21.

28 June, 11:10 AM, Stare Duszki

“This is it, I guess.”

They were standing on a gentle grassy slope, not far from the edge of the water. The surface was as flat and gleaming like a sheet of polished lead, water undisturbed by the still air.

“It’s quite pretty,” Marina said.

It was, in that unspoiled rustic Eastern European sort of way, which a cynic could otherwise describe as underdeveloped and impoverished. They were looking across the lake to the north, from where they came earlier this morning, to where the village of Stare Duszki stretched for about a kilometre, with small white-washed houses strung like beads along the main and the only road. Behind Stare Duszki, a string of gently undulating slopes, like humps of a lake serpent, closed off the horizon and hid the view towards Czernograd.

There was no tourist office or even signs as they drove in Marina’s small red Fiat for a few kilometres past the village, the road getting them further away from the lake and their ultimate destination, so they had to do a u-turn to get back to Stare Duszki and ask for directions. The man at a small garage, which also doubled up as a petrol station with one weather-beaten pump, explained which unpaved country road to turn right into to take them to the southern shore of the lake, where a stream called Tisza flowed down from the mountains behind.

The track challenged Fiat’s suspension and shook their breakfasts around, but Marina insisted they drive as far as they could. This proved to be a padlocked wire-mesh gate, pinning together like a belt buckle two lengths of a fence, a few strands of barbed wire nailed to wooden posts every five metres or so. They left the car and sneaked in between the rusty metal threads, careful not to get caught on the spikes.

“What did that sign on the gate said?” Jake asked once they were through on the other side and walking towards the lake.

“Private property. Keep out,” Marina chuckled.

Jake didn’t. “You’re serious? I don’t want to-“

“Oh, Jake,” she lightly punched his bicep, “you’re so serious and responsible. We’re not going to do anyone any harm, are we?”

“We’re trespassing on a private property,” Jake said, “and I already have enough run-ins with local authorities...”

“Ah, you Americans and your private property,” she overtook him and dramatically threw her hands in the air. “Besides,” she said, turning towards him and walking backwards, “when you get the ashes back, you’ll still have to come back here and trespass, won’t you?”

“Well, the next time I can make sure to check with the owner, whoever he or she is.”

She shook her head and rolled her eyes. They agreed to disagree.

The dirt road continued for another few hundred metres before dissolving into a meadow. It was another two hundred metres down a gentle slope towards the water’s edge and a short walk east, to where a stream entered the lake. This was the spot.

“When I die, I can think of a lot of less pleasant places I would like my ashes to be scattered around,” she said.

“I can also think of a lot of more convenient ones,” Jake said, standing close to the shoreline, hands in pockets, “like somewhere close to home. Off the Brooklyn Bridge, perhaps.”

“C’mon, this place must have meant something to your grandfather,” she chided him.

“Quite a lot.”

“Pity he didn’t care to explain,” Jake shrugged. “Maybe he used to fish here.”

“Did he like fishing? Over there, in America?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Jake shrugged again.

She was standing with her back to the water and he noticed, as he glanced at her, that she was looking at something behind him. He slowly turned around to follow her gaze.

A gentle, grassed slope continued for about a kilometre before the forest started and went on the cover the steeper inclines of the mountain, only ceasing when the range’s exposed spine erupted in craggy, barren rocks. Maybe two hundred metres down from the facade of the trees they could see a long, two-storey building resting on the slope. The large area around, together with several smaller outbuildings, was enclosed within a tall fence, and another road, which looked asphalted and well-maintained, snaked along the mountain side, connecting the compound to the outside world.

“Nice,” Marina said. “Someone pretty well off must have some very nice views from up there.”

“The lord of the manor,” said Jake. “They probably own the village and everything in sight, and people around here work as serfs to keep the lord in this lifestyle.”

“Very funny, Jake. It’s not like that. Not anymore. You people think we all don’t bathe and don’t have indoor plumbing.”

“Not-“ Jake stopped himself before telling a lie. “We’re not that bad. Really. By the way, I hope we’re not trespassing on the lord’s land.”

“Wouldn’t think so,” Marina said. “The place up there seems to be quite well fenced up already.”

They started walking back to their car. A slight breeze picked up and Jake could feel its gentle touch on the back of his neck. Soon – bureaucracy permitting – he would be back at this very spot, with the platinum urn in his hand, ready to enable his family to pry the considerable fortune out of grandfather’s dead, cold hands, instead of love, affection and closeness they couldn’t when he still alive. Hopefully the weather would hold as pleasant, and he would unscrew the top of the container, Marina watching a few steps away, or maybe her hand on his shoulder, in support… Actually, he simply assumed that Marina would be there; she has been around since the beginning, and it just seemed right that she would be there when…

A dog’s bark yanked him back to reality.

They both stopped in their track and looked ahead. Between them and the gate and Marina’s car beyond it, a man was standing in the middle of the track, a German shepherd struggling on a short leash. The man was short, going into slightly podgy, with an oversized short coat and a pair of jeans coveralls. His face was round, and adorned with a thick black mustache, but the rest of his hair was hidden underneath a cloth cap.

“I think we got ourselves the owner,” Jake murmured.

“How about we pretend we’re both American tourists and can’t speak the language?” Marina whispered back.

They started walking towards him. “I think the truth is the best policy, particularly since I have to be back here again sometime soon,” Jake said, “so just be honest with him about what we’re doing here. And please apologise for getting onto his land without his permission. I would have asked first if I knew where he lived, but no one in the village told us…”

They stopped about five metres from the man. The dog was now sitting on its hind legs, but still growling as Marina started to talk. The man soon joined. He had a baritone voice, and short delivery, but Jake couldn’t detect from the tone or inflection neither anger nor agitation. There was more expression on his German shepherd’s face.

“Don’t worry, he won’t seek his dog onto us,” Marina turned to Jake after a while. “I just explained to him that you’re an American tourist and we didn’t mean any harm.”

“Can you explain to him about the ashes and ask his permission to come back?” Jake said.

There was more conversation, this time seemingly more animated.

Marina turned back to him, her brow furrowed and eyes without the usual spark. “He says no.”

“Please tell him how important it is – I mean don’t mention the will and the money – just the old man’s last wish and how his family wants to respect that. Surely he can understand that.”

More talk in a language that Jake was glad he was not being asked to master, somewhere between the Polish he remembered spoken at the home of one of his high school buddies and the Russian spoken by the bad guys in action movies, before the bad guys in action movies became American.

“He says he won’t allow spilling of anyone’s ashes on his land, that it’s pollution and against the laws of God,” Marina said. “He must be Ruthenian Orthodox; I think they believe that a proper burial is the only way to dispose of mortal remains and that cremation is the Satan’s idea. Or something like that.”

“Tell him it’s Bohdan Voynich, or Bohu Voynich,” Jake was clutching at the last few straws in his hand. “Maybe the name will mean something to him? If grandfather was a local, perhaps.”

No luck either. “He has never heard of anyone of that name and has no idea why that somebody would want his ashes scattered on his land.”

“I can pay,” it was the only thing now left that Jake could think of.

“I don’t think suggesting it to him would be a great idea,” Marina said.

“Please ask him anyway. It’s really important.”

She did, and for the first time in the conversation the man became visibly unhappy.

“Told you it wasn’t a good idea,” Marina shook her head. “You can’t buy somebody’s conscience.”

“Well, some people just play it up to ratchet up the price.”

“Not this guy,” said Marina. “And he definitely wants us, Godless heathens, off his land now.”

They drove back to Stare Duszki in silence. This really wasn’t going according to the plan, Jake thought, as if Ruthenia and Galicia was doing everything it could to reject the last mortal remains of one of her emigrant sons. Would he have to try to slip in at night to do the deed, and hope that the Ruthenian Orthodox owner wasn’t scanning his property with night vision goggles, ready to unleash his dog on uninvited guests? Truthfully, he was beginning to consider quitting the farce that the whole exercise has become and simply disposing of the ashes in a more convenient way – more respectful than a rubbish bin but less trouble than the Stare Duszki option. After all, who the hell would know? His grandfather’s ghost? Jake didn’t believe in ghosts, even after a few days in this crazy country.

On the way back, they stopped at the garage again and Marina filled up the tank. Jake hoped that the owner-mechanic wasn’t watering his petrol, but as he and Marina were chatting at the bowser, he seemed amicable enough, unlike his anti-cremation neighbour.

“Paluch is his name,” Marina said, after Jake insisted he pays for the petrol and soft drinks to go.

“Who, the mechanic?”

“No, the guy whose property we trespassed,” Marina said. “The mechanic said that he was always difficult to deal with, even when he was a child. And after his wife died a few years ago, he’d become even more… unfriendly.”

“I can sort of understand,” Jake sighed. “If a stranger turned up on my land – if I had any land – with a similar request, I’m not sure what my initial reaction would be.”

“I hope that you would be nicer and more accommodating,” Marina turned to him and smiled.

‘Possibly,” said Jake. “It’s only ash after all.” And somebody’s life and memories, and their family’s.

“By the way,” she said, “I asked the mechanic about your grandfather, and his name did not ring any bells either.”

“Even if he was a local, he migrated some sixty years ago. There are probably not many people alive around him who would remember him.”

“Still, if he were a local, the family name shouldn’t be unfamiliar. Unless he was the last of his family.”

“Or it wasn’t his real name. Too many question marks,” said Jake. “And we’re none the wiser now.”

“Sorry,” she said.

“Oh no,” Jake said, “please… Not your fault. Not anyone else’s fault. And I enjoyed getting some fresh country air. Without running into any werewolf trouble,” he smiled.

“Well, we’re not out of the danger zone yet, so touch wood.” Then after a moment of silence she said, “I just hoped that we might learn something new by coming here.”

“Well, we did,” he touched her arm. “We learned that fulfilling my obligation will not be as easy as I thought…” He realised that his gesture, meant to reassure Marina that he was fine – that everything was fine – despite the obstacles, and that she was fine too, might seem too familiar. He moved his hand and not knowing what to do with it put it in his pocket.

“You don’t have any plans for the afternoon?” she didn’t seem to notice, or if she noticed she didn’t mind, or if she minded she didn’t mention it.

“Not really.” He was quite used to by now to her almost constant presence and her eagerness to fill up his time, as if she felt personally responsible to extend hospitality on behalf of her country and compensate for the less than ideal first impression Ruthenia and Galicia was leaving in his mind. Her country, Jake thought. I guess it’s my country too, one quarter mine in a way. He did not feel any strong emotions, just some mild curiosity tampered by caution, like when you suddenly discover you have a relative you never knew about. Nothing, certainly not his grandfather, had prepared him for that. Here’s my ashes, Jake, and here’s your other country.

“That’s good,” Marina said. “I have an idea.”

“Will it involve trespassing on someone else’s private property?”

“I’m half-Gypsy,” she winked at him. “We’re always on someone else’s property.”

About ten kilometres past Stare Duszki, with the road to Czernograd winding itself through a gap in the mountains, Marina put on the right indicator and turned into an unmarked side road, paved, but a long time ago by the looks of it, and narrow, without any median marking and with shoulders that seamlessly merged with the forest rising tall on both sides and shielding them from the midday sun.

“By the way, that house on the hill,” she said. “The mechanic said it’s an old disused hunting lodge that still belongs to the royal family.”

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger on Unsplash