The cigarette had a foul taste. The men were fast, self-assured, walking to their cars. Some of the cars had been taken by thieves. It was a game of sorts. The cops were on Widok. Large sheets of glass doubled the world like a window to the other side. That’s what infinity looks like. Enter, and you wander till you’re shitfaced. The ways through the city are without number. It’s always possible to find a door, because any hope is good.
He reached Kniewskiego and turned at the Palladium to stand for a while in the recess by the entrance. Cars plunged into the tunnel with a screech. The view to the right was blocked by a furniture store where dummies fucked on leather sofas, because everything has to look real. A minute was enough, so he crossed and passed the Relax Cinema, remembering twenty-zloty tickets and the men with crafty and blank faces. They were always crowded in that dark walkway, their white T-shirts glowing like phosphorescent fish. They had cold blood and quick, self-possessed fingers. He feared them as he would dogs that don’t move.
Then there was the building by the public toilet and the big Sezam department store. He recalled the smell that filled its floors, with the food down below and all the other stuff upstairs. A steamy aroma, neither pleasant nor unpleasant, simply strong. He recalled the dark, rough surface of the stairs, where your shoes stuck as if glued. It made walking difficult, because teenagers like to shuffle. To the side was a place where sausage and pasta were served for under ten zlotys. One day when it was raining he went there and dropped a plate.
He waited for the green light, hopped on a number 18, and, eyes darting, rode for two stops.
He looked to either side before he went in. It was dark inside and warmer, the radio played Wolność with Szczota on drums, and the girl got up when she saw him.
“Good afternoon, boss,” she said.
He returned her greeting and carefully looked around.
“Was anyone here?” he asked.
“Just customers.”
“Have there been many?”
“The usual.”
Rain was slanting outside. The cloud would move on soon. His things lay on the shelves, worthless. He hadn’t yet paid for most of them. He went behind the counter, opened the till, counted the bills.
“Is this all?” he asked.
“All.”
“It’s not much.”
“At noon Mr. Zalewski came to collect what was owed him. A week ago you said he was first in line.”
“All right, Zosia,” he said quietly, though he felt like grabbing the metal box and hurling it at the mirror on the wall, then dropping into an armchair and covering his face with his hands.
“How much did you give him?”
“Ten million.”
He counted the bills once more: a thin bundle. As thin as death. He shuffled them, arranged them into pairs, threes, fours, but it didn’t change anything. He slammed the drawer and sat in a chair. When it creaked, he realized how still the place was. Just the radio playing; no sound of breathing.
“Zosia, I know I owe you for last month, but I’m taking this money. I need it now.”
“There has to be something in the till for the morning. I don’t have much of my own,” she said as if she were the one apologizing. Outside, the rain was almost over. Cars pulled the dust of drops behind them. A yellow Polonez passed a white Ford. The trees on the other side of the street glistened brown. She wore a gray skirt and a green blouse fastened at the neck with a silver brooch. He told her several times to wear less—“You understand, Zosia, for the clients”—but the next day she’d turn up the same. At the most there’d be no brooch and the top button of her blouse would be undone. Or her hair would be down, like today. He asked for coffee. When she went into the little back room, he saw her slender calves, her feet in their dark flat shoes. She was never late and never made the least miscalculation; she spoke little, spoke sensibly and softly; she had brown hair and did not wear lipstick. He found her through an ad in Gazeta Wyborcza.
The cup she handed him contained one level spoonful of sugar. The sight of the coffee made him sick, but he wanted to be nice and ask her for something. She smelled faintly of flower water; her fingernails were trimmed short and she wore a modest ring on the third finger of her left hand. She returned to her place behind the counter.
“No,” he said. “Close today at seven, Zosia, and don’t open tomorrow. We’ll take a short break. If something more comes in today, it’s an advance on what I owe you.”
Someone passed by the window. It was growing dark. Lights came on in the apartment building opposite. A black man, bent, crossed the street. A tram whined as it braked. A cold wind blew and gradually uncovered the stars.
“I forgot to turn on the light,” she said, flustered. The mirror reflected her figure distinctly, indifferently. His mind was a blank. He had a little more coffee before he left, looking out the window. In a first-floor apartment they were preparing a late dinner. He noticed the candy lamb.
“You brought the little sheep?”
“I did, but it can come down . . .”
“No. It’s fine there. Looks nice.”
It occurred to him that he could spend the night at her place. Somewhere in Ursynów in a two-room apartment: pine furniture, a braided runner in the hallway, a kitchen with a collection of wooden spoons, a portable television on the bookcase. He had known her for several months. A coffee table with red-and-white checkered tablecloth, a pink fluffy mat by the bathtub.
“Are you in trouble, boss?” she asked softly.
He smiled, put the cup and saucer back on the counter.
“Nothing much. Business.”
“If there’s any way I can help . . .”
He got up, went to the door.
“Thanks, Zosia. You don’t need to stay to seven. You can close sooner.”
He crossed the street and zipped up his jacket because of the wind. The stars silver, sharp as needles. From Dobrzańskiego a car stopped at the store and two men got out. One had something in his hand. She stood in the window, and he could practically see her assuming a polite expression. He walked slowly, turned on Biała, and ran to Elektoralna.
Meanwhile Bolek was eating meat and Syl was drinking grape juice. They sat in the black-and-gold room, the TV on, he wearing what he wore that morning and she in a white T-shirt. The pork chop on salad leaves surrounded by fries; beside it a glass of beer. Syl, bored, sipped her juice, watched the people on television, let them talk awhile, then killed them with the remote and went to other people, in some story or other, but they were all men, so she kept searching, a German commentator saying the names of Japanese motorcyclists, amusing for a moment, then a music channel, but they were songs from before she was born, so she tried a black-and-white Arabic channel where the same film had been on for three hours.
“Porkie, let’s go out.”
“You made dinner,” said Bolek, pointing at the plate with his fork.
“Not to a restaurant. Just out. To the movies, or dancing.”
“I can’t. I’m expecting a call.”
“You can take your cell with you.”
“I can’t. I might have to leave and take something from here.”
“I’m bored, Porkie.”
“Watch a video.”
“I’ve seen them all.”
“Call the store and have them bring new ones.”
“I don’t like videos. I like the movie theater.”
“Not today.”
“And not yesterday, not the day before yesterday, not tomorrow, not the day after tomorrow . . .”
Syl’s glass banged on the glass tabletop.
“You keep me here like it was prison, and you only have one thing on your mind.”
“Lucynka, today I really can’t.”
The phone tinkled, Bolek reached for it. He didn’t speak, just listened. “OK,” he said finally.
“You see, I told you.”
“At least lock Sheikh up. I don’t like the way he stares. You can’t move.”
&n
bsp; “He’s a good dog.”
“I know. But lock him up.”
Bolek went out into the hallway and dressed. When he was done, he looked in the mirror. Everything was right.
“I’m locking from the outside,” he said.
“Fuck, Porkie! You keep me here like—”
“Lucia, either I lock the door or I don’t lock Sheikh.”
She picked up the remote and went back to her search. In the window, purple clouds.
Still running, like a few hours before. He didn’t slow down till Marchlewskiego, at a bus stop where two old women were waiting and now him. There were no trams to be seen coming from Żoliborz. He considered a 17: it went directly south into the neighborhoods between Konstruktorska and Domaniewska, which would be deserted this time of day, with the terminus at the bottom of Marynarska where cars climb the overpass, close to heaven for a moment before they drop in defeat among the vegetable gardens. He could take refuge by the Cemia plant, on those creepy, windswept streets with not a soul around, a few caretakers at most, and nothing of interest for thieves. The cube warehouses and office buildings of Unitra with their dark, dirty windows, haunted at night by phantom robots. No one in his right mind had any business there. He’d go there if a 17 came. By the time it reached Woronicza it would be like an empty aquarium, cold as ice. He’d been there once. An early Sunday morning. Everything looked abandoned as soon as it was built. He’d heard about towns like that in America. No 17 showed, so he waited for a 29 to take him to Okęcie. A tram terminal in the early evening always circled a void. Shelters made of glass and tin over shadows and the glowing tips of cigarettes. Bills are riffled by fingers in pockets, to shorten the wait. Okęcie, he thought, where the city stops at Mineralna, then darkness from there all the way to Grójec. To the left, drab grass and the giant X of the two runways; inky lights behind a chain-link fence summon the planes, and the distant control towers are like the tops of sinking ships. The roar in the sky makes the earth seem twice as large, and uninhabited. Three stops before he once slept with a woman. But no 29 showed.
In the end, out in Muranów a single swinging light came into view. Then he remembered he didn’t have a ticket. From Hala Mirowska wafted the white stink of dead poultry. He went up to a woman in a light-colored coat and asked if she had a ticket she could sell him.
“Leave me alone!” she barked.
A number 19 finally.
He didn’t find a kiosk till Świętokrzyska. He bought tickets and two soft packs of Marlboro. He looked around for a large, dark car. He’d already counted five. They passed indifferently or sped by at the traffic circle. A Vento, a Vectra, an old Scorpio, and Christ knows what the other two were. He was gradually losing his fear, because he was losing hope. A glow spread from the right. Wola was almost extinguished; it was a little brighter in Poznań. A fringe of light over the skyscrapers near Central Station. A narrow black cloud, its sharp edge pointing down. The land was fading, the stars were coming out, and people were taking cover from the wind at bus stops. The sidewalks still wet. He guessed that in the night there’d be a frost and the puddles would ice over. He had a little over a million now, but it was too little to hide out somewhere until morning. He considered going home, but the fear returned, though he still had three days. Counting from this morning, so really only two. “Fucking wind,” he muttered. The collar of his jacket didn’t protect his neck. He thought of going to the Centrum to buy a hat, but decided on Central Station, because it was warm there for free.
The passageway was filled with the stink of trash cans set on fire. A teenage girl on roller skates passed him. She was dressed in tight-fitting black and wore a helmet. He caught the smell of sweat and perfume. His legs hurt. The girl was way ahead. Warm air came from the far end of the station. He turned right and went up the escalator to the main hall.
The brown light of the cafeteria barely hulled the faces from the dark. People ate, sat, slept like rag dolls, as if they’d been there forever. He couldn’t finish his second helping: the patty swam in overcooked cabbage, the cold potatoes were like salty custard. Below, a stream of cars flowed along the Aleje, their roofs like glimmering lights on the surface of dark water. He tried to focus on one particular person, for example the man in the red Honda, but couldn’t stay with him beyond the intersection with Krucza, terrified by the chasm of the Poniatowskiego Bridge, which at night was always a huge mouth, and you never knew for sure you’d come out whole on the other side. So he chose a white baby Fiat, which a moment later turned into Nowy Świat, drove down the Aleje Uzajdowskie, and reached the developments near Jałtańska, Batumi, Soczi. A man of fifty with a briefcase on the backseat. The briefcase smelled of sandwiches—slightly sour because the bread had sat too long in foil in a hot place. Under the rearview mirror hung a small medallion of Our Lady of Częstochowa. Those people can never get their hands clean. His brown jacket was fastened to the neck, and he wore a brown hat. He parked outside an apartment building and took the elevator to the sixth floor. His wife opened the door.
He turned from the window and saw a scruffy man in a green coat. From the man’s sleeves poked out another pair of sleeves, and from them a third pair. The man leaned forward a little and asked:
“Excuse me, sir, are you going to finish that?”
“I’m not,” he replied automatically.
“In that case I will,” said the man, sitting down. He ate calmly, not hurrying, a bite of patty, a little cabbage, a forkful of potatoes. Tattered dark-red wool at his wrists like rays.
“Pity it’s cold,” he said, swallowing. “Sometimes it’s hard to tell. You were sitting far from the door. I always look through the window first, and I only go in when I’m certain.”
“I bought two and couldn’t finish the second.”
“One person has two, another has a half. Not so bad, is it?” A red face, blue eyes. He didn’t stink. Maybe a little, like an unaired closet. When he finished, he said, “Thank you.” Some of his teeth discolored.
“You live here?”
“I’ve been here for some time. It’ll get warmer soon. This isn’t a good place.” The man looked around the room. “The witch is working here today. If you buy me tea, I can sit a while longer. She chucks people out if they don’t order.”
He took out a bill and put it in front of the man.
“Should I bring you some? Food’s awful greasy.” He nodded. The clock said 7:42. The man came back with two glasses of tea and change. They dropped the teabags in, watched the toffee streaks spread in the water.
“This place isn’t good, but at this time of day there’s little choice. East Station is worse—that’s the worst place on earth.” The man said it softly, as if someone were listening. “I lived there once. It was hell.”
“Why was it hell?” he asked, dropping the slice of lemon into his tea.
“Do you believe in the devil?” The man leaned across the table; he smelled his foul breath. “You know,” he whispered.
“I don’t.” He shrugged. “The devil?”
“See, if you don’t believe, then why should I tell you? It’s a story for believers.”
“And here?”
“It’s awful here too but bearable.”
“Like purgatory?”
The man chuckled.
“Something like that. Penance. You keep doing penance, but shit comes of it. You could do it your whole life, and nothing.”
The tea had stopped steaming in the half-empty glasses; it was almost eight. Two guards in black uniforms entered.
“Where there’s business, there must be a routine.”
“What business?”
“Give me a hundred, and I’ll do whatever you want, sir. When you don’t know anyone and you need something, a hundred for a middle man is nothing. A bottle, some powder, H, coke, ass, a boy, little girl, all of the above, eat in or carry out, at your place or in your car. Or maybe you need someone to take care of something? A straight hundred, boss.”
“Thanks. Maybe another time.”
“I’m here every two hours. Closer to the odd-numbered hours. Give me fifty at least.”
He set the money in front of the man and walked out onto the mezzanine. The man continued behind him: “But this isn’t an advance. If you need something, it’s a whole hundred.”
He leaned on the railing and looked down. The bum descended, crossed the hall, and joined the line at the kiosk. Before he reached the window, the bum changed his mind and set off toward the concourse. Two burly guys in bomber jackets leaned at him. He said something to them and pointed at the clock over the stairway that led to the platforms. One of them clapped him on the shoulder, then both men went down the steps.
The station light lent a corpselike pallor to all the faces. Every figure cast many weak shadows.
When the sliding doors clicked shut behind him, Emilii Plater was dark as usual, because even at night the Palace cast a shadow. The large block of sky moving over the neighborhood was cut off by the Domy Centrum department store and gnawed at the right by the notched edge of the buildings on the Aleje. People hid in the lighted buses. The 501, 505, and 510 were small caves hollowed out of black rock. The driver of the 505 went to get something to eat at a Vietnamese stall while the passengers wiggled their frozen toes in their shoes. He watched a 510 with a drooping belly pull away from the stop. One cigarette, two, separated him from the next bus. He could get in, ride to the end, and tidy up his place, sweep, put things in order, as usual, but more carefully. Just half an hour sitting with indifferent people with a single bridge between two voids, the colossus of the power station to the left, the chimneys with their red lights like an electric crown of thorns. So he lit a cigarette to measure time. The wind blew from around the corner, making sparks. He cupped the cigarette in his hand. A man in an unfamiliar uniform tried to light up, gave up, asked for a light from his cigarette.
Then, through the dirty panes of the sliding door he saw Jacek. The same suit, the same long mousy hair. Running toward the closed door. Two steps and on the moving part. The doors opened, and the gray figure flew past. Then a man in a bomber jacket came running. When he was half outside, Paweł kicked a metal trash can in front of him.
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