The Girl From the Train

by Irma Joubert

  “I’m going to the Zispo factory,” said Mr. Drobner. He looked worried.

  “I’ll walk to the fair,” said Jakób. “I’m sure it’ll be open.”

  But his feet took him to the square instead, where he joined a crowd of disgruntled compatriots fed up with the struggle to survive. As he walked along, he listened to their frustrations, their dashed hopes, and their suffering. He shared their conviction that things had to change. A sense of pride grew inside him, a confidence that Poland would not succumb to Russian domination.

  The stream of people grew, became wider and thicker, pressed forward. They were joined by workers from factories and offices, some carrying banners, most of them hastily assembled: “Give us bread.” “We demand lower prices and higher wages.” “Freedom and bread—now.”

  Jakób was swept along, part of the crowd, one with the crowd. He saw overalls and heavy boots, rough hands. He heard voices, women’s voices as well, some with a child on the hip or one by each hand. All we want is a decent life, they were saying, the same as our people for centuries before us. He smelled the people around him—his people. Adrenaline rushed through his veins. It might be a peaceful march, but it was the first stab, the first instance of public rebellion against Russian domination since the war had ended.

  The Polish sun blazed down from above, from below the street reflected the heat, around him he felt the press of warm human bodies. He was glowing, but not because of the hot day; there was a heat inside him he had almost forgotten existed.

  On the square in front of the city hall the stream dammed up. By ten o’clock a great mass of people filled the square. They had been joined by students singing patriotic songs and waving banners that read: “Away with the Russians! We want freedom!” “Away with false Communism!” “Away with dictatorship!” “Away with Soviet domination!”

  The events were beginning to take on a revolutionary color, Jakób realized. A hot wave of excitement washed over him.

  A middle-aged woman stood next to Jakób, clad in the overalls of a factory worker. The scarf covering her graying hair had become undone; the soles of her shoes were worn thin. In her hand she held a Polish flag.

  “I’m glad the Poles have begun to stand up for their rights,” she said to Jakób. “I just hope the children won’t get hurt.”

  “Attack the prison! Free the prisoners!” shouted one of the ringleaders who had clambered up a pillar in front of the city hall.

  “Take the guards’ weapons!” shouted a second one from the topmost step.

  Matters are getting violent, Jakób thought. Maybe it’s a good thing; maybe the Soviets will realize how strongly the people feel.

  Momentum was building, pushing against the breakwater.

  A group of people overturned a car. Others joined in and more cars were overturned. Emotions were churned up to a breaking point. The march turned into a riot.

  In front of the radio station, where Western broadcasts were outlawed, a tram was ablaze.

  Then the first shots rang out.

  Someone shouted, “The secret police are firing at us! From their building!”

  Out of nowhere Molotov cocktails appeared. Bottles containing petrol bombs flew through the air, shattered against closed windows. Within minutes thick black smoke was billowing from the broken windows. More shots were fired. People ducked, screamed, fell over each other to get away. The crowd surged.

  Jakób watched with a sick feeling of helplessness.

  Two army trucks with infantrymen in the back pushed their way through the sea of people, followed by three tanks. The protesters shouted, “Poles don’t shoot fellow Poles!” The students shouted, “Away with the Russians!” The crowd shouted, “Away with Communism!” “Away with dictatorship!” “Away with Soviet occupation!”

  Next to him, the woman who had lost her scarf was struck by a bullet.

  She collapsed at Jakób’s feet, the Polish flag still in her hands. He knelt next to her and turned her over. Her eyes were wide, glazed, fixed in an expression of surprise. She stared past him, already gone.

  A boy of no older than fourteen took the Polish flag out of her hands and waved it wildly. “You shot her! You pigs! You shot her!” he screamed.

  Two big hands grabbed the boy from behind, lifting him up. The hands belonged to a red-faced man in the uniform of the secret police.

  “Who are you calling a pig?” he roared.

  They took the child away. But before they clamped their hands over his mouth to silence him, the boy shouted to Jakób, “Take my mother to hospital, please! I think she’s badly hurt.”

  Workers climbed up on the trucks, engaged in hand-to-hand fighting with the soldiers, took command of the tanks. They sang patriotic songs, planted Polish flags on the trucks and tanks, waved Polish flags above their heads. They attacked more buildings, including the police station, and began to loot shops. They used overturned cars to build barricades.

  Reinforcements arrived, possibly in the form of Soviet soldiers. Jakób couldn’t be sure.

  In the late afternoon Jakób made his way back to the hotel. He saw no sign of Mr. Drobner. Hastily he threw his things into his bag and slung it over his shoulder. He walked the few miles to the station at a brisk pace, as if he could exorcize the horrors. The station smelled of smoke and urine. He bought a ticket on the first train back to Katowice.

  Jakób didn’t remember how he got to Mischka’s apartment. He wasn’t aware of having knocked on the door. But she had opened it a crack.

  “Jakób?” Her voice was thick with sleep; her dark hair tumbled over her shoulders.

  He shouldn’t have come. What was he thinking?

  She opened the door wider. “Come in,” she said, stepping aside.

  He hesitated on the threshold. “I shouldn’t have come.”

  “Come in, Jakób, you’ll wake the neighbors.” He couldn’t get enough of the way she said his name.

  He went in and closed the door behind him.

  He stood, taking in his surroundings. There was a dresser, much like the one in his mother’s house. On a shelf stood a Primus stove and a kettle. Three cups hung on hooks. The sugar and the coffee were on top of the dresser in labeled tins. A two-seater couch stood in front of the window, and next to it a deep armchair. Against the other wall was a table containing several books, a pile of records, and a gramophone. A curtain separated her sleeping quarters from her living space. Her home was cozy, comforting.

  “Sit, I’ll make coffee,” she said and began to pump the Primus stove. Over her shoulder she asked, “Is everything okay?”

  He made a declining motion with his hand. “Just tired,” he said.

  “You’ve just come back from Poznań?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I disturbed you in the middle of the night.”

  “Sit,” she said firmly. “You came because you didn’t want to be alone right now.”

  He sank into the deep armchair and felt an immense exhaustion take hold of him. He watched her, the graceful movements of her hands, the silky black hair cascading over her shoulders, the soft curve of her hips under the thin robe. Along with the weariness he felt an unfamiliar sensation, a kind of tenderness, a pleasant strangeness, as if he were treading on sacred ground.

  You’re losing it, Jakób Kowalski, he told himself and deliberately closed his eyes.

  She put the kettle on the stove and sat down on the two-seater. “Do you want to talk?”

  He shook his head.

  She got up and put on soft music. He didn’t recognize the melody, but it was soothing. She came to stand behind him and put her
hands on his shoulders.

  “Okay if I rub your shoulders?”

  Wordlessly he nodded.

  Her touch jolted his body. He leaned back and felt her fingers softly kneading his stiff muscles, rolling them under her fingertips. Gradually he felt himself relax.

  “I heard about the riot in Poznań, Jakób.” Her words were round, like pebbles, her voice the water of a deep, quiet river.

  When he spoke, his voice sounded hoarse and distant in his ears. “It began peacefully.”

  She said nothing, just kept up the rhythmic massaging.

  “They were just people, workers, wanting bread and freedom.”

  Her fingers kept kneading, sending painful spasms into his head. He lowered his head when she began to massage his neck. He felt her calmness.

  “Then they began to shoot.” There was no need to explain—she would know.

  She followed the muscles of his neck to his scalp. Her fingers were in his thick, dark hair.

  “They say it was a policewoman who lost control and fired the first shots.”

  He tried to focus on her strong fingers.

  “A woman and a child were shot dead.”

  She worked methodically, almost professionally. He didn’t want to say more, didn’t want to bring the images into the room. But he didn’t want to stop talking either. “Many people fell—men, women, children. They shot a soft-spoken woman with a flag right next to me. And threw her young son, just a child, into a police van.”

  He was drained, couldn’t say anything more.

  He tipped his head back, kept his eyes closed. She began to massage his face, her fingers circling his mouth, his eyes, his temples. No one had ever touched him like that before. Life flowed slowly back into his body. He tried to focus on nothing but the moment, tried to ignore the effect her closeness had on him.

  He had been with women before, beautiful women, but he had never felt this way.

  She tenderly rested her lips on his forehead. Slowly he opened his eyes. “The kettle is boiling.” She smiled.

  He sat up. The room, the two-seater, the steaming kettle came into focus. “Do you have anything stronger than coffee?”

  “Vodka? Wine?” She bent down and took a bottle of red wine and two tall, slim glasses from the dresser.

  He got up, opened the wine, and poured. She put another record on the turntable. The beautiful, tranquil music filled his mind.

  He looked at her as she sat on the sofa, her long legs stretched in front of her, the slender ankles crossed, her eyes closed, her face relaxed, almost serene. He stared blatantly at her sublime beauty.

  She gave him an amused smile. “Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked.

  She had caught him unawares. He changed the subject.

  “You could actually see it coming. I should have brought you one of the papers I bought in Poznań.”

  She looked at the ruby-red wine in her glass, reflecting the soft light, then up into his eyes. “Try to stay out of politics, Jakób,” she said. “It’s not worth it. I know.”

  Something in her voice got through to him. He felt the urge to wrap his arms around her, to protect her from the hardships she had evidently experienced. With a great effort he controlled his feelings. He gave her a searching look. She said nothing more.

  “Will you tell me?” he asked softly.

  “Maybe someday,” she replied. She took a last sip of wine, got up, and took the glasses to the basin. When she opened the tap, he saw that her hands were quaking.

  He got up as well. She opened the door for him.

  In the doorway he turned. For a brief moment he put his arms around her, held her. He felt her tremble, was aware of his own desire.

  “Thank you for tonight, Mischka,” he said into her hair before he turned and left.

  When he arrived at his own place just before sunrise, he realized he hadn’t told her he had offered to testify at the boy’s trial.

  10

  “Where can I find tickets for a show or something?” Jakób asked Mr. Drobner the next week.

  His boss gave him a surprised look. “A show? You? Oh, I see, you want to impress a lady.”

  “She’s rather sophisticated,” he admitted.

  “Well, well, how the mighty fall,” said Drobner, amiably patting him on the back. “I’ll ask my wife. She’s good at that kind of thing.”

  “Czech black theater!” exclaimed Mischka the next evening. They were standing in her small living room, and he had just showed her the tickets. “Jakób, you surprise me more every day!” Spontaneously she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him.

  He wrapped his arms around her. “Mm, we can do it every week if you promise to thank me like this every time.”

  She laughed softly. “It’s been five years since I last saw a black-theater performance,” she said, smiling and stepping away from his embrace. “Wine, vodka, or coffee?”

  “Red wine, thanks. Here, I’ll open the bottle. I’ve brought bread and cheese. It’s in the brown-paper packet.”

  After mass on Sunday Jakób visited his brother’s family. The conversation turned to Black Thursday, which had ended with fifty-four dead, more than three hundred wounded, and three hundred twenty-three people still detained three weeks after the event.

  “Do you think the trials will be of a political nature?” Stan asked.

  “I hope they’ll focus on crime,” Jakób answered. “There was a lot of looting and random vandalism.”

  Stan absentmindedly scratched his cheek. “I’m afraid you’re too optimistic,” he said. “The Russians have something to prove.”

  “At least the workers also proved that they’re a power to be reckoned with. I was proud to be Polish.”

  “Watch out,” Stan warned. “Your name is on the witness list; the secret police will take note of you.”

  Jakób cut off that worry and turned to Haneczka. “What’s Czech black theater?”

  “Czech what?”

  “Czech black theater.”

  “Jakób, how on earth should I know?”

  “You’re a woman—women know these things.”

  “You, Jakób Kowalski, have no idea what women know.”

  I fully agree, he thought, but I still have no idea what Czech black theater is. “Will you find out for me?” he asked.

  She sighed, “Yes, Jakób, I will. Please help the boys with their math, won’t you? I’m out of my depth. I’ll see to the food on the Primus, that’s a big enough problem for me.”

  By the time Saturday came around, Jakób knew what Czech black theater was. Nonetheless, he was amazed at the sight of the miniature stage. When the show began, it was pitch-dark. Violet fluorescent light turned white-gloved hands into people walking on tiny feet, performing intricate dance steps, climbing ropes, falling in love, leaning over, kissing.

  Completely unbidden, little Gretl Schmidt was back in his thoughts. She had believed in fairy-tale worlds of castles and princesses, of Sleeping Beauty and Hansel and Gretel and a little Swiss girl called Heidi.

  He sighed and closed his eyes.

  He wondered whether his skinny little duckling with the silky-soft hair still liked to escape into her imaginary world. His Gretchen, so delicate, so brave. Whom he had taken on a train ride. And left on the steps of a ruined church in Germany.

  She had taught him to think about other things when life got tough. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t.

  He opened his eyes and leaned toward Mischka. “They’re very g
ood, aren’t they?”

  “They’re incredible, Jakób! It’s hard to believe people are doing this with their hands.”

  He smiled in the dark. She was beautiful when she was so animated. He put his arm around her bare shoulders. She leaned against him, and he felt her relax.

  It was hard to concentrate on the rest of the performance.

  “There’s a big Polish-Catholic festival in Częstochowa at the end of August,” Haneczka said one Sunday afternoon.

  “Where Grandpa and Grandma live?” her oldest boy asked excitedly.

  “I don’t think the steelworks will give me leave,” said Stan.

  “It’s on the weekend. The hospital will just have to give me leave,” Haneczka said firmly. “They owe it to me!”

  “Tell me more about the festival,” said Mischka.

  “This is the year of the Madonna,” Jakób explained. “I understand the culmination of the celebration is a pilgrimage to Częstochowa.”

  “That’s right,” Haneczka added. “It coincides with the three-hundred-year commemoration of the crowning of the Black Madonna as ‘queen of Poland.’ Thousands of people will attend.”

  “The cathedral at Częstochowa is where the painting of the Black Madonna is?” Mischka asked.

  “That’s right,” said Stan. He turned to his brother. “Why don’t you speak to Drobner, Jakób? Maybe you can arrange something for us.”

  “I can try,” Jakób hesitantly agreed, “but I don’t know. He’s a hard-bitten Communist. I doubt whether he sets much store by religious-patriotic gatherings.”

  “I didn’t mean you should ask the man along!” Stan protested.

  Jakób laughed. “It never crossed my mind!”

  When they were walking back to the hospital’s residences, Jakób asked Mischka if she would join them at the festival.

  She was silent for a while. When she spoke, she sounded distant. “Why, Jakób?”