Rag and Bone: Billy Boyle 05

by James R Benn

  “Because Lieutenant Kazimierz trusts you,” Horak said. “And we would be fools not to take notice of your connection with the esteemed general. And you would be a fool to think your friend brought you here under false pretenses. He speaks well of you, and this luncheon was entirely my idea.”

  “OK,” I said. “How about a cup of coffee, and then you fill me in?” We moved to a pair of sofas facing each other by the fireplace. Radecki brought a file and sat across from me, kneading his thigh.

  “War wound?” I asked as the coffee was poured.

  “I wish it had been,” Radecki said with a wry smile. “It was a tram accident, in Bucharest. The bone was not set properly, but I had no time to go back to the hospital. I had a freighter to catch in Constanta, on the Black Sea. Otherwise I would have been trapped in Romania.”

  “It looks painful,” I said.

  “It is. I fell again, hurrying on the stairs recently, and aggravated it. My doctor has prescribed laudanum, which I take only when I cannot sleep. They say they can reset the bone, but it would be a long convalescence. After the war, perhaps.”

  “Captain Radecki knows I rely on him,” Horak said. “With so few experienced officers, he is worth more with a bad leg than ten junior officers.” He gave a nod to Radecki to begin.

  “I am sure you know the basics, Billy,” Radecki said. “But, to summarize, in September 1939 the Germans attacked Poland, the beginning of this war. England declared war on Germany, but could do nothing to aid us. The Russians, who had a nonaggression pact with Nazi Germany, then invaded our nation from the east. The Russians and Germans divided Poland between them.”

  “I know,” I said. “It was a raw deal.” I drank the hot coffee, remembering the newspaper headlines at the time. There had been rumors of peace, with the most optimistic, or naive, thinking that with the two big powers in eastern Europe in cahoots, it might end quickly. I guess if a few small countries had to take it on the chin, that didn’t bother some people much.

  “Indeed. The Russians took a quarter of a million Polish troops prisoner. They released many of the lower ranks, and turned thousands over to the Germans. Ultimately, they were left with forty thousand. Officers from all services, plus many professionals who had been arrested. Physicians, clergymen, teachers, judges, and so on.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “If the Russians and Germans were taking everyone prisoner, how did so many Poles make it out? How did you two end up here, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  “The border with Romania was open,” Horak said. “Many of us crossed the border after the fighting, before either side had firm control. My unit was in the Carpathian Mountains, south of Krakow. After the Russians and German forces met, some of us made it on foot into Romania. From there, we went to France, where Polish forces were reorganizing.”

  “I also went through Romania, paying bribes to get a ship on the Black Sea to take me to Palestine,” Radecki said. “The Germans were putting pressure on Romania, which was then neutral, to intern all Polish nationals. The escape route did not last long.”

  “Meanwhile,” Kaz said, “the Russians were trying to convince their Polish prisoners of the virtues of Communism. We know they spent a lot of time in the camps interrogating everyone, trying to find converts.”

  “There were very, very few,” Radecki said. “Perhaps that sealed their fate. For months, letters had been going to families back in Poland. In April 1940, the letters stopped. Mail that had been sent to prisoners was returned. Thousands of parcels and envelopes came back to Poland ‘Addressee unknown.’”

  “Apparently the decision had been made to eliminate any future threat to Soviet domination of Poland,” Horak said. “Stalin did not foresee the Nazi invasion of Russia, and thought the Polish officers were an unnecessary surplus. So they were eliminated.”

  “But in June 1941, the Nazis did invade Russia,” Radecki said. “Suddenly, the remaining Polish prisoners, mostly enlisted men, were needed to fight Germans. Stalin kept the few tame Poles to form a Polish unit within the Russian Army, and let all the others go. They came from 138 camps. A center at Buzul’uk was set up to take in the released prisoners and send them on to the British in the Mediterranean.”

  “General Wladyslaw Anders was in charge, Billy. You may have met him in Italy.”

  “Yes, I did. He’s commander of the Second Polish Corps.”

  “Right,” said Radecki. “One of the first things Anders discovered was that he had practically no senior officers. He was one of sixteen generals captured by the Russians, but only one other general was accounted for. According to our estimates, we were missing, from one camp alone, one hundred colonels, three hundred majors, one thousand captains, twenty-five hundred lieutenants, and hundreds of cadets, doctors, teachers, engineers, and so on.”

  “This was the camp at Kozielsk,” Kaz said. “These were the victims who were shot in the back of the head and buried in mass graves. There were thousands of others, killed in other locations.”

  “But the Germans found the graves from Kozielsk?”

  “Yes. In the Katyn Forest, outside of Smolensk. In April of last year, the locals told them what had happened. They unearthed the bodies, and revealed the crime to the world.”

  “But the Nazis,” Radecki said, “being murderers themselves, were not believed by many. Not the press, certainly. But we knew that, for once, they told the truth. We asked the Red Cross to investigate, and for this crime, Stalin cut off relations with the Polish Government in Exile.”

  “And formed his own puppet regime,” put in Horak.

  “So where does all this leave us?” I asked.

  “For now, we will go on fighting wherever we can. But we must prove Russian guilt beyond all doubt, so that when Germany is defeated, we can go home to a free country, not one dominated by the Soviet Union,” Horak said.

  Radecki opened the file and tossed a stack of photographs on the table between us. An open pit with layers of bodies, the army greatcoats and boots marking each man an officer. Close-ups. A neat hole in the back of each head. Hands tied behind the back with rough twine.

  “Is this how they were all killed? Hands tied, and a bullet in the back of the head, I mean.”

  “For the most part, yes. Reports from the Red Cross indicated that some had their hands tied with barbed wire. There were some with stab wounds from bayonets, but those were in the minority, likely those who resisted at the last minute,” Radecki said, lighting another cigarette. “It appears they were driven into the woods, then forced to walk to the pits. Each man saw, and heard, what was done to those who went before him.”

  It was a horrible vision, but what I was seeing was not a forest outside of Smolensk. It was a London neighborhood near the Liverpool Street Tube Station, where a dead Russian was found, his hands bound behind his back with string, and a single bullet hole to the back of the head. I looked at Kaz and wondered.

  “It is a terrible sight, isn’t it?” Radecki asked.

  “Can you be certain this wasn’t done by the Germans and then blamed on the Russians, as a propaganda ploy?”

  “Yes, we are certain, and so is the International Red Cross. The bodies were all heavily clothed, which points to the date of the killings as being April of 1940, when the temperature was still quite cold. The Russian story is that the Germans captured the Poles in August 1941, when they were performing roadwork as part of a labor detail. The clothing does not make sense for hot, dusty summer work.”

  “And there is the matter of the letters,” Horak said. “Both the letters that were returned, and the fact that many letters and other documents were recovered with the bodies. None had a date after April 1940.”

  “This is a Russian crime, Billy. A mass murder. And no one wants to hear about it,” Kaz said. “The British government worries that a split over this might move the Russians to make a separate peace with the Germans. They are quite willing to let us die to defend England, but they will not seek justice for our murde
red dead.”

  “Look at this,” Radecki said, handing me a memo on the stationery of His Majesty’s Government. It was from Anthony Eden, British foreign secretary, to Winston Churchill, on the Katyn revelations. One line stood out:

  His Majesty’s Government have used their best efforts not to allow these German maneuvers to have even the semblance of success.

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “The best efforts of a government in peril often bring out the worst they are capable of,” Radecki said as he took the memo back. “It means that the British will never reveal that the Russians were responsible for the executions. It is not in their interest.”

  “How did you get this letter?”

  “Remember, London is a city of spies.”

  “I will,” I said, looking Radecki in the eye, and wondering if he went out armed, and what caliber his weapon was. “Do you think the American government will listen to you if the British won’t?”

  “We hope so. We hear that General Eisenhower is a fair man.”

  “Major Horak,” I said, appealing to the ranking officer present. “If there is one thing the general values above all, it is Allied unity. Fair or not, I don’t see him risking that, no matter how strong your evidence. You could argue it was all circumstantial. A clever plot by the Nazis to divide the Allies. There are no living witnesses, except Russians.”

  “That is not quite the case, Lieutenant Boyle. There is someone we would like you to meet.” He nodded, and Radecki and Kaz left the room. “There is a witness. Lieutenant Kazimierz will bring him in. It is best if Captain Radecki is not present. He may make him somewhat nervous.”

  “Why?”

  “The ordeal has been difficult, and he would prefer to not speak of it. Radecki had rather insisted, and the poor fellow suffered a setback, so we kept them apart for a while. Then we tried again, and their relationship improved greatly, but still, there is no need for a crowd. Our guest does have a nervous disposition. Ah, here they are!” The door opened, and Kaz entered the room with a young man. Kaz had his arm around him, and I wasn’t sure if it was to keep him from falling over or running away. His eyes flitted around the room, as if he was searching for an unknown threat. Kaz whispered something to him and he relaxed as they drew nearer.

  “Tad, this is my friend, the American I told you about. Billy, this is Tadeusz Tucholski.”

  “Glad to meet you,” I said, standing and extending my hand. Tadeusz flinched.

  “It’s all right,” Horak said in a calming voice. “We are all good friends here.”

  “Yes, yes, sir,” Tadeusz said. “Sorry.” He and Kaz sat on the couch together. Tadeusz was dressed in the same uniform with the Poland shoulder patch, but he wore no indication of rank or other insignia. He looked maybe twenty, but it was hard to tell. His face was thin and pale, and his dark eyes seemed to bulge out of their sockets. He rubbed his hands together, rubbed them on his pants, then together again. He studied them for a minute, and then spoke without moving his eyes off them.

  “They want me to tell you, to tell you what I saw. I don’t want to, but I will. I know it is important.” The words came out in a rush, the rapidity of his speech at odds with the stillness of his body.

  “If you want to,” I said. “Do you want some coffee?”

  “Coffee?” He sounded like it was the oddest question he’d ever heard. “Yes, please.” I poured a cup from the silver coffee service and put it down in front of him. I filled my cup and held it, wisps of steam drifting above it. I took a sip, and it was still warm.

  “I was a cadet,” Tadeusz began. “When the Russians came, I was a cadet, in training to become an officer, you understand? In a special school for cadets.”

  “Yes, I understand,” I said. He spoke English well, though with a heavy accent.

  “They took us prisoner. It was terrible. At first, they put all of us in the basement of a building. They left us there for three days. No food, no bathroom. A little water, nothing else. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Three days, over one hundred cadets. In a dark basement. Do you understand?” He took the cup and saucer in his hands. They trembled, and the china made a clattering, clinking sound as he spilled coffee into the saucer. Kaz took it from him gently and touched his arm.

  “Then we spent two days and two nights in railcars. There was bread and water. It was bad, but not as bad as the basement. There was fresh air, and we had something to eat. Do you understand?” He raised his voice, the question insistent.

  “Yes, I do. It wasn’t as bad.”

  “No, and then they marched us to the camp. There were showers, and barracks. Soup for dinner. We thought the worst of it was over. They let us write home. They questioned us, each of us, alone. They seemed to know a great deal about us, what our parents did, what youth groups we belonged to. There were many rumors, always about going to Romania. They were going to send us there any day. But that day never came.”

  “What happened next?” Kaz prompted him.

  “They came for me one morning. I thought it would be more of the same. More questions about school, the other cadets, and about Marxism. They wanted us to believe in Marx and Stalin, but no one listened. I thought it was going to be more of the same. But they beat me. A big NKVD sergeant, he started beating me while an officer sat in a chair and watched. No one said anything. Then they threw me out into the snow.

  The next day, they came for me again. This time the officer sat at a table. He had a confession for me to sign. It was in Russian, and he told me it was my confession about spying for the Germans.”

  “But you were just a kid,” I said.

  “They said my father was a spy. He had been to Berlin, for business meetings. He was an architect, so it was normal for him to travel. I tried to explain, but they said we were all spies, all capitalists, my father, mother, and little sister, we were all enemies of the people. He told me my father had confessed, and showed me a piece of paper with his signature. It was his, I recognized it. I knew they had forced him, I knew he was not a spy, not an enemy of anyone. He was an architect, do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. They told me it was important for you to understand. I wouldn’t talk about it otherwise. It’s too painful.”

  “You don’t have to, you know.”

  “Yes, I must, it is my duty. I did not sign. They told me they would be lenient with my mother and sister if I signed. But I was smarter than that. I knew that if my mother and sister had confessed, they would have shown me their signatures. But they hadn’t. They beat me. They put me in solitary confinement. But I didn’t sign.”

  “Good for you.”

  “Perhaps, but I am not sure. One day the officer who interrogated me was gone. They stopped coming for me. Spring came, and then one day they announced we would be leaving the camp. Romania, we thought. Finally. They took us out in small groups, marching out the main gate, everyone in good spirits. The most senior officers went first. I was in one of the last groups. We marched to a train. NKVD guards stood along the road and prodded us with bayonets, forcing us into railcars, like the ones that had brought us to the camp. It was springtime, but it was cold, very cold. We wore everything we owned.” Tadeusz shivered and rubbed his hands together. “Someone realized we were not traveling south toward Romania. I didn’t know what to think. The train stopped and they had buses and trucks back right up to the cars. They shoved us in, packed us in tight, so we almost couldn’t breathe. When the truck finally stopped, they hauled us out and tied our hands behind our backs. No one knew what was going on, and the guards cursed at us, kicked us, hit men with their rifle butts. They marched us into the woods, on a muddy road, still screaming at us to hurry, hurry. I began to hear popping noises, like firecrackers, lots of firecrackers. The noise would start up and then stop, start and stop. More guards came, with pistols in their hands. One had blood on his sleeve. I was scared, but there was no time to do any
thing, nowhere to go, it was all shouts and pop pop pop, I couldn’t think. There were NKVD officers standing around with clipboards and lists of names. They took a group of ten men in front of me and pushed them up and over a hill. I heard the shots, and then they came for us, bayonets sticking into our backs. They were calling us Polish pigs, telling us to hurry, hurry, or they’d shoot us right there. I fell at the top of the hill when I saw what was there. A huge pit, and it was full of bodies. I remember thinking it was astounding that so many of us had run to our deaths like that. I saw four men kneeling and a Russian walk behind them, bang, bang, bang, bang, and they all tumbled into the pit. There were men in the pit— Russian prisoners, they looked like, not Poles—stacking the bodies. One row of heads in one direction, the next row feet in that direction. It was so unbelievable that I was no longer afraid. I sat on the ground while madness went on around me. I don’t know why they left me there, although it was only a minute or so. I saw men pushed up the hill, saw pistols being reloaded, saw more bodies fall. It was mechanical, like a killing factory, except we were in the woods, on a beautiful, clear spring day. I see every moment of that minute, over and over again, every day. Every hour. Every night. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I whispered. “How …” I didn’t have to finish, the question was obvious.

  “The NKVD officer, the one who had questioned me. He was there, and he had a list of names. There were six of us. You see, he’d had appendicitis. He was in hospital, and hadn’t finished his interrogations. He was angry that we’d been sent to the forest with the others, since he needed to produce confessions. Well, a dead man can’t confess, can he? He had a guard detail, and they beat us, but that was nothing. They put us into a Tshorni Voron and drove us to the NKVD prison in Smolensk.”

  “A what?”

  “Tshorni Voron, Black Raven in Russian. A special NKVD bus for transporting prisoners. Locked compartments on either side, just big enough for one person to squat. You can’t stand, can’t sit. When you see the Black Raven, you see death itself.”