Swans Are Fat Too (6 page)

Konstanty, seeing Hania at the grocery store in the morning, considered that she looked like a heart patient after an unsuccessful operation. Not one of his, of course.

"Good morning
pani
, any luck with the job hunting?"

"No, I think I'm stuck as a babysitter for the moment. Unless I can get something to do at home."

On a sudden impulse he thought he'd probably regret later, he said, "I may have a job for you––of course, I don't know if you'd be interested…it's not much, a little typing and editing really…"

"I'm sure I'd be…" don't sound so eager, she told herself, and ended the sentence on an entirely lower key––"interested."

So, thought Konstanty on his way to work, maybe that was a mistake, but probably not. He wondered what she'd make of his writing, felt almost a little anxious about it––not very, just that tiniest little uneasiness. He had asked her some question; he forgot what, something about her reading habits, to see if she actually had any literary interests. He'd got more of a reply than he expected.

Pianists, she said, were supposed to know literature. There were so many links between literature and music. The themes of novels, she continued, went by nations. English novels were about requited love, she said. (Any other Polish woman would have batted her eyes at him at that point. She didn't even blink. There was no need for him to let a twinkle show in his eye, to smile his three-quarter Mona Lisa smile. Had he missed it?) French novels, she said, were about love, disillusionment, and self-knowledge––and more love, and more self-knowledge. American novels were all about struggle––for money, position, survival, something. In American novels it was always a battle. In Russian novels it was all suffer, sin, and suffer. Polish novels, whatever their ostensible subject, were only about Poland, always and
toujours
Poland. And then he'd had to admit that indeed, he was writing about Poland, but it wasn't a novel…

So, okay, maybe he, like other Poles, had his country a bit too much on his mind, but really, where else in the world would one find a prince and a pianist discussing literature while standing over a barrel of pickles? Or was that just his romanticizing view? If one looked at them differently, weren't they just two perfectly ordinary people chatting as they waited in line? Or––an unintentional illustration of Jack Sprat and his wife?

Although Konstanty could be charming when he wished, his general austerity of manner was such that few people realized he had a sense of humor.

He walked into the gray-floored hall of the hospital, down the corridor toward his examining room in the cardiology department. His colleague Jacek, middle-aged, round, and jolly, was ushering in a patient while humming a tune––something about a "heart beating to the rhythm of the cha-cha." Jacek was always singing, and he told his patients off-color jokes in a way that rather scandalized Konstanty, trained in a different tradition. Jacek's patients adored him, spoke easily to him as to a friend, left him with smiles on their faces; Konstanty's patients treated him with deference and reserve and left him with grateful little bows. One accepted the limitations of one's character and did the best one could. So, all right, his best wasn't at the level of Jacek's, but he knew he was doing good and that was tremendously important to him.

It had surprised him, a little, when he had come back to Poland, that there were so many other doctors––and nurses––in the country who had not taken the opportunity to go elsewhere, who were also willing to work for a pittance, for the disinterested reason of helping their fellow humans. Not, certainly, that he had wished to consider himself unique in any way, only it had struck him, coming from abroad, where his position was so clearly linked with economic advantage. Well, yes, there were a few doctors in the hospital, he knew, who took bribes, a few even whose avarice might be described as extortion, but that there were such numbers of the others gave him hope, whenever he was inclined to feel discouraged about his country's future.

Hania, with the prospect of the job from Konstanty to sustain her, found the day almost bearable. She didn't say anything to the children about the previous night, she just hoped, hoped, hoped, that their parents would come back. She also found the house keys and put them in her pocket. She had brought a newspaper from the kiosk, and had marked several possible apartments for rent. Tonight, she would get the work from Konstanty, and tomorrow Wiktor and Ania would come back, and as soon as she could she would move out. It would be awkward, of course, but she would do it. She could afford to spend two months in a small, rented apartment, if she had work. She would enjoy a child-free summer and maybe sometimes she would talk to Konstanty about his writing. It would be lonely but anything was better than her pariah status here.

The telephone rang in the middle of the afternoon. She dived for it, almost choking on a bit of sandwich.

"Hania," it was Wiktor's voice.

"Waaugh."

"Hania, listen."

She hated sentences that began that way; they always ended badly for her.

"We can't get back for a while."

She'd known it––she'd been sure that's what would happen––she'd steeled herself for what to say. She took a deep breath in order to blast Wiktor with "No! You get back here and take care of your children! You can't use me this way!"

But he was saying, "Haniu,
kochanie
, you're a lifesaver, we're so grateful, how could we manage without you? I'm mentioning you to everyone I'm meeting here ––I think I've got a concert arranged––"

"No! I don't want anything arranged for me!" and there she was, arguing about concerts and completely derailed and then unable to get a word in. But this is ridiculous, she thought, I have to tell him to come home. She took her deep breath again.

"Wiktor, listen!"

"Haniu,
kochanie
, I have to end now." And the line went dead in the middle of her shriek of "Nooo!"

She listened to the silence for a moment and then slammed the receiver down, fuming. Kalina and Maks were watching.

"Are they coming back?" asked Kalina in a rather sneering tone.

"I don't know. I suspect you're stuck with me for a while."

Kalina shrugged; then she reached under one of the sofa pillows, pulled out a small plastic object, stuck it in her mouth, and began to suck on it. Hania stared, unable to see at first what the object was. Then she realized. Kalina was sucking on a pacifier. Somehow this upset her more than anything that had happened before.

"It's mine," whined Maks, "I want it."

"It isn't yours," said Kalina, taking the pacifier out for a second. "I found it in the park." She put it back in her mouth and sucked as she watched the television.

"I want one too." Maks' lip was trembling.

Hania said, "Maks, if you really want one, I'll buy you one tomorrow."

"I don't want anything from you! Why don't you go away?" he shouted and flung out of the room.

Hania felt for the children, since they'd clearly been abandoned, and because, more clearly, they were accustomed to it. But as they appeared to want none of her, there was not much she could do for them.

She took her laptop out and considered the paper beside her with Konstanty's handwriting. Those first words might be 'the neolithic peoples' or 'till narcolepsy prevails.' He had walked back to the apartment with her from the grocery store and handed her a large stack of papers. The handwriting was appalling––a series of mountain peaks peppered with stray accent marks. "I'm writing something on the order of a brief history for foreigners," he had said, "nothing scholarly, you understand, just a sort of hopefully readable, rough outline to fit into a guide with a lot of economic information. It's for my sister's PR company––she thought it would amuse me to choose what goes in and what stays out, since I've always loved history. And it has afforded me some pleasure, I admit. But I type at the speed of––well, let's just say, any bird hunting and pecking at that speed would die of hunger"––there had been that flash of amusement, so quickly disappearing––"and I have doubts about my English…" His English was quite good, actually, thought Hania, rather British-accented. "We weren't required to write a lot in medical school." That slight, deprecating smile again. "Then, too, I'd like another opinion about what to leave in and out––this is intended, you see, for people whose knowledge of the country, even though they may be considering investing here, will probably be very limited." The choices were good, she thought, but the writing was rather convoluted. Some––no, a lot––of the sentences needed rewriting. They were fairly grammatical, but not constructed in the way a native English-speaker would speak or write. 

There was an email. Konstanty had written to her. She stared at the heading for a moment before clicking on it:
Respected Madam, I am eager to know whether in your opinion the text that I gave you is in need of much work? 

She hesitated. It wouldn't do to be fulsome or gushing, to say 'oh thank you for writing to me, I feel so much less lonely now.' And besides it did need work. She had a curious image of her grandmother standing beside a piano student.

Respected Sir––
that was how one began letters in Polish––
Yes
.

She clicked send, and very quickly received an answer.

Respected Madam, I am obliged for your prompt and laconic reply. I was not aware that it was as unacceptable as your answer leads me to believe. I wonder if you could elaborate?

Respected Sir, In English, one says and writes, 'I'm going for a walk.' Polish people say 'I'm going for a walk,' and write 'I intend to fulfil the concept of performing the action of going for a walk.'

Respected Madam, I retire, carrying my wounded pride on a stretcher.

Oh dear. Was he joking? Had she hurt his feelings?
Respected Sir, It's very interesting. You are joking about the stretcher?

Respected Madam, Yes.

By evening she had corrected several pages of text. Maks had disappeared after his outburst, which should have put her on her guard, but she was wrapped up in her reading.

The Slavonian tribes, Procopius writes, governed themselves in democratic fashion, without a leader, 'and therefore they are all concerned with what is successful and what detrimental…and agree on everything together...' The Slavs agreed so well that they often, curiously, turned to outsiders for leadership…

Konstanty had added in the margin:
Would it be better to write––'a jealous guardianship of their equality persisted through the centuries
…'? Of course, she realized that he must have written the words for himself, before he had any idea that she would be working on the text, but for a moment she had the pleasing illusion that he was asking her opinion.

Mieszko, a 10
^th
century duke with whom the beginnings of the Polish state are connected, may have been of a Danish royal family. He had two wives: the first was a Christian noblewoman from the Czech lands; the second was a German nun, whom he abducted from the monastery of Kalbe.

Hania smiled at this, but besides the occasional images of prosperity and developing culture, of a land rich in
'grain, meat, honey, and fish
' with stone palaces and cathedrals going up, some of it, of course, made her blood run rather cold:

Mieszko also engaged in marriage-making. He had 3,000 men in armour and paid for their children's marriages, says the chronicler Ibn Jakub. His own daughter, Sigrid the Haughty, married the kings of Sweden and Denmark respectively, was famed for her 'exuberant lifestyle' (she burned two of her suitors alive), and became the mother of King Canute. Another daughter––or sister, the chronicles aren't certain––one Adelaida, was mother of the first king of Hungary, who became Saint Stephen. Adelaida, however, 'drank excessively and rode on horseback like a knight. Once she even killed, in an access of furious rage, one of her husbands…'

Mieszko's son Bolesław behaved better with his unwanted wives; he simply sent them back to their parents. With his political opponents, however, he was harsher, ordering their eyes to be put out. Such were the times, and such ferocities common across Europe.

Konstanty had written at the bottom of the page, and then crossed out:
Think, for instance, of the 15,000 Bulgarian soldiers taken prisoner by the Byzantine Emperor Basil II in 1016, all blinded and sent home with a one-eyed guide, or of Richard I of England setting up a grandstand to watch the cold-blooded execution of 3,000 Muslim prisoners in the succeeding century. 

Hania sat for a moment, contemplating. One could skim over things like this in history books. Not let them really sink in. These things had to be left padded by the layers of years in between or the sense of revulsion became too strong. Shuddering away the images of pain and gore, she turned back to the text, and began to rearrange a sentence.

Maks appeared at her side. That was unusual. He actually looked like he'd gotten over his anger, like he wanted something from her. She felt a little surge of warmth towards him. She had an impulse to click off the text before he saw it, but then remembered he couldn't read English. Actually, she didn't know if he could read at all.

"Maks, can you read?"

"Of course." He pushed his glasses up and regarded her with his disdainful, owlish eyes. "But why should I read when there's the television? It says on the news that there's a murderer around."

She should pay attention to what he watched, she realized. Children shouldn't watch the news.

"Yes. A murderer of children. He chops them up with a knife."

What did one say to that? Oh, surely not? Not here in Warsaw. Hardly ever anywhere? Err…

"Well, I'm sure you're quite safe, Maks. There are a couple billion children in the world and the murder statistics among them are miniscule. Um…There aren't any murderers here, I'm sure." So why did she have that creepy feeling down her spine now? Drat Maks. He gave her a long look and turned on his heel. "I'm going to bed," he called over his shoulder.