39.

30 June, 12:45 PM, Stare Duszki

Jake and Marina retraced their way back to the village, followed this time all the way by low clouds. Like a flock of sheep, they were being shepherded along by a northerly that Marina explained was called spoczny, the wind that usually brought rain in its wake. Even though it came in wet and musty, people preferred it to its southerly counterpart, halny, which blow from the mountain slopes onto the central plains; cool, dry, and bearing melancholy and suicide, according to superstitious old people, and who of them weren’t?

This spoczny looked like bringing a storm, too. Impending violence and welt-like darkness was slowly consuming the sky behind them, the air already charged with electricity and humidity pressing out the breath and energy from the face of the earth. As they sped toward Stare Duszki, Jake noticed few signs of life outside the car window, as if the weather has already disabled men and beast and confined them to suffer it out indoors.

The printout of the photo, folded in half, traveled down with him in his breast pocket. He was still unsure of the wisdom of returning. Even if Marina was right and they managed to find someone who still remembered Bohu Voynich after all these decades, would they know the missing “why” of the past, and therefore, indirectly, the missing “why” of the present - why somebody still seemed to mind so much to try to stop the grandson? It seemed a very long shot.

They did not speak much as they drove down south. It was unusual; in Jake’s experience new lovers bubbled with conversation, often silly or inconsequential; another way to channel the joy and excitement and tie the fresh bond with strings of words. The past too, like the humid air, was pressing down on them, heavy and cheerless, and menacing too.

Around lunchtime they pulled up outside of the garage-cum-petrol station, whose owner had previously given them directions to the lake. He looked surprised to see them again, but they explained to him that this time they were looking for a person, or to be more precise, someone who might have known a certain person.

They showed him Bohu’s photograph, more as a courtesy. The man was probably forty, though he looked ten years older, weathered by hard work and disappointment; his own parents might have been children the last time Bohu had walked around here, if indeed he ever had.

The man shook his head. He didn’t took the picture in his hands, which he kept pressed to the sides of his pants as he leaned over, afraid to stain the thin paper with grease. “Nope,” he shook his head.

“This man left-“ Marina turned to Jake, “-sixty years ago?” Jake nodded. “Do you know anyone around here old enough around here who could still remember him?”

The mechanic thought about for a while. “Old Moskal must be close to ninety. And Mother Buska well past eighty. If there is anyone who can remember something that far back it would be them. Though their memory might not be what it used to be,” he smiled, exposing a yellow grin with a missing right upper two.

“We’ll take our chances,” Marina said. He gave them instructions where to find Old Moskal’s and Mother Buska’s houses and they thanked him for his help again.

Of the two, Old Moskal lived closer to the garage. They drove down the road as if they were heading for the lake and stopped a few hundred metres later, outside a small cottage with white-washed walls and window frames painted bright blue, just as the mechanic described it.

And old dog watched them lazily as they opened the gate and walked an earth-beaten path through the middle of a vegetable garden towards the front door. Marina knocked on the door and after a while they heard footsteps inside the house. An elderly woman opened the door slightly, enough to look at them wearily. She must not have been expecting guests, particularly strangers. They conversed with Marina for a while before she closed the door.

“No luck?” Jake asked.

“Apparently the old man has been at the local hospital for the past few days,” said Marina. “He started having trouble with his heart on Tuesday and they’ve been keeping him for observation. That was his daughter, by the way.”

“I guess that leaves the woman,” Jake said opening the front gate for Marina.

“Mother Buska,” she nodded.

The old woman lived further down in the direction of the lake and away from the main road. Past a roadside wooden cross with a roughly hewn figure of Christ hanging in agony, weather-beaten and darkened, they turned left into an unpaved side road. Tall hedges bordered the narrow lane on both sides, broken occasionally by sections of wooden fences, sagging with age.

Another half a kilometre drive and they pulled into a patch of dirt at the road’s shoulder. Beyond it lay a solitary dwelling, more unkempt than other houses they have seen in the village. It hasn’t been painted for a long time, and the whole structure seemed to be slowly sinking into the ground, though that was perhaps just an illusion created by a thatched roof – Good God, thatched roofs; still? thought Jake – that seemed somehow too big for what it was covering.

They walked to the front door and Marina once again did the knocking. Jake wanted to tell her to be careful not to get any splinters; the wooden planks looked on the verge of disintegration.

After the second series of raps there was shuffling inside and Jake heard a woman’s voice say something that sounded like “eede, eede”, which he thought was either “I’m coming, I’m coming” or “Stop making all the ruckus”.

A metal latch slid away and the door squealed on its hinges. The woman in the doorway was barely past five feet tall, shrunken with age, her skin the colour and the texture of a walnut – or a brain. But her eyes were very much alive, clear, and staring at them with curiosity from underneath a faded headscarf.

Marina did the talking. After a minute or two she nudged Jake and he handed over the photo, which she in turn handed to the woman.

Mother Buska, took the printed-out picture of Jake’s grandfather and first looked at it at arm’s length before bringing it closer to her face. She stared at it, glanced at Marina, returned her gaze to the photo and her features slackened, her toothless mouth gaping half open over the the piece of paper in her trembling hands.

The old woman raised her head and barked something at Marina. Marina tried to say something, but Mother Buska thrust the picture back at her and shot a fast, high-pitched tirade at her, crossing herself repeatedly, her features tightened by anger and eyes flashing. Marina tried once again to interrupt her, but Mother Buska went on, finally waving her hands around in the universal gesture of shooing them off, then with unexpected agility she stepped back and slammed the door shut. They heard the bolt sliding into place for a good measure.

The audience was definitely over.

“What the hell was that all about?” Jake asked, gently putting his hand on Marina’s shoulder. She flinched and slowly turned away. He pulled his hand back.

“Well...” she started hesitantly.

“Well?”

Marina started to run her fingers through her hair, forgetting that she still held the picture in one hand.

“Oh shit,” she stopped. “Sorry,” she handed him back the piece of paper, worse for wear for having now passed through several sets of hands.

“No problem,” Jake shrugged, taking the picture and sliding it into his pocket. “By the looks of it, it’s already served its purpose of sending one lucky octogenarian stark raving mad.”

“Sorry,” she repeated.

“Now you’re doing it,” he said.

“What?”

“Apologising all the time.”

“S-“ she started again, unselfconscious. Then she just shook her head. “This is weird.”

“You tell me,” he said. “I’m still waiting to hear what happened.”

She sighed.

“Well, we started chatting, and I told her that we are trying to find someone who might still remember this person, your grandfather, and that the guy at the garage pointed us towards her. She asked how long ago. I said about sixty years, give or take. She said, oh my, I was a young woman then, like it brought back some good memories she didn’t have too many of. Then I showed her the photo and...”

“...she had a look at it...”

“Yes, and then she just like spat out right at me, are you making a fool of me, young girl, and I tried to say something, but she started screaming... And crossing herself...”

Marina sighed again and looked away.

“She said, God rest his soul, God rest his soul, and curse on the beast that took him from us.”

“The beast?” Jake scowled. “What the...”

“Yeah, the beast, she said,” Marina nodded, still not avoiding eye contact. “And then she said, well, screamed, you know, you heard her... don’t try to make a fool of me, do you think I’m a simple country woman? How dare you, you silly young peacocks-“

“She called us peacocks?”

“Yes, she called us peacocks. How dare you silly young peacocks from the city make fool of me, and how dare you bring him – him – into this. Don’t you have any decency left?... And then she slammed the door.”

Only now Marina turned her head back and looked at him.

“Ok,” Jake said. “So it’s like watching a French art-house movie with English subtitles. You understand what they’re saying, but you have no fucking idea what’s actually going on.”

“She thinks your grandfather died...”

“Well, yes. But certainly not then. It happened only a few weeks ago...”

“And the beast...,” she reminded him.

“Yes, and the beast. Whatever the hell that means. Do you have any idea?”

Marina shrugged. “Could be anyone or anything. This is Ruthenia, after all.”

“Whatever it is, Mother Buska appears to be pretty sore about it. Our practical joke was in a particular bad taste...”

He was going to say something else, to the effect that in this inquiry of theirs the more they learned the less they knew, when his phone started ringing.

“Hello.”

“Mr Voynich?”

“Yes.”

“It’s Deputy Inspector Milos here.”

He recognised the voice from two days ago. Did the police ever call you with good news? From Mother Buska and the beast to Inspector Maciejewicz and his beast, all in a space of few minutes.

“Ah,” he said, “Hello, Mr Deputy Inspector.”

“Where are you at the moment?” No unnecessary pleasantries there.

“Stare Duszki, actually.”

“Oh,” this time it was Milos’ turn. “Again...”

“What can I say?” Jake said. “We fell in love with the place. Have you ever been-”

“Inspector Maciejewicz wants to see you as soon as possible.” Guess he hasn’t.

“Something important came up?”

“The Inspector would appreciate it if you could come by as soon as you can.”

“OK, we’ll drive straight back,” Jake said.

Yes, it was bound to be good news, for sure.

Photo by Norbert Buduczki on Unsplash