The Minotaur's Head: An Eberhard Mock Investigation (Eberhard Mock Investigation 4) Read online

  “Well, Papa, which scene?”

  Popielski’s head was in turmoil. Because of that cursed session at Szaniawski’s he could not remember which tableaux vivants were to have been presented that day. Matejko, surely. But where do maidens figure in his paintings?

  “You were so delighted,” cried out Jadzia, “when Marek Winicjusz visited his beloved Ligia in prison!”

  “But of course!” he said with feigned enthusiasm. “You played that so well, darling! But do you know what? I’m waiting for you to do something other than mere pantomime. You have such a harmonious, beautiful voice.”

  “Thank you for the compliment, Papa.” Rita watched tiny flakes of snow as they fell in the lamplight.

  “So, how about it, girls?” Popielski latched on to the good mood. “Shall we go to Masełko’s for some pastries?”

  Jadzia’s smile was full of consent but Rita hesitated, which meant the suggestion did not fill her with enthusiasm. He recalled forced conversations over pastries with his daughter, punctuated by troubled silences. Each one had inevitably led to a discussion of poor school marks or unforgivable behaviour, and had ended in sulks and once even in tears. He remembered how on Sunday she had rolled her eyes when he suggested they pop out to the Europejska Café for some meringues. “Not again!” is what her expression had conveyed. Then as now.

  “I understand. You’re tired,” he said with a false smile. “Let’s go home, then. Please get into the car, Jadzia. I’ll give you a lift.”

  “But can’t we go home by ourselves?” Rita’s eyes entreated. “Jadzia will see me home. Please, Papa!”

  “No.” He walked to the car and opened the door. “Please get in.”

  Once the girls had obediently climbed in Popielski started the engine and turned round.

  “I have something important to say to you. Lwów is a very dangerous place right now …”

  “So that’s why you came to the show,” Rita exclaimed. “Not to see me, but to supposedly protect me. Right? That’s why! How many times have I heard about all these dangers lurking, just waiting to pounce on young ladies!”

  “Rita, how dare you speak to me like that!” he said coldly. “And in front of your friend, too!”

  “But, Rita,” said Jadzia, staring at him with the eyes of a schoolgirl who is top of her class and always has an answer ready, “your father only wants what’s best …”

  Popielski turned away and the car moved off. The girls were silent. In the rear-view mirror he saw Rita gaze at the passing shops and buildings while Jadzia read the special supplement he had tossed onto the back seat earlier. Her eyes did not leave the front page. Throughout the entire journey one thought preyed on Popielski. The Minotaur murdered and raped only virgins. Rita could be protected from the beast if … At this Popielski shook his head to prevent the monstrous notion from entering it. “… if she wasn’t a virgin,” uttered a demon.

  LWÓW, THAT SAME JANUARY 25TH, 1937 EIGHT O’CLOCK IN THE EVENING

  Aspirant Cygan sat in the Atlas cursing his Ephebe-like looks. This sumptuous place on the corner of Rynek was frequented by artists and men of letters, some of whom had decidedly Greek tastes. They usually met on odd-numbered days in the Grey Room, although this was never mentioned expressis verbis. Except, perhaps, among officers who could not afford to let themselves be led by smug prudishness and needed to call a spade by its name. Included in the circle of men upholding the Greek habit were the ballet dancer, Juliusz Szaniawski, the rich art merchant and antique-shop owner, Wojciech Adam, and the director of the National Bank, Jerzy Chruśliński. As a cover they were often accompanied by women who were always ready for a lively discussion, and vociferously expressed unconventional or entirely revolutionary opinions on moral issues. Anyone not native to Lwów and coming here for the first time might think they had found themselves in an exclusive restaurant which distinguished itself – if at all – by its magnificence. Only once they had studied the slicked, slim waiters, with backs straight as arrows, would they realize that they were all young and striking in their exceptional beauty. An outsider would have no idea that some of the waiters had got a job at this luxurious restaurant through the influence of their wealthy lovers.

  Aspirant Cygan had inhabited Lwów since birth and was not in the least surprised by the Greek preferences of some of the waiters and customers. As soon as he entered he was met by two languid glances. In a mirror he could clearly see the caresses bestowed upon him by a no longer young man with dyed black hair who was sipping alcohol from a shallow glass, and a thirty-something man with an athlete’s build and booming voice who knocked back one glass after another and followed his vodka with – oh, the horror! – cream cakes.

  Cygan did not return their glances or smiles but calmly smoked his cigarette, sipped slowly on a small iced vodka, ate an excellent steak tatare – which he had seasoned and made exceptionally spicy – and waited patiently. Szaniawski had told him earlier that day that two young men had appeared in his circle, and because of their swarthy complexions and remarkably beautiful black eyes they had immediately found themselves in the receptive sights of some of the Atlas’ regulars. They spoke, to use Szaniawski’s expression, “a mixture of Polish and Russian”, which for some unknown reason added to their attraction in his eyes. So Cygan sat by the door and watched for these dark-haired young men with sallow complexions. After an hour of waiting, which he whiled away by reading the weekly newspaper Signals, he saw two youths who answered to the ballet dancer’s description. First he heard a stamping outside and then they came in, brushed the snow off their coats and handed them to the cloakroom assistant. They walked past Cygan and sat by a window with a view of Adonis’ fountain. A waiter appeared straightaway and took their order: two glasses of gin and apple cake with cream.

  Cygan walked up to their table and greeted them gallantly. Without waiting for an invitation, he sat down and said something which made their smiles disappear as they stood their glasses back on the marble surface.

  “Criminal police,” he said in a sweet voice. “I’m not going to pull out my badge now because everyone’s looking. Our conversation’s to look like a friendly chat, understand? So, please raise the glasses to your lips and give me a nice smile.”

  Silence fell at the table.

  “Your names?” Cygan asked when they had done as he requested.

  “Ivan Tshuchna.”

  “Anatol Gravadze.”

  “Been in Lwów long?”

  “Two years.”

  “Me, too, like my friend.”

  “Did you arrive in our city together?”

  “Yes, together we came.”

  “Where from?”

  “Odessa, then Stanbul.”

  Cygan was silent as he considered whether one of them might be the man sought by the police. Both were very elegantly and stylishly dressed: suits of Bielsko wool, diamond tie-pins. He had not thought their Polish would be so bad. The German customs official and the cabby in Breslau would have been able to distinguish Polish from Russian, especially by of the melodious accent. But could he himself be sure? Would he be able to tell Danish from Swedish? Probably not, but had he ever heard the languages? No. Yet the customs official must have heard Polish frequently. But one of the Russians might have spoken to the German official in Polish, in which case he would have really had to know Polish very well or else have a musical ear in order to differentiate literary Polish from that of a foreigner. Cygan decided not to bank on the musicality of German officials and instead to carefully check how well both of the men knew Polish.

  “To what do we owe the honour of you gentlemen from Odessa visiting our ancient settlement on the Poltva?” he asked in a manner both courteous and convoluted, and waited for their reaction.

  As if on command the two men shook their heads and looked puzzled. They obviously had not understood.

  “Keep smiling,” he said sweetly but emphatically. “Why did you leave Odessa?”

  “Things poor,” aske
d Ivan Tshuchna. “Here better. Play music and dance there. And to Lwów come for stage. To dance and sing. Then stay here and ask Lwów authorities if can stay. Well, get permission. And two years we here.”

  “And what do you do here?”

  “Well, same as Odessa.” Tshuchna pronounced the name of the town as in Russian: “Odessya”. “Dance Cossack, sing in Bagatella two times Sundays.”

  “You couldn’t make such a good living dancing and singing,” thought Cygan. “You wouldn’t be able to afford expensive clothes and drink gin at the Atlas, even though the boss of the Bagatella – known to everyone as Mr Scheffer – is no miser.” He turned and immediately found his answer. Here there were several men for whom the upkeep of these two eastern princes would not prove a great cost.

  “And did you dance at the Bagatella on Sylvester’s night, too?”

  “When?” Gravadze had clearly not understood.

  “Of course,” thought Cygan, “the Soviets only celebrate birthdays. They’ve no idea that in a Catholic country every day has its patron saint. Even the last day of the year. And don’t be so bigoted,” he criticized himself. “These two aren’t members of the Sodality of Our Lady.”

  “Well, on New Year’s Eve, when champagne is drunk at midnight! Where were you?”

  “Oh, drink champagne at ball in Cyganeria,” replied Tshuchna. “Go there with fiancées.”

  “Any of these?” Cygan jerked his head as if wanting to look behind. “Can any of these confirm what you say?”

  “No,” Gravadze said, looking offended. “We not like that. We with girls.”

  “Don’t lie to me, you queen!” Cygan stuck out his jaw. “Or we’ll go and talk at the police station and you’ll be back in that Odessa of yours!”

  “We not lie, Colonel, sir.” There were tears in Tshuchna’s eyes. “Girls dance now at Bagatella. We go with you – you talk to them. We not even go in, not cook anything up before.”

  “That’s what you say.” Cygan stood up but he was plagued by uncertainty as to the logic of his decision. “So, let’s go to the Bagatella!”

  He said this loud enough for others to hear. As they left the Atlas in a threesome they were followed by several pairs of envious eyes and the murmur of voices talking about the handsome dancers’ new young boyfriend.

  LWÓW, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27TH, 1937 TEN O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING

  Aspirant Walerian Grabski was disheartened when he left the Police Headquarters archives. He belonged to the category of men who are conscientious, reliable and level-headed. Only once in his life had he been thrown off balance, and that was in his relationship with a certain priest who had taught him religion. He had got into the priest’s bad books for aping his sermon at a retreat. Catching the boy red-handed, the priest had come down very hard on him, a true Cato the Elder to the Carthaginians. While turning a blind eye to the ignorance of the other pupils, awarding them all solely on the basis of his own perception of their religiosity, he grilled Grabski in great detail about the decrees of specific synods and ecumenical councils, about the views of the Holy Fathers, about liturgical and homiletic reforms. Grabski had learned all this by heart and recited it like a parrot, but even so he could not please his catechist. After two months of such torture he could stand it no longer. One day, when he was not praised but criticized for his descriptions of St Athanasius the Great’s and Socrates Scholasticus’ accounts of the Nicean Council, he was tipped over the edge. He walked up to the priest and slapped him so hard the priest fell off his chair. Thus Grabski left the Secondary School for Classics after six years of studies and almost ended up in jail. Blacklisted, he was allowed only to become an accountant, and it had been in a counting-house that he was spotted by Marian Zubik, at that time Head of Personnel at Lwów Police Headquarters. Moved by the accountant’s punctiliousness and punctuality he had offered him a job in his unit, which Grabski had willingly accepted. He had then wandered through various departments and even towns as a result of his benefactor’s promotions. He had the diligence of an ant and a particular liking for archival work, which is why he was a little saddened when, keeping to the order of tasks allocated by Popielski, he had to remove his over-sleeves and protective dust visor, leave the police archives and instead visit student hostels to question their caretakers. His sadness was all the greater as every man listed in the archives as having a moral transgression on his conscience was either too old to dress up as a young woman, or was in jail or had left Lwów long ago. Of the latter there were only two and neither looked like a Gypsy.

  The hostel on Issakowicz Street was first on a list he had meticulously put together, beginning with establishments closest to the mansion on Łącki. He walked slowly along Potocki and congratulated himself once again for not having left Lwów for Lublin, a move offered to him along with a promotion. He would not now have been looking at such wonderful buildings as, for example, the Biesiadecki manor, constructed in the style of a medieval fortress; he would not have been walking through vast and well-tended parks; and he would not have been able to visit his favourite haunts, especially Mrs Teliczkowa’s famous restaurant where they served crispy onion bread rolls and boiled ham with horseradish for breakfast, or a cup of borscht to “calm the digestive humours” of those suffering a hangover.

  Aspirant Grabski regretfully cast aside these pleasant thoughts and plunged down a tree-lined street where the huge edifice of the House of Technicians student hostel was located.

  The beadle sat in a duty room where there was a small settee, a basin and spirit burner. To Grabski it was plain that he was a tough old man from Lwów. Unlike the owners of the hostel, which offered shelter to young men regardless of their denomination or origin, the beadle was not very tolerant. He immediately criticized the “stubborn Rusyns whom the state allows to stay and who don’t do anything but conspire against Poland”. The description did not endear him to Grabski, who should have been presented at every meeting of the chiefs of the Provincial Police as a paradigm of complete and absolute apolitical standing, something which, after all, police regulations required.

  The aspirant soon realised that with such a hostile attitude towards Ukrainians, the beadle was bound to answer any question about moral perversion by stating that all pupils of such origin staying at the hostel were sexually rampant and committed the sin of impurity several times a day. He decided to put this hostility to use.

  “Hey, good citizen!” he said grimly. “Are you aware that you’re committing an offence right now?”

  “And what offence might that be?” The beadle cringed.

  “Are you aware that you’re stirring up nationalist hatred before a representative of the law? – before a state official?”

  “But I wasn’t … I even quite like those Rusyns … Some of them are good chaps!”

  “And did you know that I’m a Rusyn myself?” Grabski pulled a stern face and slipped a pair of spectacles onto his nose.

  “Well, I … There’s nothing …” The caretaker was clearly embarrassed.

  “Alright, alright, Mr … Mr …”

  “Źrebik’s the name, christened Józef …”

  “Well then, Mr Źrebik” – the aspirant waggled a finger at him – “let that be the last time! I don’t want anything but the honest truth!”

  “Jawohl, Commissioner, sir.” The old man must have served under Franz Jozef because he clicked his heels there in the duty room.

  “Well then, tell me since you know this best, Mr Źrebik.” Grabski leaned over the beadle. “How do these Rusyn students and pupils behave? And not only the Rusyns … the Poles, Jews, maybe others … You know what I mean … With girls and that sort of thing …”

  “I don’t let anyone in, Commissioner, sir.” Źrebik looked offended. “No stranger! I’m a veteran Feldfebel, I obey my superiors!”

  “That’s very good, very praiseworthy.” Grabski held out his right hand. “Let me shake the hand of such a fine state official. I, as it were, am also your superior. But
a gentle and understanding one …”

  Źrebik was so pleased he even blushed as he shook Grabski’s hand, while the latter prepared to hit him with more taxing questions.

  “So, tell me one thing. These are young men, after all – they need the company of women. You know, when I was their age I couldn’t go a day without … Well, you know …”

  “Commissioner sir, there was a fellow in the army with us, a smith from Sanok who, when he woke up in the morning, could carry a bucket on his rascal! That’s how hard his was!”

  “There you are.” Grabski laughed heartily. “We’re all like that … Life’s not easy with women but it’s even worse without them …”

  “I always tell my Mania …”

  “There you are … And here are these boys … None of them is going to nip off to a harlot because they can’t afford one, they’re too expensive, right Mr Źrebik?”

  “Sicher. One harlot costs as much as some live off for a month …”

  “So? Surely there are times when they … You know what I’m thinking about … They have to have it off themselves …”

  “Oh, that there are, that there are,” sighed the beadle. “There are sometimes such queues to the toilet it’s terrible – because someone or other is taking so long in the lav … Well, what could he be doing there if not wanking …”

  The aspirant wondered for a moment whether, when asking the most important question of all, he should allude to his interlocutor’s military experiences. He decided, however, that an opener such as: “Mr Źrebik, you know about life, so I’m going to ask you straight out …” could offend the old man if he thought he was being suspected of homosexual leanings.