Poklosie Page #4

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What's going on here?

What's going on, Father,

is these two Yids here are

stealing church property,

and we won't have it.

No! We won't!

Nobody's stealing anything here.

I personally asked these boys

to remove these stones

because I mean to renovate the vicarage.

The stones were placed here

unlawfully during the war,

and it's time they went

back where they belong.

And the Kalinas are

as Polish as you and I,

and good Christians, too.

As for you, Suds, I never see you in

church, and you're going to fry in hell.

- Father Janusz was right all along!

- They bamboozled him!

The Jews killed Our Lord

and he's standing up for them.

It's me who's in charge of this parish,

not Father Janusz.

Now go home, all of you.

The trailer's rented by the hour

and it's costing me money.

Any of you that have

trouble sleeping are welcome

to join me for a vigil by the altar.

Right this way...

You got it upside down.

Look. They're here.

Nobody's here.

Folks are superstitious,

nobody'd go through the woods at night.

Hold it straight, will you.

No.

Franek, come on,

I can't do this on my own.

You did the previous 300 yourself.

How do you know they're yours?

They all look the same to me.

If you look up close, you see

the name of the factory in American.

I had two boxes of them in my suitcase.

Someone pinched them off me.

The harvester guy

should've been here by now.

He's getting paid starting 4 a. M...

What time do you have?

He's late.

Where's my harvester?

You getting it all

mixed up lately, Kalina:

It's not your harvester.

It's not even my harvester,

- it's the co-op's harvester.

- I had it down for 4 a. m.

you got the downpayment.

There's wheat needs cutting.

- Where's the harvester?

- In the shop.

- What do you mean: It's in the shop?

- You heard me, it's in the shop.

People break down sooner

or later, same with machines.

- When will you get it fixed?

- How am I supposed to know?

You can see it's not here.

It was serious so I had

to send it down to Gurwka.

- Two, three days.

- I can't wait two, three days.

Well, you'll have to because

you lost your place in line.

It'll do your field last...

- Who says I lost my place in line?

- I do.

It'd be fair if everybody

else waited two days, too.

Don't you Kalinas go telling me what's

fair, cause I'm the one in charge here.

I can move you to the bottom of the list

or let you have the downpayment back.

What'll it be?

That bastard is up to something.

He broke the harvester

on purpose? For harvest season?

I don't think so.

Bad luck, that's what it is.

I bet he would have put us back

on the list if we paid him extra.

You going to the registry

about that deed of title?

No, you go on ahead.

I have to lube up the reaper.

Hell of a lot of wheat for a reaper.

Pa got by with a scythe, he didn't

even dream of using a reaper.

Have it your way...

What y'all doing on my land?

You're Kalina's brother,

the one from America.

How come your not in our field?

Ask the manager. I was

about to go to your place,

but then he sends me

to Grzelak's, so here I am.

- I just go where they tell me to.

- Finish up here and get to our field.

That's not for me or you to decide:

The manager dispatches the rig.

Harvester's expensive to run.

Line it up for tomorrow if you want.

I don't care whose field I work.

And don't be setting foot

on my land without my say-so. Got that?

You won't get off this easy next time.

If you're looking for plot numbers you

have to check against several registries,

but it's a lot easier when you know

where White Brook or Vicar's Glade are.

I know these parts.

I was born here.

- What's the name?

- Kalina.

It's all here. Kalina

should be on the next page...

- Funny, the entry's not right...

- How come? It's not possible.

Apparently the signature was changed.

Do you have a map from

the period with plot numbers?

Yes!

It was all nice and

neat before the war,

things got worse

after the liberation...

It says here that my father inherited

plots no. 2365/4 and 2365/5, right?

So it was noted.

Both plots are down by the river-bend.

- Yep.

- That's marshland now.

That's your forefathers' land.

I'll go get the files.

Come on, that's

all swamp and wastes.

I have a document here saying

my father owns the land between

the old forest and the village road.

Signed by the land

ownership commissioner

from the Polish National

Liberation Committee.

Interesting. Take a look

at the date:
May 17, 1945.

That's two months

before the agrarian reform.

On these lands

it took place in July 1945.

Meaning that the reform only

confirmed the status quo after the war.

Because earlier that

was your father's land.

- Swamp?

- As you can see.

So by the time of the reform

father was farming different land

than he had before the war?

Who did the plots

belong to before the war?

Here you are. What's the number?

Wimelman, Awraham.

Itzhak Akiwa,

son of Reb Awrahama Wimelman.

And Sudecki?

Whose land does he live on?

Found it. 2777/8.

Piernik, Shlomo.

Piernik, Shlomo.

What about Malinowski?

Malinowski.

Here it is. 3005/11.

Goldberg, Izaak.

There.

And Stanislaw Nowak?

Nowak. 2601/6.

Simon, Hirshbaim.

Simeon. Son of Benjamin Zelig,

blessed remembrance Hirshbaim.

They took land belonging to

murdered Jews. All of them.

Well, what did you expect?

The Germans couldn't

take that land with them,

and there were

no heirs left to claim it.

Burek!

Go away, Yids!

Burek,

you no good mutt...

Come here!

Need some help?

I'll manage. You take Burek

and bury him in the garden.

They shoot him?

This ain't America.

Cut his head off with the scythe.

I'll hold it in place,

you screw them on.

I was at the registry

and stopped by the archives.

A little more to the right...

What for?

There was something

wrong with the papers.

Little higher, otherwise

the screw won't hold...

This is our land, our father's,

our grandfather's, our...

Our father's, yes. But Grandpa's farm

was originally down by the river-bend.

It's all marshland down there. No wonder

he took this land during the reform.

And where do you think they got

the land they gave Father from?

It was the landlord's.

You know, Koscieliski's,

the one who fled to America, like you.

The Koscieliski estate only went up

to that side of the woods.

The woods were theirs,

but this here land wasn't.

Talk straight, will you.

All these were Jewish farms.

From the woods down to the river.

After the Germans killed the Jews

our people took their homes and land.

All the reform did was round it off

so everyone would have 5 hectares.

- How many of them were there?

- Yids? - Jews.

Twenty six families.

Over a hundred people. Get it?

Folks are scared of them coming

back and claiming what's theirs.

In the old days they would've

set dogs on them, but now...

the law's on their side,

and there's documents

in the archives to prove it.

Those Jews were all smallholders.

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