’re spoiling the show!” said Philip’s neighbor angrily.
“I’m so sorry, excuse me please,” replied Philips modestly.
So they sat there quietly to the end of the show. The dandy went on watching it too, but he couldn’t applaud because he was wearing handcuffs.
Philips had sent a telegram to the Warsaw police saying:
Tuesday. Sell the colt. One hundred yards of silk, a hundred of velvet, and a hundred of plush.
That meant: “Arrest the boy. One hundred policemen are to wait for him at the station, one hundred are to escort him to jail, and one hundred are to guard him there.”
“Surely it’s a mistake. Let’s wait for a second telegram,” said the police.
They thought they would receive some more precise instructions because Philips always sent several telegrams; if one of them fell into the wrong hands, it wouldn’t give much away on its own.
But no more instructions have come, and it’s already Tuesday. People are wondering why there are so many policemen at the station. The train is pulling in. The police are on the lookout, scanning the passengers as they emerge from the train.
Philips isn’t there, but out of the first-class car steps Kaytek, with a bandage on his head.
“Stop. Who injured you?”
“No one. It’s just a scratch – it happened when the train was derailed.”
“So where are the mother and father?”
“The train didn’t have a mother or a father.”
“Don’t play dumb. Who were you traveling with?”
“With Mr. Philips. He only just had time to introduce himself.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because he bit the dust.”
“Handcuff the kid.”
“My pleasure,” jokes Kaytek.
The senior officer is furious.
“What’s the meaning of this? It’s true he’s a wily, brazen little colt, but why does it take a hundred guys to arrest one small kid?”
He sends the policemen back to base and puts Kaytek in the paddy wagon himself.
They set off.
“Sit down! Why are you standing up?” says the senior officer.
“I have to look through the bars to make sure you don’t take me too far,” says Kaytek.
“So where do you want to go?”
“Not to the cooler, just home. What a lot of questions you ask!”
Kaytek is kind of joking, but he’s feeling nervous and irritated.
“My home city is welcoming me the same way it said farewell.”
He smiles painfully.
“Well, that’s the limit.”
He takes a deep breath, glances at his own hands, and at the officer’s hands.
He frowns and gives a command.
“What are you gaping at me for?” says the officer.
“You’re just about to find out.”
He takes another deep breath and repeats his command.
“Bon voyage, Chief,” says Kaytek politely, and opens the door of the paddy wagon.
And so the senior officer trots off to jail with handcuffs on his wrists and a gag in his mouth, while Kaytek the colt runs free. Now the know-it-all officer realizes that Philips was right.
Kaytek is looking around the city in curiosity. Nothing here has changed – he sees the same old stores and movie houses, the same ads on the pillars, and the same passers-by. Nothing has changed – it’s only Kaytek who is different now.
He walks past his school. He stops at the gate and listens to the buzz of voices. He puts on his Cap of Invisibility and goes into the yard. He recognizes his friends – they’ve grown. But they’re kids – what do they know? They just play games, chase about, push each other, and laugh in a carefree way.
“That’s not true! They have their own childhood sorrows and fears, and obligations too.”
Kaytek scowls when he sees his lookalike playing in the classroom. What sort of life does he live, that strange phantom whom he called into being? Why does it bother him and make him feel nervous? After all, it was his choice.
“I’m off. I have nothing to do here.”
He opens the gate out of the school yard.
“Hey, who goes there?” calls the janitor.
The invisible Kaytek goes through the gate, with the janitor after him.
And just then a boy comes across the street.
“What are you hanging around here for? Why did you open the gate?”
“What? I didn’t open the gate. What do you want from me?”
“You know what I want, you rascal!”
“No, I don’t.”
“Don’t answer back or I’ll give you a thrashing! Now scram!”
“I’m on my way.”
Kaytek can see a
flush of anger and sparks of rebellion in the boy’s eyes. He remembers how many times he was unfairly judged in the past.
What can you do to make one person trust another? Unjust suspicions prompt vindictiveness, and mistrust kills the truth in a person. If only you could tell everyone everything! It’s enough to bring tears to your eyes.
He quickly jumps over the wall and goes back into the school yard. Just then the bell rings. In the confusion, it’s easy for him to stop and destroy the lookalike. He goes back to his usual appearance and takes off his Cap of Invisibility.
“I’m me, it’s me again. I’m the old Antek again.”
He whistles as he runs to his classroom. He strokes the familiar bench like a trusty steed. He stands up when the teacher comes in. He takes a book and notepad from his schoolbag and listens attentively, as if he has entirely forgotten everything that has happened in the past. And so a not very interesting arithmetic lesson goes by quickly.
It’s the end of the school day. He runs to the cloakroom and bumps into the lady teacher in the corridor.
“Antek, how did you injure your forehead?”
“It’s nothing, miss, just a scratch.”
Now he’s outside, he’s on the steps, and now he can see Mom. He throws his arms around her neck and gives her a big hug.
“Momma!” He can’t say another word.
“What’s happened to you? What’s this? How did you hurt your head?”
“It’s nothing, just a scratch,” he says.
But his mom demands a proper answer.
“Oh, all right – I cut myself. I hit my head.”
“Tell the truth, Antek.”
“Well, the train was derailed. Didn’t you read about in the papers?”
“What train? What are you saying?”
“It’s really not worth talking about. When will Dad be home? We’ll all be back together again. Life’s so hard when I’m not with you.”
“Anyone would think . . . Is someone after you? Is that why you never stay home for long?”
“So what’s new?”
“Not much – this morning I made coffee, and now I’m making soup, and that’s the biggest change.”
Mom doesn’t know it was the lookalike who went off to school this morning, but now it’s the real Kaytek who has come home.
Kaytek the Wizard Page 20