“You must excuse Teodor,” said Hauer. “He has trouble keeping up with the work and consequently he becomes easily upset. He tends to exaggerate things and sometimes I think, well…” He shook his head. “I think he imagines things.”
“He’s a very nervous young man,” she said.
“He has reason to be. His work is not up to standard. But let’s not waste our breath on him. You came about poor Count Oginski.” His dark eyes sparkled at her, took her in.
“If you don’t mind my asking, how did you two know each other?” she asked.
He raised his eyebrows, scratched the back of his neck. “The Count came to me when he started writing his book. He was a very charming man and I was eager to help. I don’t think he understood how much work was involved. I sat with him so many times, telling him about the period, the people. I tried to help him as much as I could. He was a count, after all.” He gave her a crooked smile, his eyes still gleaming at her. “And in the end, the book was —” He shook his head portentously.
He paused and looked off to the side in a teasing way that annoyed her, since she knew he had every intention of explaining.
“Was what, Professor?” she asked, playing his game “The book was what?”
“It was a disaster.”
She was taken aback. “Why do you say that?”
He folded his clean pink hands on the desk; his eyes returned to her face. “He was not an academic. He had no academic training. Or credentials. And he tried to write a book that required rigorous scholarship, discipline. He was just not up to it.”
Behind him the soft light of the lamp suffused the ancient grey paint. He had tried to allay the shabbiness of the office but had only succeeded in calling attention to it. She wondered whether the university shared his own high opinion of his scholarship.
“I have to disagree,” she said, surprised at the anger building up in her. “I’ve read a few chapters and I’m sure he never meant it to be a scholarly work. I’m enjoying it immensely.”
“With all due respect, you are not working in the field, Miss —”
“Dr. Temple.”
He stopped short and took a better look. He had been talking at her before and now appeared to finally see her.
“You are at the university?”
“I’m a physician.”
He raised his dark eyebrows. “Well,” he said, smiling with tight lips, a puzzled respect. “Do not misunderstand. He was a great aristocrat. You could see it as soon as he walked into the room. Tall, distinguished. Very impressive. I’m sorry to say the book — the book is a fiction.”
“He told me he was going to reveal a secret about his family that would upset historians. Did he discuss that with you?”
He gave her a disdainful smile, cocking his great brown head on an angle. “A secret that would upset historians?” He arched an eyebrow. “I have to explain something to you, dear Doctor. History is the highest of disciplines. It requires many years of intensive study, research, erudition. It is not something that can be rattled off in one book by an amateur. As much as I admired the Count, his book is not history, so how can it upset historians? It is a novel. Good for the beach.”
“So you don’t know what he was referring to?”
“I helped him in the beginning. With the research, and so on. I haven’t had much contact with him recently.”
“So you wouldn’t know where the end of his manuscript is?”
He looked at her blankly.
“Teodor says he typed almost two hundred pages for Michael but we can only find a hundred and forty.”
“Ah. Teodor. With Teodor anything is possible. I’m sorry I can’t help you there.”
“You think he’s lying about having the manuscript?”
Hauer shrugged. “He’s a very odd fellow.” His brown eyes narrowed. “He has some… psychological problems. I should’ve trusted my instincts when I first met him. He told me about his family in Poland. Disturbed people. Apparently his father took his own life. I should’ve seen the signs. But he was on his best behaviour and he fooled me. He wanted to study Poland. How could I know? So I took him on. There are not so many students who want to study Poland.”
“But about the manuscript…”
“He is having trouble with his thesis. Maybe he plans to use the Count’s material in some way.”
“Wouldn’t you recognize that, since you’re familiar with both works? Wouldn’t he have to show the thesis to you as his supervisor?”
“Yes, of course, dear Doctor. But he is desperate.”
“Professor Hauer, I’m not convinced that Michael’s death was an accident.”
His eyebrows flew up. “You think Teodor —”
“I’m not accusing anyone.”
“What do the police say?”
“They’re doing an autopsy. I think they’re leaning toward the accident theory.”
“It said in the paper that he drowned. That friends found him in the pool.”
It was so hot in the building. How could he stand it, in his tweed jacket? “He’d invited all of us to his house that day.”
“You were there when it happened?”
She shook her head. “We arrived too late.”
“So you were the ones who found him.”
In her profession she was used to people’s morbid curiosity. It bothered her nonetheless.
“I understand there were friends from Poland?”
She nodded.
“He mentioned a compass that belonged to his family in Poland. That he would like to get his hands on it. I always doubted its existence.” He seemed to be waiting.
It was time to change the subject. She decided to take some liberties with the truth.
“He told me about the project you’re working on, setting up the Chair in Polish Studies.”
He bowed his head as if she had just mentioned the name of God. “It is my most fervent goal. I have directed all my energies toward it.” He looked off into the distance behind her. “It will transform Polish studies in this country.”
“And how will you do that?”
His eyes popped open. “Me? Dear Doctor! I am not lobbying for myself. The position of Chair is open to the best qualified candidate.”
“I just assumed…”
“No, no, no. Of course I would be deeply honoured if later I am chosen. But that will not be up to me ultimately. The Chair is bigger than any one person. And for now, I must see to the publishing of my book, a seminal history of Poland, in English.”
He reached over to the shelf and picked off a thick volume. He placed it on the desk in front of her triumphantly. The black dust jacket bore red and white lettering in Polish, which she couldn’t read. By Dr. Anton Hauer. She flipped through to be polite. Some very dated black and white photos of castles and battles flashed by. She turned it over. On the back, a small photo in the bottom corner of the dust jacket revealed a much younger Dr. Hauer, clean-shaven except for a thin moustache, brooding for the camera.
“In Polish universities,” he said, leaning forward, “this book is required reading.”
“I guess I’ll have to wait for the English version,” she said. “Have you translated it yourself?”
“Yes, yes, it’s all ready to go.”
“When is it coming out?”
His face clouded over, his body stiffened in the chair. “There’s a delay,” he said. “Publishers move so slowly. They don’t really understand my book. There’s a new editor and he simply misses the point. He thinks history should be dramatic and exciting — and it is, but not the way he thinks. You know, these young editors brought up on television. The facts aren’t always dramatic but they’re real and that’s history. For instance, the three partitions of Poland…”
She looked at her watch to signal the end of her visit. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but I have to go.”
He watched her more intently. “Where are my manners? Another glass of water?”
She s
tood up. “Thank you, but I’m running behind. I have to get back to my office.”
He stood up. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Doctor. Perhaps you can come back for another visit.”
In two long strides he reached the door before she could open it. “Here’s my card. Do you have one?”
Without enthusiasm she reached into her purse for a card.
He leaned in front of her to turn the door knob. The aroma of balm on a thick head of hair.
In the hall she turned back to look at Teodor, see if there was anything in his face that would betray him. He in turn was watching Hauer, who blithely ignored him. The student’s face was disfigured with an unsettling mixture of fear and loathing.
chapter seventeen
Stanislaw
A Fateful Meeting
Warsaw, 1749
I feel the gentle pressure of my body on the featherbed as if it is someone else lying here and I am floating above, watching. What a foolish young man that is, hating the autumn light that creeps through the window. He has never understood anything, even less now. Educated, yes, learned beyond reason, but true understanding — how can he understand anything when he has never had a real friend. What does all his knowledge and rational thinking gain him beyond a puzzlement with the world that has chased him into this room, this bed. His tutors cannot help him now. His Maman draws the curtains each morning to show him that the world waits outside and each morning he closes his eyes against the light and the world.
“I am afraid for him, Staek,” Maman whispers by the door outside the room, but I can hear. My senses have become acute after endless days of lying here with my eyes shut. “He recovers from one illness and falls prey to the next. And he is not trying any longer. He doesn’t want to get better.”
“He is a strong boy, Konya, do not upset yourself.” His voice is steady, but I know Papa is worried. He is an old soldier and doesn’t allow himself the luxury of showing fear. “He is too much inside himself, Konya. Brooding on philosophy and art makes him melancholy, and melancholy brings him to… this. He would benefit from the company of young men who ride. The air would do him good.”
Maman disagrees wordlessly. It was she who kept me solitary from the beginning of my childhood. My books were my companions. Her duty was to oversee my education and ensure that I grew into a fitting member of the Familia. Other children were foolish and unschooled and would corrupt my forming mind. I cannot say she was wrong. I can say only that my education was joyless, for I was never allowed the time to be a child. It is as if one took the month of April out of the year.
I will not blame my present illness on my upbringing, yet there was another time when I was twelve and on the verge of manhood. By then I was being educated by the very liberal Theatine Fathers in the spirit of the Enlightenment. Count Keyserling, an old family friend, gave me lessons in logic and mathematics, a Freemason taught me military studies, and my spiritual instructor believed in predestination. Was it any wonder that my mind became overloaded with fashionable concepts and I had a breakdown at that tender age, struggling with the basic contradiction: how to resolve the idea of predestination with the question of free will?
If all is decided ahead of time and fate is predetermined, what is the point of trying to do anything? Any action one takes is futile and pointless, and the wise man accepts his lot with resignation. Yet we seem to live our lives making decisions as if they are ours to make. Over the years, my cloud of confusion has floated skywards, and even now at eighteen I sense its presence but it no longer troubles me. Then what is this ennui that has grasped me in its tentacles until I feel I cannot breathe? No, it is not confusion. It is… meaninglessness. What is the point? If I am meant to keep breathing, I suppose I shall. But for what? Despite Maman’s piety, she has not managed to pass her faith on to me. But the idea of fate, a corollary of her religion, has somehow entered my soul and found an unlikely home. Logic seems to be of no avail; no rational word I tell myself will penetrate my childhood lessons.
One evening while I lie here pretending to be dead, I hear a second male voice, Count Keyserling, whispering outside my door. “My dear Count Poniatowski, while I was Minister in Berlin, I made the acquaintance of an exceptional physician, Dr. Lieberkühn. He has worked wonders where others have failed. Send the boy to Berlin so that he can be placed under this doctor’s care.”
“But to go alone to a strange city…” Maman begins.
“I am certain that our mutual friend, Count Bülow, will keep an eye on him while he is away from home.”
What is the point, Count Keyserling, I would say if I could speak. We cannot change anything. Yet perhaps that is part of the plan, that I go to the Prussian capital to search for my destiny.
I imagine Maman looking over at me, sighing that her favourite child should be taken from her.
Dr. Lieberkühn is indeed a remarkable physician, part chemist, part magician. I spend most of the winter and spring in his tender care. Perhaps because he wants nothing from me, I respond. Then to garner his approval, I will my body to heal itself. Even so, I cannot say that in his hands alone lies the secret of my recovery. Escape from home has played its part since it has pulled me out of the tedium of Polish politics that never fails to oppress me whilst in the stern employ of my uncle Michael. But perhaps the greatest credit for my newfound spirits ought to go to a stranger, the British Minister in Berlin, a man I have never set eyes on before.
We have all come to dine at the house of Count Bülow, who presents me to one illustrious guest at a time.
“Sir Charles Hanbury-Williams, this is Count Stanislaw Poniatowski, the son of an old friend.” The Englishman is a large, well-dressed man wearing an expensive wig.
“I recently made the acquaintance of your brother Kazimierz,” he says, “and we became great friends. There is quite a difference in ages between you, I see. You’re more Digby’s age.” He turns to the young man beside him. “Count, I’d like you to meet the nephew of a dear friend, Harry Digby, who is also my secretary. You two will get on famously.”
Both their faces beam at me with such open friendliness that I feel at ease at once. It is the most cheerful reception I have received since arriving in Berlin months before.
When we go to table, Sir Charles sits down on my right, Digby on my left. The older man refuses nothing that is set before him, expressing such exuberant wit at the sight of the soup, the duck, the pudding, that all around him are in high spirits. A prodigious appetite accompanies his wit.
At first he prods me with the usual questions about my stay in Berlin — have I had the opportunity to admire the view of the river Spree, or ride upon the grand alleé of Unter den Linden, the magnificent main avenue lined on both sides with linden trees in full leaf? Have I seen the deer in the Tiergarten? Once he has heard the frankness of my answers — yes, the river, the trees, the deer are all they should be, but Berlin seems a drab place where the men are perpetually absent on active service while the ladies suffer from a surfeit of Voltaire — he begins to favour me with asides that our neighbours are not meant to hear.
“What is your impression of the great Frederick?” he asks, as if my opinion is the one he has been waiting for.
I wonder how far my frankness can go. “His court is not what I expected, though he, himself, is the cleverest of men.”
Draining his wineglass he replies, “Do not hesitate to tell me your true thoughts, young Count — I can tell you have them — for I am bored with insipid, invariably magnanimous opinions.”
Count Bülow and M. Gross, the Russian Minister, are engaged in their own conversation. I must admit I am flattered by Sir Charles’s attention and try to impress.
“I have met with Frederick twice and both times I’ve found him looking haggard and anxious. His eyes are dark from fatigue and his clothes in need of washing. He is always trying to be more brilliant than everyone else and has the embarrassed air of a man who fears he’s failing.”
Sir Charles watches
me with interest. “You are an astute observer — your conclusions happen to exactly coincide with my own. I find Frederick the completest tyrant that God ever sent as a scourge to an offending people. His ambition and treachery know no bounds. He thinks nothing of plunging all of Europe into bloody war.” He quickly peers around. “Count Bülow has given us a holiday from the Prussians this evening, leaving them off the guest list tonight.”
Harry Digby adds, “Yet Frederick is held in affection by many of the common people, Sir Charles. They call him unser Fritz, our Fritz.”
Sir Charles sniffs at this but keeps his voice low. “The basest of rulers have their followers. But do not doubt that he is an absolute Prince — his people tremble before him and detest his iron government. Why, no man can sell an estate, marry a child, or go out of this town, without special leave.”
Count Bülow suddenly turns his attention to us. “Sir Charles, I hear you were presented to the Queen Mother last night.”
My table companion delivers a smile. “Charming woman, Her Sacred Majesty, Sophia. I cannot complain of my reception there — to be sure she is our Sovereign’s sister. She welcomed me warmly at her residence, Mon Bijou — indeed a jewel on the banks of the Spree. We spent some agreeable hours walking in the gardens, then she did me the honour of asking me to stay to supper. The lady is adept at cards and won forty florins from me.”
“I hear that you, also, are adept at cards, Sir Charles,” Count Bülow says. “I salute your generosity.”
“I salute your diplomacy,” M. Gross adds with a wink.
“I’m afraid my diplomacy has not won over the son,” says Sir Charles. “It is unfortunate the mother has no influence with him. I hear he resides so much at Potsdam on account of her presence in Berlin. When a son does not love his mother, I cannot expect deference from his court, though King George be his uncle. Did I say? — the Prussian Minister tried to provoke me with an insult to the King, days after my arrival. They have been even worse to poor M. Gross because he represents Muskovy. He is ignored at court, sometimes rudely on account of the enmity between Frederick and the Empress Elizabeth.”
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