‘I’ve never thought of you two as normal people, but calling me at this time of night exceeds the limits even of my tolerance,’ was how Kormak greeted them when he arrived at the Skylight building.
It was coming up to three in the morning, and if it hadn’t been Chyłka calling, Kormak would probably not have answered the phone at all. She had used her powers of persuasion to make him get dressed, order a taxi and turn up at the office.
‘Sit down and shut up,’ said Joanna, pointing to her chair. ‘Thanks, but I’d prefer to work in the McCarthy Cave.’
‘So raus, raus, schneller,’ she ordered.
‘Less of the raus, I need to copy the files . . . oh, OK.’ Kormak took the SD card that Joanna waved in front of him.
When Chyłka called him, Kormak had no idea what to expect, but now in the office, she summed everything up from start to finish. Kormak looked at the screen and started analysing the recording.
‘How come you know Morse code?’ asked Kordian.
‘It’s an alphabet rather than a code,’ Kormak answered, stopping the recording. ‘I know a few codes, not least the GA-DE-RY-PO-LU-KI cypher.’
‘The what?’
‘Weren’t you ever a scout?’ asked Kormak. ‘Or perhaps you were in that poor substitute for real scouting, the ZHP?’
‘Er . . .’ was all that Oryński could say. He had no idea about the differences between the two scouting organisations, let alone the disputes between them.
‘Er? Is that all you can say?’ snapped Kormak. ‘If I hadn’t been a proper scout, you wouldn’t have your own personal code-breaker here with you today. And another thing . . .’
‘OK, OK,’ interrupted Chyłka. ‘Keep your honour shining bright, be loyal in the hardest fight – and get to work right now.’
‘What?’
‘Isn’t that how your scouting hymn goes?’
Kormak shook his head, took out an A4 sheet of paper and drew a diagram similar to the one Joanna had found on the internet. He worked for a solid hour watching all the recordings. In that time, his two guests managed to smoke half a packet of cigarettes, and Kordian once again firmly resolved to give up smoking and to take up sports training. At least once a week.
‘OK,’ Kormak said finally, putting down his fineliner and flexing his back on the chair. ‘Allow me to read it.’
‘Do the honours, Scoutmaster,’ said Chyłka encouragingly.
‘I shall ignore the SOS at the beginning, because it was only meant to draw your attention – rather ineffectually as we can see, because you dimwits don’t know the first thing about how to behave in a crisis and thought that the bloke was a) paranoid about having eavesdropping devices everywhere, b) a weirdo who sat in silence for minutes on end and c) a nervous delinquent who felt a compulsion to blink like crazy during his moments of silence.’
‘So he gave the SOS message,’ said Joanna, hoping to close the subject.
‘Yes. Then he gave the “start of new message” signal, as you discovered yourselves. Though I wonder why he wasted time on the Morse prosign nonsense, it needs more patience than a Buddhist monk. On the other hand, when you’re stuck in prison with not much to do, I suppose arranging and repeating Morse signals in your head helps to kill time. And for that he deserves . . .’
‘Get to the point, Kormak.’
The thin man turned the page and pointed to the first series of signals. Oryński and Chyłka simply saw an incomprehensible series of dots and dashes.
.- -. - --- -. .. / .-- .- -. ... . .-..
‘What does it say?’
‘It says “Antoni Wansel”.’
‘What?’ Oryński blurted out.
‘I have no idea who he is, but that’s the name Langer signalled in the second recording.
Joanna wrote down the name and looked at Kormak’s A4 sheet of paper.
She now had tangible evidence that Langer had been communicating with them all along. Admittedly, she’d been getting used to the idea, but now it was beginning to sink in.
‘And on subsequent visits?’ asked Oryński.
‘During the second visit, he signalled, “I am innocent”, and I assume that was still before you managed to establish any meaningful verbal contact. Next, he signalled various instructions and warnings, such as “Beware of the Grey-Haired Man”, and “Find Gorzym”. Nothing that’s useful to you now. He devoted the greatest amount of time to signalling the address of your grey-haired friend. Unfortunately, all that trouble went to waste because we deciphered the message long after the fact.’
‘And the last visit?’
‘He repeated the name “Antoni Wansel”, and then silence. That was it.’
Joanna had been hoping for more. After her breakthrough, her expectations had skyrocketed, and she saw herself finding a new, key piece of evidence. In her mind’s eye she saw herself and Zordon sitting opposite Rejchert, waiting for the right moment to roll out the heavy artillery and crush him.
‘Find out who that Antoni man is,’ she said.
‘Already done it.’ Kormak turned from his sheet of paper to the monitor. ‘Google hasn’t found anything much other than a mention on Zumi that someone by that name runs a patisserie in Lubusz province, near Świebodzin.’
‘Excellent.’
‘Hold on, there’s more.’ Kormak narrowed his eyes. ‘I also looked at a list of the deceased buried at Bródno cemetery. And bingo! The date indicates that this man was buried there very recently. Soon after Langer landed in Białołęka.’
‘Are they allowed to disclose that sort of thing?’ asked Oryński.
‘I don’t know,’ replied Kormak, looking at the data giving the exact location of the grave. ‘This is a page from an amateur site. In the introduction, they say that their catalogue isn’t exhaustive, and more detailed information is available from the Cemetery Board.’
Kordian felt it was rather strange that a bunch of people should wander around graveyards writing down the names of the deceased and the dates of their departure to the Kingdom of Heaven, but on further consideration, there was nothing wrong with it. After all, who doesn’t read the inscriptions on tombstones when they visit the cemetery?
‘Give me the coordinates, sector, alley and so on,’ said Chyłka.
Kormak provided the required information, and turned the monitor round, pointing to the exact location of the recently dug grave.
‘Go through the fourth gate, from Chodecka Street.’
‘What? Are we going to the graveyard?’
‘I assumed that’s why you went to all this trouble. And why you woke me in the middle of the night when I should have been sleeping off the previous night, which I spent playing World of Warcraft. I also thought there must be some reason you wanted a dead man’s exact resting place.’
‘God rest his soul.’ Kordian looked at the other two. Now no one wanted to speak.
‘Seriously?’ Kordian finally asked. ‘Are we going to dig him up?’
The three Żelazny & McVay employees exchanged looks. There was no good answer to that.
‘First we have to check what’s in there,’ said Joanna. ‘Then we can think about what to do next. I have no ambitions to be a B-movie horror film star, so don’t count on me as far as pulling corpses out of coffins is concerned.’
‘I’m a bit worried that you’re using the plural, and looking at me,’ said Kormak.
Chyłka shrugged her shoulders, and he had to accept that the subject was closed and resistance would be futile. He’d known he’d get involved the minute Chyłka had asked for the location of the grave.
‘Let’s go,’ she said, getting out of her chair.
With a combination of modest night-time traffic and the X5’s impressive horsepower, they were parking outside Bródno cemetery just over ten minutes after leaving the Skylight building.
It was four in the morning and still dark. The graveyard looked as if it was ready to claim anyone who passed through its gate.