The Warsaw Conspiracy

by James Conroyd Martin

  The meal started out peacefully. Wanda and her daughter Elzbieta had engineered a celebratory meal of wine soup with spices, pork roast with caraway, slivered beets, and mushroom cutlets.

  “Mother, it’s so wonderful to see you,” Barbara said after Zofia and her guests were well settled at their places, the twins sitting at the table on huge books for height. “What are your plans? To see Józef, of course?”

  “Yes, Basia, that was part of my plan, but Michałek here tells me that visiting days are Mondays now, and strictly so. Why, back when he and . . . Tadek were at the academy, I could almost come and go as I wished, and even this past summer they had no such rule in effect.”

  Michał noticed the tremor in her voice when she mentioned her son lost to to the French winter march on Moscow, what she often called Napoleon’s folly. “But Józef is doing well,” Michał said, speaking to the table at large, “as I was telling Mother. He’s continuing with the piano, too!” Michał went on, providing what little knowledge he had about Józef’s life at the academy, hoping to keep his mother from mentioning her real reason for coming to Warsaw. He didn’t want her speaking of his father’s incarceration in Russia. Not in front of Viktor. It was none of his business and he was, after all, Russian.

  “You saw your brother Monday, then?” Viktor asked. “On visiting day?”

  Michał nodded, stared at Viktor, whose face pleaded polite interest only. He returned the expression in kind. What was his game? That he worked within the Imperial Commissioner’s office was enough to give pause.

  Anna laid down her fork. “I’m determined,” she said, her emerald eyes focused on Barbara, “to find someone in this city who can at least find out where your father is. Siberia is no small place.”

  Barbara’s eyes widened. “Oh, Mother, if only you could.—Perhaps Viktor knows someone.”

  Viktor colored slightly and gave a little shrug. “As I have told your daughter, Lady Stelnicka, I haven’t much influence. I wish I had.”

  A clumsy but convenient way to deny assistance, Michał thought. He sensed a tension between Barbara and her husband on the subject. He watched his sister now, wondering what it was she had seen in him other than his good looks. He took in her fashionable silver gown and sapphire necklace. She lacked for nothing, it seemed, and on a minor bureaucrat’s income, a bureaucrat who had no influence? It was a mystery.

  “Oh, if only we could turn back time,” Zofia was saying. “Just the other night when Izabel and I attended the Chopin concert at the Belweder, I had one dance with the Grand Duke Konstantin. It was a polonaise, one of Chopin’s in the new livelier mode, you know? Anyway, had I known you were coming with this quest of yours in mind, I might have said something about Jan.”

  Anna’s eyes registered hurt at the lost moment, an expression lost on Zofia.

  “You know me, Anna, I’m not shy,” Zofia said.

  Anna forced a laugh. “Quite the contrary, cousin.” Here, Michał noticed in his mother’s comment a certain sarcasm but of a lighter tone than Zofia had shown with her princess comment. He knew that many fences had been mended between the cousins, and yet a rivalry, not unlike those of siblings, remained. Over the years he had fitted together, like pieces of a puzzle, the causes of the discord between them: how his mother had been raped by Zofia’s adopted brother Walter; how Zofia had used the situation to foist upon her the man her parents had arranged for her to marry; how that man, Antoni, had attempted to murder Anna—his own wife—for her money and estate; and, most especially, how Zofia’s scheme succeeded in keeping his mother from Jan, her true love, for years. These were bittersweet thoughts that touched Michał: bitter because he was the result of that rape by Walter; sweet because when his mother was at last able to marry Jan Stelnicki, a bond of love as strong as any grew up between Michał and his stepfather.

  Michał noticed now that his mother’s green eyes were fastened on Iza. “My dear, you look divine. You have been missed all these years. Not that being a nun is not a wonderful calling. But the world is happy to welcome you back.”

  “Thank you, Cousin Anna. I can tell you it is a different Europe I see now. So little peace, what with new revolutions in Belgium and in the German and Italian states.”

  “And in France all over again,” Zofia piped. “Can you imagine? Hadn’t they had enough? I may never realize my dream to visit Paris, City of Light!”

  “I hear, too,” Barbara said, “that even the Papal States are rising up. It’s like a disease sweeping Europe.”

  Viktor harrumphed. “But Russia is free of this disease, my love. People in my country know their place.”

  “I beg to differ, Basia,” Michał said, ignoring Viktor’s comment, yet at the same time striking a discordant tone because of it. “Not a disease, hardly that.” He felt all eyes come to him. “It’s a desire, Basia, nothing so negative as a disease. People want little. They want their freedom. They want to live like men and like women. Like human beings.” Michał’s gaze at his sister across the table moved away, taking on a challenging intensity and becoming fixed now on Viktor. “One day it will happen in Russia, too.”

  The barb hit home like an arrow flying true. Viktor’s features seemed to tighten in a face gone red. “Are you a prognosticator, Michał?” he asked, shifting in his chair. “Should we mark your words? Perhaps you can divine what will happen in these places, yes? France? Belgium? Italy? Germany? The Papal States?”

  Michał smiled to himself at his brother-in-law’s bluster. “I can say only that people will strive to be free. Always.”

  “Ah! I see. And what about the Congress Kingdom, my brother? What do you forecast here?”

  “The Congress Kingdom of Poland,” Michał corrected, bristling not at the retort, but at being called his brother. “There was a time when the saying went, ‘In Russia do as one must; in Poland as one will.’ One day it will be true again.”

  Zofia’s fork came down, ringing hard against porcelain. When Michał glanced at her, she shot him a cautionary message. Avoid politics.

  “You’re alluding to the days of your constitution, I suppose,” Viktor said. You must come to terms with the fact that you have another constitution, another name, another king—Tsar Nicholas.” Viktor’s ice-blue eyes flashed. “It is a dangerous thing to always side with insurgents.”

  Michał had more to say in rebuttal but knew he was being baited now and would not give Viktor satisfaction. Neither did he wish to spoil his hostess’ little supper, so when Zofia announced that the maids were bringing in a special dessert—waffles with poppy seed—he let the subject lapse.

  When the meal ended, the little company adjourned to the music room, where Anna would keep a promise to the twins to play something for them on the piano.

  Pretending to nurse his coffee, Michał sat at the table a bit longer, lost in thought. He was still thunderstruck by Viktor Baklanov’s use of the word insurgents. It is a dangerous thing, he had said, to always side with insurgents. Was this merely talk? Was it an accusation? Was it a warning? It almost seemed to Michał that his brother-in-law knew something of his mission here in Warsaw. Could that be possible? How? He knew he had said too much to Iza, but he was certain that she had no opportunity to speak to Viktor. Nor, he guessed, would she have the inclination, for as much as everyone loved Barbara, her husband Viktor remained an outsider to the family.

  In exiting the dining hall, he noticed Iza near the front door. “You’re not going out?” he asked.

  “No,” she said, her voice barely audible.

  Michał walked over to her. “What is it? Something said at the table? I was too argumentative, I admit.”

  “No, Michał, it wasn’t that had all. In fact, you voiced my thoughts.”

  “Then what is it?”

  Her blue eyes, wide as moons, looked up into his. “As I came out into the hallway, I—I just had, I don’t know, a premonition.”

  “Of what?”

  “Something prompted me to look out the window
. . . and—”

  “And?”

  “He’s out there. Watching the house.”

  Michał moved quickly to the tall, narrow window to the left of the door. Pulling back the lace curtain, he peered out. Dusk had long since passed, but the full cover of night had yet to fall completely. Michał could make out a figure standing across the street in a very narrow gap between two town houses. His head seemed to lift slightly as if he was taking note of Michał. As if he was indeed watching the house!

  “Stay put,” he ordered Iza. “I’ll see what this is all about.”

  Iza reached out, grasped his arm. “No,” she pleaded, “it’s not safe, Michał. Please don’t go!”

  “I’ll be fine,” he answered, lifting her hand from his arm and letting it fall, but not without a subtle squeeze. “I’ll not have anyone threatening you or frightening you, do you hear? I won’t!” With that Michał left, pulling the door closed behind him.

  His eyes took a moment to adjust to the dark. The watcher had wasted no time in giving up his station and moving up the street, toward Market Square.

  Michał followed. The man hastened his steps, as did Michał. And then they were running. The man led him up Piwna to Celna, through Market Square, where few seemed to notice the chase, and then toward the riverfront, Michał closing the gap, little by little.

  They came upon a narrow, winding street perched on the bluff above the river. The modest shops were closed but ramshackle taverns didn’t lack for customers. Michał clapped onto the man’s shoulder, stopping his forward motion, and spinning him around. He was astonished to find him a man well into his fifties, albeit handsome and in good form, for he was no more breathless than was Michał.

  “Who are you?” Michał demanded, having taken hold of the man’s arms at the wrists. “Who?”

  The man attempted to pull away. “Let me go!”

  Michał held. “No! You were watching the Gronska house on Piwna Street—why? You will tell me.” It occurred to Michał now that he had thought to give chase without a weapon. What if this man had one?

  The man pulled one hand free and struck Michał hard upon the chest with enough power to propel him a foot or two and allow for his own escape. Michał caught his breath and flew at the man, bringing both of them to the hard graveled street, Michał atop the man’s back, twisting his arm behind him.

  The man seemed to accept defeat. “Look, I meant Izabel no harm.”

  “You know her name? How? What’s your purpose? Who’s put you up to it?” Michał shoved the man’s arm high up on his back. Another inch and it would break like a twig.

  The man grunted. “No one. Truly.”

  “You followed her the other night—gave her the fright of her life.”

  “No, not at night. In the square the other day when she turned the tables and came after me, but never at night.”

  “But what is your interest? Be truthful unless you wish your arm broken.”

  “I will tell you. You must care about Izabel. I will tell you. I suggest you release me. We can go into that tavern across the way. It will take some explaining.”

  “Why should I trust you? Don’t play me for a fool.”

  “I will not fight you. You’ve outdone me there. Neither will I run. What I have to say is confusing—and surprising. And quite true.”

  In his years in uniform, Michał had learned a bit of human nature; he had learned when to trust a man—or not. Michał’s gut feeling now was to believe the man. He released the arm, allowed him to stand, and the two made their way toward a tavern called The King’s Ransom.

  Iza sat in a chair near the door, away from the little group surrounding Anna at the piano. Her fingers drummed the arms of the chair. Where is Jan Michał? He went tearing off on a dangerous chase, all because of her. She wished she had kept silent. It was her fault. She little doubted that he was in peril, that he might be hurt. Perhaps he was hurt already, lying prone on some deserted street. This was no game. And for him to go off like that, taking after someone who might be well-armed. She caught herself now, realizing that Michał could not possibly be armed. He had only just left the supper table when the trouble arose. It was such an impulsive thing for him to do, a thought that brought her up short, for only the day before hadn’t she done the very same thing?

  Her heart and mind elsewhere, Iza vacantly watched the Stelnicki family happily singing along with Anna’s playing, the twins laughing and mimicking the adults. Then she saw Viktor, who sat removed from the others. He had not attempted to join in with the Polish or French songs. She doubted that he would ever fit into the family. He was that odd piece of sky that one could never find a place for in a table puzzle. Iza brought her eyes into a keener focus on him. Her heart lost a beat. He was staring with the greatest intensity—at her.

  8

  HAVING LEFT THE MAN WHO called himself Jerzy to finish his beer, Michał exited The King’s Ransom, his head swimming with what he had been told. He passed through the front door and out onto the darkened street. He did observe peripherally the two young men approaching the tavern but was too preoccupied to take real notice—until they were upon him and he felt the force of a mighty fist to his stomach. He bent over in pain, breath knocked out of him, but nonetheless attempting to stay upright. It was then that an upper cut to his jaw—from the other ruffian, he thought—propelled him backward. He fell into a sitting position. Not for long. Each assailant took an arm and heaved him to, allowing him to stand on his own. Only now, it seemed, were they ready to speak.

  “Lord Stelnicki?” the thin wiry blond asked. When Michał didn’t respond, he said, “It is our commission to respectfully suggest to you that it is best for you to return to Sochaczew.”

  A halfway intelligent ruffian, Michał thought. “Respectfully? And only now do you check for my identity? And what if I am not the man in question?”

  This response visibly rattled the thicker, slightly older fellow, whose wide brow furrowed. “You mean you’re not Stelnicki?”

  “Shut up!” his friend growled. “Don’t be a fool. It’s the count, all right, isn’t it, milord?”

  “It is!” cried Michał. “And here’s a print of my signet ring to prove it.” His arm moved in an arc toward the thin one, the clenched fist and signet coming into contact with the soft flesh of a beardless cheek. Later he would wonder at his impulsiveness, but for now his anger fed him.

  From there things became a blur. The gullible one was upon him with punches to his side and then Michał’s arms were pulled behind his back so that the elbows were nearly touching. With his head hanging down, his mind cloudy and his body wracked with pain, Michał caught in the diffused lighting from the tavern the glint of something.

  A knife.

  The wiry one, blood dripping from his cheek, held it menacingly, moving it closer, near to Michał’s throat. “You can make us take the easy route to keep you from the academy, milord. In which case you won’t have the option of returning home—or anywhere!”

  At that moment someone came down hard on the thin assailant, who spun about, the knife moving away from Michał and toward the newcomer. Michał tapped all of his reserve and pulled his arms free, his captor likely distracted by his compatriot’s struggle. He saw that the knife had changed hands. It was lifted into the air, swiftly coming down now, finding soft flesh amidst the ribs of the thin assailant.

  By this time men were spilling out of the tavern to observe the fracas. Later Michał wondered whom they might have helped, or whether they themselves would have merely enjoyed giving vent to liquor-induced violence. But for now his assailants, the one helping the other, were hightailing it down the darkened street, no one giving chase.

  Michał’s dumb surprise must have passed over his face as he realized now that the man who had come to his defense was the man whom he had just left sitting in the tavern. He simply nodded his thanks in the way it was often done on the battlefield when one’s life was saved by a compatriot. Stooping, he picked up t
he knife from the gravel. It was an ordinary sort. When he looked to his new friend and protector, Jerzy, he realized that the thin, wiry attacker had not been the only recipient of a wound.

  It was a hellish task half carrying and half dragging Jerzy back to the Gronska town house. Finally, they stood waiting at the front door, Jerzy’s arm around Michał’s shoulders. “You see,” Michał said, quite out of breath, “had you stayed in front of the house here, we could have avoided those other two.”

  “And miss the excitement?”

  They were both laughing when Iza opened the door to Michał and the bleeding man. She was shocked into silence by their appearance and bizarre laughter so that she merely stepped aside as the two crossed the threshold.

  Michał managed to get the wounded man to the hall chair, then straightened up to speak to Iza. “Look, he’s bleeding badly at the shoulder. We need to get him upstairs to a bed. I can staunch the bleeding myself, but we’ll need a doctor as soon as we can get one here.” Michał had thought of having him tended to right there on the ground floor, but in less than a heartbeat realized the complications that would arise should Zofia come upon him.

  Iza had yet to recover. “But he . . . he’s—”

  “Jerzy, the visitor to your garden at the convent, I know—as well as the one from yesterday in the Square.” Michał went to place his hands on Iza’s shoulders but thought better of it when he saw how bloodied they were. “Listen to me, Iza. I know who he is. There is nothing to fear. Trust me.”

  Iza looked hard into Michał’s eyes for several beats, then her eyelids closed, as if to say, I do.

  “I’ll need help getting him up the stairs. Where is everybody?”

  “Viktor and Barbara took the boys home, your mother’s gone to bed, and mine has gone out. The servants are asleep. . . . I’ll help you, Michał. There’s a guest room on the third level.”