The Slaughterman's Daughter

by Yaniv Iczkovits

  All residents are under curfew. No-one can either enter or leave. It goes without saying that the local muzhiks are allowed to go about their daily affairs – there is no point in punishing innocent peasants – but they, too, are subjected to inspections of their papers and searches of their wagons. The families in the eye of the storm, Keismann and Speismann, are under constant pressure. All that remains for him to do is to seize his suspects in Minsk.

  So it is little wonder that, when the suspect is brought to Novak, and he realises it is Shleiml Cantor, he sighs with despair. What can he get out of this toothpick, goddammit? Of what use is this hare-brained, imbecile, drunk cantor? What can he do with the compulsive gambler he saved from being lynched at Adamsky’s tavern, who proceeded to piss the bed next to Fanny’s later that night?

  As the toothpick is told to sit down, he immediately demands food: for himself and for the lady. What lady? Novak wonders, but then he realises that Cantor’s putative companion is made up of two broken planks and a sheet of tarpaulin. Novak begins to feel embarrassed, surrounded as he is by his agents. Such an interrogation risks blemishing his reputation.

  “Lock him up,” Novak orders. “He’s useless.”

  “That is no way to speak to a soldier,” Cantor says, very seriously, and the Okhrana detectives in the room burst out laughing.

  “Take him!” Novak raises his voice. “And throw away those damned planks.”

  What happens next, Novak could not have anticipated. Some men have a family – wife and children – whom they embrace every day. And then there are people like Shleiml Cantor, who have two wooden planks and a sack that mean the world to them. They were destined not to grow up under the wings of a soothing mother and a comforting father. As far as they can remember, they experienced the touch of skin against skin only when copecks were transferred from one hand to another, if they were lucky, but more often when they took slaps and punches. Then one day, Cantor was sent to a guard post where he met a pleasant damsel. Is she the prettiest lady he’s ever set eyes on? Is she the most talkative? Certainly not. But who is Shleiml Cantor to expect the best? So he threw in his lot with her. And although he is certainly used to losing, Olga is one thing he is not prepared to lose, which is why he falls to his knees and starts weeping. “Olga!” Sobbing, mouth drooling, nose dripping, eyes swollen and shoulders trembling, he cries, “Olga!”

  Naturally, Shleiml’s little scene makes the audience roar all the louder. There is nothing funnier than a man who has fallen as low as a man can. One is almost compelled to laugh, otherwise one might imagine oneself in his place. Everyone is laughing except for Novak, who for some reason is moved by the cantor’s tears. He, Novak, could not cry like that even if he wanted to. He, Novak, could not rejoice like his Hasidic hosts in Grodno. There’s no such drama in his life, for better or worse. He is like an abandoned, ransacked house without furniture, window frames or floorboards; a bare framework supported by old foundations. So even this matchstick has an advantage over him, albeit one that amounts to no more than two planks and a sheet of tarpaulin. Dammit, Novak, are you losing your mind? He orders his agents to let Cantor reunite with his bride.

  A messenger enters the room holding a telegram. Novak anxiously scans it and smiles, a smile that dispels all of his former doubts. It is the smile of success.

  “The four suspects have been apprehended in Minsk,” he informs his agents. “Fanny Keismann, Zizek Breshov, Patrick Adamsky and Zvi-Meir Speismann.”

  The room resounds with applause, handshakes and back-slapping, and Dodek looks at Novak in amazement.

  “You’ve done it, sir,” he says, clapping him on the shoulder. Novak says nothing, but thumps his cane on the floor.

  “Well done,” whispers Shleiml Cantor. “That Zvi-Meir will pay for his deeds at long last.”

  “His deeds?” Novak straightens his back and leans on his cane, all ears. “What do you know about Zvi-Meir’s deeds?”

  “Well,” Cantor stutters, “he’s quite a rascal, isn’t he, Olga?”

  “Release him,” Novak orders, “and leave us alone.”

  IV

  * * *

  Novak’s keen senses lead him to assume that what the human toothpick is saying can be either worthless or priceless. But it does not occur to him that Cantor’s account will turn out to be of tremendous value precisely because it is worthless.

  He has no need of Haim-Lazer right now as the toothpick speaks Polish, at least. Novak leads Cantor down to the Yaselda. How long does their conversation last? Not very. Novak begins by asking about his links with the gang, and the toothpick is horrified by his suggestion. As far as Cantor is concerned, there is no link at all. They found him on the road and took advantage of his naivety. What business does he have with them? Their relationship is like the one between people and the weather. When the former is present the latter always appears, but this does not prove cause and effect. This metaphor surprises Novak. Although far from perfect, it is not something you’d expect from a complete imbecile.

  “Still,” Novak presses, “how do you know Zvi-Meir?”

  “Zvi-Meir?” the toothpick says. “Obviously, I don’t know him at all.”

  “And yet you observed that he is a rascal,” Novak says.

  “A rascal through and through,” the cantor affirms. “Fanny is right to be chasing after him.”

  “Fanny?”

  “I think this is her name, is not that so?”

  Strange, thinks Novak, “is not that so?” is my phrase. Is there more to this wretch than meets the eye, and especially more than meets the nostrils?

  “Why is she chasing after him?” Novak asks.

  Cantor repeats the whole story he heard at the barracks. In short, Zvi-Meir, a villain of the first order, left his wife and children and ran away to Minsk. Fanny, the woman whom the honourable gentleman is pursuing, went after him to get a writ of divorce and save her sister from a life of solitude. And therefore he, the cantor, is completely unrelated to the whole plot. If being poor amounts to conspiracy, why hasn’t the honourable gentleman arrested every single citizen of the empire? Either way, there must be—

  “That’s enough!” Novak interrupts him, and the toothpick stops talking and stands as straight as a birch tree. “Now go away!”

  The cantor turns this way and that, walks in circles, and finally chooses a random direction. He could be shot for breaking the curfew, Novak thinks, and yet he does not call him back. Standing on the town’s empty main street, the inspector looks around. He can sense the townspeople peering at him through the closed shutters, Hasidim mocking him from rooftops, black crows ready to peck at his eyes.

  He sets off in the direction of the Jewish cemetery, then towards the road out of Motal. A writ of divorce? Is this what all the drama is about? Is the entire Okhrana on high alert because of this ridiculous story? Impossible. Women do not leave their homes with knives on their thighs in the middle of the night to teach a wayward brother-in-law a lesson. What is more, there is nothing in this story to explain the other details of the investigation. Why did the army join her cause? Why did complete strangers come to her help? How has this affair reached as far as His Highness Count Alexander Pazhari? The divorce story must be a red herring.

  Or maybe . . . maybe there really is a very simple explanation. A woman set out to help her unhappy sister and defended herself with a butcher’s knife. Yet, even if this is indeed the true course of events, how did it lead to this point? Again, why did all these strangers help her? How could such a trivial matter lead the empire’s two most loyal forces to a head-on confrontation? There must be more to it than this. There must be.

  The more Novak is trying to come to grips with the tale he has just been told, the more his heart tells him that he has let himself be fooled. There is nothing profound about this business. The story is embarrassingly straightforward. Fanny paid Zizek to join her,
and after they had the run-in with the family of thieves, they became frightened and turned to Zizek’s old army friend, Patrick Adamsky, for help. Then the debacle deteriorated into a bloodbath, and they were forced to seek refuge in the army camp. They must have used old contacts with David Pazhari or one of the senior officers and managed to have the garrison escort them to Minsk. Mishenkov will be putting his boots up in Nesvizh as usual, Alexander Pazhari will walk away free for lack of evidence, and what is left for Novak? Wild delusions about a revolution.

  Novak looks up. Clouds crowd the autumnal skies. Pine needles prick the wind. In a week, maybe two, the rains will start falling and the entire region will become a bog. He wanders down to the Yaselda and stands on the riverbank. What does it take for a man to walk on water? If he took a confident step, could he avoid drowning? What does it take for a man to drown in a river? If he dunked his head underwater, would his nostrils open? That would make one hell of a resignation letter.

  In the distance, Novak hears the sound of galloping hooves, and turns towards the forest on the opposite shore. Could the suspects have already arrived from Minsk? Realising that the procession is making its way towards him, he quickly climbs up the bank to take a better look. The riders unharness the horses from their carriages and urge the animals to enter the river. Dammit, these are skilled horsemen. The horses’ heads bob above the water as they advance towards midstream, until they finally swim across to the other shore with their riders. Novak’s surprise vanishes once he recognises the new guests.

  A grey-haired man with a bushy, extravagant moustache dismounts from his stallion. His uniform, the sumptuous attire of a high-ranking general, is awe-inspiring. His boots are laced all the way up to his knees, the hilt of his sword glimmers above its scabbard, and the butt of his gun is gilded. Now there’s a proud Russian, Novak thinks. There’s a fearless face, the moustache of a warrior, the gaze of a leader, the uniform of a count, a clean-shaven chin (how long has it been since Novak last shaved? He must look like a miserable old vagabond). There you go, Piotr, this man is everything you could have been.

  “Your Excellency,” he says to Governor Osip Gurko.

  “Your Excellency?” Gurko barks, ruffling Novak’s hair as if they were two humble soldiers. “You and I swam through shit together.”

  “Indeed, Your Excellency,” Novak says, smiling, “and yet, your rank obliges.”

  “Rank my ass! Novak, old man, give me a hug. It’s been years! You know how badly I’ve wanted to visit! I keep saying to Arkady,” he says, turning to one of the horsemen whose name must be Arkady, “‘we must visit Novak.’ But work, m’dear fellow, as you of all people should know, forces us to keep our noses to the grindstone.”

  “Quite,” Novak says, nodding.

  “So, what have you been up to?”

  “Not much.”

  “Not much?” Gurko laughs. “Did you hear that, Arkady? I wish everyone else would do as little as he does. And how’s your leg, old man?” Gurko thumps him on the shoulder. “Is it any better?”

  “It’s getting worse,” Novak says, his smile vanishing, and Gurko roars with laughter again. “Did you hear that, Arkady? It’s getting worse!”

  Novak has always detested Gurko’s habit of repeating everything he says to everyone else present. He notices that the one called Arkady does not even raise his head. Arkady must have also grown accustomed to being used as a rhetorical device.

  “Did you come to welcome us?” Gurko asks.

  “Yes, sir,” Novak lies, wondering who has brought Gurko into the matter. The obvious answer would be Dodek, but that would entail wit that this witless creature doesn’t have.

  “Let us walk a little,” Gurko says, removing his cap. “I’d like a word.” Novak follows him. They walk along the riverbank and Gurko stops by a bare sweet-cherry tree and inspects its branches. Standing next to him, Novak suddenly notices how deep the wrinkles in Gurko’s face have become. He’s grown old, dammit. The hands that emerge from the governor’s uniform sleeves are shrivelled and pale, as if they have just shed their skin, like a snake.

  “Your name keeps coming up, Novak,” says Gurko. “Did you know that a major reorganisation is planned for this region? We will need new governors, mayors; not today or tomorrow, to be sure, but you know, when the day comes . . . in due course. Your Anna will be very pleased, and so will the boys.”

  “Yes, Your Excellency, thank you.” Novak bows his head. “My Anna will certainly be pleased.”

  “Is anything the matter, Novak? You seem a bit downcast.”

  “Everything’s fine.”

  “I thought you would be happy to hear this.”

  “Very happy, Your Excellency.”

  Gurko sighs. “Well, old man, do you want to tell me what’s been going on here?”

  Novak knows that the moment of truth has arrived. He would like to say, “It’s nothing, Your Highness, this affair proved to be much less serious than we originally thought. A Jewess went out of her mind, that’s all.” Yet even this one sentence would be false, because Novak cannot deny his admiration for the main suspect, Fanny Keismann. Can he separate his feelings from the conclusions of the investigation? Who is he trying to deceive? How much power does he really have? If he dares to shares his version of the story, he will face ridicule. “He’s lost his mind,” people will say, “nothing about his version corresponds with the evidence.” Could it be that the entire army had mobilised because of a writ of divorce? A colonel disobeyed orders so he could hunt down a runaway husband? The honourable Count Alexander Pazhari lied to rescue a Jewish woman from loneliness? Did the governor take the trouble to come all this way only to make a fool of himself? Gurko’s presence alone requires the construction of a story that he can take back to St Petersburg.

  At this point, Novak realises that he is powerless. He has control over nothing. No matter what he says, the only version endorsed will be, by necessity, the version deemed most beneficial to the powerful and the influential. Count Gurko will return to St Petersburg a hero, the Okhrana agents will once again prove the efficiency of the secret police, Novak will keep his job and may even get an appointment in the civil service (a mayor? He never imagined himself without a uniform). The suspects and their accomplices will pay the price either at the gallows or in Siberia, and the local mob will vent their feelings by staging a small pogrom. As far as the authorities are concerned, there is only one way to bring this story to a satisfactory conclusion.

  “Well, m’dear fellow?”

  Novak delivers the goods. Gurko did not expect such a windfall. As Novak’s story builds, he notices satisfaction spreading across Gurko’s face. This is what the inspector tells the governor: Count Alexander Pazhari, nominated to be the Czar’s closest adviser, and, according to some, already serving in this capacity short of an official appointment, has been lying for years about family ties with a senior army officer, Colonel David Pazhari. The precise nature of the relationship between the two men is still unclear, but what is clear is that Count Alexander Pazhari has at his disposal a formidable military force that he can use at will. While he is still deciding to what end he should put this unit, the count has been sending agitators to circulate the radical views of a żyd from Minsk named Zvi-Meir Speismann. The precise nature of Speismann’s activities is yet to be ascertained, but what is already known is that his followers are prepared to slit the throat of anyone who refuses to adhere to his teachings. The cases at hand – and there must certainly be others they don’t yet know about – were committed by Zizek Breshov and Patrick Adamsky, two former Jews – what else? – who have left a bloody trail behind them. Every once in a while, Count Alexander Pazhari dispatches, by means of Colonel David Pazhari, a small troop of soldiers to help them carry out their misdeeds. The garrison that escorted them to Minsk, for example, was sent to secure a secret meeting with their leader, Zvi-Meir Speismann. It is reasonable to suspect
that Count Alexander Pazhari is waiting for the opportune moment to put his private unit to good use, at which point five dead bodies will seem like a trifle. “We are on the brink of dis-aster,” Novak concludes. “A fifth column made up of our finest men is on the rise, high-ranking noblemen from St Petersburg, advisers to the Czar, are raising private armies under our very noses. Would you believe it?”

  “Believe it?” Gurko’s massive moustache quivers. “These Petersburgians are all snakes, the lot of them. If it were up to me, I’d have them all before a firing squad.”

  “Well, that is where things stand.”

  As Gurko mulls this over, every strand of moustache that his fingers stroke seems to outline a new thought. “But what about the woman?” he asks, and Novak reddens with embarrassment. Who the hell has been keeping the governor informed of every detail of the investigation?

  “Oh, her? She’s of no importance. Led astray. An innocent lamb.”

  “But I heard that she is good friends with her knife.”

  “W-well,” Novak stutters, “that is what we thought at the beginning . . . I mean . . . being a butcher . . . it seemed to make sense. But when it comes to it, there is no doubt that the men are the culprits.”

  “I want her too, Novak.”

  “Certainly, Your Excellency, we have no intention of releasing her.”

  “I am not talking about releasing anyone. I want them all hanging from a noose, no ifs or buts.”

  “There won’t be any.”

  “Excellent. I’m sick of them! These żyds, they are not Russian.”

  “Of course not.”

  “They are not like us.”

  “How could they be like us?”

  “They stink and live on top of each other like vermin. They are uncultured.”

  “I quite agree.”

  “Take a long look at us, how far we have come. A proud nation. People are finally holding their heads up high. We did not fight in vain, Novak. You did not lose your leg for nothing.”