Homeland (39 page)

‘They know what they’ve stolen all right!’ Hanley said, his agitation bobbing back to the surface. ‘They’ve stolen my gates, that’s what!’

For a moment Wladyslaw thought he must have misunderstood. ‘Gates?’ he echoed.

‘Gates!’

Wladyslaw delivered the accusation to the man with the broken nose, who relayed it in German like a parade sergeant, in a tuneless chant at the top of his voice.

The impassive German began to reply, but was interrupted by a couple of the men behind him. Some sort of disagreement followed, Wladyslaw couldn’t tell what it was about.

Finally the impassive man overruled the others and delivered a message for relay into Polish.

‘We are freezing in our barracks,’ intoned the broken-nosed man. ‘There is no fuel. The men were desperate for wood.’

Wladyslaw said, ‘You admit to stealing the gates then?’

The man with the broken nose seemed to think this unworthy of translation until Wladyslaw urged him on with a flick of an upturned hand.

‘They thought the gates were abandoned,’ came the reply.

‘Where are the gates now?’ Wladyslaw asked.

‘Back at the barracks.’

During these exchanges Hanley had become increasingly restless. ‘What’re they on about? What’re they saying?’

‘It appears that they have knowledge of these gates,’ Wladyslaw said with great politeness. ‘Now I try to discover what has happened to them.’ He said to the Polish
speaker, ‘Can they be returned?’

There was some delay before the translator reported, ‘We smashed them up ready for burning.’

Wladyslaw took a long breath before saying to Hanley, ‘I think maybe you will want to apply for payment for these gates from British authorities.’

Hanley’s expression was scathing. ‘What! You can tell your friends they’re not going to get away with it as easily as that.’

‘The gates are in pieces.’

‘I don’t care what state they’re in,’ Hanley said, the quiver of righteousness resonating in his voice. ‘I want them back. Every single bit of them!’

Wladyslaw said to the Germans, ‘Will you be prepared to return the wood?’

The attitude of the impassive man grew weary at the question. He issued his reply in a tone of infinite boredom, leaving long pauses between sentences, and not simply for the purposes of
translation.

‘It will be difficult to return the precise wood . . . The men spend all their available time collecting many kinds of wood . . . If we have to return the wood we will go cold tonight . .
. Not only is this contrary to our rights as prisoners of war . . . but we have volunteered for the job of clearing this railway . . . It will not go down well with the men if the wood is taken
from them . . . Also, we would point out that the gates were in a bad state when we found them . . . They were not the gates of a good farmer.’

Wladyslaw was deciding how much of this, if any, it would be wise to relay to Hanley when a shout sounded on the deadened air, and he saw four guards hurrying along the railway track with the
bustling officiousness of men who know they have been found wanting in their duty and are about to take it out on everyone else.

‘At last!’ Hanley cried in savage triumph. Armed with an expression of high moral purpose, he went forward to meet them.

When Wladyslaw glanced back he found himself exchanging a look with the impassive German. He was about to turn away when the German said in English, ‘To live through the war only to die
now
. . .’ and gave an audible snort of disdain.

Wladyslaw found Stella holding the cartridges stiffly in one hand.

‘Best thing I walk back to the farm,’ he said.

‘You did the right thing, Wladek,’ she said unhappily.

He gave a light shrug. ‘It is done now.’ He looked into her face, searching for confirmation that everything that had passed between them at the sluice was not entirely forgotten,
and saw only anxiety. ‘We will meet at seven?’

She nodded dumbly.

He offered a small smile. After a moment’s hesitation she returned it. Reassured, he began the long walk back.

Since the arrival of the snows Wladyslaw had missed only five days’ work on the moor, three when the blizzards were too thick to see in front of his face, and two when he
was bed-ridden with a cough and mild fever. Otherwise it might have been Siberia again, a fact not entirely lost on him as he bent to the back-breaking labour of cutting the withies. Sometimes,
when the wind was particularly keen, he would try to find a bed where the existing withies gave the impression, probably illusory, of a lee. At other times the snow was so thick on the ground that
it was a job to find a bed where the base of the withy stocks was showing through. Even then, it might only be an outside row or an irregular patch where the wind had scoured the snow away.
Whatever the conditions, the yield was at best mixed. Some beds were full of the bent and horny stems that Billy had called spraggle, others were festooned with shrivelled but tenacious weeds that
had to be pulled free, yet more beds produced little but hurdle wood which fetched next to nothing at Honeymans’ yard. Whatever the harvest, the cart was useless in the snow, and he had to
carry the bundles back to the farm strapped to his shoulders, four at a time. On some days he had to make three journeys from one end of the moor to the other, and then the work seemed very
hard.

Now, feeling he should do some work before preparing for Stella’s arrival, he broke open the bundles he had cut the previous day and, spreading the meagre harvest over the floor of the
withy shed, began to sort through it.

Somewhere in a far corner of the shed a rat scuffled, and he made a mental note to put poison down. The sound came again, but this time it was more of a scraping noise, too substantial for a
rat. Letting his bundle drop, Wladyslaw listened carefully before walking softly past the stripping machine towards the dark corner where the corrugated-iron sheets, fence posts and lengths of
timber were stored. In the gloom he saw a man getting up off a pile of sacking. It was Jozef.

‘Dear Lord,’ Wladyslaw exclaimed with an involuntary laugh. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

Jozef pulled his mouth down, partly in greeting, partly in a grimace, as if his bones had seized up in the cold. He was wearing a fur cap and thick woollen donkey jacket, and his bony face
seemed very white as he came forward into the light. ‘I was waiting for you,’ he said.

Wladyslaw gripped his shoulder delightedly. ‘For heaven’s sake, how are you?’

‘I’m all right.’

‘Where have you been? Did you get to London?’

Jozef gave a bitter sigh. ‘I got to London all right.’

‘Ah . . .’ Wladyslaw murmured sympathetically. ‘It didn’t work out?’

‘It worked out fine!’ Jozef cried sharply, as if they’d just been arguing the point. ‘It was great, OK?’

Wladyslaw stood corrected. ‘I’m glad to hear it. You found a job then?’

‘Listen, have you got a smoke? I’m desperate.’

Wladyslaw led the way to the work area and, extracting two cigarettes from his packet, threw one to Jozef. When they had lit up, they sat side by side on a wooden trestle, facing the yard and
the falling snow.

Wladyslaw asked, ‘So, tell me, what sort of a job did you get?’

‘In a shop. A department store.’

‘Good Lord!’ Wladyslaw exclaimed, genuinely impressed. ‘And what did you do there?’

‘Oh, loading, unloading. Maintenance,’ Jozef said carelessly.

‘Was it hard?’

‘No! Easy.’

‘And otherwise? Where did you live? What did you do?’

‘What I did was to have a great time!’ Jozef clamped his lips together and blinked rapidly as if to contain some powerful emotion, then Wladyslaw saw to his astonishment that his
eyes were shining with bitter tears. ‘I’ve never had such a great time in my life. Never! London’s a wonderful city, and anyone who says different is just trying to fool you. We
never stopped, not for a minute. We had a car and we went all over the place, trying different pubs every night. It was crazy! Eating fish and chips. My God, I think we had fish and chips every
night for a month!’ He gave a wild laugh as if the craziness of it still excited him.

‘Who were your friends? Workmates?’

‘God, no. No, they were crazy fools like me. Poles on the loose.’

‘Really? And had they found jobs as well?’

‘Sure! It’s easy. This talk of no work – it’s just to keep us away. I tell you, there’s plenty of work.’

‘You astound me,’ Wladyslaw said.

He would have asked what kind of work these friends had found, but Jozef had begun to talk with a strange mournful excitement about the sights he had seen, the visit they had made to a place
called Brighton, the shop they had discovered in the Soho area of London which sold Polish sausage and cheese and pickles, as well as vodka. ‘Not Polish vodka, of course, not even Russian,
but good enough to have some crazy nights. My God, we had some crazy nights! One time we ended up driving to the flower market at dawn and drinking beer till midday.’ He slapped a hand
against his forehead as if in remorse, but really in pride and bravado at having lived to the hilt.

‘I bet you had a hangover.’

‘And how! The best ever! My head was like an anvil. My eyeballs like sandpaper. I slept for a whole day. Yes, truly magnificent.’

‘But you’ve survived. You look well enough at any rate.’

Jozef made no effort to answer. His strange euphoria had evaporated, leaving him morose and inert.

‘You found a place to stay all right, did you?’

It was a while before Jozef responded. ‘Mmm? Yeah . . . with friends.’

‘Was it a rented place?’

Jozef gave a dismissive shrug.

‘I only ask because I’m thinking of going to London myself and I was wondering how hard it was to find lodgings.’

But Jozef had given up all pretence of listening. Sinking deeper into his preoccupations he drew on his cigarette and began to kick his boot at the floor with short stabbing motions.

‘So, what brings you back, Jozef?’

Again he seemed not to have heard, but the moment Wladyslaw began to repeat the question Jozef sprang into a fury as sudden as it was violent, throwing up both hands, jamming his eyes shut,
trembling and shivering with rage.

Taken aback, retreating to safer ground, Wladyslaw took a long breath and asked in a tone of mild enquiry, ‘Are you here for long?’

Jozef gave another shiver and breathed, ‘Not if I can help it.’

‘What’s the problem, old friend? Is there something wrong?’

‘Just leave it!’

‘I was merely asking,’ Wladyslaw said reasonably, with the smallest hint of reproach. Taking refuge in practicalities, he asked, ‘Have you anywhere to stay?’

Jozef shook his head.

‘Well, you could probably sleep in the apple store for tonight. It used to be my place before I moved into the house. I’ll have to ask permission from the old people, of course, but
they won’t mind, I’m sure. Would that be any good to you?’

Jozef nodded.

Wladyslaw stood up. ‘Come. I’ll show you.’

Jozef collected his kitbag and followed Wladyslaw down to the apple store. Stopping on the threshold, he stared at the bare white room as if it were a prison cell.

Wladyslaw lit the paraffin stove and explained how the controls worked and how it mustn’t be moved any closer to the door or the draughts would blow it out. ‘Are you all right for
food till six?’ he asked. ‘I can bring you something hot then.’

Jozef seemed reluctant to come further into the room. When he finally moved, it was with the shuffle of a man entering solitary. ‘Sure,’ he said, lifting his kitbag onto the bed.

Wladyslaw placed the matches by the bedside candle and checked there were spare candles on the shelf above. When he looked back, it was to find Jozef unscrewing a bottle and taking a long swig.
Exhaling with a small shudder of pleasure, Jozef passed the bottle over. It was vodka, and not bad at that. They sat opposite each other, Jozef on the bed, shoulders slumped, Wladyslaw on the
rickety wooden chair, upright, watchful. For a time Wladyslaw talked lightly about the news from the camp, the arrivals and departures, the celebrations and feuds, the British government’s
grudging recruitment of a few dozen Polish miners for their struggling coalmines, with, it was rumoured, more extensive recruitment to follow, until the bottle had been back and forth several times
and Wladyslaw detected a mellowing in Jozef’s expression.

He offered Jozef another cigarette and, holding a light to it, said in a compassionate tone, ‘Look, I’m glad you felt you could come to me. I’m glad to be able to help out. But
in return I must ask that you confide in me. That you tell me why you’re here.’

‘I wish I could!’ Jozef retorted bitterly. ‘I’d like to know myself! I’d like to know why I was forced to leave London and come back to this dead-end
place.’

Wladyslaw gazed at him quietly through the drift of cigarette smoke, letting the silence urge him on.

Shifting to the edge of the bed in a jerky movement, Jozef thrust his forearms onto his knees and, head hanging low, gaze fixed on the floor, growled, ‘They tried to say I did something
wrong, they tried to say I was a thief. But it was a complete lie. It was just an excuse to get rid of me. I was an easy target, wasn’t I? A Pole. A foreigner. I was always going to get the
blame if things went wrong. It was a forgone conclusion, right from the outset.’

‘What were you meant to have stolen?’

Jozef threw a sharp upward glance at Wladyslaw before resuming his examination of the floor. ‘They said some boxes had gone missing from the loading bay. Six cases of Scotch whisky. They
said I was the only person who could have taken them. But where was I meant to have put them? Up my shirt? Under my arm? Down my throat? I’d have had to drink the whole lot in ten minutes
flat. And where was I meant to have hidden the bottles? Up my arse? No, it was a set-up. They picked on me because I was an outsider, because the other workers didn’t like me, because I
couldn’t speak the language. They decided they’d blame me, and that was that. No argument. No discussion. No one interested in hearing my side of the story. It was just: Clear off or
we’ll call the police.’