“You’ll do it, Eddie, oh yes, you will,” said Woroniecki almost to himself. “And I’ll record it all. I’ll have a beautiful Theseus and a beautiful Minotaur on film. And then I’ll hide the film in my safe and then I’ll be able to issue you with orders. And you’ll obey them. If you don’t, you’ll hear a curse which will work like magic. It goes: ‘I’ll send the film to Marian Zubik.’ You’re going to be mine, Eddie … You’re going to obey my orders and ask for more. And here’s the first: you’re going to get Nierobisch out of prison and hand her over to me as a gift. I’ve had enough of paying that filthy old witch …”
“I won’t kill anybody,” Popielski croaked.
“Won’t kill anybody?” Woroniecki extracted the axe from the chopping block with ease. “Well, that’s too bad. My men, my loyal friends from my days in Kattowitz are going to take you to Brzuchowicki forest. They’re going to dig a hole, throw you into it and cover you with our fertile humus. And your beloved Rita won’t come to your grave … She won’t light a candle for her papa, who she cuddled up to so sweetly, like in the photograph …”
Popielski stared at Woroniecki as if turned to stone.
“She won’t come …” – the count ran his finger over the blade of the axe – “because she’ll be far away. She’ll be a beauty queen. In a Buenos Aires brothel!”
He approached Popielski, took a swing, and the axe hit the floor at his feet. Over its handle he tossed a rubber apron.
“But if you kill the Minotaur,” he said, “you’ll see Rita, who’s quite nearby. She’s grown even more beautiful over the past six months. She’s, she’s here … She so wanted to wish you a happy name day! If you want, you can even take her home with you. But is she going to want to go? She could become an actress with me, while you wanted to turn her into a Latin scholar! You think I don’t have friends in the film industry? Many of them made naughty films on the quiet, and some of my girls took part. But don’t worry! Not Rita! She’s a true artist! Well, what do you say? Put the apron on, the axe is waiting.”
He then shouted: “We’re starting!”, and the two men who had brought Popielski appeared. One aimed a Browning at the commissioner, while the other undid his handcuffs. Popielski’s head was empty; he acted like an automaton and put on the apron.
“I’m starting to roll! Action!” yelled Woroniecki from behind the camera.
Popielski grabbed the chain wrapped around Potok’s neck and dragged the beast towards the chopping block. The Minotaur thrashed about in every direction, like a fish out of water. The aprons on the floor bunched up and squeaked terribly as they rubbed against his sweaty skin.
“Stun him first!” shouted the count. “Otherwise you won’t get his mug on the block!”
Popielski raised the axe. Beneath him writhed a human body, not an animal. This was no beast, it was a human being who could not be slaughtered like a porker. He ought to be judged fairly and hanged with legal sanction. And what if some golden-mouthed cunning fellow, some lawyer with a double-barrelled name, succeeded in defending him? The court would pronounce judgement: the accused is to be handed over for treatment to a secure mental institution! And Popielski would have to listen to all this with the gnawed faces of those girls in front of his eyes, the lesions on Maria Szynok’s body and the bubbles of blood on Zaremba’s lips. He raised the axe and struck Potok’s temple with its head. Potok jerked and went limp. Popielski tried to pull his neck over the block, but the flaccid body fell to the ground. He kicked the block in anger and raised his arms with the axe over his head.
“Wait, wait!” screamed Woroniecki. “For God’s sake, don’t move out of frame!”
A moment later Popielski no longer heard nor felt anything. Apart from the beast’s blood on his legs.
LWÓW, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14TH, 1937 SIX O’CLOCK IN THE EVENING
Rita Popielska was in her sumptuous apartment in the Rohatyn tenement on the corner of Kościuszko and 3rd May Street. She paced nervously across the luxuriously furnished room, the interior of which Dionizy Czyczkowski, reknowned architect and designer, had conceived on a peaceful and elegant cream-coloured scheme. She strode between the clock and the table, between the modern sideboard and antique armchair, which featured as an intended extravagance in the modernist, ascetic style of the apartment. Her heart rose to her throat when she heard the doorbell. The servant entered the room and opened his mouth to announce the arrival of a guest, but he did not have time. He staggered, thrust forward by a strong hand, and leaned against the wall before Rita’s father burst into the room and drove him away. Rita fell to her knees when she saw him; the earth gave way beneath her. Her slender waist swayed as if she were in a trance, and the girl would have collapsed to the floor had she not been held up by her father’s hand. Rita pressed her lips to it. She cried silently, without sobbing or spasms. Tears ran down Popielski’s hand. He kneeled over his daughter without saying a word and stroked the hair above her ears. This was where he had loved to kiss her most when she was a child. He would breathe in, and in her locks pick up the scent of the forest near Sokolnik where they used to spend their holidays, or the salty tang of the sea and Baltic beaches. He wanted to kiss her there now, but refrained. He had picked up an unfamiliar scent, a sharp perfume he did not recognise. “She’ll be a beauty queen. In a Buenos Aires brothel!”
Popielski rubbed his eyes, gently pushed his daughter aside and sat down at the table. He interlocked his fingers as if wanting to fence himself off from the feelings that tormented him. Rita sat opposite her father and laid a slender hand – an expensive diamond on its finger – over one of his.
“I beg you, Papa, forgive me.” Two large tears fell onto her cheeks. “Forgive me, it was your name day yesterday! I must hear your words of forgiveness today!”
“I forgive you,” he whispered, squeezing his eyes, but he did not manage to hold back the tears which forced their way through his thick eyelashes.
“I’ve been a terrible, stupid egoist.” Rita pulled out a lace handkerchief and dabbed her eyes; she could control herself in a split second, just like her mother. “But don’t think, Papa, that I left home because I thought you were an unbearable tyrant, no, that wasn’t it at all! Father, listen to what I have to say! Bronisław wrote to me, seducing me with his letters. We corresponded: he charmed me. He sent me his photograph with a dedication … That day, the first day of spring, I went to meet him as we’d agreed. Beanpole came with me. I was frightened of going by myself. This was on Żuliński Street. We were supposed to be meeting in a billiard club! Suddenly I saw you and I was annoyed, I thought that you were following me. But you were after the Minotaur. I saw you quite by chance! Beanpole ran off, scared, and I ran to the club, which turned out not to be any kind of club at all!”
She stood and drew the curtains so that the sun did not dazzle her father. She studied him in silence. He had changed, lost weight; he no longer dressed with care. His head and cheeks were badly shaven. It made her heart ache.
“He fell in love with me at first sight.” She swallowed bitterly. “Then he abducted me, carried away by his feelings. He’s of noble stock, the owner of vast estates, heir of an aristocratic family. He said his ancestors had also been guilty of raptus puellae.”
“You’re speaking Latin.” Popielski shuddered and smiled feebly.
“No, I’m simply repeating Bronisław’s words. He abducted me and took me to his manor, forbidding me to make contact with you. But don’t think he took advantage of me, Papa … Oh, no! He’s too much of a gentleman for that! He gave me two months to decide whether I wanted to stay with him and make a career as an actress – he’s got friends everywhere, he’s going to make it possible for me! – or go home to that cursed school … He visited me every day; we took walks in his parks and forests … After two weeks the servants stopped keeping an eye on me. They didn’t have to, I didn’t want to leave … I wanted to be there, listen to his words and look into his eyes.” Rita stirred. “Oh, I’m sorry, Papa! I’m describi
ng all this in such detail, as if you were a woman!”
“Why didn’t you write to me?” he asked hollowly.
She hurried over to her father, kissed him on the head and rested her cheek on his bald skull.
“I’m sorry, Papa, I’m sorry … I wasn’t myself … It was as if I were living in a dream. Nothing was important to me. But I’ve recovered my senses. I’m composed again, and reasonable! We’re always going to be together now, Papa, always … I won’t give you any more reason to worry …” Tears once again appeared in her eyes and ran down his head. “Father, I always carried that photograph with me, the one taken years ago… I love you, Papa!”
Popielski stood up and gave his daughter a tight hug. Suddenly he pulled away and gripped her by her delicate shoulders. Red-pink appeared patches on his neck.
“Yes, father,” she said firmly and emphatically. “I’m pregnant. And Bronisław is the father of my child.”
The commissioner sat down at the table and fixed his eyes on the clock. Only now did Rita notice that his ears were unnaturally large and purple.
“But Papa, you don’t care about bourgeois conventions.” She ran to her father and grasped his hands. “You lived with mama without getting married, and the whole town was indignant and disgusted! What are you worried about, Papa? The most important thing is that Bronisław and I love each other! Here’s the wedding invitation. It’s in the cathedral in three weeks’ time!”
The commissioner glanced at the invitation. “Rita Popielska and Doctor Bronisław Kulik have the honour of inviting the Honorable Mr …” He read no more and went back in time. He is at the meeting of the Lwów circle of the Polish Mathematical Society. Professor Stefan Banach says: “Today we have the pleasure of listening to Doctor Bronisław Kulik from Kraków, who will be talking to us about formal logic in a lecture entitled “Logic of names and logic of sentences”.
Rita ran around the room like a little girl and clapped her hands.
“Papa, I’m sure you’re going to have so much to talk about with Bronisław! I’ve got that feeling! He’s a mathematician like you, and he’s very good at chess! Now that I’m independent I realise how much I love you, Papa! We can all go on trips together! You Papa, Auntie, your grandson, Bronisław and myself. He loves the Carpathian Mountains!”
LWÓW, NOVEMBER 22ND, 1938
Dear Eberhard,
I apologize greatly for my silence, broken only by trite seasonal greetings. I have lived through a great deal in all that time, especially between Rita’s death and her resurrection. Your letters piled up on my desk like pangs of conscience and, as you know yourself, a bad conscience muted by work or alcohol grows quieter, and eventually becomes completely silent. And I wanted to rid myself of these pangs. One day, drunk and irritated, I collected all your letters in an ashtray and burned them. I didn’t want to know anything about your investigation, or about the affairs of some baron. They didn’t interest me in the least because I had locked myself up in my own problems. But I hear that my cousin Leokadia corresponded with you and told you everything: pregnant Rita’s return and her marriage to a doctor and count all in one – Bronisław Woroniecki-Kulik. Rita loves him, Leokadia likes him, and I detest him. I don’t know why my daughter fell in love with him. Perhaps it’s because they’re both similar; both have disappointed their parents. Or perhaps he was the Satan and tempter who possessed her. I won’t write any more about him because the very thought of his degeneracy fills me with repulsion. I’ll say only one thing: he is a monster, an insane criminal. No, Eberhard, I have not gone mad. I repeat, and I’m fully aware of what I’m saying: he is a crazy murderer who will never be judged for his crimes. Do you know why? Because I am the only one who knows about them, apart from his two praetorians. And I’m never going to speak up against him! After all, I’m not going to take Jerzyk’s father away from him, from my beloved grandson happily born in February of this year. No doubt you’re curious to hear how I know about my son-in-law’s villainy. From his very own lips! He told me about it, and he was fully aware of what he was doing. To hear him out and not lock him up is like being his accomplice. This is what I have become. I listened to him and I let him go free. Do you know why? Because he blackmailed me. When Rita had been gone for half a year, when in my mind I had already buried her, the right honourable count appeared and said: your daughter is with me, you can win her back when you’ve heard me out or lose her if you spurn my story. You choose. I chose my daughter. He told me of his horrific crimes, and I have to remain silent.
My dear friend, I want to retire. Zubik won’t even hear of it and begs me to stay. I’ve grown even more famous and enjoy the favour of the commander of the provincial police himself. And that’s because Zdzisław Potok has been found: it is my doing, supposedly, that the police hit upon his trail. Yes, he was found in the village of Strzelczyska in the Mościska District, department of Lwów. Dead, decapitated. Polish news probably doesn’t reach you, so perhaps you don’t know about it – unless Leokadia told you. Our forensic pathologist and psychologist, Doctor Iwan Pidhirny, found an explanation for Potok’s perversion and cannibalism. The doctor believes that the criminal, damaged by his monstrous ugliness, was ridiculed by women and took his revenge on them. By depriving them of their virginity and disfiguring them, he simply branded them. But this is only Pidhirny’s hypothesis. Potok took his secret to the grave.
Eberhard, I’m writing to thank you for your help. For the fact that I could always depend on you. I’m also writing to say goodbye. I cannot see or correspond with you because I have to banish from my memory anything which reminds me of the case of the Minotaur. For me it was a blood bath, Dante’s hell and purgatory. It has left memories from which I must free myself. In bidding you farewell, I bid farewell to all police work – as I mentioned above. I cannot be a police officer, cannot represent the law and at the same time assure a murderer of his immunity. He killed the police officer in me, demoralized me – for ever and with no forgiveness. Farewell, my dear friend, and forgive this Hamletizing.
Yours,
Edward
P.S. I sincerely wish you a peaceful and blessed Christmas. Do not wish the same for me. I will be spending Christmas in the presence of a murderer. What doesn’t one do for one’s own child?
BRESLAU, DECEMBER 20TH, 1938
Dear Edward,
Your letter has greatly saddened me. It pains me above all that you should wish to break up our relationship for reasons which I understand, but which cannot be absolute. Because time heals all wounds and one day you will laugh about the Minotaur case. For the time being I ask only one thing of you. I was even prepared to convince you on the spot, in Lwów – I was worried about you – but because of the multitude of urgent matters could not do so. I beseech you not to leave the police force. Please trust in your slightly older colleague: to sit at the same table as the murderer paradoxically gives you the opportunity to be an even better police officer than you are. Keep looking at him, remember his face well – impudent, sure of itself, unpunished. That face has to be irrevocably engraved in your memory just as irregular Greek verbs were impressed on it once. You have to be able to recall it at any moment. And particularly when you’re hunting another murderer. When you hesitate, when your hands fall helplessly to your sides and the criminal keeps eluding you, bring to mind the face you now see next to your daughter’s. Let that mug be the mug of all the murderers in the world, let that mug be Satan’s or the Minotaur’s mug – as you prefer. And thus experiencing the apex of hatred you will become Satan’s vanquisher, a real bloodhound who will either gnaw the murderer to death or choke on his gore. Heed my instructions, Edward, but do as you wish. If old Ebi reminds you of the case of the Minotaur, then forget about old Ebi for a while. But not for ever, for God’s sake! Who am I going to drink vodka and go for girls with, if not you?
Yours,
Eberhard
P.S. And remember – you can always depend on me.
LWÓW, CHRISTMAS EVE,
1938 SIX O’CLOCK IN THE EVENING
The entire Popielski family sat around the table on Christmas Eve: Edward, Leokadia, Rita and her husband, Doctor Count Bronisław Woroniecki-Kulik. There was one other, the smallest member of the family – ten-month-old Jerzyk Woroniecki-Kulik whom the servant, Hanna, called her “sweetest pony”. The child was developing as it should and had probably inherited its appetite from its grandfather, because everything it met in its path it considered food. And since Jerzyk usually moved around on all fours he ate anything that was within half a metre of the ground. Like a little puppy he attacked all the chair and table legs as well as the tablecloths that dangled from various cupboards and tables. It was unfortunate when the “countling” – because that is what the trusty, loving servant also called him – pulled down a dish along with the tablecloth. When this was a plate of cakes which were instantly eaten, it was not so bad; far worse when the little one took to the contents of his grandfather’s ashtray with equal eagerness.
During his first ever Christmas Eve dinner the child was restless. No doubt the general atmosphere of hurry and tension and all the scuttling about had knocked him out of his usual daily routine, because he refused to take a nap in the afternoon and was peevish and exasperating as a consequence. He would not even be calmed by his grandfather, who normally had a soothing effect on him. It was not, however, so much the grandfather himself who had this effect as his bald head. Jerzyk usually grabbed his grandfather’s head with such passion as if he were discovering foreign lands. The growls emitted by Edward during all this made the baby squeal with joy and bare his gums in a smile, at first toothless, then adorned with two sharp milk teeth.
The Minotaur's Head: An Eberhard Mock Investigation (Eberhard Mock Investigation 4) Page 27