“That’s the kind you really like,” and here she poured a glass of water on a certain gentleman at Hania’s (with a somewhat belated squeal). Then she was sorry, apologized. But that was in 1950.
We didn’t know Wawa then. Personally. By sight, from what we’d heard of her, from her performances — yes. Who didn’t know her? Swen tells how in those days he was rushing somewhere through the cellars into that crowd, all squashed together, rushing about. Wawa was in the crowd, wearing her hat. Swen ran up to her: “Miss Wawa!”
“Oh?” she replied.
“Hello!”
“Hello, sir.”
“You’re here?”
“Oh!”
For now, through those gates. On Chmielna. We ran past with clanking buckets. For water. Other people were also waiting there for it. But Father and Zocha had Home Army armbands. To tell the truth, yesterday evening, or maybe it was two days ago, Father hid when they came to look for him. He was needed for something. That was probably the night when we arrived from Starówka. Or maybe September 2. After Uncle Stefan. The printing shop. And the lard and cherries. Father wasn’t such a shirker. I’ve already written. That he rushed about. Did things. But at times — nothing doing. It’s necessary. According to someone. But he thinks that he has his own affairs. For buckets it was effective. Allowed through immediately. If some of the women, or civilians, made a stink about it, oh well, they’re always complaining anyway. There was water in three-quarters of an hour, at most. In the house. Upstairs. In our cubicle.
Maybe we were already at the Bałturowiczes’. (After the night of the fourth to fifth, probably the last night at Zocha’s, 32 Chmielna.) That is, in our quarters. Actually, we had our own room. The six of us. Because here the second floor was in the thick triangle and five other floors. Plus the Klein vaulting. And over there — it was unsafe. At 32 Chmielna. So perhaps we had partially moved to the corner of Chmielna and Zgoda. I think so. It was either the sixth or seventh. Of September. Wednesday — Thursday. Because that’s how we were living here. We spent the night, we ate. At times we looked in at 32 Chmielna, but less frequently with each passing day. Because it was getting worse all the time. They were shelling. Feeling their way along a line. Now Złota, now Jasna, now Sienkiewicz Street. Everyone knows this. Which streets when. Yes, but in the daytime. The sky. Dreadful. A lot. A lot. Often. Buu-uu-u. Planes. Like a toothache. And fine weather. Heat. Sky-blue. But here it’s gray! And…
uu-uu-uu-uu-uu…
voooom-uu-u…
vroooooooom-uuu — crash!
vroooooo-uuu… crash!
After days. Three. Of major diarrhea. And major vomiting. We raced around. Because why sit and sit (since the runs had stopped). In our quarters on the corner of Zgoda. Although it wasn’t bad here. Because we were among family. And Halina was there. And that room which was almost ours. Zocha was caught up in her duties. A friend of the family. Excited by her own energy. She cooks. She boils. Pours from a ladle. Tops up. Wearing her turban and sneakers all the time. She chatters, tells us stories, tells them to her men from the Home Army.
She liked to address one of them “Hey you, Gloomy,” because that was his code name. Like Teik — the Talon. Roman Ż.—Athos. Lech — Efazy. I’ve forgotten Father’s.
Once, I’m moving along at a trot, running. Down Chmielna Street. People and more people. To the gate. On Przechodnia. Past Aleje. The line had grown even longer. And was still growing. Snaking. Day — night. Well, I’m walking along. Then bombs from, I think, the Jasna — Moniuszko — Złota line. They’re coming in at us, thicker and thicker. From Powiśle, too. And from behind Marszałkowska. And now: wheeeeee… cows.
I dash into a huge building — a colossus — a wardrobe — seven stories high — bowed — bay windows — Chmielna… To the right of the gate, stairs. Already crash, crash. Somewhere here. And wheeeeee… crash. And the next, and again. There’s no time. These are the only stairs. On the right. And only leading up. So I run upstairs. Gates were considered among the worst places to be (in relation to the cows). And these gates were the real thing. Typical. Into a barrel. (Defensive?) With a threshold, a grate. Made of iron. Set into niches at the entry. And also often with little iron figures of haystacks or Saint Nicholases on either side.
From the stairs — stopping one and a half flights up, on a landing with a window looking into a tiny courtyard. Very small. I see. It. Yes. But I also see something I never would have expected (the elegant-conditional mood, conditionally courteous, typically Varsovian). Well, suddenly against the background of the rear of a second building there was a little detached building, a tiny one-and-a-half-story palace; on the building, a hanging garden with tiny paths, covered with flowers. Paving stones, little sidewalks, balustrades. And trees. Lilacs, I think. With leaves strewn about gray and brick-red. With a fresh sprinkling on top.
That was a shock. Extraordinary. Like the cathedral with the statues, the rear of the Radziwiłł gardens (on an island today), the Four Winds on burnt-out Długa Street.
Another time Swen and I were walking along Zgoda and Złota Streets. Opposite the Bank Under the Eagles there’s a sign for a toilet. It was on Złota at number 5, I think. We barge in. A long courtyard. At the end, in the vicinity of a low wall that has been broken through to the next property — a latrine. Public. One of many. Perches. Made of poles, sticks. Extremely long. Over long trenches. For those piles. And on them? Like chickens. In trousers. Dropped. Dangling. Various people. And among them was Wojciech Bąk.[21] Whom we knew from his poems, his slim volumes. A friend had pointed him out to me. Once. That he was here. During the war. In Warsaw. They’d deported him from Poznań. So he was here. He was waiting. For this moment on a perch. In the danger and the smoke. I saw him wandering about somewhere else, too. Well — as it turned out — he survived everything.
From the latrines you could slip into 32 Chmielna through holes in the wall. As for those corpses, once their rags had been burned they were buried. In the Palladium. You could see the fresh graves from the fourth floor. Next to them was a constantly smoking pile of garbage. And next to it, another latrine.
As for the Bank Under the Eagles… Well, every now and then we went out to Zgoda Street from our lodgings. Halina and I, for example. We go outside. We look at the bank and fantasize aloud that if it has to burn (and it definitely has to) then may it happen before our eyes. Because it will be a sight to see. Six mighty stories. The walls with their metal fixtures, black. In general, the entire edifice is black (it was then). And there were two eagles, one at each corner. Crouching. As if poised to take off. Looking at the roofs and somewhat downward. Consequently, everything below them was transformed into cliffs.
Halina and I go outside once more. In front of our triangular fortress, the one in which we are staying. Suddenly we hear a shell. Boom! And the eagles are already above a totally occupied abyss. And how! In an instant. Live fire. Six stories high. Hardly a wisp of smoke. But flames are rising from the ground floor right up to the eagles. No one does anything, extinguishes anything. What could be done? So it blazed. But the walls remained standing. Nowadays, who would even imagine something like that?