Phantoms of Breslau by Marek Krajewski Page B

always knocking it back”. He half-opened the hatch and peered into the depths of the butcher’s shop. Light footsteps on the stairs. From the square of darkness loomed a headand neck. Wisps of pomaded hair were arranged in an intricate curl; the neck was covered with flaking eczema. The head tipped back to reveal congealed red lava flowing from its eyes. The mouth opened and spat a bubble of blood. More appeared, bursting without a sound. Director Julius Wohsedt looked far less handsome than he had at the launching of the ship Wodan.
    Mock quickly backed away from the trapdoor and tripped over a basket of logs. Flapping his arms, he knocked down a large bottle of paraffin.
    “Ebi, wake up, damn it!” His father was shaking his arm. “Look what you’ve done!”
    Sitting amongst the shards of glass, he felt the burning of small cuts on his legs and buttocks. Threads of his blood meandered over the surface of the paraffin. The hatch was closed.
    “I must be a lunatic, Father,” he croaked, his breath reeking of four large shots of schnapps.
    “Knocking it back, always knocking it back.” The old man waved him aside and shuffled over to his bed. “Clean it up – it stinks and it’ll stop me sleeping. We’ll have to air the room.” He opened the window and looked at the sky. “You’re a drunkard, not a lunatic. There’s no moon tonight, you idiot.” He yawned and clambered into the warm refuge of his quilt.
    Mock took the first-aid kit which hung on the wall. His father had put it together himself when they moved in: “So that no inspector picks on us. Every workshop ought to have a first-aid kit. That’s what the labour law says.” Hammering little nails into the pale planks, he had did not want to hear the fact that the apartment was not a craftsman’s workshop and that he himself had not been a shoemaker for some time.
    Mock gathered up the shards, removed his nightshirt and used it to wipe the floor. He felt the cold instantly. “Not surprising,” he thought.“After all, I’m naked.” He threw over his shoulders an old coat which served him in winter for his trips to the toilet, took an iron candlestick from the kitchen and opened the hatch. His back prickled. In the weak glow of the street lamp outside the shop, he looked down the stairs. Empty and dark. Cursing his own fear under his breath, he lit his way with the candle. There was no bucket below, nor any trace of spilled water. Mock squatted to study the drain in the floor, listening for sqeaking rats. Nothing. Silence. A shadow glided across the wall. Mock felt a rush of adrenaline, his hair stood on end and he began to sweat. Postman Dosche and his dog with its upset bowels had crossed Plesserstrasse. Mock felt a gust of cold wind. All of a sudden he remembered his grandmother, Hildegard, who considered a downy duvet a remedy for everything. In her well-scrubbed kitchen in Waldenburg, she would wrap the duvet around little Franz and little Eberhard, saying: “Hide your heads in the duvet. The room’s cold. And where it is cold there are evil spirits. It’s a sign from them.”
    Mock sat on the counter and opened the first-aid box. He moistened a piece of cotton wool with hydrogen peroxide and by the feeble light of the candle dabbed at the three small wounds on his thigh and buttock. Then he approached the drainage grille. He levered it up with his fingernail and moved it aside to reveal a square hole. Mock knew the remedy for everything – for evil spirits and the cold. It was hidden beneath the grille. He felt the familiar shape of the flat bottle in his hand and pulled it out without using the candle, which was burning down on the counter. This was a task he could accomplish even in the dark. He heard a rustling in the hole. A rat? He held the candlestick aloft. A crumpled piece of paper lay embedded in the depths. A squared sheet, torn from a maths exercise book. He held it up to the flame and began to read. There were things in this