Secretly, Karla was relieved that she would not have to leave Wilno and Sister Thérèse. For the next week she alternated between visiting the convent and sitting with her mother and father at the farm, listening to the radio. The radio became a way of life. Her family couldn’t get through to their relatives in Bialystok . . . obviously they had fled. The escape route was through Rumania. In the village a mass exodus had begun. A constant flow of people carrying bundles, bits of valuable furniture, and even some livestock, were trying to make their way to Rumania. The Polish army was fighting valiantly, but on the seventeenth of September the Russians began to invade from the east. Andrzej told his wife and daughter to seek refuge at the convent. Maria, fear turning the blue eyes glassy in her round weather-beaten face, refused to leave her husband and their land. But she insisted Karla must go. She stared at the girl as if seeing her for the first time. “You are tall . . . you will be a strong beautiful woman. Go to the convent. Even the Russians will not harm the church.”
Somehow Karla knew it was the end of the only life she had known. These two strangers were her parents . . . yet she didn’t know them. She clung to them, but they barely responded. They stood like petrified images of people. They did not know how to give affection . . . or to accept it. They raised their children because they were there. They farmed the barren land because it was there. And now the two sons had vanished from the university . . . and with them went all hope of any tomorrow. Nothing was left but the land.
Sister Thérèse welcomed Karla into the convent. As people fled they left their dogs, cats and even baby lambs on the street. Each day Karla went out and collected the homeless animals. She took them all into the convent. But as the days passed and the Russians drew closer, the Mother Superior said they must be turned out. They were running low on supplies themselves . . . they were God’s creatures, she claimed, and the Lord would take care of them. Karla had pleaded . . . she had grown to love the kittens and the dogs. She begged to be allowed to keep the smallest, but the Mother Superior was adamant. Another nun collected them and turned them out. When Sister Thérèse came to her room, she found Karla sobbing. She looked up and shouted, “I am never going to love anyone . . . not even an animal. It hurts too much when it’s taken away from you.”
Sister Thérèse stroked her hair. “Love the Lord. He will never desert you or be taken away from you. He will be with you throughout eternity.”
“He’ll never leave me?”
“Never. This life is just something to get through as well as we can. But it is only the preparation for the real world—the life we have after death—when we go to Him.”
“Perhaps I could become a nun,” Karla suggested.
Sister Thérèse looked at the girl seriously. “It is too big a decision to make in such a short time. I do not feel you have the calling. You are coming to this decision from fear. But pray to Him . . . ask Him to show you the way.”
And so Karla spent the long days with the Sisters, ate with them, and went to early Mass and evening Chapel with them while the Polish army fought on. After nineteen days of unbelievable resistance to the bombardment of Germany’s superior forces, the battered and heroic defenders of Warsaw surrendered to the Germans. Until the last hour, Radio Warsaw continued to identify itself with the first three notes of the Polonaise.
A few days later several Russian officers arrived at the convent and informed them that they were now living in Russian-occupied territory. Schools were closed, and the remaining citizens were notified that an immediate Sovietization of the Russian occupied areas had begun. Tales began to trickle into the convent of midnight arrests by the Soviet officers. At first they were made on the charge of subversiveness to the new government. By September 30, President Moxcicki had crossed the border into Rumania with the entire government, and the exiles formed a provisional government in exile in Paris.
General Sikorsky, also in exile, acted through some high-ranking Polish officers who had remained in the country, and gradually the Polish Underground began. It was a ground swell that grew larger and larger despite cruel and barbaric reprisals. It became known as the Polish home army—ARMIA KRAJOWS, whispered among the Poles as the A.K.
No one bothered the nuns, but for safety’s sake, after hearing rumors of rape by drunken army privates, the Mother Superior allowed Karla to wear the habit. Each weekend Karla drove the battered convent car to her parents’ farm and brought them any news that she heard. And she would return to the convent with fresh eggs, which her parents insisted she give to the Sisters. The Soviets had reopened elementary and secondary schools. Nuns were no longer allowed to teach, and the Polish universities at Lwow and Wilno were transformed into centers designated to convert the population to the Soviet order. Although the convents and churches were not desecrated, religion was frowned upon.
One weekend, just before Christmas, she drove to the farm, just as her mother and father were being herded into a jeep by two Russian officers. She was wearing her nun’s habit and was about to rush to them, but her mother merely nodded and said distantly, “Hello, Sister. Take the eggs for the convent. They are in the kitchen.” She started toward them, but the fear in her father’s eyes also shot her a warning not to speak. The Russian soldiers ignored her, made some jokes among themselves about the ugly black habit, and drove away in the jeep with her parents. She felt helpless. But if she rushed after them and declared they were her parents . . . then what? Be taken off with them and shipped to a labor camp.
She drove back to the convent, and as she got out of the car, she noticed a good-looking young Russian officer turn to stare at her on the street. She rushed inside and bolted the door, and that night when she looked at herself in the small bathroom mirror she realized that although the coif hid her hair, it only served to make her prominent cheekbones and large eyes more effective. She stared at herself from every angle. Yes . . . she was beautiful . . . not petitely beautiful like Sister Thérèse . . . but the way the Russian officer had stared . . . she knew a man would find her desirable. But she was now serious about becoming a nun, and in her daily prayers she asked guidance and pleaded for the Lord to make her love Him more and Sister Thérèse less. But as arrests grew more frequent, her days became too busy for daydreams about Sister Thérèse. Half of the chapel had now been converted into bed-space for the children found wandering in the streets . . . children whose parents had been taken off in the night. And the library which had been the Mother Superior’s office held cribs with five infants. Mothers who knew they were being taken away hid their children in closets and warned them against crying out. They often bundled up their infants and hid them in the yard, praying a more fortunate neighbor would care for them. The neighbors invariably brought them to the convent. And as the days passed, more children streamed into the convents. People who had been arrested as “political” prisoners were now arrested for being nothing other than Poles and were forced into slave labor.
As the stories of rape grew, women began to wear thick glasses to make themselves unattractive to the Russian soldiers. Some carried a handkerchief and a small penknife. If a soldier approached, they cut their finger and let the fresh blood stain the handkerchief. Then if the soldier reached for them, they’d pretend to cough into the handkerchief, show the fresh blood, and say “Tuberculosis.” It was an effective ruse, and it forced many soldiers into an abrupt change of mind.
Both Sister Thérèse and Karla had acquired thick glasses brought to them by the children. They came with their pitiful possessions. A lock of the mother’s hair . . . the father’s glasses . . . the family Bible.
Winter came early the year of 1939. By October there was snow on the ground, and when dusk came they could hear the soldiers singing songs of their homeland. But when they were drunk, their songs were raucous and often they loitered near the convent. Many nuns grew frightened, but Sister Thérèse would constantly remind them, “They are God’s children too. It is a war between countries . . . not people. Remember,
they are in a strange land . . . away from their loved ones. Conquerors can be the loneliest of all.”
A few weeks later, Karla was in the children’s dormitory, hearing the children’s prayers. She was about to turn out the lights when she heard the thundering noise downstairs at the front door of the convent. The children began to scream when they heard the sounds of Russian voices and heavy boots. She quickly put on her thick glasses and commanded the children to be quiet. She slipped out of the dormitory and tiptoed down the stairs. The sight in the reception room turned her rigid with terror. A surge of nausea ripped through her, and she clamped her hand over her mouth to kill the scream that started in her throat. She wanted to run, but she was paralyzed as she clung to the wall in the safe darkness. She wanted to cover her eyes but her horror held her transfixed.
The Mother Superior was naked. She had always seemed such a powerful and domineering figure as she marched into Chapel, shrouded in the thick black habit with the massive silver cross hanging down her ample front. But stripped of her habit, she had diminished into a skinny old woman, with long flat hanging breasts, blue-veined legs, a quivering object of ridicule to the drunken soldiers who laughed every time they glanced her way. She stood huddled in a corner, praying, as the Russian soldiers boisterously and methodically raped all the other nuns who were lying nude on the floor, their helpless arms and legs flapping under the weight of their merciless captors.
And then Karla saw Sister Thérèse. Blood was smeared between her thighs as one Russian got off her. Another picked her up by the neck and kissed her violently. Then his mouth began to ravage her body, beginning at the breasts as he chewed away on each of them, his dirty fingers groping between her legs. While he was enjoying himself, slobbering down her body, another soldier approached her from the back, spread her buttocks apart and rammed into her. At the same moment, the soldier in front opened his pants and also rammed into her. Karla couldn’t believe it—two men tearing at her insides . . . one from the front . . . one inside her back! Mercifully, Sister Thérèse passed out.
Karla stood crouched in the darkness for half an hour. She counted ten of them who had attacked Sister Thérèse alone. Suddenly she heard footsteps behind her. It was Eva, the thirteen-year-old who helped her with the smaller children. Karla tried to motion her away, but it was too late. The child saw the nude bodies on the floor and screamed. The soldiers looked toward the dark hall. “Run, Eva,” Karla commanded. “Run and get into bed.” But the child stood frozen as the soldier approached.
He grabbed Karla and Eva by the arms and shoved them into the room. One soldier looked up at Karla and saw the thick glasses. He shrugged with distaste, but snatched off the white starched bib and pulled her habit apart. He looked at her flat chest, and at the glasses, and pushed her away and reached out for the screaming Eva. Karla rushed over to protect the child, but she was thrown across the room where she fell against the naked and shivering Mother Superior mumbling bits of prayers. Karla adjusted her habit, stood in front of the older nun, and clenched her teeth as the tormented Eva’s screams filled the room. Sister Thérèse was still mercifully unconscious.
The bedlam began to abate after another half hour. The soldiers were satisfied. They adjusted their belts and pants and stared at the limp naked bodies on the floor like diners who have eaten their fill at a banquet but are still loath to leave food on a table. One who was obviously in command pointed at Sister Thérèse, Eva, and three other nuns and shouted a command. Blankets were thrown around them, and the soldiers threw them over their shoulders like potato sacks and carried them outside. Karla broke away from the icy grip of the Mother Superior. “Where are you taking them?”
One soldier who spoke Polish said, “To our camp. Do not worry, ugly one. We only want the beauties. We leave you and the others to stay and take care of the children.”
She stood at the door helplessly as the jeeps rolled away into the cold night. As the last sounds of the raucous laughter faded away, the Mother Superior began to move like a sleepwalker. She groped around the floor for parts of her habit as other nuns picked up broken rosary beads that were strewn across the room. Prayer books that had been torn from the nuns’ hands lay abandoned on the floor. Karla saw Sister Thérèse’s prayer book and rosary near the spot where she had lain. She knelt down and touched the blood. She put her fingers to it and touched her lips. She pressed the prayer book to her cheek. Then she set about helping the other ravaged nuns. She ran baths for them, put ice on swollen lips, prayed with them and for them. By dawn some semblance of order was restored. Shrouded in a new habit, the Mother Superior seemed to take on at least a shadow of her old strength.
A week later the same soldiers returned. They were more raucous than before. And this time Karla did not escape. They pulled off her glasses and her clothes. She was thrown on the floor and her head struck against a chair. She prayed for unconsciousness but was jolted into awareness with the knifelike pain as her legs were forced apart and the soldier ripped into her. Rhythmically, roughly, they rode her, one after another—five, six, seven, eight . . . her blood mixed with their orgasms . . . their wet mouths biting at her lips, her breasts.
And then she saw the heaviest man coming toward her. He looked like a giant. He fell on top of her . . . his breath was foul and he slopped some kisses on her lips . . . she prayed for death . . . then she heard the door open and more voices. Oh, God . . . more soldiers. But suddenly the man was dragged off her. There were angry voices . . . the soldiers were scrambling to their feet. And then, almost gently, an officer was helping her up. It was the same young Russian captain she had seen on the street. Blond and brown-eyed . . . and it seemed as if there was sadness in his eyes as he handed her part of her torn habit to cover herself. Then he snapped orders at the men . . . another officer herded them off. He spoke to Karla in Polish. “I am sorry for what these men have done. They will be punished. We are soldiers, not animals. I shall return tomorrow and see what reparation can be done.”
When they were gone, Karla and the other sisters gradually got to their feet. They moved slowly . . . silently . . . and hopelessly. Some of the sisters went to a small chapel they had erected in one of the rooms and prayed. Karla went to her bed and lay very still. She thought about taking her life . . . but then she would spend the rest of eternity in Purgatory. She thought about Sister Thérèse. And for the first time in her fear and loneliness, she found herself thinking of her mother, and as she listened in the darkness of the night, she heard muffled sobs coming from many of the other small cubicles . . . only they were calling for Jesus . . . and suddenly she realized she had no one.
The following morning, the blond young captain arrived and apologized again and promised complete protection for the convent. His name was Gregory Sokoyen. His father was General Alexis Sokoyen . . . and he had just married a beautiful girl whose father was an important government official. He was lonesome for his young wife and took to visiting Karla several nights a week. He would sit in the reception parlor while she sewed and tell her stories of his boyhood, of the children he and his young wife hoped to have.
She listened politely. He was attractive and he was also the first young man she had ever known. He made no improper advances and always brought the nuns provisions along with candy for the children.
It was toward the end of November when Karla noticed her waist was growing thick. She had never been too regular with her periods, but suddenly she realized she was overdue. She was terrified, but she methodically went about her work. When the children went outdoors to play and she noticed some soldiers look with interest toward the ten- and eleven-year-old girls, she immediately cut off their hair and bound their chests and had them dress like boys. And every night, in the secrecy of her bedroom, she did the most strenuous ballet exercises, hoping to dislodge the baby that was forming inside. After a time she realized it was hopeless. Her waist was thick and her stomach was taut.
One morning the young captain arrived unexpectedly wit
h some provisions. He had warm blankets and several pounds of cereal. She helped him unload them and was suddenly seized with an attack of nausea. She rushed to the sink and he held her head as she threw up. “You are sick. You must go to bed,” he said.
She managed a smile as she sat down. “I am all right—it has passed.”
“What causes your illness?” he asked.
“The Russian soldiers,” she said tonelessly.
His eyes shot to her stomach which was hidden by the voluminous folds of her habit. “A baby?” He paused. “Do you want it?”
“Want it . . . how can I want it . . . knowing it came from one of those beasts?”
“But it is also yours. It is your body that is forming it . . . your blood . . . it might be a little girl who would look just like you.”
She wrung her hands. “And then what could I do for her? How could I raise her? And besides, how do I know it would not be a boy who would look like Rudolph or Leopold or Nicholas or Igor or Sversky or—”
“You know all their names?”
“When you are lying on the floor and they are calling out to one another . . . you remember. You remember the bad breath, the hairs on their noses, the decayed teeth . . . and their names. Oh God—if there is a God—how can I rid myself of this thing growing in me?”
He colored slightly. “I know of a way that might work. I . . . I saw it happen one night last week. Some soldiers were searching some homes . . . looking for some escaped prisoners from work camps. Suddenly I heard a scream . . . I rushed upstairs . . . one of the soldiers had raped a woman—” He sighed. “You must understand, some of these men are peasants . . . they are lonely . . . they have never been away from the farm . . . they have never had much to drink . . . suddenly they have Polish vodka . . . there are pretty women. And—” He shrugged. “They rape. This man . . . he raped a girl in your condition. Only it was a baby she wanted . . . from her husband. She had pleaded with him . . . told him she was three months’ pregnant . . . that she might lose it.” He shuddered. “I heard her begging . . . but when I got to the room it was too late . . . and she lost the baby . . . or what was the beginning of the baby. I shot him.” Then he stood up. “Think about it . . . I shall come by tonight at eleven. You can give me your decision then.”