A Blind Eye: Book 1 in the Adam Kaminski Mystery Series

by Jane Gorman

  At first, Adam wasn’t sure what he was looking at. Flipping through three folders, he saw a word or two he recognized, but nothing that helped explain why Wilenek had been destroying them.

  Finally, he saw a word stamped on the front of one of the folders: Służba Bezpieczeństwa. These were the records from the secret police. The records that could be used to verify someone’s lustration statement, if necessary.

  Whoever had hired Wilenek to kill Basia and Łukasz had also paid him to destroy the evidence.

  That’s what this has been about all along. Not corruption, not connections with the Russian mafia, not illegitimate children. It was all here, if anyone had taken the time to dig. It was only a matter of time before it came out.

  Only one name Adam recognized appeared consistently on all of the sheets: Tomek Malak.

  These were the records of Malak’s meetings with the secret police. These were proof that he had acted as an informant under the previous regime, meeting with the secret police, sharing information on the activities, plans, even thoughts of his friends and comrades. Exposing them to questioning, arrest, torture.

  Why would he have done it? Adam asked himself this question as he stuffed the papers into his coat to take them to Łukasz for translating. Had he been forced? Was he a willing informant, seeking recompense for his knowledge, or just another victim of this deadly history?

  He paused as he realized that for him, the more important question was, did Sylvia know? She worked with him so closely, she must have at least suspected.

  Shaking his head, Adam pushed the thought away. He needed to get to Malak before Wilenek did.

  50

  Lights gleamed from every window in the front of Malak’s house, just as they had the first time Adam had been here. But he saw no figures profiled in the windows.

  He approached the ornate wooden door. Someone was moving around inside, making small noises that Adam could just hear over the pounding of his own heart. He raised his hand in the air, then held it there, balled into a fist, while he took a breath. The air was heavy with the scent of juniper and burning wood.

  He knocked, loudly. The noise inside the house stopped.

  Adam waited.

  Ten seconds later, the door opened. Malak stood in the entranceway, this time dressed in a dark blue track suit, a silver streak running down the sides of his legs. He held a thick crystal tumbler in one hand, and he used this to wave Adam inside. As it moved through the air, fumes from the scotch trailed behind.

  Malak led the way into his opulent living room, then turned to Adam without sitting. Adam stood near the doorway, and the two men faced each other.

  “You’ve done well for yourself, Pan Malak.” Adam gestured around the gaudy room.

  Malak nodded. “Yes.”

  They fell silent again, and Adam considered his options. They weren’t many.

  “You knew Stefan Wilenek.” Adam finally spoke. “From your time in university.”

  Malak nodded and took another sip of his drink. He didn’t speak, so Adam continued.

  “He was your contact. With the Polish secret police. He was the one you would give the information to. When you were informing on your colleagues. Your friends.”

  Malak glared at Adam, the contempt and hatred in his eyes so strong Adam felt them physically repulsing him.

  “You provided information in return for what — security? Because you believed in the cause?”

  No response from Malak.

  “Money?”

  Malak blinked and Adam knew he had hit home.

  “You informed on your friends, turning them in when they were standing up for what they believed in, fighting for what they believed could really happen here in Poland. And you did it for money?” Adam grabbed the back of a chair, squeezing his fingers around the carved wood, its solidity helping him keep his mind in the present, ignoring the sound of dirt hitting a coffin.

  Malak’s anger, which had been barely controlled, flared. “Yes, I did it for money. They were ridiculous. Ideologues. What they believed, what they wanted, that could never happen. How could a labor union succeed against the mighty communist regime? Their cause was already lost. I was not hurting them. I was looking to the future.”

  “Your future.”

  “Yes, my future. I enjoyed the politics, I enjoyed the thrill of feeling like we were doing something big. But I am practical. I knew that in the end it would not succeed. And I would be on the side of the winner. And I would be rich.”

  “They did succeed. And you were so ashamed of what you had done, you lied on your lustration form.”

  “I was on the side of the winner after all, it turned out. No one needed to know the truth. They saw me as one of them. A compatriot.”

  “You had betrayed them.”

  Malak’s voice softened, took on a whine. “Who could have expected this? Who could have expected Solidarity to succeed? No one… even the sharpest academic minds of the time thought it impossible. It was impossible. No, I made the right choice.”

  “So you prospered. You rose in prominence in the political circles within the student movement of Solidarity. And at the same time, you were bringing in extra cash by selling out your friends. When Solidarity won, you must have been quite disappointed. Your secret well had dried up; how were you going to make a living?”

  Malak laughed without humor. “There are always ways to make money for someone who wants it badly enough.”

  “Small things. Taking a little bit here, a little bit there. Not enough so anyone would complain, even if they did notice.”

  “And all the time, I have been doing great things for Warsaw. Look at the business I have brought in. Look how the economy is thriving under my leadership. Look how the people are happy. We are a democracy. And I am a hero to them.”

  “If the truth ever came out about your past, you would lose all this. You would lose your job. You would lose the respect of the people. You would lose everything.”

  “I could not let that happen, you must understand.” Malak sounded almost apologetic. “I cannot let that happen.”

  The sound of a door closing from a connecting room was as soft as a puff of air, but it set Adam’s hair on end. Keeping his eyes on Malak, he moved cautiously to the door leading into the kitchen and listened. Footsteps, he was sure of it, in a room beyond the kitchen.

  Malak took another long drink from his scotch then sat heavily in one of the silk chairs. He raised his eyebrows and dipped his head toward Adam. Adam stepped through to the kitchen.

  51

  Only a small light over the sink was lit, the kitchen in semi-darkness, looking out over an even darker back yard. Behind him, lights shone through the doorway from the living room he had just left, casting shadows from the table and chairs midway through the room. On the far wall, another doorway, another room in semi-gloom.

  A shadow moved in that room. Adam heard a door open and shut. He saw the shadow moving in the dark yard.

  He followed with caution, stepping slowly into the side room, seeing the back door resting lightly on its latch, not fully closed. More shadows loomed here, bizarre shapes created by the distant light blocked by high-backed carved mahogany chairs, marble busts on turned wood pedestals, a dark porcelain vase on a low shelf that jutted out into the room.

  He pulled the door toward him, then leaned to the side, careful not to stand in the doorway, exposed to whoever might be out there. Though he had a pretty good idea who he was following.

  Stefan Wilenek scared him, Adam could admit that to himself. A man trained to kill, a man with a lot of experience to back up that training. He had never killed a man. And he didn’t want to start now — not when he was acting as a civilian. A civilian already wanted by the police for a different murder.

  Seeing nothing in the shadows outside, Adam stepped quickly through the door. He paused with his back up against the house. The rich scent of the juniper again caught at his throat and he coughed.

 
“I could kill you right now.” A voice floated out of the darkness, thick, Russian, menacing.

  “I have no doubt,” Adam responded in an even voice. “That’s what you have been paid to do.”

  “But where’s the fun in that?” The voice carried a smile in its tone.

  Adam shivered involuntarily and stepped to his right, away from the door and deeper into the shadows cast by the large bushes that lined the walkway away from the house. The cloying scent grabbed at him again. He listened carefully, but the silence was broken only by the distant sound of a bus on the main street blocks away. So far away.

  Adam heard a footfall. Soft, treading in the dirt that lined the path. Only a few feet away.

  Adam moved again, crossing the path in front of him in a single stride then moving through a dormant flower bed to a grove of small trees that stood off to one side. Blending in, he hoped.

  “What do you think is going to happen here tonight, Pan Kaminski?” the voice asked.

  “I think we are both going to live through this,” Adam answered. “I think you are going to walk away and I am going to expose Tomek Malak for what he has done. For what he is.”

  A sharp laugh like a brief explosion. “Why would I walk away, when I have you now?”

  “Because the truth is out there. I found the documents that you failed to destroy in the archives. They prove Malak’s guilt, his trail of lies. They are safe, and they will be published. No matter what happens to me.”

  “Ah yes, your cousin. The journalist. The one who refuses to die.”

  “It’s too late, Wilenek. The truth is out. You can kill me… kill Łukasz… keep killing, but it won’t matter. It won’t be hidden any more.”

  “And what if I just want to kill you for the fun of it? And walk away.”

  Adam shrugged. “I guess that’s your choice. It will be one more murder to hold against you when the police finally catch up with you.”

  “One more… I have killed so many, Pan Kaminski, one more will make no difference to me. No difference to the court of law.”

  “When Malak is arrested — and he will be arrested, I assure you — he will squeal. Just like he informed on his compatriots before the fall, he will inform on you. He will tell everything he knows just to save his own skin.” Adam spoke quickly. “You know him. You know I’m right.”

  There was silence. Adam took this as a good sign.

  “He will be arrested soon — tomorrow, probably. You need to get away, to save yourself. And you need to go, now. Every minute counts. The police will track you. They know your techniques, they know your style. They will find you. You can’t afford to waste any more time here, serving a master who is already destroyed.”

  Silence. No response. Then Adam heard the light puff of air that he knew was the back door being gently opened and closed.

  52

  He moved carefully. Slowly. Too carefully, it turned out. He was too late.

  Malak lay back in the same gilded chair. He leaned awkwardly to one side, one arm dangling down to the ground, the other propped on the arm of the chair pointing toward the heavens.

  His tumbler had come lose from his grip and rolled uselessly on the ground. The scotch seeped into the thick woven fibers of the carpet and the room reeked of it.

  The knife was still there, protruding from his side, as if one of the dark branches from the garden had somehow materialized here, in this room of wealth and safety.

  Adam paused at the doorway, seeking out the shadows in the corners of the room, listening for Wilenek’s breathing. He saw nothing, he heard nothing. Malak blinked, and Adam moved.

  He went first to the phone on a polished walnut desk beneath the window. After calling for help, he went back to Malak and knelt at his side.

  Malak was moving his hands, without full control, trying to grab at the knife. “Wilenek,” he mumbled, “Wilenek.”

  “Stop, leave it.” Adam put his own hand gently on Malak’s arm. “You should leave it in, until the medics arrive. They’ll take care of you.”

  Malak shifted and grimaced with the pain, then turned his blood-red eyes to Adam. “It is better this way, perhaps. I could not have lived with the truth. I could not have looked my people in the eyes knowing that they knew what I had done.” He groaned slightly and licked his lips.

  “People will know, Malak. The truth will still come out.”

  “Perhaps.” Malak spoke softly. “Perhaps.”

  “Łukasz will publish what he found. He’s seeking justice for his daughter — a daughter you had killed. He’ll make sure everyone knows what you did. The people of Warsaw, the people of Poland. The people you work with — Sylvia…”

  Adam stopped himself when he saw a light smile play on Malak’s lips at Sylvia’s name.

  “Sylvia,” Adam repeated, almost to himself. His chest constricted. “She knows?” He whispered the question.

  Malak smiled. “My Sylvia. She trusts me. She has always trusted me.” His eyes sprang open and he stared madly at Adam. “You must protect her. My Sylvia. You must take care of her. She is an innocent. She will only be hurt by this.”

  Adam’s thoughts were flying wildly. He stood from where he had been kneeling by Malak’s chair and paced around the room.

  “How much does Sylvia know? Does she know you killed Basia?”

  Malak groaned again, and once more reached for the knife. Adam grabbed his arm, more sharply this time. “Tell me what Sylvia knows.”

  “You must protect her,” Malak said, “she knows nothing, you must protect her from this, from what will happen when the truth is told. No one will believe that she is innocent, no one will believe her.”

  Sirens cut through the night, growing louder as the ambulance approached the house.

  “I can’t protect her if I’m in jail.” Adam spoke slowly, watching Malak.

  Malak nodded his understanding. “It was Wilenek. Wilenek killed Basia. Wilenek killed small Jurij in the street, to try to frame you. And now Wilenek has killed me.”

  The ambulance pulled into the driveway. Adam heard running steps on the path, then hands on the door. He stepped quietly out of the room, heading for the backyard.

  As he rounded the side of the house, he saw Malak carried out on a stretcher, two medics by his side, a uniformed police officer following closely behind, his notebook open.

  “Stefan Wilenek,” Malak was repeating, “you must find Wilenek.”

  53

  The sky hovered low overhead, a dark gray pressing down on him as Adam moved through the city streets. He shivered beneath his coat and dug his bare hands deep into his pockets, but he kept moving.

  Trams and buses had long since stopped running for the night and wouldn’t start up again for a few more hours. He picked up his pace, knowing it would take over an hour to cover the distance back to Sylvia’s apartment.

  He stayed on the main streets and hugged the buildings as he walked. The rough gray concrete that covered most of the city reflected the Soviet-era regime’s plan to create a city that would withstand the tests of time. They had thought only of wind and rain, snow and ice, not of the disdain of architects and artists.

  Square block after square block of apartment buildings, stores, schools, barely distinguishable one from the other. Here and there, new construction stood out, colorful, round, angled, glimpses of joy and creativity against the dull background.

  As Adam walked, he felt the hope of the city around him and he thought about his own hopes. He hoped that Sylvia was safe at home, away from the danger he had faced that night. Hoped she wasn’t part of Malak’s plot. Hoped she hadn’t known of his attempts at Łukasz’s life, his success at robbing Basia of hers.

  The wind bit into his face and broke through the defenses of his woolen coat. He turned his shoulder as a cold blast blew across a wide intersection, stinging his ears with its bitter chill.

  As he got closer to the Old Town, the buildings gradually changed. More and more new construction stood alon
g the street, blotting out the dull grayness of the older architecture. Buildings designed to look like historic structures, designed according to the tastes of Poles generations ago. Buildings reclaiming Warsaw’s identity and style.

  The sun had barely tinged the sky with streaks of orange and pink when Adam reached Ulica Miodowa, when he saw the giant metal men crawling out from their concrete bunker. Pausing, he searched for the police guard that had been present the past few days. He finally found the uniformed officer, sitting in a doorway a few doors down from Sylvia’s, his head lolling against the stone wall. Asleep.

  He ran the last few yards to Sylvia’s door, then leaned on the bell. Glancing up, he saw that her apartment was dark, the curtains pulled tight.

  He rang again. And again. And again.

  Still there was no response.

  He leaned on the bell for almost thirty seconds. He saw a curtain twitch in the apartment above Sylvia’s, but he didn’t care. He leaned on the bell again.

  He was still pushing it when the front door flew open. Sylvia stood there wrapped in her pink robe. She started shivering as soon as she opened the door. Glancing quickly up and down the street, she grabbed Adam’s arm and pulled him into the building.

  Without saying a word, she turned and ran up the stairs to her apartment. Adam followed closely behind.

  Inside, she threw herself onto the sofa and wrapped herself in a thick, sheepskin rug. When all Adam could see was the tip of her head, she spoke.

  “Well? Where have you been? What have you found?” she asked quietly.

  Adam looked at her — at what he could see of her. He trusted her, he told himself again. She had helped him. She had been the one who suggested going to Malak for help. She wouldn’t have done that if she had known he was involved. Would she?

  “Tell me about Malak, Sylvia. Tell me what you know.”

  She peered out at him over the blanket, her blue eyes questioning. “What do you mean? You know Tomek, you know about him.”