Rage

by Zygmunt Miloszewski

  “They get rain clouds.”

  “So you do that when they’re naughty. And what do Mommy and Daddy do when they’re being naughty?”

  “They shout.”

  “And how does it make you feel?”

  “It makes me mad!”

  “And what do you do?”

  “I never shout ’cos shouting’s not allowed. I’ve gotta be good and quiet.”

  “And what happens when you can’t help yourself, and you’re not quiet?”

  “Then I get a punishment.”

  Piotruś became sad. He let his head droop and got off his little chair onto the rug.

  “Can I sit down next to you?” asked Adela gently.

  The boy nodded, and she joined him on the rug.

  “You must put your legs in a bow.” He showed her how to sit cross-legged.

  Adela sat as he showed her.

  “Very good,” said the boy.

  “Nobody likes getting a punishment, do they?”

  The boy shook his head.

  “Tell me, what’s your very worst punishment?”

  In the technical room everyone held their breath.

  Piotruś took a sheet of paper and started to draw something on it with crayons. Adela picked up a yellow crayon and added a sun to his picture.

  “I don’t like being alone,” he finally muttered.

  “And what does that mean, being alone?”

  “I have to be in my room, and me and Mommy can’t go outside. When I’ve gotten a punishment.”

  “I don’t understand. Are you trying to say that when you’ve gotten a punishment you have to stay in your room with your mom?”

  The boy huffed, impatient with Adela for not understanding him.

  “You don’t understand anything. I have to stay alone in my room when I’ve gotten a punishment.”

  Szacki clenched his fists. Please, he thought, let this be leading somewhere. Let him give me a reason to put the screws on Mrs. Najman and get the truth out of her.

  “That’s why I’m asking, to understand. I wonder where your mom is when you’re in your room alone.”

  “She’s in the house.” The boy shrugged, busy with his drawing.

  It occurred to Szacki that children are all alike. When Hela was little she’d called their living room “the house” as well.

  “But when she’s gotten a punishment she stays in her room too. Except she’s got a TV in her room and I haven’t. I can’t watch cartoons like ‘Franklin’s Afraid of the Dark.’”

  “And why does Mommy get a punishment?”

  “Daddy gives her a rain cloud.”

  “And what happens then?”

  “She has to stay in her room, I told you.”

  “And what do you do then?”

  “I play with Daddy.”

  “And what do you and Daddy play?”

  “Do you like it?”

  Piotruś showed Adela his drawing. An ordinary kid’s drawing, no black holes or red clouds, or men with huge dicks, or terrifying faces, such as the victims of pedophilia and violence usually draw. Just a family in front of a house, orange clouds, and a yellow sun.

  “That’s beautiful! I love your orange clouds.”

  “I like orange. I like blue too,” said the boy happily. “There’s a parrot in a movie, and he’s blue.”

  Szacki rolled his eyes. Christ, give me strength, or I’ll rip the little brat to pieces.

  11:47:18—shimmer.

  “I know that movie. It’s Rio, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, Rio. I went to the movie theater with Daddy.”

  Because Mommy had a rain cloud, figured Szacki, and glanced at Mrs. Najman. She didn’t seem unsettled by the interview.

  “Tell me what else you play with Daddy.”

  “We read books about Elmer.”

  “The patchwork elephant.”

  “And Wilbur. Wilbur’s got patches but not color.”

  “And what else do you do?”

  “Play-Doh people. Or we watch cartoons. But I can’t watch them when it’s the news.”

  “And what do you like best of all?”

  “When I go to the pool with Daddy on my bike and Daddy fools around, puts on the jet engines, and does a rally.”

  “And is there any game with Daddy that you don’t like?”

  “Daddy’s awesome,” said Piotruś.

  Adela glanced toward the mirror. Her look said: We’re wasting time. A normal boy, a normal family. The parents don’t seem to get along particularly well, but there’s nothing abnormal about it. Besides, maybe the boy sees their arguments the wrong way and says his mom has a punishment when the woman’s just annoyed and shuts herself in her room.

  “Does Mom go to the pool with you?”

  “Mommy doesn’t like getting wet.”

  The technician working the computer sniggered and then immediately gave them an apologetic look.

  “Does she often get a punishment and have to stay in her room?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He was drawing more and more vigorously. Szacki could remember what small children are like, and he knew it wasn’t a sign of stress. The child was simply distracting himself—he couldn’t pay attention for such a long time and was feeling antsy.

  “We’ll be done in a few minutes, OK?” Adela interpreted the child’s body language correctly. “Just three more questions, about your mommy and daddy, and you can run. All right?”

  “All right.”

  “Does Mommy get any other punishments besides staying in her room like you?”

  “When she’s very naughty she has to go in the attic. There’s no TV in there.”

  Szacki and Bierut exchanged glances. To be searched as soon as possible.

  “And what’s it like in the attic?”

  “It’s smelly and there’s dust.”

  Not good, thought Szacki. If it was really bad they wouldn’t let him go up there.

  “And do you know why Mommy gets rain clouds from your dad?”

  “’Cos she’s naughty, I guess. You’ve gotta be good.”

  Szacki turned so he could see the scene beyond the two-way mirror and also Teresa Najman, who was standing behind him. She was relaxed and unruffled, even smiling a bit. And to his horror Szacki realized they were asking the wrong questions. At first she’d been tense, because she knew something might come to light. But now she was calm, because they hadn’t touched on it.

  Fuck the updated penal code. There’d be no second chance to interview him. Never. Mentally he let out a howl.

  “And when Mom’s naughty, what happens then?”

  “I don’t like shouting.”

  “Does anything else happen when your mom and dad are upset? Something you don’t like?”

  “Shouting makes me sad.”

  “Is there anything else you don’t like?”

  “Biting and pushing. Marek’s always pushing me at preschool.”

  “And does anyone push you at home?”

  “When I push Daddy, he says you shouldn’t push.”

  “And do Mommy and Daddy push each other?”

  “You’re funny!” The little boy laughed. “They’re grown-ups, they don’t push.”

  Adela glanced toward the mirror. Interview over.

  Szacki swore hideous oaths to himself.

  “Can I take him home now please, Prosecutor?” said Teresa Najman in a firm, confident tone—how very different from the one he’d heard during their first encounter. “Or do you intend to lock him up for the next three months to extract valuable information?”

  11:59:48—shimmer.

  The technician stopped recording a moment later, on the stroke of twelve, and switched on the light. The judge picked up her purse to show she regarded the session as over. Szacki did nothing. He had no idea what to do. He felt as if there were too little oxygen in the air.

  “In fact,” said Mrs. Najman, unable to restrain herself, “I sincerely hope you have some other way of cat
ching my husband’s killer than persecuting a five-year-old fatherless child. Do you, Prosecutor?”

  Adela’s entrance saved him. Without a word he turned to face the friendly room where little Piotruś was trying to sharpen a broken crayon. For a while he struggled with the awkward device, but finally he got the better of it, and went back to his drawing.

  Once Mrs. Najman had taken the boy away, Szacki found himself standing in the corridor, desperate for oxygen. With no better idea, he went into the interview room. The stuffy little space smelled of dusty carpet tiles, the five-year-old’s sweat, and Adela’s subtle flowery scent, too subtle for her tough personality as well as the time of year.

  He felt weak, as if he were going to faint. He sat down on the little blue chair and started examining the little boy’s drawings, which Adela had picked up off the floor and left on the table.

  A little house, clouds, a sun, a happy family. How badly he’d misfired.

  A happy family. Huh, something he might never have again.

  His head was heavy, so he put his elbows on the table and rested his forehead in his hands. A big guy, in a gray suit and a black overcoat, hunched as if he’d almost snapped in two, squeezed into a little plastic chair for preschoolers. He realized how it looked, but he didn’t have the strength to get up.

  Just under his nose lay Piotruś Najman’s drawing, quite joyful in its pastel colors. Adela’s sun was nice and symmetrical, while the other elements were typical of preschool artwork. The orange clouds were more like puddles than clouds. The trees consisted equally of brown trunks and green crowns, two-tone rectangles. The house, wide and squat, was exactly like the Najmans’ Stawiguda property. Outside it stood the entire family: the mommy, the daddy, and their little boy.

  And one other woman, holding the child by the hand.

  He sat up abruptly.

  The five-year-old Najman was already capable of capturing the figures’ main features. He himself had brown eyes and brown hair. And a blue top, maybe a favorite T-shirt. Next to him stood his parents. Szacki recognized the deceased Najman by his bald head, black eyebrows, and the fact that his hand was missing two fingers. For the child it must have been an important feature. Najman was holding a bizarre angular dog on a leash; it was red, and it had no head. Szacki stared at this monster for a while before realizing it was a suitcase on wheels. Daddy the traveler, of course. Mommy Najman was slender, with light-brown hair, wearing a green dress and holding a bunch of flowers. Maybe she liked flowers? Maybe she liked messing around in the garden? The boy had even caught the fact that his mom was a shade taller than his dad.

  Mr. and Mrs. Najman weren’t holding hands, but just standing next to each other. Mommy and Daddy. The father wasn’t holding the boy’s hand, and although he was standing next to him, they were divided by the red suitcase. Standing to the right of it, Piotruś was holding hands with a woman, clearly an adult, though not as tall as his mother. This woman had long hair drawn with a black crayon, and dark blue eyes, exaggeratedly large—in fact the eyes took up her entire face. It produced quite a creepy effect. She was wearing a long dress drawn in the same color.

  Szacki spread the drawings on the table. Mom and Dad weren’t in all of them. But every single one showed the little boy holding hands with the black-haired woman with huge blue eyes.

  He gathered the drawings and ran toward the exit.

  Teresa Najman was trying to join the stream of traffic on Wojsko Polskie Avenue, heading toward the center, when Szacki appeared in front of her hood, blocking her way.

  She rolled down the window.

  “Aren’t you going a bit far? This isn’t the Soviet Union where you can go around persecuting people and get away with it.”

  “Who is this woman?” he asked, showing her the drawings.

  Piotruś Najman was asleep in his little seat, tired out by his adventures in the land of law and order.

  “How should I know?”

  “Your son drew her. Is she an aunt? A babysitter? Grandmother?”

  He spoke deliberately loud in the hope of waking the kid, but he was fast asleep.

  “Number one, don’t yell. Number two, I have no idea. Number three, I couldn’t give a shit. And finally, please get out of my way before I run you down.”

  “She’s in every picture. She’s the only one holding his hand. It has to mean something. Just tell me who she is!”

  She smiled at him, coldly and sweetly all at once.

  “You’ve had your chance,” she said. “You should have asked the right questions.”

  She drove off abruptly, splashing Szacki with black winter mud that had gathered in the parking lot, unevenly surfaced with old paving stones. The Skoda’s brake lights blinked at him, and zoomed into the traffic just in front of a city bus; two seconds later it was out of sight.

  He stood in a rippling puddle, covered in mud spots from head to toe, clutching the child’s drawings. The splashes of color looked surreal against Szacki, the sidewalk, the mud, the social assistance building, and the whole wintry urban landscape.

  He had no idea what to do. He decided to let himself weep. Just then someone put a hand on his arm.

  Jan Paweł Bierut. As sad as ever. It couldn’t be good news.

  “We’ve found the guy with no hands,” he said.

  8

  The little light by the door changed to red. Hela sat quietly, but she couldn’t hear any sounds from the other side; it was hard to say if someone had taken away her breakfast leftovers or not. Maybe they’d done it silently—maybe the door was soundproof. She shuddered—she couldn’t bear to think what the kidnappers might need soundproof rooms for.

  Half an hour had passed since she’d drawn the line marking noon, and she was planning to take a nap, when for the first time since breakfast something changed.

  The television came on.

  There was black-and-white interference on the screen.

  Then the interference disappeared and was replaced by the image of a room. A room like any other—it looked like the unfinished ground floor of a single-family house, yet to be supplied with interior fittings: walls made of cinder blocks, a concrete slab floor, roof beams visible on the ceiling. The room had been lit up by several strong lamps.

  In the middle stood a sort of pipe, a thick one, made of metal. Possibly a sewage pipe. Or maybe it was a sort of column?

  Set against the column was a painter’s ladder, the kind with a platform at the top.

  The camera angle changed, and now she could see into the pipe.

  She felt a nasty shudder.

  Stuck inside the pipe was a naked man. Maybe asleep, maybe unconscious, maybe dead. His head was slumped to one shoulder, so that all she could see was an ear, part of a cheek with dark stubble, and the top of a bald head.

  She gazed for a while at this unusual, disturbing image. But there was nothing happening. She wanted to go and pee, but she realized she’d better not move, or she might miss something. But nothing was happening, and she couldn’t hold it, so she quickly ran to the toilet, and came back without washing her hands.

  There was still nothing happening.

  She was starting to suspect some madman had recorded a decaying corpse and was now making her watch it for the next two weeks so she’d know what lay ahead. She couldn’t restrain the thought that if she was going to spend those two weeks sitting in a six-foot-square room eating McDonald’s, there was no way she wouldn’t gain weight.

  Suddenly there was audio. Nothing special—background noise. Footsteps, a text message notification, somebody putting something down, somebody shifting something, somebody slamming a door.

  Then the angle changed for a few minutes, showing a general view: the cinder blocks, the pipe, the lamps. A shadow, as if someone had walked behind the camera. And then back to the close-up on the body.

  The image was very high quality. In the well-lit room she could clearly see that the man’s ear was very slightly misshapen. At first she wondered if it was t
he first stage of decomposition, but she soon came to the conclusion that it was a scar, as if from a burn.

  And just then, when she had almost set her nose against the television screen to take a closer look at the scar, the corpse moved.

  Hela screamed and jumped away from the TV.

  “Oh fuck, just like a horror movie!” she said out loud to give herself courage, and automatically went back to her safe place on the couch.

  It took the man a while to regain consciousness. He coughed, looked around, and craned his neck, staring at the camera, and thus straight into Hela’s eyes.

  A man with an ordinary face, neither ugly nor handsome. Square, masculine in a caveman sort of way, which always put Hela off—she thought men like that sweated more and stank. He had thick black eyebrows that looked almost fake.

  For a while the man’s eyes moved in all directions; he must have been trying to see where he was, but from Hela’s point of view it looked comical, as if he were inspecting her cell. His initial amazement was soon replaced by fury, and his face twisted into a nasty scowl.

  “Have you gone completely crazy?” he shouted. “What’s this dumb-ass show about?”

  Nobody answered him, but nobody stopped working either. The whole time Hela could hear the noises of something in the background that made Hela think for the first time of preparations for an execution. A shiver went down her spine.

  The man thrashed about violently, as if trying to overturn his prison. His hands were tied at the front, and he could touch the wall of the pipe with his fingers. He laid his palms flat and tried to rock it, but to no effect—it didn’t move an inch.

  She noticed that he had two fingers missing on one hand.

  “You’ll be sorry!” he yelled.

  He was tired of squirming. He went quiet and tried to calm his breathing; drops of sweat broke out on his forehead.

  “You fucking bitch, you’ll be sorry, you can be sure of that,” he muttered to himself. “I can fucking guarantee you.”

  A shadow appeared on the man’s face. Evidently someone was standing on the ladder, blocking the light.

  The man gave a crooked smile.

  “What will you gain from this? What are you trying to achieve? Well? Are you going to drown me in here? Kill me? Get rid of me? What will that change?”