The hubbub has done everyone good. They’ve stopped thinking about the bishop’s contorted body and the horror of his eyes wide open and bright red, the burst blood vessels testimony to the toll that passing into the next realm took on him. There was nervous discussion about whether there would be time to prepare a proper funeral, since it is soon Christmas and then right away Zapusty, when people eat and drink and visit neighbors and are often away, so they had to take that into account when determining the date of the funeral. It is quite vexing that the bishop died at such an awkward time.
Now poems are being commissioned to honor the deceased, speeches written, nuns hired to sew funeral banners and chasubles. Two of the best painters in Lwów paint coffin portraits. And the living all wonder whether they have a worthy coat, whether a fur would be more appropriate, and whether their winter boots are in good condition, since the day of the funeral will no doubt be cold. Should they not order a new fur-lined cloak with a fox fur collar for their wife? They could also do with a Turkish belt, and of course a fur hat, ornamented with a feather and a jewel. The prevailing custom is to come to a funeral richly dressed in the Eastern fashion, in the Sarmatian way—such are the dictates of tradition.
Father Pikulski is not concerned for his own attire—he will be dressed as a priest, in his cassock and his fur-lined black wool coat that reaches down to the ground. Estimates for the funeral have begun to come in, and they contain sums he has never dreamed of. The violet material to cover the walls of the church—they’re still discussing how many hundreds of cubits of it, since no one is able to measure the surface area of the cathedral’s walls exactly—plus the torches and the wax for candles, that’s already almost half of his budget! Organizing the guests’ transportation and lodgings is done by one group of people, while another—just as numerous—plans the banquet. Loans from the Jews have already been taken out for the construction of a catafalque in the cathedral, and for the candles.
Archbishop Dembowski’s funeral thus becomes an unexpected early high point of this year’s Carnival. It is to be a real pompa funebris, with speeches, banners, salvos, and choirs.
There is an issue, since on opening his will and testament they learn that the bishop in fact wanted a quiet funeral, shrouded in modesty. This causes widespread consternation—how can that possibly be? Bishop So?tyk is right when he says that no Polish bishop may be allowed to pass quietly. It is good that it is icy out, so that the burial can be delayed until everyone learns the news and is able to plan their journey.
Immediately after Christmas, the archbishop’s body is ceremoniously and with great pomp brought by sleigh to Kamieniec. Along the way, altars are laid out and masses are conducted, though the cold is nigh unbearable, and clouds of steam rise into the heavens from the mouths of the faithful like prayers. Peasants watch this procession with piety and devotion, kneeling in the snow—the Orthodox ones, too, making the sign of the cross over and over and with fervor. Some assume it is a military march and not a funeral procession.
On the day of the funeral, to the sound of gunshots and salvos, a procession consisting of all three Catholic rites—Latin, Uniate, and Armenian—as well as of szlachta and dignitaries of state, guilds, the military, and the regular population makes its way to the cathedral. Farewell orations are given in different parts of the city, and a Jesuit ordinary gives the final speech. The ceremonies last until eleven at night. Masses are held on the following day, and the body is not placed in its grave until seven in the evening. Torches burn throughout the city.
It is a good thing that the cold had already set in and turned Bishop Dembowski’s blackened body into a frozen slab of meat.
Of spilled blood and hungry leeches
One evening, as Asher stands leaning against the doorframe watching the women bathe little Samuel, someone pounds on the door. Reluctantly, he opens it. He sees a disheveled young man partly covered in blood who splutters half in Polish, half in Yiddish, urging Asher to follow him to save someone, a rabbi.
“Elisha? Which Elisha?” asks Asher, but he is already rolling up his sleeves and pulling his coat from its peg. He grabs his valise from beside the door—it is always there and fully stocked, as a doctor’s bag should be.
“Elisha Shorr of Rohatyn was attacked, beaten, broken, Jesus Lord,” the man stammers.
“Who are you?” Asher asks him as they are going down the stairs, struck by this use of “Jesus Lord.”
“I am Hry?ko, Hayim, it doesn’t matter, just try not to be frightened, sir, doctor, so much blood, so much blood . . . We had some things to take care of in Lwów and . . .”
He leads Asher around the corner, down a narrow alleyway, and then into a dark courtyard, where they go up some stairs and get into a narrow room lit by an oil lamp. On the bed lies Old Shorr—Asher recognizes him by his high forehead with its receded hairline, though the face is drenched in blood; he recognizes, too, the eldest of his sons, Solomon, Shlomo, and behind him Isaac, and then some others he does not know. All of them are smeared in blood and bruised. Shlomo is holding his ear, blood flowing out between his fingers and then solidifying in dark unmoving streams. Asher would like to ask what happened, but there is a kind of death rattle coming out of the old man’s mouth, so instead he rushes to him and carefully props him up a bit, lest, unconscious, he be suffocated by his own blood.
“Give me more light,” he says in a calm, controlled voice, and the sons hurry to light more candles. “And water, warm water.”
Having carefully removed the wounded man’s shirt, he sees on his chest little pouches on a leather cord, with amulets; he wants to take them off, but the other men won’t allow it, so he merely moves them over to Shorr’s shoulder, to uncover the broken collarbone and the massive bruise on his chest flushed with purple. Shorr’s teeth have been bashed out, his nose is broken, and blood is pouring from the cut on his forehead.
“He’ll live,” he says, perhaps somewhat prematurely, but he wants to reassure them.
Then they start to sing, in a whisper, but Asher doesn’t recognize the words—all he knows is that it is the language of the Sephardim, some prayer of theirs.
Asher takes the injured men back to his home, where he has more bandages and other medical supplies. Solomon will need his ear sewn up. Gitla peeks in through the half-open door. Young Shorr looks at her face, but he does not recognize her; she’s put on a little weight. Besides, it wouldn’t have occurred to him that the medic’s woman could have been one of Jacob’s lady guardians not so long ago.
When the bandaged men emerge, Gitla, vigorously slicing an onion, sings a Sephardic prayer under her breath. It gets louder and louder.
“Gitla!” says Asher. “Stop mumbling like that.”
“In town they’re saying the bishop has become a ghost and is pacing around in front of his big house, confessing to all his faults. This is a protective prayer, an ancient one—that’s why it works.”
“In that case all of us will be ghosts after we die. Stop going on like that, the baby will get scared.”
“What kind of Jew are you that doesn’t believe in ghosts?” Gitla laughs and wipes her onion tears with her apron.