When Jacob returns from seeing her, he tells the brothers and sisters of their meetings, and the brothers and sisters thrill to imagine the Lord with Eva at his side as Viceroy of Wallachia. What, in comparison with such visions, were the dreams they had so recently held so dear—those miserable few little villages in Podolia that now strike them as terribly amusing and childish. Jacob goes to the empress with gifts; there is no visit at which Maria Theresa does not receive something, now a cashmere scarf, now hand-painted silk kerchiefs, now shoes decorated with turquoise, made of the finest Turkish leather. She has set them aside as if uninterested in such luxury, but deep down she is delighted by these presents, as she is by Jacob’s visits. She realizes that many must hate him. He is naturally gallant, and he has that sort of ironic humor that she particularly likes. Her sympathy for this man must make many people feel uneasy. All kinds of denunciations and reports are always landing on the empress’s desk. The first of one day’s stack informs:
. . . a no less suspicious thing was the source of his income, a quite substantial income, when he was living a life of luxury in Warsaw. It is said, for instance, that this Jacob Frank has his own postal service, people stationed up and down the Polish borders, through whom he sends his communiqués. Consignments of money, always in barrels, come to him under escort by his own guard.
“What of it?” she responds to such doubts to her son. “Bringing in gold across our borders and spending it here, where we are, merely enriches us. Better he land among us than if he were to find himself in Russia.”
Or there is the accusation that Frank is arming his private guard, ever more numerous.
“Let him arm himself,” says the empress. “Let him take care of his own safety. Did not our aristocracy in Galicia have their own army? He may yet be of service to us as a commander.”
And she says to her son in a quieter voice:
“I have my designs for him.”
Joseph thinks she has returned to her reading now, but after just a moment she adds:
“But you should not make any designs on her.”
The young emperor says nothing in response to this and leaves. His mother often humiliates him like this. He is firmly convinced that this is the stubborn peasant Catholicism in her.
27.
How Nahman Piotr Jakubowski is appointed an ambassador
The court in Brünn is not just a place for idle merrymaking or a vanity fair. In the chancelleries upstairs, the work never stops. Jacob goes there first thing in the morning and dictates letters that must then be copied out and sent. Next door, under the direction of Zwierzchowska, is the court’s bookkeeping. In the third chancellery, the Czerniawskis—the Lord’s sister and her husband—conduct the youth recruitment, respond to letters, and negotiate with the parents of young people sent to the Lord’s court. Insofar as the second chancellery is occupied with courtly matters, the first is a little ministry of foreign affairs. The third, meanwhile, is focused squarely on trade and the economy.
As late as December 1774, Jacob’s best messengers travel from Vienna to Stamboul: Pawe? Paw?owski, Jan Wo?owski and his brother-in-law Jacob Kapliński, Hayim, who, after Tovah’s death, gathered together his whole family and brought them to Brünn. Before their departure, a solemn ceremony is held, during which Jacob gives a speech. He calls them warriors of the Messiah, says they have no religion; they have heard this many times. The only important thing is their mission, which is a secret one—they are to curry favor with the sultan, and offer their services to their former patrons. On the evening preceding their departure, the communal prayers go on at great length, concluding with prayers said in a circle and songs. In these ceremonies everyone takes part, including the guests, but afterward only the brothers and sisters remain, and then the feast begins, with vast quantities of the Moravian wine they have grown so fond of since their arrival. It is like before, in Ivanie, but now the Strange Deeds have become symbolic, have metamorphosed into rituals. They are all so close to one another still, can recognize each other by smell, by touch, and all of it makes them emotional—Jan Wo?owski’s long face, his just-shaved cheeks, Paw?owska’s little shoulders, her short stature, Yeruhim J?drzej Dembowski’s graying mop, Zwierzchowska’s limp. They have all aged, they have grown children now, and some of them are grandparents already. Others have buried their husbands or wives and entered into new marriages. They have known terrible tragedies and great sorrows—the deaths of children, and serious illnesses. Henryk Wo?owski, for example, recently suffered an apoplexy, which left him with paresis on the right side of his body, causing him to slur his speech, though his vitality has remained the same as always. Not long ago, supported by his daughters, he personally drilled a colorful legion of motley, very young pseudo-soldiers.
At dawn, when the messengers set out, the house is still quiet. The women readied baskets of provisions for the road the day before. The horses seem a little sleepy. Jacob goes out into the courtyard in a red silk robe and gives each of his emissaries a gold coin and a blessing. He tells them that the future of the true believers depends upon this mission. The carriage rolls over the cobblestones of Brünn to the market square, and from there it will pass out of the city, heading southeast.