BLACK SHEEP
©2021, K.A. Bachus
"It is only just past the border. I attended the gymnasium there, for a little while. My uncle…"
Misha interrupted. "Vasily, you are under a death sentence because of what happened in Gdansk."
The balding American they called Frank who sat with them in a dark corner of a seedy restaurant, spoke up. "What happened in Gdansk?"
Vasily and his two friends responded with a malignant stare. He debated switching to Polish for privacy. Louis and Misha were fluent, but Frank studied too much and had added both semi-competent French and basic Russian to his repertoire. Vasily did not want this American to take up his language. He contented himself with an unmistakably hostile glare.
Misha set his empty glass on the table.
"If you will not wait here, then wait in Prague if you can avoid the Czech secret police, but do not come with us to Krakow. It is too dangerous for you, Vasily. This commission is simple. We will kill the target and be back within the day. Frank will wait with you if you stay in Vienna."
At the last words, Frank's already bulbous eyes opened even wider in alarm. This made Vasily smile. Sweat formed on Frank's forehead.
"It is not simple," insisted Vasily. "He is very high-level KGB, First Directorate. He will have bodyguards, an armored car, and a classified route."
"I will know the route within an hour of arrival," said Louis.
"But your rounds will not penetrate a ZIL-117. He will not stop, and his entourage will annihilate you."
"Then prepare a charge for us that will stop the ZIL, and we will use it. You need not be there."
"I must see the route to find where best to place it without detection and the most effective method to detonate. You will need me. I must go."
Misha signaled for more beer before answering.
"You are wearing your most obstinate face, my friend. I concede you are persuasive, but you do not become stubborn like this without a reason. What makes you so determined to risk summary execution?"
Vasily drained the first third of his new glass of beer before answering. They had a right to know, he mused, but then they would feel obligated to help, and he could not bear to endanger them for this. But they should know, he decided finally as he licked the foam from his top lip because this is what it means to be a team.
"I have had a message from my uncle Henryk in Warsaw. My great-uncle Mateusz is under suspicion. I must convince him to leave."
"How many uncles do you have, Vasily?" Louis asked with a furrowed brow.
Vasily did not answer because he sensed Frank's interest. The man would put the number in an American file to be stolen eventually by the KGB.
Louis did not press the question. His glance at Frank told Vasily his understanding had caught up, and he now regretted asking.
"Where is Mateusz now?" asked Misha.
"In Krakow. He is a professor of medieval history at Jagiellonian University. I lived with him when I was fifteen."
"Your presence could put him in more danger."
…
Great-uncle Mateusz repeated this argument when they arrived.
"Your presence puts the entire family in more danger, Vasily. Why are you here?"
The three young men stood uncomfortably in the professor's cramped quarters surrounded by books and boxes of papers, spilled coffee mugs, and the dank smell of old beer. Vasily had difficulty expressing his thoughts at the best of times. The old man's glare robbed him of what little speech he might have had, and he welcomed Misha's rescue.
"Sir, we have had a message from Henryk in Warsaw," said Misha. "He says that you are in particular danger and must leave Poland. We are here to help you do that."
"Leave Poland? I cannot leave Poland. I do not wish to leave. I have my work.…" His scrawny arm swept over stacks of books and boxes in the narrow space. He dropped the arm and frowned, then pointed to the top shelf of one bookcase.
"And I have a cat. I cannot leave her."
The cat blinked slowly down at them with yellow eyes.
Misha's face showed no reaction, but Louis blanched. Vasily ventured a question.
"Uncle, why are you under suspicion?"
"Because it is well known that you are my great-nephew. That is why. When I let you shelter with me, I did not know you would become a killer. I am ashamed. They say you killed a young woman. What kind of monster does that?"
The mixture of truth and injustice in this speech left Vasily momentarily silent, but the injustice spurred his voice.
"She killed Dominik, Uncle."
"The KGB shot him. It was reported in the newspaper. He blew up a building.…"
"I blew up the building. Dominik was not involved. The woman knew that but arranged his death regardless. She was arranging our deaths when I shot her."
Louis's eyebrows rose in surprise at both the length and the vehemence of Vasily's explanation. Great-uncle Mateusz dropped his gaze in defeat.
"Then what they say about you is true," he whispered. "I hoped it was the usual lies."
"It is like always, Uncle, a mixture of both. There is some other reason why you have been threatened. What is it?"
The old man hesitated.
"My latest book has been published."
The three young men waited quietly. Mateusz spoke again after a few seconds.
"By the underground press."
During another long pause, the old scholar tidied a stack of papers from a haphazard pile on a small table. He looked up at his still audience and sighed.
"I wrote a strong criticism of Soviet revisionist history. I understand they are quite angry. My presence has not been requested for a ceremony to unveil a statue of Felix Dzerzhinsky in the Courtyard of Modern History. I have been disinvited."
Misha threw a significant glance to Louis who nodded. This must be the destination of their target. What better reason could a high-ranking Russian intelligence officer have to visit Poland than the unveiling of a monument to the Polish founder of Soviet intelligence?
"Do you have a basket for the cat?" Misha asked the scholar.
"Yes, but.…"
"Make it ready and pack one small box with your current work. You will leave before the unveiling."
Louis pulled a set of survey maps from his rucksack, swept a table clear of books and coffee mugs, and laid out a chart.
"Show me where they will put the statue."
"I do not agree that I am leaving. I do not agree with whatever it is you are doing here. I protest your presence and ask you to leave."
"Uncle," said Vasily, "you will like living in Misha's house. Our old tutor has retired there. You have much in common."
"Not to mention our regrettable common acquaintance with you," said the old man sourly.
The four men got in each other's way for the next two hours as the young ones devised a plan of escape and another plan they carefully kept from Mateusz. He grumbled at volume as he discarded text after text, sometimes with tears, and filled two boxes with essential documents. Misha stood adamant, and after an argument, the old man tediously examined all, discarded some, and overstuffed a single box, wrapping it with twine to keep it closed.
"I cannot move quickly," he whined. "Even if I am not burdened, I will be a danger to you. I should stay here."
It was a new tactic in his argument, equally ignored as had been the others. He watched Vasily shape and prepare a charge of plastique, his face registering profound dismay.
Louis answered the old man, "Do not worry, Professor. We will find a car and drive to the frontier, then obtain another after we cross."
"Obtain? How obtain? You mean to steal one, don't you? Not only are you murderers, but you are also thieves. I cannot go with you. I will not be associated with such people."
He crossed his arms and stood staring up at the cat. When there was no answer from the young men, each busy cleaning a gun, planning a route, or making a bomb, the old man spoke again more quietly.
"I have an auto. It does not run, but it is not stolen. I can ride in an auto that is not stolen."
"How can you ride in an auto that does not run, Uncle?" asked Vasily.
Nonetheless, they made it run. Louis picked the lock to a ramshackle garage down the street. Vasily stole the parts that Misha said he would need. They siphoned no more than half a liter from every car they could find during the night, some of them parked behind locked doors easily defeated by Louis, others on the street, until they had filled the tank. They saw no reason to burden Mateusz with such details.
The task they were hired to perform took as much or more ingenuity, tedious research, and planning. Louis broke into the college provost's office and examined his correspondence. Misha climbed onto suitable rooftops along the route to the courtyard where the unveiling would take place. Vasily stood in the deepest shadow of a cloister on the north face of the Courtyard of Modern History and contemplated the shrouded statue in its center. After an hour, he moved silently to the spot he had chosen, lifted the canvas covering, and placed the charge he had devised, shaping it to resemble a portion of the raised wreath that decorated the plinth.
They breakfasted on black bread and black coffee to the sound of a running litany of complaints and recriminations from the old man. He did not know where the box had disappeared to. Had they stolen it? Surely one book would not create too heavy a burden. They were young and strong. Just one book.
Vasily bundled his uncle and the cat into the roomy front seat of an ancient German-made relic of the war. He took the wheel, drove to the rendezvous, and waited.
"What are we waiting for?" asked his great-uncle. "Where are your friends?"
"They are on the roofs."
"Why?"
"In case."
"In case what?"
"In case my work fails."
"Your work? What work? You are a disgrace to this family. To every other vice you have adopted, you add the crime of kidnapping an old man. I will escape you and return to my home. See if I don't."
Vasily set his jaw and said nothing. Between his querulous relative and the wailing cat, he longed for the peace and certainty of a gun battle.
He had already put the car in gear the moment they heard the boom that told them his work had not failed. Louis and Misha poured into the back seat within seconds, wearing clothing as grey as the sky and carrying long rifles. By the time sirens began, the car had already crossed the Vistula River and was headed southwest out of the city.
They skirted the mountains as they made their way in an unhurried manner so as not to draw attention. Misha and Louis stayed down in the back seat. The cat cried for almost three hours. Ditching the car near the Czech border, they shouldered their burdens, rifles, ammunition, climbing gear, hard black bread and canteens of water, a box filled with papers and books, and a cat in a basket. Vasily carried a backpack containing his tools and the box of papers. The professor carried the cat.
The cat accepted its fate, finally, and fell asleep in the basket—a lucky thing during times when they were at risk of detection. Great-uncle Mateusz required more persuasion to be quiet during tense moments. Vasily remonstrated, not always gently. Louis tried unsuccessfully to explain their peril. It fell to Misha to solve the problem.
"I cannot walk another step," said Mateusz. "The basket is too heavy. Be careful with that box, Vasily. One of my papers threatens to escape it because of your rough handling. I am thirsty. Can we not find a comfortable pub along the way?"
Misha stopped and placed the point of his knife under the professor's chin.
"We will soon cross into Czechoslovakia. If you endanger us with your noise, old man, I will solve the problem silently. It is a talent of mine."
Mateusz's eyes widened, and he spoke through his teeth. "And I will be required to live in your house?"
In answer, Misha raised the knife higher and with it, the professor's chin, making it impossible to utter another sound. They exchanged glare for glare before Misha withdrew the knife.
"Now I understand how you acquired your obstinacy, Vasily. It is a family trait," murmured Misha.
Vasily was too stubborn to admit relief when they hot-wired a roomy sedan and began the drive to the next border. After nearly three hours on foot, he discovered that a box of paper gains weight over time. Eventually, the string he carried it by had cut into his good hand.
They ditched the car in a remote area west of a tiny village and picked up their burdens for the last trek. Either Misha's knife or the rugged path they followed to a river crossing kept Mateusz's litany of complaints at bay. The old man concentrated on his feet as they climbed and slithered their way to a remote border crossing into Austria.
Frank met them with a car and their payment. It was past midnight before Great-uncle Mateusz and his feline companion, Nada, had been fed and settled into their new quarters in Misha's house.
The main difficulty of having two scholars in the same household became evident the next morning at the breakfast table. The two old academics responded enthusiastically in unison any time someone said 'professor'. It was Louis who devised a shorthand method of address. Professors Graf and Sobieski became Professor G and Professor S.
The solution mollified Mateusz and turned his expression minimally less sour. The plate of eggs and sausages placed before him with an accompanying basket of warm bread made him fight a smile.
Vasily had no small talk to give, but he caught his great-uncle's almost smile as he reached for a slice of bread. It seemed the perfect time to bring it up.
"Uncle, do you still plan to return to Krakow?"
The old man arrested his knife on its way to a pot of jam and narrowed his eyes at his brother's grandson.
"You know I do."
"I know nothing of the sort. It may be the height of folly since you are implicated in the bombing of the Dzerzhinsky statue, and you are no fool, Sir."
"How am I implicated? I cannot be accused merely because we are related. I will tell them you kidnapped me. I do not answer for the black sheep in my family."
"You will if one of your lambs leaves incriminating evidence behind."
"What evidence? Behind where?"
"An ounce of explosive on your desk?"
The knife clattered on his plate; his mouth opened in an 'oh' and he slumped, dropping his eyes.
Misha cleared his throat.
"I beg to differ with you, Professor S. The authorities in your country are perfectly content to accuse the innocent who bear the burden of unfortunate relatives. I have been contacted by your nephew Henryk."
Turning his eyes to Vasily, he continued, "More members of the family have experienced difficulties, and Henryk is asking you not to visit or communicate with them. I told Frank not to offer us any commissions in Poland."
Vasily sat back with a stunned expression. These were the only things in his life that could be considered normal: his vast, hide-bound, gloriously passionate country and his irascible, complicated collection of relatives.
"If I am no longer Polish, what am I?"
"You are a Sobieski, I am sad to say," said Mateusz. "Every bit your father's son.