Part 14 (1/2)

She shrugged.

”I was afraid he'd hear me. I was afraid as soon as I went out he'd do something to Zuzia. I was afraid that even if I did call they'd tell me they're not my bodyguards. That has happened before now.”

”So what did you do?”

”Nothing. I waited to see what would happen. And then I saw him take a braided leather lead off the clothes rack. We used to have a dog, a sort of mongrelly Alsatian. He was. .h.i.t by a bus a couple of years ago. Somehow I've never had the heart to throw away the lead. I loved that dog. I started shouting that he was to leave her alone now, otherwise I'd call the police and he'd go to prison.”

”And what happened then?”

”He said I shouldn't interfere but should remember what he'd said earlier. Then I replied that he should watch out because he wasn't immortal either. Then he let the child go, came up to me and lashed me with the lead. It didn't even hurt, because the hardest blow hit my hair, but the end of the lead wound around my head and cut my lip-” she put her finger to a scab at the corner of her mouth. ”Zuzia began to wail of course. Then he went mad, shouting that neither of us would ever forget this day. Then I stood up. He swung the lead, but I raised my hand and it wound around my arm. That upset him terribly. He pushed me onto the work surface, but as we were both still holding the lead, he came flying after me. I was afraid that would be the end of me. I reached out a hand, grabbed the bread knife and stuck it in his side. I wasn't trying to kill him, I just wanted him to stop. He flew at me and lost his balance.”

”Why didn't you withdraw the hand holding the knife?”

She licked her lips and looked at him. For a long time. He understood, but he couldn't put it in the report. However, he had to write something down. Without dropping her gaze, she opened her mouth, then gently shook her head. She understood. And instead of what she was probably intending to say, in other words ”I didn't want to”, she replied: ”I wasn't quick enough. It all happened in a flash.”

And that was how the earth came to carry one less son of a b.i.t.c.h, he felt like adding as the punchline. But instead of saying anything, he let her finish her story. The inquiry had confirmed that the woman's life was h.e.l.l. Even the victim's own parents had picked him to shreds. Nidziecka's father-in-law was amazed it was him that was dead and not her. ”But that's good, very good,” he'd kept saying over and over.

A simple case. At least for the police. They'd arrested her, interviewed her, got a confession, the end. The rest of the job was up to the prosecutor and the court. The policeman didn't have to wonder which article in the Penal Code had been contravened, how to cla.s.sify the crime and what penalty to demand. The policeman didn't have a supervisor above him in the shape of the Preparatory Proceedings Department who'd write him letters demanding that he catch criminals in a different way. Szacki often wondered if he wouldn't have been a better policeman than a prosecutor. As it was, he performed lots of tasks that his colleagues had only heard of, never done. He went to incident scenes and autopsies, and sometimes even took the trouble to go and see a witness to interview him on the spot. Rarely, but he did do it. Though on the other hand, as a policeman, often living on the fringes of the underworld, making concessions, occasionally turning a blind eye in exchange for something, he wouldn't have had the satisfaction he got from being part of the legal machine, whose aim was to administer justice - the penalty for breaking the law.

Now, as he wondered about the legal cla.s.sification, he felt as if the merciless machine had got stuck. He knew what was expected of him - that he should charge Nidziecka as severely as possible under Article 148, paragraph 1: ”Whoever kills a person is liable to a penalty of imprisonment for a term of no less than eight years.” Would that be in accordance with the law? Surely. Szacki was convinced Nidziecka had wanted to kill her husband. And that alone should have interested him. The court would probably have given her a low sentence, a special commutation of the sentence and so on, but still: that would mean Nidziecka was a worse murderer than the merciless thugs responsible for ”causing grievous bodily harm resulting in death”. He could decide on Article 148, paragraph 4: ”Whoever kills a person while in a state of extreme agitation justified by the circ.u.mstances is liable to a penalty of imprisonment of from one to ten years”. One year was less than eight.

Szacki pushed the computer keyboard away from him. He had already written the entire indictment, he was just missing the cla.s.sification and the grounds for it in a few sentences. In fact he felt like writing a draft decision to dismiss under the rule of self-defence - the right to repulse an unlawful attack. Without doubt that was what had happened here. But the supervisory board would stamp him into the ground if in such an obvious case he didn't submit an indictment that plainly improved the official statistics.

Finally he wrote down the cla.s.sification from Article 155: ”Whoever causes a person's death unintentionally is liable to a penalty of imprisonment for from three months to five years.”

”And I'll quit this rotten job sooner than change that,” he said aloud to himself.

Half an hour later the indictment was ready. He left it with Chorko's secretary, as the boss had just gone home. It was six p.m. High time to leave this charming place, he thought. He packed up quickly and switched off his computer. Just then the phone rang. He cursed out loud. For an instant he simply wanted to leave, but duty triumphed. As usual.

It was Nawrocki calling. He had located the people from the parallel cla.s.s to Sylwia Boniczka's , including someone repeating the year, as the clairvoyant had said. Some of them had no idea what he was talking about, some seemed truly scared, and the one repeating the year was terrified. He'd trembled all over, and Nawrocki was convinced that if he'd put more pressure on him he'd have cracked. Szacki didn't say it aloud, but he was sorry Nawrocki had interviewed the man. Although the policeman had a brain like a computer, physically he looked like a wimp and wasn't best suited to ”putting pressure” on interviewees. Kuzniecow was quite another matter - he only had to appear in the doorway and they all became very talkative in an instant.

”I don't think we could establish a rape case,” said Nawrocki. ”There's no injured party, no evidence, no proof, no circ.u.mstantial evidence; there's just the clairvoyant and a few potential suspects who are digging in their heels.”

”What about the father?”

”Well, yes, I've had an idea that we should interview him jointly.”

”How do you mean jointly?”

”I think if he's squeezed a bit he'll tell the truth. But we've only got one chance. If he doesn't admit it the first time, that'll be it. So I suggest a ma.s.sed attack: policeman, prosecutor, the darkest interview room in Mostowski Palace, being brought there by the police, a two-hour wait... Do you see, Prosecutor?”

Theatre, thought Szacki, he's suggesting b.l.o.o.d.y theatre. What should I do now? Go to the costume-hire place and get a bad cop's mask?

”What time?” he asked after a short silence, regretting it before the words had reached Nawrocki.

”What about six tomorrow evening?” suggested the policeman, sounding as if they were off to a nice pub.

”The perfect time,” said Szacki emphatically. ”Don't forget I only drink lightly chilled red wine, best of all from the Puglia region of Italy. And the table mustn't be too near the window or by the door.”

”Sorry?”

”Never mind. Tomorrow at six at your place. I'll call from downstairs.”

It was approaching seven as he turned off witokrzyski Bridge onto Szczeciskie Embankment towards the zoo and politely joined the queue in the left lane. The right one ended just past the little bridge at Praga port - you could only turn right from it - which didn't prevent some crafty customers from driving all the way down it, then playing dumb with their indicators on. Szacki never let them in.

He glanced at the ugly river-police building, and thought it was just about the start of the season for bodies in the Vistula. Drunken bathing, rape in the bushes, bets who could swim further. Luckily they rarely found anything in the City Centre section of the brown river. He couldn't bear drowned bodies, those livid, swollen corpses that looked like seals with the fur shaved off. He hoped this season he'd be spared that nightmare. A year ago, when they'd found one right by Gdaski Bridge, he had felt like moving it by hand a few yards further down - then his colleagues from the oliborz district would have had to deal with it. Fortunately the case was simple - the guy turned out to be a suicide who had jumped off Siekierkowski Bridge. Szacki had never understood why he had fully undressed before doing it, but didn't put that in his letter to the wife. The wife claimed he had always been very shy.

At the lanes by the main entrance to the zoo he had to stop to let a man and his daughter cross the road. The man was several years older than him, horribly emaciated, maybe sick. The girl was Helka's age. She was holding a balloon shaped like Piglet. Szacki thought how strange it was that all the cases he was involved in lately featured fathers and daughters. Boniczka, who may have murdered his daughter out of shame and buried her at night in the nursery school playground. Nidziecki, dragging his daughter into her bedroom and explaining that it was harder for him than for her. Telak wanting to commit suicide to follow his daughter into death. But also perhaps in some twisted way guilty of her death. And himself. Desperately wanting change, chasing after a young journalist. Was he prepared to sacrifice his daughter? And what exactly did it mean, ”sacrifice”? It was too early for solutions of that kind. But why too early? he wondered, as he waited for the lights to change at the corner of Ratuszowa and Jagielloska Streets. A hopeless junction. If there was traffic, at most two cars could turn left. And that only if the drivers were quick to react. Why too early? Wasn't it better to sort it out at once and have a free hand? Not have to tremble during dates in case his wife called. Not have to deceive either one or the other party.

He parked outside the house.

”What f.u.c.king bulls.h.i.+t,” he said aloud, putting the radio-control panel in his briefcase. ”You're getting worse, Szacki, worse and worse.”

6.

Friday, 10th June 2005.

UEFA has decided that Liverpool can after all defend its t.i.tle in the next season of the Champions League, though it shouldn't, because it only took fifth place in the Premiers.h.i.+p. The Moscow Prosecutor's Office has ruled that there is nothing wrong with the expression ”Jewish aggression as a form of Satanism”. The centrist Polish People's Party authorities have decided that Jarosaw Kalinowski will be their party's candidate for President. The candidate wants to hold a debate during the campaign on what Poland should be like. But in the polls Lech Kaczyski gains two points again, leaving independent Zbigniew Religa eight points behind. From other polls it appears that most Poles support Mayor Kaczyski's crusade against gays, but most Varsovians do not. A bomb scare in the capital. Fearing a sarin attack, for three hours in the afternoon the police block off the main junction in the city and suspend the metro. The resulting mega-jam probably exceeds the hoaxer's boldest expectations. Meanwhile at Warsaw Zoo lumps have appeared on Buba the elephant's trunk, probably caused by a virus. She is bearing her treatment bravely and doesn't have to be anaesthetized for it. Maximum temperature - 18 degrees; fairly sunny, no rain.

I.

Dr Jeremiasz Wrobel resembled a cat. His face looked as if it had been drawn with a compa.s.s, pale and freckled, with short, spa.r.s.e red stubble and spa.r.s.e, curly red hair cut very short. On top of that, he had no profile. Although looking at him face on, you did get an impression of some depth, from the side his face was almost flat. It crossed Szacki's mind that as a child he must always have slept on his stomach, and always on the floor. His ears stuck so closely to his head that he didn't seem to have any at all. He looked peculiar, but was, as Szacki had to admit, extremely amiable. His voice was nice and warm, similar to Rudzki's therapist voice, but more velvety. If Szacki had had to choose which one to tell his problems to, he'd undoubtedly have chosen Wrobel. Maybe because he wasn't implicated in a murder.

They soon left the doctor's tiny study at the Inst.i.tute of Psychiatry and Neurology on Sobieski Street and went down a corridor into a conference room, where the doctor could watch the recording of the constellation held at azienkowska Street. They only exchanged a few words. Szacki did most of the talking, describing the inquiry to Wrobel. He also explained why, instead of making a request for a written opinion in the usual manner, he had insisted on a meeting.

”This recording might be the key to the mystery of Telak's murder,” he said. ”Therefore, I'll also be ordering a written opinion from you for the files, but for now I need to know what you think of it as soon as possible.”

”Prosecutor, you stand out among your kind like an erection at an OAPs' club,” said the therapist as he switched on the light in the small conference room. There was a hospital odour mixed with the smell of coffee and new carpeting. Szacki was starting to understand why the idea of transcribing a conversation with Wrobel prompted mirth.

”We psychotherapists rarely host representatives of your office. I think each of you should talk to us in person before and after we give an expert opinion. But that is just my view, and I am merely a humble a.s.sistant in the Lord's garden, entrusted with caring for the vegetable bed.”

Szacki had it on the tip of his tongue to say the ”vegetables” should be treated individually, not as a group, but all he said was that, unless something had changed since yesterday, the Prosecution Service was simply too understaffed to meet with every expert witness.

The therapist watched the recording in silent concentration. Several times he made notes. Then he reached the bit where Kwiatkowska and Kaim went closer to the chairs representing Telak's parents, Jarczyk was in hysterics and Telak himself was staring into s.p.a.ce, his face twisted with pain. He stopped the image.

”Ask your question,” he urged, turning to face Szacki.

”Why did you stop it at that moment?”

”First the foreplay, then the climax,” said the therapist, shaking his head.

Szacki almost said automatically: ”You talk just like my wife”, but he stopped himself at the last moment. He was at work.

”First of all, I'd like to know if this therapy was conducted according to the rules of the art.”