“I don’t know,” I said, aware that it was the truth. “He hasn’t told me. You’ll have to ask him.”

The next morning I awoke with a headache, bothered by the sunlight that came into the room. Your bed was made, and you were gone. I took a shower and went downstairs, where all of you were sitting at the long table in the dining room. Hania and Agata both had wet hair, combed back, and the air smelled of coffee. You were eating a roll with two slices of ham. “There he is!” said Maksio when I entered, and everyone looked up and greeted me sleepily. Hania was sitting beside you.

After breakfast we all went for a walk through the forest. It was damp—it had rained during the night—and smelled of freshness and decomposition. We walked on layers and layers of fallen leaves and the last of the autumn’s mushrooms. I tried to talk to Hania then, but we were never alone. And somehow I was glad about that. The day was too bright, and I knew I’d need alcohol to do it.

That afternoon Hania said she was preparing a surprise for us; after lunch she and Agata went out with two empty baskets. The three of us stayed behind in the house. You and Maksio played billiards downstairs, and I went up to our room. Upstairs it was completely quiet. Before I reached our room, my eyes fell on the double door at the end of the corridor, and a dark curiosity overcame me. I listened for a sound—there was nothing. I moved toward the door and pushed down the handle. It wasn’t locked. My heart beating hard, I slipped in. It was a large room with a fantastic view over the park. There was a four-poster bed, perfectly made, the air around it strangely solemn and untouchable, like the bed of someone recently deceased. I walked to the window, took in its view over the forest. Right by the window stood a shiny round table covered in framed photos: Hania and Maksio as children, chubby and small, but the same faces, eating ice cream; their parents—the father like an older, fatter version of Maksio, though with a different mouth, almost lipless, and the mother, tall and elegant, with Hania’s dark eyes. A more recent one of the four of them standing and smiling with the Eiffel Tower behind them. And then my eyes fell on the photograph beside that one, and for a moment I saw without comprehending. My mind jarred. In it, their father was dressed in a military uniform, covered in honors and medals. My own hands were shaking as I took the photo from the table and looked at it up close. I felt nauseous, dirty even. Hania’s father and Gierek, shaking hands, smiling at each other.