The Accidental Anarchist (27 page)

“Thank you very much,” I said. “So any time they want to rob you, all they have to do is kill me, first.”

“No one needs to kill anyone. I told you; it’s all fixed. The guard is even drawing us a map of how to get to the railroad.”

He had not, in so many words, invited me to take part in this mad excursion of his. Nor was I at all sure I would accept. But it crushed my spirits to know that the man had, entirely on his own, made these dangerous plans. And used my name to frighten people.

I was not, by nature, what you would call a pessimist. But I could suddenly think of a million obstacles. To begin with: “A five-day walk with shackles on your legs? Just how far do you think you will get? The guards will take your money and open the gates. And then they’ll sit and laugh until you all come limping back, begging to be let in.”

“You think I haven’t thought of that?”

“Being let back in?”

“How to get rid of our chains. One of the old-timers explained what to do. Of course, we can’t actually test it until we’re outside.” But he illustrated how, with a flat rock, one could possibly pound rings into an oval that might allow one’s foot to slip through.

One didn’t need to be an engineer to see the flaw in that, too. Even assuming the iron was soft enough to shape with a rock, what if you hit it a little bit too hard? How would you then, without a blacksmith’s help, widen it again? Because if you couldn’t, within hours your foot would turn black, and then. . .

One look at the naked desperation in Pyavka’s eyes and I said no more.

A moment later, he acted again as though he had no further need for me. This annoyed me enough to mention one or two other small details he might have overlooked. “What about the guard dogs?”

“There aren’t any. The prisoners ate them last year.”

“If the wolves or bounty hunters don’t get you first, you’ll lose your way and die of hunger or walk in circles until you go mad.”

Once again, I regretted my harsh words. A moment ago, I was angry because, in sheer panic, he had saddled me with a killer’s reputation. Why, then, should I have gotten angry once he assumed he could do without me?

Pyavka’s features collapsed in despair. “All right. It’s off.”

“What? What’s off?”

"If you don’t think it’s possible, then it’s off. I told the others right from the start that I wouldn’t go without you. They growled and grumbled, but I wouldn’t give in. I know I wouldn’t last one day out there on my own.”

In an instant, I was appeased. How could I have spoken so cruelly to my only friend? Schemes and ideas erupted from me like fireworks. Of course, it was possible.

“Then you will come with us?”

At the point of saying ‘yes,’ I asked how much money he would have left after bribing our way out.

“Thirty-seven rubles,” he said sheepishly.

I knew this was not the best time to bring it up, but didn’t he know a ticket to Warsaw would cost at least ten times that much for him, alone?

His eyes glazed over with tears. “Why are you trying to crush my spirit? You’ve been a soldier. You’re used to rough living. Ten years from now, you will still be thriving. But me, I’ve always lived in comfort. If I don’t get out of here, I’ll croak like a dog!”

Even as I fumbled for some way to reassure him, he added, “Once I’m free, I can always earn my way. Not every village needs a lawyer or a doctor. But there is never a time when a good thief cannot find work for his hands.”

I admitted that this was the first halfway intelligent thing I’d heard him say in some time. Yet, I was still uneasy. Not only about the villains who would be flying out on my friend’s coat tails. But what made him so certain he could trust our guards even as far as the gate?

He flashed a rueful smile. “I didn’t want to worry you, but let me explain why I believe they are being truthful with me. The fact is they had one condition. The Cossacks never forgave you for your complaint to the general, which led one of their men to kill himself. So when I told them I would not leave without you, the truest friend I have in all the world, they made it clear that they were ready to pass up the 100 rubles sooner than let you escape.

“So you see,” he continued cheerfully, “If they intended to swindle me, why would they object to your name?”

There was good, crooked logic in what he said. Our guards may have been corrupt, but clearly they were men of principle. I felt a sudden chill of loneliness. Once Pyavka was gone, I would have lost my only ally. The guards would be able to exact their revenge on me any time it suited them. I swallowed my bitterness. “When are you leaving?”

“I’m not.”

“What?”

“I told you. Not without you.”

“Then you’re a fool. You’re twice as old as I am. You have a family waiting for you. And how long do you think you will last in those mines?”

“I will not go without you,” he repeated doggedly. “Not from friendship. I’m a thief; I spit on friendship. But you’re quite right. I am a city man. I never dealt in violence. Without you at my side, they would slit my throat without a knife.”

“But if the guards won’t let me out. . .”

Pyavka interrupted, smiling again. “I’m on my way to meet with one of the officers. To offer him an extra 25 rubles for you, alone.”

And off he went, not, alas, in the brisk, balanced stride of a man who knew how to get things done, but placing one foot daintily in front of the other, like the kind of person whose dreams lasted longer than his sleep.

Not for the first time, I marveled at how this man, in a hard city like Warsaw, could ever have ruled over a kingdom of thieves.

Ten minutes later he was back with a face like a rained-out funeral. “Not a chance. In fact, the Cossacks are so angry with you that I fear for your life.”

Trying to keep the tremor out of my voice, I asked, “What time is the escape?”

“Two o’clock in the morning. But there will be no escape. I told you as I told the guard: I will not go without you.”

I seized his arm. “You will go. And so will I. There is no moon, and once the gates open and twenty men burst through, who will notice one extra body? And if they try to shoot the extra man, I’ll make sure it’s not me.”

Pyavka slung his arms around me. “I knew you would think of something!”

“You realize I could be endangering the rest of you.”

He shrugged. “Tonight, either 21 men will get out or no one will escape.”

Back in our barracks, I lay down and tried to sleep. But the blood thumped in my ears the way it used to on the eve of a military attack. Hours later, I was still awake when I saw men arise from their shelves, like specters out of their muddy graves.

Outside, in the not-quite-moonless fog, ragged shadows flitted toward the assembly point behind the tool shed. From the few faces I recognized in the darkness, it was plain that my poor friend was a lamb among wolves. No wonder he refused to go without at least one person on whom it was safe to turn his back.

Huddled against the blind wall of a guardhouse filled with snoring bodies, I watched twenty men being carefully counted twice, and again once more, and the 100 rubles being paid out and counted with at least as much care. I smudged my face with lampblack, but no one seemed to notice.

Four guards, including one officer, seemed to be in on it. The gate was quietly unlocked, and a bird cry sounded the signal. Half expecting a bullet in the back, I timed my moves so that, with twenty other sets of chains clanking like sleigh bells in heavy traffic on Nevsky Prospekt, I reached the open gate at a dead run among the first half-dozen. No one was intent on anything but running as fast as his fetters would allow.

The plan was for Pyavka and I to meet near a stack of freshly cut timber less than two kilometers from the gate. This meant Pyvka had to break away from the others almost at once. But an hour passed with no sign of him. Meanwhile, all around me, the forest rang with the insolent peal of shackles being hammered. To my ears, each blow echoed like a rifle shot. How could the camp commander sleep through all this racket?

I was about to give up on Pyavka and drag my feet to a deserted part of the forest when he showed up, panting and drenched in sweat.

“Why didn’t you wait for me?” he moaned.

“I did wait for you,” I said, without mentioning that I had been about to abandon him, the very instrument of my freedom.

“I looked for you at the trees outside the gate.”

“Not trees – timber,” I said. “And far from the gate. Why would we meet somewhere close to—?”

“Trees, timber,” he said with a wide grin. “What does it matter now that we’re together again?”

I was about to explain the subtle differences between my words and Pyavka’s interpretation, but we were still too close to the camp to engage in such lighthearted argument. At any moment, we might hear horses’ hooves, furious commands, and a burst of machine gun fire.

I stooped for a rock, two rocks, and pulled Pyavka into a dense thicket of trees. Handing him one rock, I wrapped my foot rag around my stone, which Pyavka copied, and we each pounded at our fetters, hammering rock against steel until, at the cost of some skin, I was able to wrench mine off. Once the clanking stopped echoing in my ears, the only sound I heard was the clean breeze moaning in the treetops.

After seven months and sixteen different prisons, way stations and transit camps, I was finally free.

Chapter 23: Which Way to the North Pole?

My unchained feet felt feather-light, as if they barely touched the earth. Surprisingly, although he wheezed like a milkman’s horse, Pyavka was able to keep up with me. But I suppose the first thing a thief must learn how to do is run.

Which reminded me. “Where is the map?”

“What map?”

Then it came back to him. Stricken, he admitted that in all the confusion he had failed to notice who, if anyone held onto that priceless piece of paper.

It took some effort, but I controlled myself. A map without a compass would have been of little use, anyway, surrounded as we were by trees that were identical in height and girth, giving us no signpost by which to orient ourselves.

But as we had put some distance between us and the camp, whether in the right direction or not, I suggested that we stop and rest while deep in the bowels of a forest that may not have been touched by human feet since the Six Days of Creation.

When we settled in for the remainder of the night, enveloped by curious noises, I made the innocent suggestion that we arm ourselves.

“Against what?”

“Bears, wolves, bounty hunters. Your nineteen friends.”

With a tolerant smile, Pyavka shook his head at my timidity. “Even in Warsaw, I never felt the need to go around armed like a hooligan.”

“You didn’t have bodyguards?”

“Bodyguards, of course I had. Two fine young lads. Followed me everywhere. Looked up to me like a father.”

“And where were they when the police came for you?”

His mouth twisted into a pained smile. “Would you believe it was they who turned me in? Of course, they had been handsomely paid. But I could swear there were tears in their eyes when the police hauled me off.” Even all these months later, his eyes dampened at the memory.

Mostly to occupy my hands, I broke off two straight branches and fashioned them into spears whose points I hardened over a small, smokeless flame.

“In which
yeshiva
did you learn that?” my partner scoffed.

“Never mind that.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to build a fire to frighten off a wild beast that might attack you in your sleep?”

It was true; if we built a fire, we wouldn’t have to worry about wolves because the Cossacks would be here long before them.

“Then where is it safe to sleep?” he inquired in the nasal tone of a spoiled English tourist.

I pointed to a nearby tree.

“How can a human being sleep in a tree?”

It took me a moment to realize that he was serious. His parents must have strongly impressed upon him that climbing trees was not respectable. Only how, I wondered, having grown up with such a noble inhibition, had he achieved his eminence as a master criminal?

“I grew up on the city streets. By the time I saw my first tree, I was already too well-dressed to think of climbing it. But just you watch me go up the bare facade of a house.”

I promised him that, should we both live long enough to make it back to Warsaw, I would be glad to have him give me a demonstration of his talent. Meanwhile, I tried to teach him one of the useful skills I picked up in the army, which was how to sleep in the natural hammock formed by the branches of a tree.

Hours later, from a nearby roost, I saw my comrade still clinging to the trunk like an exhausted wrestler, noisily thrashing and reassembling his limbs from one contortion to another. Until, without warning, he fell asleep, almost in mid-air.

In shameful contrast, I couldn’t close an eye. Unsure how far we were from the camp, I felt that at least one of us should stay alert. Since Pyavka’s snores might as well have come from the depths of a feather bed, and I would not have had much trust in his watchfulness, anyway, the watch might as well be me.