One Crow Alone Read online

  The weather is impossible. You should have waited. Should have sat by the stove with a plate of hot food for a day more.

  The dog wagged its snow-crusted tail. Well, there was no understanding dogs.

  And if she found the foresters’ track she was certain she could reach the northern edge of the forest before nightfall. Wolves indeed, you foolish girl! She picked her way under the sheltering boughs with growing confidence.

  But she hadn’t realized how long it had taken her to climb the hill. By four o’clock the winter sun began to drop below the horizon. The gray sky, shrouded already by the forest, grew dim and bleak.

  Yes, dusk came quickly. All of a sudden she could barely see the trees looming around her.

  “Azor.” She wanted him close.

  She tried to calm her rapidly beating heart. It’s not far to Karlikov. It is only the sinking sun that has changed everything. The world hasn’t changed. It hasn’t disappeared. It is only the coming nighttime.

  But she found that the heartbeat of the dusk-fallen forest was stronger than her prayers. The dark dropped like a curtain. There was something in it that gripped her innards. The twisted tree trunks seemed grim specters. Reaching out from dusky shadows. There was no safe corner to put her back against.

  “Aagh!” Her shins hit a fallen branch. She stumbled down onto her knees. Up ahead was a bright swathe under the trees. She clutched the pony’s rope and pulled herself up. The night sky rushed with unseen clouds and the shuttered moon appeared briefly from behind them and lit the edge of a clearing. She stepped out with loud breaths, her boots crunching across a glowing ribbon of open snow.

  On the other side of the track was something square and solid in the gloom.

  A twig snapped.

  She stopped as still as a post. The wind rattled the treetops.

  It was a broken-down foresters’ hut, the door hanging open—weathered boards roughly nailed to the walls under a snowy tin roof. A fallen branch lay over one side.

  Magda lashed the pony to a tree and pulled at the stiff wooden door, leapt back in fright as a clutch of twigs fell at her feet.

  The hut smelled damp. It smelled of earth. She peeled the rucksack from her shoulder and dug about for the matches. Struck one.

  The interior appeared in its guttering flame. Dusty cobwebs sagged in the corners. Ivy had grown in through the walls—snaking up through gaps in the boards. Along the back wall was a low bench with dead leaves heaped in mounds on top of it, an untidy pile of sticks beneath, and a small flat-topped stove rusting in the corner.

  Kneeling down, Magda opened the stove and piled a handful of dry leaves on top of the congealed char inside it, and shielding the match with her hand she lit the tinder.

  Soon the fire was burning strong. She crouched down with her arms around her knees. Tried to forget the fears hammering inside her head—claang claang claang—like a blacksmith at his anvil. Struggling to make sense of it all somehow.

  It was true the villagers had begun to talk. Even Babula. These are the hardest winters I have ever seen, Magda. And now too in Paris? In Rome? Those are places! God help your mother. Maybe it is bad in London too?—You must call her.

  Standing by Stopko’s door holding out a bowl of strawberries. “I want to use your telephone to phone my mother. Grandmother has sent these.”

  “Pretty Magda, come and sit on my knee!” Stopko had slurred.

  At least thirty and no wife. Still drunk from his success at the market. Slumped by the dirty stove. With his boots on!

  “Nearly sixteen now, aren’t you,” he said, waving his hand clumsily.

  But he let her edge around him like a frightened dog. And she called the number written on the faded piece of paper—

  Magda loosened her boots, thought about that last call. Standing in Bogdan Stopko’s house, turned to the wall, speaking to her mother. When she had finished, Stopko wanted to know everything.

  “What news, young Magda? Come on. I won’t bite. I let you make the call. The expensive call to England. And you can keep the strawberries. Eat them and think of me when you do, ha!”

  But the news—

  “She says things are bad.”

  “She lost her job? She should be looking after her own child. Here. Where she belongs.”

  “No. Not that. She says it is very cold. And food has become too expensive. Even the English are hungry.”

  “Keep digging, boys!” Stopko burped.

  “She wants to come back. But there are no buses home. Nothing is working. She says it is turning ugly.”

  * * *

  How long ago had she made that call? Months? Magda’s head sank to her knees. It had been the last time she had spoken to her mother. Before, everything had had its place, Babula and Magda quiet together like peas in a pod. Mama sending money from London. Writing letters—telling the story about how they would all be together one day: Magda, Mama, and Babula, an apartment in town—she wrote about her job and the people she worked for, the children she looked after, the shops where you could buy the clothes and shoes and sweets that spilled out of her bag as soon as she walked up the steps of the porch, tired from the long bus journey from England.

  I am saving, saving for your future, my little Magda.

  But then there is the scene before Mama leaves for the bus back to London, the scene where the bedroom door is closed. Babula sending you outside even though you are too old to play.

  Even outside you can hear Mama crying through the shutters.

  And you think to yourself, I will never leave Morochov, or Babula. However many things she brings in her bag.

  And now you must find Mama and tell her that Babula—your own Babula—is dead.

  Magda put another stick on the fire. She thought of the pony out in the cold.

  There is no time to crowd your head with tomorrow’s problems.

  She took a blanket and went out to lay it over the pony’s back. But out in the forest the darkness overwhelmed her, and she fled back to the safety of the fire, shouldering the door, with her heart beating fast.

  Azor lay calm beside the stove.

  You foolish girl! The fears are inside your head.

  And Karlikov—it was so close. As soon as dawn had even thought of breaking, she would be away and safe.

  Worse things could happen.

  “Worse things can happen, Azor.” She crouched down by him. “We must wait for dawn.”

  But the dog paid her no attention.

  Out in the darkness something had stirred.

  He pricked his ears. The hackles on his back like bristles.

  He growled.

  Low down in his chest.

  Magda heard the pony stamping and snorting out under the trees.

  She got up. Azor pushed his nose into the gap at the door, scrabbling at the earthen floor.

  Heart thumping, Magda picked up a stick.

  “What, Azor?”

  She tried to listen. The dog squeezed out—leaping into the dark with teeth bared and hackles up. His long pale back disappeared under the trees.

  “Azor!”

  She stood trembling by the hut. A toothlike sliver of light fell out of the doorway and onto the snow.

  She gripped the branch tight and crept out. Fear stabbed under her ribs. The pony whinnied and strained. The rope slipped from the tree.

  “No!” Magda lunged for the trailing rein.

  Hoofs thundered on the snow as the pony fled into the night.

  Eyes crept close in the shadows of the forest.

  Azor had heard. And smelled.

  She heard scuffling. A yelp.

  She swung about in the pitch-black. Peered into trees with terrified eyes. The dog barked, off under the trees. She thrashed the branch for all her life was worth. Flaying and thrashing, thrashing and flaying, beating the cold night, beating wildly at unseen teeth in every shadow.

  The pony came crashing back through the undergrowth. Head flung high.

  There was a
yelping in the gloom. Snapping branches.

  “Have mercy on me!” she wailed into the dark forest. “HAVE MERCY!”

  5

  “Hold that pony still!”

  Magda gripped the branch and backed toward the hut. The pony snorted. The rope dangling loose from its halter.

  “Who are you?” Magda yelled into the trees.

  A boy stepped out of the darkness.

  He was shapeless under the layers of a long heavy coat. She saw the glint of a gun in his hands and Azor at his heels.

  “The w-wolf—” Magda stammered.

  The boy looked at her. Glanced about under the trees. He rested his gun, grabbed the pony’s rein.

  And laughed.

  His laugh was loud and long.

  Magda did not understand.

  “Are there more?” she said fearfully.

  “Shh!” The boy held up his hand. Peered into the darkness. He raised the gun to his shoulder. Whispered under his breath. “Pamirti vovk.” He took aim.

  “Bang!” he shouted.

  Magda jumped in her boots. The pony shied.

  The boy laughed again.

  Magda stared at him. “But the wolves—”

  “Let me in, girl. I’m freezing out here.”

  He tied the pony to a nearby tree and pushed his way past her into the hut, threw a small bag down on the floor, and crouched by the fire.

  The boy had a fur hat on his head, cheap Russian coypu, like the ones you could buy at Sanok market. His eyes were partly hidden in its shadows, but she could see they were sharp enough. Sheepskin mittens dangled on strings from the ends of his coat sleeves. The hands holding the gun were gaunt and strong. His leather boots were tatty and tied round with thick, blackened string.

  He pulled off his hat—he was seventeen, maybe eighteen years old—and a mass of straw-colored hair fell out like a halo in the firelight. He broke some sticks and threw them onto the fire, rubbed his hands in its heat.

  “You have food?” he said.

  “But—the wolves?”

  “There are no wolves.”

  “No wolves?”

  “You are a foolish girl.”

  “I am not a foolish girl. I thought it was a wolf. Kowalski said the wolves—”

  But she did feel foolish all of a sudden.

  “If you hadn’t been so lucky to have me following you, you would have been screeching for mercy under the trees all night.”

  Magda closed the door angrily. “You have been following me?”

  “I meant to take some food when you slept.”

  “How long have you been following me?”

  “Since the village by the river,” he said. “But I wasn’t so stupid as to try and travel along the road.”

  Azor lay down beside him. The boy scratched at his obliging head. “You must have something?”

  “Yes. I’m not so foolish as to leave home without something to eat.”

  “All right, all right. Just give me some. I’m starving.”

  Magda unwrapped the ham from its cloth and held it out to him. The boy laid the gun across his knees and tore at the meat with his teeth.

  “I have a knife,” she said.

  He looked up. “Just get more wood on the fire.”

  “You’re lucky I made a fire, aren’t you?”

  He waved his hand.

  “You got any bread?”

  “No.”

  He gestured at her rucksack. “What then?”

  “Oats. I have oats and potatoes.”

  He pulled a small tin pan from his pack.

  “Here. Make a kasha.”

  “Make your own!”

  “You’ll make it better.”

  He smiled and their eyes locked as he held the pan out. She pulled it away from him, knelt down, and filled it with oats.

  The boy grinned to himself and wiped his greasy mouth with his sleeve. “I knew you’d have something good—”

  She balanced the pan on top of the tiny stove and stirred the porridge angrily with a stick. The frown deepened on her face. The fear she had felt only moments before welled up inside her. Tears threatened; her hand stopped stirring.

  The boy laughed. “You’ll burn it if you don’t pay attention.”

  Magda threw the stick down. “Why did you come if you only want to laugh at me?”

  “Pah! You are a foolish girl.” He stood up and stirred the porridge himself. “I was only on your path. And you have things to eat and saved me from making a fire. There. It’s ready.” He held it out. “Have some. Then you can sleep. I’ll keep watch.”

  “Sleep! How do I know you won’t steal the pony?”

  “Well. I give you my word.”

  “Why should I believe you?”

  “Because I am Ivan Rublev.”

  He said it as if it should mean something. As if his name was all that was needed.

  “Well, I am Magda Krol,” said Magda. “And I don’t see why I should trust you.”

  There was something unfathomable in his eyes. And his face cracked and he laughed again. “God have mercy on me—Have mercy, have mercy! Ha ha!”

  Magda grew as red as a cooked beetroot. The feeling spread right down to the tips of her toes.

  “I was frightened.” She spat out her embarrassment.

  “You were screeching into the trees like a little girl.” He slurped some porridge into his mouth with the stick. “Not bad—”

  “I thought there was a wolf! May God have mercy on you, Ivan Rublev!”

  It didn’t come out the way she had intended. It sounded as if she meant some good. But she hadn’t. He was objectionable. And arrogant. And rude. And she did not trust him.

  “You’re just tired,” he said.

  “I’m not afraid of you. Whoever you are. This is my hut. I found it, and I made the fire.”

  “Go on. Sleep. I won’t hurt you.” He smiled. “And eat something. Here.”

  She took the pan because she was hungry. And because her pride did not stretch that far.

  The boy sat and stared at the fire, musing to himself.

  They didn’t speak, but she looked at the side of his face in the firelight sometimes.

  Stupid, arrogant boy. With a cheap fur hat!

  Magda lay on the bench and pulled the blanket over her shoulders.

  Let him see I am not afraid. I will close my eyes, but I will not sleep. Let him try to steal my food. Let him see I am not a foolish girl!

  * * *

  But she was a foolish girl and she did fall asleep.

  * * *

  So she never heard Ivan Rublev tending the fire. Never heard him cutting branches outside or melting snow in his pan to drink. She never heard him emptying her pack in the low light of the fire, counting the goods inside. Halving them with an impressive degree of fairness. And she never heard him lay another blanket over her as she slept, laughing to himself, havemercy, havemercy.

  6

  Magda woke with the cold biting at her back. She got up and stumbled outside with the blanket around her shoulders.

  The snow had stopped falling. It lay thick and new across the ground. Her laces trailed in it and she bent down to tie them.

  “Ivan?” she called, her breath misting the still air.

  Early light had begun to grow in the sky. Stars fading. A pale rim to the east. The cobweb of bare trees silhouetted against it.

  “Ivan?”

  But the boy had gone.

  She pulled the blanket tight, shivering.

  I am Ivan Rublev indeed! You were right not to trust him—

  The pony rubbed its strong head against her side, smearing the blanket with hairs. He hadn’t taken the pony at least.

  “Not far now, the village is only on the other side of the forest. And Karlikov too.” She scratched between the pony’s ears. “Azor?” She peered into the trees. “Azor?”

  What a worthless creature he was. She had fed him with her own hands. Fed him with her own food. And now he was g
one.

  A bird flitted to a tree close by. Dipped and chirruped.

  What had the boy been doing out here?

  Brunon Dudek had told her of the forest spirit Lesh-ee who lived among the roots of the Great Tree of the World.

  When she was younger, before Babula had told her about his ways, she had liked to go to Brunon Dudek’s woodshed and frighten herself hearing his old stories as he plucked chickens and gulped at a bottle of vodka.

  “When the wind whistles through them trees and you find yourself lost in the woods and you can’t find your way home, Lesh-ee will appear, with his horns and his shaggy coat. Watch out! He’ll lead you further and further from home—to the swamps and the dark places! You mustn’t follow him, but take off your clothes, and turn them inside out, and put your left shoe on your right foot, and your right shoe on your left foot, and use your own head. Don’t listen to what he tells you. Gggrh!”

  “Enough, Brunon Dudek!”—Babula’s shadow falling in the doorway. “Stop listening to that godless drunken fool, Magda.”

  “Ach, Agnieszka, there’s nothing wrong with the old stories—”

  * * *

  Magda looked out from under the trees.

  There were footprints in the snow leading away from the hut. They did not take the wide-open path but disappeared between the tree trunks. Where was the boy going? Magda wondered. He had not asked her where she was going. He had been as unsurprised to find her as if she had been a fallen branch on the ground.

  She went back into the hut and rolled up the blankets. She discovered her pilfered bag.

  The worthless. Arrogant. Thief. You blushed! And made him porridge!

  She stamped about the hut, thrusting things angrily into the bag. She kicked at the door that would not open without force. And hurt her toe.

  If I ever find him I’ll—She felt her faith flutter for a moment. Two days ago your own village was filled with people, and now it seems that everyone has forgotten you. Even that wretched dog.

  For some reason that she could not understand, Magda wished the boy had not left her. She looked up into the branches above her, arching into the brightening sky like beams. She remembered Ivan’s long laugh.

  Why do you care? He is a worthless creature—no better than the dog. She untied the pony and climbed onto its back, kicking it on with unease lodged in her heart. She headed along the foresters’ track running straight and wide through the trees. The sooner she reached the open fields above Karlikov the better. To see a house, even empty, would be something.