Kane and Abel (Kane & Abel 1)

Wladek liked school from the first day; it was an escape from the tiny cottage which had until then been his whole world. School also confronted him for the first time in life with the savage implications of the Russian occupation of eastern Poland. He learned that his native Polish was to be "ken only in the privacy of the cottage and that while at school, only Russian was to be used. He sensed in the other children around him a fierce pride in the oppressed mother tongue and culture. He, too, felt that same pride. To his surprise, Wladek found that he was not belittled by Mr. Kotowski, his schoolteacher, the way he was at home by his father. Although still the youngest, as at home, it was not long before he rose above all his classmates in everything except height.

His tiny stature misled them into continual underestimation of his real abilities: children always imagine biggest is best. By the age of five, Wladek was first in every subject taken by his class except ironwork.

At night, back at the little wooden cottage~ while the other children would tend the violets and poplars that bloomed so fragrantly in their spring - time garden, pick berries, chop wood, catch rabbits or make dresses, Wladek read and read, until he was reading the unopened books of his eldest brother and then those of his elder sister. It began to dawn slowly on Helena Koskiewicz that she had taken on more than she had bargained for when the young hunter had brought home the little animal in place of three rabbits; already Wladek was asking questions she could not answer. She knew soon that she would - be quite unable to cope, and she wasn~t sure what to do about it. She had an unswerving belief in destiny and so was not surprised when the decision was taken out of her hands.

One evening in the auturnn of 1911 came the first turning point in Wladek's life. The family had all finished their plain supper of beetroot soup and meatballs, Jasio Koskiewicz was seated snoring by the fire, Helena was sewing, and the other children were playing. Wladek was sitting at the feet of his mother, reading, when above the noise of Stefan and Josef squabbling over the possession of some newly painted pine cones, they heard a loud knock on the door, They all were silent.

A knock was always a surprise to the Kos'kiewicz family, for the little cottage was eighteen wiorsta from Slonim and over six from the Baron's estate. Visitors were almost unknown, and could be offered only a drink of berry juice and the company of noisy children. The whole family looked towards the door apprehensively. As if it had not happened, they waited for the knock to come again. It did, if anything a little louder. Jasio rose sleepily from his chair, walked to the door and opened it cautiously. When they saw the man standing there, everyone bowed their heads except Wladek, who stared up at the broad, handsome, aristocratic figure in the heavy bearskin coat, whose presence dominated the tiny room and brought fear into the father's eyes. A cordial smile allayed that fear, and the trapper invited the Baron Rosnovski into his home. Nobody spoke. The Baron had never visited them in the past and no one was sure what to say.

Wladek put down his book, rose, and walked towards the str - anger, thrusting out his hand before his father could stop him.

$Good evening, sir,' said Wladek.

The Baron took his hand and they stared into each other's eyes. As the Baron released hirn, Wladek's eyes fell on a magnificent silver band around his wrist with an inscription on it that he could not quite make out.

'You must be Wladek.'

'Yes, sir,' said the boy, neither sounding nor showing surprise that the Baron knew his name.

'It is about you that I have come to see your father,' said the Baron.

. Wladek remained before the Bar - on, staring up at hiuL The trapper signified to his children by a wave of the arm that they should leave him alone with his master, so two of them curtsied, four bowed and all six retreated silently into the loft. Wladek remained, and no one suggested he should do otherwise.

'Koskiewicz,' began the Baron, still standing, as no one had invited him to sit. The trapper had not offered him a chair for two reasons: first, because he was too shy and second, because he assumed the Baron was there to issue a reprimand. 'I have come to ask a favour.'

'Anything, sir, anything,' said the father, wondering wbat he could give the Baron that he did not already have a hundred - fold.

The Baron continued. 'My son, Leon, is now six and is being taught privately at the castle by two tutors, one from our native Poland and the other frorn Germany. They tell me he is a clever boy, but that he lacks competition as he has only himself to beat. Mr. Kotowski, the teacher of the village school at Slonim, tells me that Wladek is the only boy capable of providing the competition that Leon so badly needs. I wonder therefore if you would allow your son to leave the village school and to join Leon and his tutors at the castle.