Petrus, who is a Belorussian, can read the whole title: “Stalin, Voprosy Leninizma” (Studies in Leninism). It is the only book from which we learn Russian, and our only copy of this book. On the stiff cover wrapped in gray linen, large, gold letters.
“Departing from us, Comrade Lenin commanded us to …,” the humble and quiet Władzio reads from the first row in a faltering voice. Best not ask who Lenin was. All our mothers have already instructed us not to ask about anything. But these warnings weren’t necessary anyway. I cannot explain it, I cannot say where it came from, but there was something so frightening in the air, something so tense and heavy, that the town in which we used to cavort with wild and joyful abandon had suddenly become a minefield. We were afraid even to take a deep breath, lest we set off an explosion.
All children will be members of the Pioneers! One day a car pulls into the schoolyard, and out step some gentlemen in sky-blue uniforms. Someone says that it’s the NKVD. What the NKVD is isn’t quite clear, but one thing is certain — when grown-ups utter this name, they lower their voice to a whisper. The NKVD must be terribly important, because its uniforms are elegant, new, spick-and-span. The army walks around in rags; instead of knapsacks they have small linen bags, most often empty, tied up with a piece of old string, and boots that look like they’ve never been polished, whereas if someone from the NKVD is coming, there is an azure glow for a kilometer around him.
The NKVD people brought us white shirts and red scarves. “On important holidays,” says our teacher in a frightened and sad voice, “every child will come to school in this shirt and scarf.” They also brought a box of stamps and distributed them to us. On each stamp was a portrait of a different gentleman. Some had mustaches, others not. One gentleman had a small beard, and two didn’t have any hair. Two or three wore glasses. One of the NKVD people went from bench to bench distributing the stamps. “Children,” said our teacher in a voice that resembled the sound of hollow wood, “these are your leaders.” There were nine of these leaders. They were called Andreyev, Voroshilov, Zhdanov, Kaganovich, Kalinin, Mikoyan, Molotov, Khrushchev. The ninth leader was Stalin. The stamp with his portrait was twice as large as the rest. But that was understandable. The gentleman who wrote a book as thick as Voprosy Leninizma (from which we were learning to read) should have a stamp larger than the others.
We wore the stamps attached with a safety pin on the left side, in the place where grown-ups wear medals. But soon a problem arose — there was a shortage of stamps. It was ideal, and perhaps even obligatory, to wear all of the leaders at once, with the large Stalin stamp opening, as it were, the collection. That’s what those from the NKVD also recommended: “You must wear them all!” But meantime, it turned out that somebody had Zhdanov but didn’t have Mikoyan, or somebody had two Kaganovichs but didn’t have Molotov. One day Janek brought in as many as four Khrushchevs, which he exchanged for one Stalin (somebody had earlier stolen his Stalin). The real Croesus among us was Petrus — he had three Stalins. He would take them out of his pocket, display them, boast about them.
One day a neighbor from a side bench, Chaim, took me aside. He wanted to exchange two Andreyevs for one Mikoyan, but I told him that Andreyev wasn’t worth much (which was true, because no one could find out who this Andreyev was), and I refused. The next day Chaim took me aside again. He pulled Voroshilov out of his pocket. I trembled. Voroshilov was my dream! He wore a uniform, therefore he smelled of war, and I already knew war, which is why I felt a sort of closeness to him. In exchange I gave him Zhdanov, Kaganovich, and threw in Mikoyan for good measure. In general, Voroshilov fared well. Similarly Molotov. Molotov could be traded for three others, because grown-ups said that Molotov was important. The price was also high for Kalinin, because he resembled a Polish grandfather. He had a pale beard and — unique among the leaders — something resembling a smile.
SOMETIMES CLASSES are interrupted by gunfire. The discharge resounds nearby, violent, loud, the panes quiver, the walls tremble, and our teacher looks with terror and despair at the window. If silence follows the detonation, we go back to reading our thick book, but if the crash of iron sheets is heard, the roar of bursting walls, and the thud of falling stones, the classroom comes alive. One hears raised voices—“They hit! They hit!”—and barely has the bell rung than we are racing to the square to see what has happened. Our small, single-storied school is right by a broad square, which is called the Third of May. On this square stands a large, a truly large, church, the biggest in town. You have to raise your head high to see where the church ends and the sky begins. And it is precisely at that spot that the cannon is now firing. It is firing at the tower, to knock it down.
This is how at the time we reasoned about it in class: When the Bolsheviks were marching toward us, before they saw Poland and before they saw our town, they must have first caught a glimpse of the towers of the Pińsk church. They were that high. This apparently irritated them very much. Why? We didn’t know how to answer that question. But we concluded it was irritation solely from the fact that as soon as the Russians entered the town, before they had taken a breather, before they’d had a look around to see which street is where, before they’d had a good meal and before they’d taken a few drags on their cheap tobacco, they had already set up a cannon in the square and started firing at the church.
Because all their artillery had gone to the front, they had only one cannon left. They fired it pell-mell. If they hit the mark, clouds of black dust rose from the tower; sometimes a flame burst out. People took cover in deep gateways around the square and observed this bombardment gloomily, but also with curiosity. Women knelt and said the rosary. A drunken gunner walked around the deserted square and shouted: “Look, we’re firing at your God! And what does he do? Nothing! Not a peep out of him! Is he afraid, or what?” He laughed, and then got an attack of the hiccups. Our neighbor told my mother that one day when the dust had settled she saw the figure of St. Andrew Bobola on top of the ruins. St. Andrew, she said, had a terribly suffering face — they were burning him alive.
WALKING TO SCHOOL I have to cross the railroad tracks, right by the train station. I like this place; I like to look at the trains arriving and departing. Most of all I like to look at the locomotive: I would like to be a locomotive engineer. Crossing the tracks one morning, I see that the railroad workers are starting to gather freight cars. Dozens and dozens of them. Feverish motion on the shunting stations: the locomotives are moving; the brakes are screeching; the bumpers ringing out. And the place is swarming with Red Army men, with the NKVD. Finally the motion stops; for several days there is silence. Then one day I see that wooden wagons full of people and bundles are pulling up to the freight cars. Beside each wagon, several soldiers, each one holding a rifle in such a way as though he were going to fire it at any second. At whom? Those on the wagons are already half-dead with fatigue and fear. I ask my mother why they are taking these people. And she, very nervously, says that the deportations have begun. Deportations? Strange word. What does it mean? But my mother doesn’t want to answer the question, doesn’t want to speak to me. She is crying.
NIGHT. A knocking at the window (we live in a little house half-sunk into the ground). Father’s face pressed against the windowpane, flat, melting into the darkness. I see my father entering the room, but I barely recognize him. We had said good-bye in the summer. He was in an officer’s uniform; he had on tall boots, a yellow belt, and leather gloves. I walked down the street with him and listened with pride to how everything on him creaked and clattered. Now he stands before us in the clothes of a Polish peasant, thin, unshaven. He is wearing a cotton knee-length shirt tied with burlap string and straw shoes on his feet. From what my mother is saying, I understand that he fell into Soviet captivity and that he was being driven east. He says that he escaped when they were walking in a column through the forest, and in a village he exchanged his uniform with a peasant for the shirt and straw shoes.