The Miernik Dossier

41. FROM MIERNIK’S DIARY.

Reunion! There by the roadside were Zofia and Paul when I arrived in my taxi. The picture of them, and especially of Zofia with tears on her sweet face, rises out of the green ink with which I am covering this page. Until the moment I saw them I did not believe in my heart that they would be there. Even now, while Zofia sleeps in a room just down the corridor, I am not quite convinced that everything is as I know it to be-my sister safe at last and my friend out of danger. Of course I should have realized that Sasha would arrange everything perfectly. How many persons have had the gift of such a friend? He sent me no messages by Zofia. She was the message.

After the perfection of Sasha’s plan, my arrival on the dark road in a Viennese taxi seemed humorous to Zofia and Paul. The more I explained that I could not drive with my arm in a sling (and with no Austrian driver’s permit), the more they giggled. The taxi driver was befuddled by my instructions, but very glad to have the enormous fare. I gave him a very large tip in addition, so he went away as happy in his way as we were in ours. No doubt he put two and two together, but what does that matter? We will be out of Austria tomorrow, and we need never return.

Zofia has not changed at all. She is the same willful girl. It was my plan that she should go at once to Geneva and stay in my flat. I believe that Léon and Ilona would care for her until I am able to find a place for us to be together. But as soon as she heard of our trip to Sudan, Geneva was out. She insists on coming along. Paul merely shrugs when I discuss this with him. He agrees to discuss it with Kalash.

I have already made the mistake of mentioning the possibility to Nigel. Naturally he is opposed; I think perhaps he will change his mind when he meets Zofia. “This is not supposed to be an expedition on which one brings along one’s sister,” Nigel says. He points out the danger in the desert. He reminds me that Kalash speaks often of bandits. “You are putting your sister in danger of rape.” Actually I think he is just opposed to having to deal with another Miernik. I annoy him. It is more than his natural impatience now… Ilona. Poor Nigel has found that he is not so nonchalant about this girl as he thought. It is impossible to regret what happened between Ilona and myself. I am shocked that I should feel such indifference to my betrayal of a friend, but there it is-a truth to be faced.

Tonight I thought nothing could intrude on my happiness. I have not felt such emotion or known such serenity since I was a child. On my way to collect Zofia, all my life flowed by in my memory. She is the last link to that short interval of happiness that I knew (and Zofia was too young to know) between my birth and the war and Mother’s death. Zofia suffered more from Father’s death than I. All capacity for sorrow was lost to me when Mother was killed. I have never until now been able to think about the details of that death. I mean think in words. The picture is in my mind at all times, and I push it down a hundred times a day.

We are walking across the field. The earth is still cold after the winter. It is muddy-streaks of wet earth slimy under our feet. The daisies have opened, and also some yellow flowers that must have been jonquils. There are cattle in the next field. We walk into the woods and suddenly we are surrounded by a group of Polish soldiers-ragged and filthy. They call themselves partisans but in fact they are stragglers, semi-criminals who have seized on the war as an excuse for banditry. Father had explained this to me and now I see that what he said was true.

They are bold with Mother. One of them touches her on the breast and she leaps away and, holding my hand, begins to run. Behind us I hear the hard breathing of running men. Mother slips on a patch of mud and falls. There is a long brown streak on her skirt, like filth. I try to help her up. I feel a blow on the back of my head. They are all around us. Mother lies on the ground, panting, her eyes filled with-not fear but contempt. “Tadeusz,” she says, “go home. I’ll be along.” I am pulled to my feet and kicked on the tail of my spine. The pain is nauseating. I run into the woods and hide, covering my eyes with my hands.

I hear a burst of machine gun fire. I creep back and find my mother’s naked body. They have pulled her dress upward over her head, so her face is hidden. On her stomach are five tiny blue holes, and under her body a pool of red blood. Her legs are pulled apart as if they wanted to break them from her body. I find her underclothes and pull the torn cloth over her legs, to cover her. I lift her body and pull down her dress. Her hair is loose and stained with the blood she coughed into it.

I knew what had happened to her. I did not want Father to know that Poles had done this. So I told him a German airplane strafed us. I was in such a state of shock I could hardly talk. But I could lie. Father never believed it. Never. But it was better that I could let him blame the Germans: he had sent us into the countryside so that we would be safe.

Nigel does not know what he does when he speaks to me of Zofia being raped by bandits in the desert.