‘I don’t know. Probably for the same reasons as other young men. Besides, he’d been adopted and didn’t have a very good relationship with his adoptive father. But he did love his mother very much. I asked him straight out and he evaded the question, merely saying that silence is a virtue and he wasn’t going to say anything because – I remember this – a wise man will remain silent until the right moment. And one day he’d explain. Some such nonsense. I had no illusions. He was young, wanted to leave and left. Mrs Bończak didn’t say anybody like that had been at his mother’s funeral so he’s probably not back. You confirm it, so I must have seen somebody else. Probably someone’s got keys to the house and as, a friendly gesture or for a couple of złotys, is showing it to interested parties. Still, I’m glad I came. You’ve reassured me,’ she said in a relaxed voice.
Bartol’s head, on the other hand, was racing, racing to his desk, racing to Lentz, racing to Magda. Everything had become clear. Of course, someone had taken care of the child, the unwanted child of a sacrilegious union, and that child was now thanking everyone for it. Only the dull repetition in his head of the words ‘a wise man will remain silent until the right moment’ kept him on his chair. He didn’t want to note anything down; he wanted to wait. He must have had a foolish expression on his face because now it was she who was looking at him oddly. He took a deep breath.
‘Yes. It’s good you’ve come. And if, let’s say, the son were to pay you a visit, please let us know. His statements could prove very helpful.’ He smiled. He wanted to sound as natural as possible and ask a few less important questions so she wouldn’t go away convinced that she’d suggested who the main suspect could be.
He opened his internal files and printed out Pilski’s photograph. He wanted to make sure that, under the pretext of taking a holiday, he wasn’t conducting some sort of private investigation again.
‘Have you ever seen this man? Has he ever spoken to you?’
‘No. I’ve never seen him.’ She shrugged indifferently.
‘One last question.’ He reached into his file. ‘You know there were a great many paintings in Mr and Mrs Mikulski’s house but very few photographs. We found one in his escritoire, cut out of a newspaper. Perhaps it’s of no significance, but since you’re here maybe you know who it is.’ He congratulated himself ten-fold for having taken a company folder from the Elizabeth Garden Fun Factory warehouse. He’d taken it out of curiosity; only later did he see, and cut out, a photograph from some anniversary celebration showing the chairwoman, again in the background, but clearly suggesting she was the subject in hand: all the rest of the people were standing either in profile or the back. He passed it to Romana Zalewska. She gazed at it with a blank expression.
‘I know that for a pretty meagre contact with Mr and Mrs Mikulskis, I get around quite a bit. I don’t know the woman. Because that’s who you mean, isn’t it?’ she looked at him suspiciously.
‘I’ve already told you, we don’t know. Maybe it’s someone they knew or maybe the photo just happened to be lying around, but since you’re here I’m asking, that’s all.’
‘A domineering woman, a bit sad, not a bad figure, keeps herself upright. No, I don’t know her; don’t think I’ve ever seen her. You could ask Mrs Bończak. She once mentioned an elegant, quarrelsome ballerina. Whether that concerned Mikulski’s house or some other, I can’t tell you now.’
But Mrs Bończak, at a crowded stall handing one customer a pair of thongs, another customer a bra, could. ‘Yes, she was there, but how do you know this?’ He tried to call Magda not once, not twice, but fourteen times. She didn’t pick up. He still hadn’t got used to it.
Lentz, as usual, picked up after the first ring and, as usual, without needless questions resigned himself to setting aside everything he’d been doing and concentrating solely on Jan Mikulski, taking it to be a certainty that he was in Poland and was their chief suspect. Bartol merely added that they were in for a dreary procedural chase and the most recent photograph they had was on Facebook from his last class.
Bartol didn’t have time to reach headquarters and see the school photo before Magda phoned. Nor did he have time to say anything about her not having picked up the phone. She got there before him.
‘I couldn’t answer the phone but that doesn’t matter now. Listen carefully because the phone doesn’t charge itself and is going to run out of battery. How fast can you get to Gniezno?’
‘I’m in the car, but…’ Furious, he slipped into the lay-by. He wasn’t prepared for such a conversation and had no time to say anything.
‘Listen, I think I know who could have done it. In my opinion it’s Antoniusz Mikulski’s son, the first victim's, but let’s not waste time on details now, you’ve got to come here anyway. I’ll wait.’
‘In just under an hour,’ dumbstruck, he answered her earlier question and, without asking anything else, added: ‘Where shall I go?’
‘The cathedral. There’s a large, very historical one, you’ll find it. If my phone runs out, I’ll be there somewhere, probably in the old chapter house. There’s a baroque polychrome here…’
‘Where? What?’
‘In the chapter house, surrounded by the virtues – literally. The chapter house is where the chapter meets, in this case where the entrance usually is. A polychrome is a multi-coloured painting, on the ceiling in this case. Understand? Doesn’t matter if you don’t. Call the woman and ask whether she’s found something like a platter with the writing Omnibus omnia anywhere near her, or two blades, knives, something like that, with the writing Alter alterius since you think she’s the one concerned. I’m waiting.’
‘Spell it for me.’
Fortunately, she managed not only to sigh with patient sufferance but to spell the Latin words before the connection broke off.
Bartol collected his thoughts before phoning Elżbieta Ogrodniczak. She was unpleasant. She said only that she had no idea who Jan Mikulski was, hadn’t visited Poznań for twenty years, hadn’t received any suspicious gifts and hadn’t seen any Latin words anywhere near her recently, or Hebrew ones for that matter. She hoped she wasn’t suspected of anything and was allowed to travel because she was at the airport. On her way to the Paris Fair. When informed that it could be a matter of her own safety, she retorted that a squadron of lawyers – who were going to get in touch with him imminently – was watching over her safety. She didn’t answer the question as to when she’d return and turned off the phone.
That wasn’t the only phone she turned off. She turned off her second phone – her company one, her third – the land line at home; she turned off her laptop and computer. She turned off all the alarms. She turned off the world. And waited.
She waited as she carefully dressed in the morning, like someone waiting for somebody important. She waited as she made some tea – boiling more water than needed, coffee – filling the espresso machine to the brim. She waited sitting on the terrace. A second glass of water covered with a napkin also waited. Everything waited.
She waited. Ever since she’d received the mirror, she’d been waiting every minute, studying herself and her life in it. She searched for the eyes. She searched in the eyes of those who wanted to meet her and in the eyes of those she met by chance. She searched although she knew she wouldn’t find them because all she remembered were the frightened eyes of a child, and those eyes she’d never see.
So she waited.
But when he arrived, she didn’t see them either; he’d hidden them behind a pair of glasses. She remembered those glasses – the first luxury she’d owned – which he’d lifted off her the last time she’d picked him up. She hadn’t been able to pull them out of his clasped fist.
She’d missed those glasses.
Maciej Bartol found himself in Gniezno much sooner than he’d anticipated. He couldn’t miss the cathedral. From afar, too, he caught sight of Magda sitting on the steps by one of the side entrances. As he approached, he noticed two old women throw her a look full of disda
in. Magda half reclined with her elbow resting on the step above and her too-short skirt failing to cover the full length of her crossed legs. The women had a reason to complain. But he liked what he saw.
She wasn’t paying attention to anyone, didn’t see him until he stood right next to her. She sprung to her feet.
‘At last. I thought you’d never come.’
‘Couldn’t get here earlier. Tell me what you’ve found.’ He gestured at the cathedral door.
‘What? Exactly what I wanted. Aren’t you going to ask how?’
‘I thought I’d ask later.’
‘Where did you get that gift of spoiling the mood? Listen, because this is important and I’m not going to repeat myself. I've probably got an allergy from all those ancient papers. I looked through seventeen volumes of Dutch prints yesterday and there were still more. When I got home I saw some unpaid bills which must have got lost among the pile of cards and pieces of paper. Don’t look like that, it’s not your fault. I simply realised I was wasting time. I tidied everything up, put it away and decided to take a different approach. I realised I’d reached the Monastery of Apa Jeremias in Saqqara from the fifth century because some virtues figured there, but didn’t really have any idea what was in the church in Szamotuły in the sacristy, for example. Don’t look at me like that. I’ve still no idea what’s there. And it came to me like a bolt out of the blue. A restorer of old buildings. And Mikulski was a restorer, too. I thought I might find something hidden somewhere in some small town with a note saying it was going to be restored but hadn’t been described yet. But no, what I found was something that had already been restored fifteen years ago. Nobody had written anything about it. And this had been found not in some little roadside church but here, in Gniezno Cathedral. But now come and see for yourself.’
She said all this so quickly he didn’t even have time to think it over. And, without waiting for his reaction, she took him by the hand, opened the enormous door and pulled him into the depths of the cathedral.
He thought he’d remember something – after all, he’d been here on a school trip – but his only recollection was that of being told to stop chewing gum. He’d stopped and pretended to have swallowed it, then, when the teacher wasn’t looking, he’d stuck it to the nose of some bishop and skilfully stretched it over his face. The stunt had won him recognition and respect among his friends; it had been worth it. He couldn’t remember anything else.
But now he walked. Walked and looked around amazed, like a child.
At St Adalbert drowning in gold, at the twisted pillars which guarded him and looked as if they might come to life at any moment, might curl further and crush anyone who invaded the place.
At the enormous stained glass windows which seemed to change the speed of light and allow it only to spill lazily over the golden stucco work, the marble tombs, the stone floor.
At the priest who dozed in the huge confessional with an expression of bliss on his face almost identical to that of the bishops on the tombstones.
He looked as if he had only learned how to look esterday.
The cathedral was almost empty; only the subdued murmur of whispering, deadened by the measured thudding of his shoes and the clapping of Magda’s flip-flops.
They came to a halt right opposite the altar, on the other side of the church. There, where there would usually be an entrance, was an enormous wrought-iron grille which didn’t partition off an atrium but another room.
‘And now take a look,’ said Magda, opening the huge grille with surprising ease. They entered. In the light of a bulb hanging on a piece of rope, he saw an old built-in church pew, a huge candle, an old baptismal font, in the corner some banners carried during processions, and on the walls paintings depicting numerous human figures. He didn’t know what they represented, just as he didn’t know who the bishops in the portraits were.
‘For heaven’s sake, don’t look around, look at the ceiling, at the polychrome!’
And he saw it.
First a host of figures, each separate in its own frame, nearly every one holding something – colourful, old, probably beautiful. Until recently that’s all he would have said on the subject. He wouldn’t have known more – once, but not now. Slowly, very slowly he stopped just looking and started reading.
He noticed the three most important figures almost at once. Love gazing lovingly at the children surrounding her. Faith with a cross and Apostles’ Creed, which he now recognised as he read Credo in unum Deum. And the third, trusting and the most beautiful of them: Hope with an anchor, the only hope of a ship struggling in the seas raging behind her back.
They were the most important ones, centrally placed, but they weren’t alone. They only reigned over the rest. Over Justice with pursed lips, scales in one hand, sword in the other; over the gently smiling woman pouring water into a chalice and whom he recognised as Moderation. And over others whom he didn’t know.
‘What do a snake and mirror represent?’ he asked.
‘Prudence, one of the cardinal virtues. Even the snake is seen in a positive light from time to time. The phrase "be as prudent as snakes" comes to mind but I don’t know where from, but a mirror… There was a saying once: "What is contained in the mirror does not reside in the mirror". In other words, you have to look wider, not just at your own reflection. That figures. Justice is there, with the scales. As Job said: “if my foot hastened towards deception, may He weigh me on a just scale”, He meaning God, and punish me if necessary. Hence the sword.’
‘I recognised her. Moderation, too. I only don’t know who that one is, the one dragging something.’
‘It’s the only man in the group. He’s called Fortitude. It’s a bit biased. The virtues were generally personified by women because apparently they nurture and caress but, as you see, that obviously isn’t enough for Fortitude. He’s dragging a shattered pillar, like Samson, and hurrying to the stronghold at the top of the hill behind him. To God, in other words – the refuge of safety. I don’t know whether it’s intentional but he’s the only one who’s entering into a dialogue with those who look at him.’
‘What dialogue? I can’t see any speech bubbles.’
‘You won’t see if you don’t look. He’s the only one moving. He’s the only one turning round and looking at you as though inviting you, saying: follow me, don’t be afraid, I’m Fortitude, you be valiant too.’
Bartol stared for a long time. All the other figures were, indeed, either sitting or standing with no intention of going anywhere. But although he stared and stared he still didn’t feel he was being invited anywhere.
‘As for the other young ladies,’ Magda said after a while, ‘I’ve still got to think about them a bit, apart maybe from Silence – there in the corner.’ She indicated one of the figures kissing a ring. ‘I’m sure about her.’
‘Is "a wise man will remain silent until the right moment" written there?’
‘No.’ She looked at him astonished. ‘It’s Non Revelabo, which means: "I shan’t disclose". But look at the pictures in the cradles coming off the three virtues.’
He didn’t quite know what cradles were but didn’t have time to ask. He saw, and only then realised what he was really looking at.
‘He’s been here.’ These were the only words he managed.
‘He has indeed. The only thing that consoles me for having taken too long to look for it is that I was right from the start, apart from a few tiny details. Each of the three divine virtues is further commented upon by the symbolic images. Look at Hope. On one side she’s got sunflowers, hopelessly stooping as they wait to see another sunrise. And they’ll live to see it because that’s what’s written beneath them: expecto donec veniat – I wait until it appears. Perhaps the corpse lying on the other side isn’t a corpse at all. Perhaps it’s survived the raging ocean storm behind Hope because dum spiro spero, that is, as long as there’s life there’s hope. Maybe it’ll come to life at any moment. ‘
‘That doesn’t mea
n much to Antoniusz Mikulski anymore. He’s not going to come to life.’ As soon as he said this he had no doubt whatsoever that he’d already seen a body laid out in exactly the same position and girded with a red cloth. It, too, had seemed to be asleep, but for eternity.
‘No, not really. Now look at Faith. She believes in one God because that’s what’s written on the inscription in her hand and she’s holding a cross and host. On one side of her is the Eye of God watching her, and the inscription’s the same as the one we had on the glasses. Why is there an eye here and he put it on a pair of glasses? The only thing that comes straight to mind is that, in this way, he wanted to say that he’s only a man, that he needs the magnification of a pair of glasses or lenses, but that he’s watching all the same. Now look at the dog on her other side.’
‘He even looks like Harpsichord.’
‘Yes, going by what you showed me, yes, he does. And there’s the text about not holding too high an opinion of yourself. But do you know what this dog and Gawlicki make me think of right now, above all? A text from the Book of Revelations about those who didn’t enter the Kingdom of Heaven… It goes something like this. Outside are dogs, lecherers, murderers, blasphemers and all who love falsehood and live by it. It fits in with his character, doesn’t it?’
‘Very much. That leaves Love.’
‘Yes. And there are two representations here, too. I’ve still got to check but take a look. Two crossed blades symbolise joint action. The inscription below reads: Alter alterius. It’s an extract from the Letter to the Galatians: “Carry each other’s burdens.” I still don’t know how this fits in but…’
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