Chapter 4 under the raft

Here, lying on a soapy metal bed in a convalescent and nursing home, within the view of the glass peephole with Bruno's eye behind it, remembering and picturing Kashube's smoldering potato seedlings It is not an easy task to see the plume of smoke and the shadow line of October rain.Without my drum (which, when played skillfully and patiently, recalls all the minutiae necessary for me to save the chaff and get the main stuff down on paper), if I don't get the sanitarium administration Agree, let this drum talk to me for three to four hours a day, and I'll be a wretch with no proven grandparents.

Anyway, my drum tells me that on that October afternoon in 1899, when the South African Om Krüger was brushing his anti-British brows, at Dilsau and Carterhouse In between, near the brick kiln in Bissau, under four skirts of the same color, amidst the smoke, the fear, the sighs, the slanting rain and the anguished cry of the saint's name, under the unimaginative questioning of two rural security policemen and their Under smoke-blurred eyes, the short, broad Joseph Koljacek impregnated Anna Bronski with my mother, Agnes. -------- ①Om Kruger, formerly known as Paulus Kruger, also known as Om Paul, led the Boers to fight against Britain in 1880, and served as President of Transvaal in 1883. Stretches on October 1899. , the British colonial authorities invaded, Kruger was defeated, and fled to Europe in September 1900.

Anna Bronski, my grandmother, changed her surname that night: with the help of a priest who gave the sacrament, always generous, she changed to Anna Koljacek and followed Joseph, though without Going to Egypt, at least to the provincial capital on the banks of the Motlau River.There, Joseph became a raftman, escaped the police, and gained temporary peace. To heighten the suspense, I will not name the city at the mouth of the Mottlau River, although it is the birthplace of my mother, and it is worth mentioning now.At the end of July 1900, when it was decided to double the Imperial battleship building program, my mother saw the Light of the World when the Sun was in Leo.Confident and dissolute, generous and vain.The first house of the astrological chart, also known as the house of destiny, is occupied by impressionable Pisces.The position of the sun is in opposition to Neptune①.Neptune in the seventh house or house of Virgo will bring chaos and trouble.Venus and Saturn are in opposition, everyone knows that Saturn is a sign of disharmony of the liver and spleen, commonly known as the unlucky star, it enters the house of Morgan and is destroyed in the house of Leo; Neptune offers eels to Saturn, and gets moles in return; Saturn loves to eat belladonna , onions, and beets, which cough up lava and sour wine; Saturn and Venus cohabiting in the eighth house, also known as the House of the Dead, portend unexpected death; Under the protection of Mercury in the life house of relatives, you will get the happiness of taking great risks.

-------- ①In the solar system, except for Mercury and Venus, when a certain planet moves in a straight line with the earth and the sun and the earth is in the middle, it is called opposition. At this point, I must insert a paragraph of my mother's protest because she always denied that my grandmother was conceived in a potato field.According to her, although her father tried to do this in the potato field (as much as she admits), neither his position nor Anna Bronski's position was chosen well enough to create favorable conditions for Kolya Cheek became the father of the fetus. "It must have happened on the way out that night, probably in Uncle Vincent's boxcar, or maybe even after we got to Troyer and found shelter with the rafters."

My mother always likes to use such words as a reason to determine the date of the origin of her life.So my grandmother, who should have known the truth, kept nodding her head, and said: "Yes, my boy, it must have been in the boxcar, or after Troyer, it's impossible in the field." Yes, because it was windy and rainy that day." Vinzent was my grandmother's older brother.After his wife's early death, he had made a pilgrimage to Częstochowa, and received an oracle from the Virgin of Częstochowa to regard her as the future Queen of Poland.From then on, he buried himself in grotesque books, and found that every sentence confirmed the claim of the Holy Mother to the throne of the Kingdom of Poland.He left the housekeeping and farming the few acres to his sister.He had a son named Yang, who was only four years old at the time. He was thin and weak, and cried a lot when he moved.Yang not only herded geese, but also collected small colored pictures and stamps; it was a bad omen to collect stamps at such a young age.

-------- ① The Madonna of Częstochowa, a statue of the Virgin hanging in a monastery in Częstochowa, has always been considered to be St. Luke (an early church figure in the "Bible" story, who was originally a doctor and followed Paul's missionary work).According to legend, in 1655, Danzig was besieged by the Swedes, and it was rescued by the power of the Virgin Mary.The following year, Polish King Johann Casimir proclaimed the Virgin Mary Queen of Poland.This is one of the most famous religious relics in Poland, and a large number of pilgrims go to worship it every year. My grandmother took the potato basket and led Koljacek back to the farmhouse blessed by the Queen of Poland in heaven.After hearing what had happened, Vinzent ran to Ramkao, knocked on the door, and called the priest out, asking him to bring all the things for the sacrament to witness the marriage of Anna and Joseph.The priest, who was sleepy, finished his blessing speech protracted by repeated yawns, received a large piece of fat as a reward, and bid farewell to the blessed.As soon as he turned to leave, Vinzent harnessed the horses to the boxcar, laid out hay and empty sacks, let the bride and groom into the cart, let Jan, who was shivering with cold and crying softly, sit beside him on the coachman's platform, and let the The animal understands that it now has to charge straight into the night: the newlyweds demand haste.

In the still dark but fading night, the carriage arrived at Timberport, the provincial capital.Friends took in the fugitive couple; they, like Koljacek, were rafters for a living.Vinzent was free to go, and he returned to Bissau with his pony; a cow, a goat, a sow with piglets, eight geese, and a watchdog were all waiting for him to feed.He also had to put his son Jan to bed, who already had a low-grade fever. Joseph Koljacek hid for three weeks, grew his hair, parted it, shaved off his moustache, and left himself a clean sheet, found by the impostor Joseph Wranka got work.The rafter, Wranka, was thrown from the raft during a fight and drowned in the Bug River south of Modlin, but the police knew nothing about it.Why did Koljacek have to have his ID in his pocket to talk to timber dealers and loggers?Because he was not a raftman for a while in the past, but worked in a sawmill in Schweitz.The boss quarreled with him because he, Koljacek, had painted a fence a provocative red and white.The boss said he was deliberately provocative, so he pulled out a red and a white slat from the fence, and with these Polish slats beat the Kashubes in Koljacek on the back, smashing the slats into pieces A pile of red and white firewood.This gave the one who was beaten a good reason.That night, no doubt a starry night, he lit the new, freshly painted sawmill ablaze, in homage to a divided Poland that had thus been united.

-------- ①The flag of Poland at that time was red and white. ②Poland was founded in 965 AD, and was divided up three times by Russia, Austria and Pu in 1773, 1793 and 1795. In 1871, the German Empire was established, and the Polish territory divided by Prussia became the two provinces of West Prussia and Posen. In this way Koljaiczek became an arsonist, and a repeat offender, because throughout West Prussia sawmills and forest farms have since provided kindling for a strong national feeling in red and white.Whenever the future of Poland was at stake, even during the great fires, the Virgin Mary was involved, and according to eyewitnesses (of whom may still be alive today), they saw a woman wearing the Polish crown Our Lady, standing on the roofs of so many collapsing sawmills.It is said that every time the fire broke out, the people present always sang the Ave Maria and swore oaths.Therefore, we have reason to believe that the scenes where Koljacek set fire several times must be solemn and solemn.

The arsonist Koljacek was accused and wanted, while the raftman Joseph Wranka had a clean history.Both of his parents died, he was harmless, withdrawn and narrow-minded, not only no one troubled him, but almost no one knew him.He divided his chewing tobacco into daily portions until the Bug River took him in.What he left behind was a jacket, papers in his pockets, and three days' worth of tobacco.It was impossible for the drowned Wranka to report again, and no one asked about the drowned Wranka to embarrass the people concerned.So, Koljacek, who was similar in build to the drowning ghost and also had a round head, first slipped into his jacket with trepidation, and then transformed himself into this man with official documents to prove his innocence.He quit smoking pipes, chewed tobacco, and even inherited Wranka's character traits and speech defects. In the following years, he played the role of a hard-working, thrifty, and stuttering raftman. The character, on a raft, travels through the forests and valleys of the Niemen, Buble, Bug, and Weixel rivers.He even became a corporal in the Prince's Hussars under Mackensen's command, since Wranka had no military service.However, Koljacek, who was four years older than the drowning ghost, had been an artilleryman and had left a bad record in Ton.

-------- ①Weixel River, Polish name is Vistula River, Latin name is Vistula River. ②The light cavalry guards brigade was stationed near Danzig, the commander of the brigade was August von Mackensen (1849~1945), and the head of the first regiment was Crown Prince William (1882~1951). The most dangerous of robbers, murderers, and arsonists, while they are still robbing, murdering, and setting fire, wait for their chance to gain a respectable and secure employment.Some of them, either through painstaking efforts or by luck, have found such opportunities.Koljacek, who pretends to be Wranka, is a good husband.He gave up his bad habit of arson, and even trembled at the sight of matches.The matchbox, which sat proudly on the kitchen table, was bound to suffer as long as it was seen by the man who might have made it.He threw this criminal temptation out of the window.Therefore, it is not easy for my grandmother to make hot meals and dishes on time.The whole family often sat in the dark room because there was no kindling to light the petrol lamps.

However, Wranka is not a domineering person.On Sunday he took his Anna Wranka to the church down town and allowed her to wear four skirts as she had done in the potato field; she was officially married to him and registered at the marriage registry .In winter, when the river was frozen and the rafters were idle, he stayed in Troyer, where only the rafters, helmsmen, and shipwrights lived, and took care of his daughter Agnes.Agnes looked like her father in character, for she either got under the bed or hid in the closet.When guests came, she sat under the table with her rag doll in her arms. What mattered most to the little girl was to hide, to find the safety in a hiding place similar to that which Joseph had found when he hid under Anna's skirts, and also to have fun, but not as her father had found.The arsonist Koljacek has had enough of being hunted down and has lingering fears, and he can fully understand his daughter's need for shelter.So one day, when it was necessary to build a rabbit house on the balcony-like protrusion of the one-and-a-half-house, he boarded up a small room for Agnes, perfectly suited to her size.My mother sat in such a small shed when she was a child, playing with her dolls, and growing up slowly.Later, when she was already at school, she is said to have thrown away the dolls, played with glass beads and colored feathers, and for the first time showed her sensibility for fragile beauty. Since I am anxious to foretell the origins of my own life, the reader may allow me to briefly mention the year before the launch of the Columbus at the Siharu dock, that is, 1913, because the Wrankas are like a raft drifting with the current. , passed this period of time in peace, but it was only in that year that the police station who never forgot to hunt down the fake Wranka came to the door. The trouble started like this: in August 1913, as every summer, Koljacek set off for Kyiv.From there he will descend on a raft and return by way of the Pripyat, the Canal, and the Bug to Modlin and the Wexel.They set off together with a total of twelve rafters, first took the tugboat "Radonna" hired by the sawmill, sailed up the Dead Wexel River from the Westlich New Channel to Einlage, and then entered The Weixel River, upstream, via Kaisermark, Letzkau, Chatkau, Dirsau and Pieckel, and anchors overnight in Thorn.Here the new owner of the sawmill is on board, and he is also going to Kyiv to oversee the timber purchase.That is to say, he was already on board the "La Donna" when it unmoored at four o'clock in the morning.The first time Koljacek saw him was at breakfast in the galley.They sat facing each other, nibbling bread and sipping barley tea in a loud voice.Koljacek recognized him immediately.The broad-shouldered bald man fetched vodka and filled everyone's empty teacups.Halfway through the meal, when the person sitting at the other end was still pouring wine, he introduced himself: "In this way, you will know that I am the new boss, and my surname is Dickerhoff. I am an orderly person. !" According to his instructions, the rafters announced their names one by one in order of seating and then toasted. When the vodka was gulped down in one gulp, their Adam's apple was so hot that it was so hot.Koljaiczek drank the wine first, and then gave his last name—"Wranka"—while keeping his eyes fixed on Dieckerhoff.He nodded as he had done several times before, and repeated the same as he had repeated other people's last names: "Wranka".Nevertheless, it seemed to Koljaiczek that when Dieckerhoff repeated the last name of the drowned raftman, he emphasized it, not sharply, but contemplatively. With the assistance of the pilots taking turns, the "Radonna" deftly avoided the sandbar and rumbled forward along the only recognizable channel against the muddy tide.On the left bank and the right bank, behind the dike, there are all harvested farmland, either flat plains or rolling hills.Hedges, field paths, basins full of gorse, and a plain between scattered farmhouses are like a natural battlefield for cavalry charges. Hussars over the Hedges, for the dreams of young cavalry officers, for the battles that have been fought here and will be repeated many times, but also for such a painting: Tatars galloping on horses in saddles, dragoons The forelegs of the horse stood in the air, the knight with the long sword fell, the captain of the knights blood stained his robe, there was no wound on the breastplate, Duke Massowien cut down a man; and those horses, there are no circuses Thoroughbred white horse, restless, fringed, with so realistically drawn sinews, with bulging, magenta nostrils, puffing through the breath of a lance pennant-tie pointing down; Slices of sky and sunset; there, in the background (for every oil painting has a background), between the black horse's hind legs, close to the horizon, is a peaceful little village.The smoke is curling up, the low-rise farmhouse, the roof of hay, the wall covered with moss; in the farmhouse, beautiful tanks are stored, ready to show their talents in the future. At that time, they will also enter the picture, in Wexel On the plain behind the river's embankment, they drove straight in, like a colt between heavy cavalry. -------- ① Masoveen is an independent duchy in the middle of the Wexel River. In 1225 or 1226, Duke Conrad I asked for help from the German Knights to resist the Prussians; in the battle of Tannenberg in 1410, the Knights were annihilated, and Masovien was occupied by the Prussians. ②This refers to September 1, 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland. When they were approaching Włozlawik, Dieckerhoff flicked Koljacek's shirt with his fingers and said, "Please tell me, Wranka, how many years ago, were you in Schweitz? Worked at a sawmill and burned it down?" Koljacek shook his head laboriously, as if he had sclerosis, and made his eyes look sad and tired.Seeing this look, Dickelhoff stopped asking questions. The Bug River joins the Weixel River in Modlin. When the "Radonna" turned into the Bug River, Koljacek, like all the rafters, leaned on the railing of the boat and spit into the river three times.Dieckerhoff, standing beside him with a cigar, asked him for a light.The word, the word match, like a shudder ran down Koljacek's spine. "Man, I'm just asking you for an excuse, no need to blush. Aren't you a big girl?" They had passed Modlin, and at this moment, the blush on Koljacek's face faded.It wasn't a blush of shame, but the lingering afterglow of the fire he'd set in the sawmill on his face. The "Radonna" went upstream on the Bug River, crossed the canal connecting the Bug River and the Pripyat River, and entered the Dnieper River through the Pripyat River.On the road from Modlin to Kyiv, there were no more conversations between Koljacek-Wranka and Dickerhoff to recount.On the tugboat, among the raftsmen, between the fireman and the raftman, between the helmsman, the fireman and the captain, between the captain and the frequently changing pilot, there have naturally occurred some things that are said to usually occur between men. That sort of thing, maybe it really is.I can imagine a quarrel between the Kashukou raftsman and the helmsman, a man from Szczecin, perhaps because of him a rebellion was brought about: a meeting was held in the galley, the leader was chosen by lot, the password was issued , and sharpened the dagger. Put that aside.There were no political debates or German-Polish battles, nor serious riots caused by social injustice. The "Radonna" refueled and continued her voyage, and on one occasion (just past Plock, I think) the ship hit a sandbar, but she got away under her own power.Captain Babusch, of the New Channel, had a heated argument with a Ukrainian pilot.That was all, and nothing else was recorded in the logbook. If I had to write a diary of Koljaiczek's thoughts, or a diary of the inner world of the sawmill owner Dickerhoff, I could write it in several ways, and it would be thrilling and moving.Suspicions, confirmations, hesitations, hesitations quickly dispelled almost simultaneously, and so on.Both of them were terrified.Dickerhoff was more frightened than Koljaiczek, because it was now in Russia.Dückelhof could have been thrown from the deck into the river, as poor Wranka had been, or, after arriving in Kyiv, on the lumberyard, which was so vast and endless, that he could have entered it alone. Labyrinth, easily losing his guardian angel, Dieckerhoff may have been overwhelmed and killed by the sudden collapse of the giant log pile, which was hard to stop.You can also write about how he escaped from danger.He was rescued by a man named Koljacek.The man who first fished the sawmill owner out of the Pripyat or Bug rivers, and then, at the very moment, when the huge log collapsed like an avalanche in Kyiv, on the lumber yard without the guardian angel, Pulled Dieckerhoff out and spared him.What a touching scene it would be, if I could describe it to you now: Dieckerhoff, who was drowned half-dead or almost crushed into fungus powder, although he was still breathing very hard, there was still death in his eyes. but immediately leaned into the false Wranka's ear and whispered: "Thank you, Koljacek, thank you!" Then, after the necessary pause, added, "We've come to an end— Let the past be the past!" They were polite but dry, smiling awkwardly, looking into each other's teary, manly eyes, and shaking each other's callused hands timidly. This kind of scene can be seen in the film of resolving grievances between enemies. If the director is not lacking in ingenuity, the two enemies will form a partnership, go through hardships and twists, and do thousands of adventures. In addition, the acting skills are superb and the photography is excellent. , it will make the audience even more mesmerized. But Koljaiczek had no chance of drowning Dieckerhoff, nor of rescuing him from the death clutches of the falling log.Thinking about his company's profit, Dieckerhoff bought the timber in Kyiv, supervised the workers to tie the timber into nine rafts, and, as usual, advanced the raftmen with a considerable deposit in Russian currency, and then boarded the train. , via Warsaw, Modlin, Deutschland Eilau, Marienburg, Dilsau, back to his company.The company's sawmill is located in the timber harbor between the Krawitter and Schauw yards. Before I send the rafters toil for weeks downriver from Kyiv, through rivers and canals, and finally into the Weixel, I have to consider whether Dieckerhoff has recognized with certainty Wranka is the arsonist Koljacek.I can say that as long as the sawmill owner sits next to this harmless, easy-going, beloved Wranka despite his insularity, he doesn't want his traveling companion to be the daring, out-of-the-ordinary Kolya Cheek.It was not until he sat on a soft seat in a railway carriage that he gave up this hope.By the time the train arrived at its destination, the Danzig station (I am only now naming the place), Dieckerhoff had made up his mind.He had his luggage loaded into the carriage, and drove home, while he went off empty-handed to the nearby police station at Wibenvall.He jumped up the stone steps, walked into the gate, searched carefully, and soon found the office. The interior layout showed an objective and fair appearance.Dieckerhoff made a brief report limited to a statement of facts.The owner of the sawmill didn't make a complaint, but just asked the police to investigate whether Wranka was Koljacek, and the police agreed. During the weeks that the raft carried the reed sheds and the rafters down the river, the many concerned authorities filled out certificate after certificate.There is a service file for Private Joseph Koljacek of the XX Prussian Field Artillery Regiment.The disreputable artilleryman was twice put in confinement for getting drunk and shouting anarchist slogans in half German and half Polish.Corporal Franka, on the contrary, had served in the 2nd Hussar Guards at Longfurt, and no such blemish was found in his file.Wranka performed well. As the battalion messenger, he made a good impression on the crown prince during the exercise, and was rewarded with a thaler with the crown prince's head cast on it.The crown prince always carried this silver coin in his pocket.However, there is no mention of this thaler reward in the service file of Corporal Wranka, and my grandmother cried out that it was true when she and her brother Vincent were killed. When sent for interrogation. -------- ①Thaler, a silver coin in old Germany. She not only used this Thaler's reward to prove that the arsonist's crime was a false accusation.She could also produce papers to prove that Joseph Wranka had joined the Volunteer Fire Brigade in Lower Danzig as early as 1904, and that in the winter, during the months when the rafters were temporarily out of business, he As a firefighter, he has saved several fires, large and small.There is also a document that proves that in 1909, a fire broke out in the main section of the railway in Troy. Firefighter Wranka not only extinguished the fire, but also saved two apprentice mechanics.Fire brigade captain Hecht, who was invited to testify, also talked about similar content.According to the records of the interrogation, Hecht said: "The person who put out the fire is not an arsonist! He was on the fire escape when the church in Hoybold caught fire. This scene is still vivid. From the ashes and flames Raise a phoenix that not only puts out the fire, the fire of the world, but quenches the thirst of my Lord Jesus. I tell you straight: whoever wears a firefighter's helmet on this head has the right of way , favored by the insurance company, who always has ashes in his pocket (maybe he dropped them in his pocket when he was fighting a fire, or he picked them up as a talisman), who will take him, this magnificent phoenix If it is said to be a big red rooster, no one will be rewarded, and a millstone should be hung around the neck of such a person..." -------- ① The German proverb "put the big red rooster on the roof" means "set fire to the house", which is a metaphor for arsonists. As the reader will see, Hecht, captain of the volunteer fire department, was an eloquent priest.During the investigation of the Koljacek-Wranka case, he stood on the pulpit of the parish church of St. Barbara in Langarten every Sunday and preached the same words, sending him to the fire department of heaven. The parables of the team and the damned arsonist babbled into the ears of his parishioners. However, the criminal officers of the police station who investigated the case did not go to St. Barbara's Church, and the parable of the phoenix, in their ears, instead of proving Wranka's innocence, became a very disrespectful word that offends today. Son, therefore, Wranka's activities as a volunteer firefighter turned out to reveal clues. Many certificates from the sawmill and the birthplace of these two people have been obtained one after another.Wranka was born in Tuchel, Koljacek was born in Thon.There are slight inconsistencies in the testimony of the old raftman and two distant relatives.Skynet is restored, sparse but not leaky.Investigations are already underway.At this time, the big raft happened to be in the territory of the empire. As soon as it passed Torn, it was under surveillance, and the raftmen went ashore and were followed. After Dilsau, my grandfather noticed that someone was following him.He had expected it.At this moment, perhaps from an indolence bordering on depression, he did not manage to escape between Letzkau and Kaisermark; He might as well have escaped.Once past Ainlage, the rafts bumped into each other and drifted slowly into the Dead Wexel.A single-masted fishing boat was coming close to the raft, how many people were there on deck!The less it wants to be eye-catching, the more eye-catching it is.Just after the village of Plainen, two motorboats of the Harbor Police Department drilled out of the reeds on the bank, cut through the increasingly salty water of the Dead Wicksell River, announcing the arrival of the port, and shuttled back and forth between the two banks .Police in blue uniforms had cordoned off the bridge to Hoybud.At a glance, the lumber yard opposite the Krawitter shipyard, several smaller shipyards, the wider and wider timber port jutting out towards the Mottlau River, the loading and unloading docks of the various sawmills, and the employees of the mills. On the waiting pier, there are policemen in blue uniforms everywhere.Only on the other side of the river, there is no area around Shihau, where there are many flags and other things are happening there.There must have been some kind of boat launching over there, and there were crowds of people, seagulls flying around, and there was a celebration over there—was it a celebration for my grandfather?When my grandfather saw the lumber piles strewn with policemen in blue uniforms, and the two motorboats approaching more and more ominously, throwing the rafts onto the raft, he understood that the enormous expense and netting that had been laid for the purpose of cleaning up his.Only then did the former arsonist Koljacek wake up.Only then did he spurn the gentle Wranka, took off the human skin of the volunteer firefighter Franka, loudly and without stammering, he announced that he was done with the stuttering Wranka, and started to run away.He ran from raft to raft, across the wide, wobbly plane, barefoot on the rough raft, from giant log to giant log, on the raft toward Shihau.There, the flags are fluttering, and a ship stands on the berth, the keel is submerged; there, no one is calling Vrank or Koljacek, and there is a splendid speech: I named you your majesty's ship "Columbus", sailing directly to the United States, with a displacement of more than 40,000 tons and 30,000 horsepower, His Majesty's ship, a first-class lounge, a second-rate restaurant, a marble gymnasium, a reading room, direct sailing to the United States, His Majesty's ship, stabilizers , promenade deck, "God bless you, wear the crown of victory" ①, the original Shanghai Harbor flag on the bow, Prince Heinrich ② standing by the steering wheel.My grandfather, on the other hand, ran barefoot, barely touching the logs, toward the brass band.O nation with such a sovereign, who ran from raft to raft, and the nation shouted to him, "God bless you, crowned with victory," and whistles blared, whistles of all docks, steamers, tugs, and The yacht's whistle, the Columbus, America, Liberty, and two motorboats galloping beside him in a joyful, mad rush, passing raft after raft, and His Majesty's raft cut him off, what a failure. interest.He was about to make a graceful leap, but he had to stop and stood alone on a raft.He had seen America when two motorboats collided and he had no choice but to dive—my grandfather was seen swimming toward a raft floating toward the Mottlau River.Because of the two motorboats he had to dive, and because of the two motorboats he had to stay underwater forever.The rafts floated above his head, and never stopped, and each raft gave birth to a new one: the raft that your raft gave birth to, one after another, for eternity: the raft. -------- ①The first sentence of the Prussian national anthem. ② Refers to Heinrich von Prince of Prussia (1862~1929), Grand Admiral of the German Navy. ③This is a parody of Catholic scriptures. Both motorboats stopped their engines.Pairs of stern, merciless eyes searched the water.But Koljacek is gone forever, farewell to brass, sirens, ship's bells, His Majesty's ship, Crown Prince Heinrich's christening speech, His Majesty's madly dancing seagulls, farewell" God bless you, wear the crown of victory" and your majesty's soft soap for lubricating your majesty's ship when it is launched from the berth, bid farewell to the United States and the "Columbus", got under the raft of endless regeneration, and escaped the pursuit of the police station . My grandfather's body was never found.He died under the raft, I am sure of that.Yet, just to be sure, I had to set down the various legends of his miraculous deliverance. One was that he had found a hole in the bottom of the raft between two logs; seen from below, it was just big enough to expose his mouth and nose above the water.Seen from above, the hole was very small, and although the police searched the raft, and even searched the reed sheds on the raft, until late at night, they did not find it.Then, through the darkness of the night—so the legend goes—he drifted away with the waves, exhausted but with some luck, to the other bank of the Motlau River, to the wharf of the Shihau Shipyard, where he hid in the scrap iron At the storage yard, later, possibly with the help of Greek sailors, in one of those grimy tankers.It is said that those ships have always been a refuge for fugitives. Another said: Koljacek is a good swimmer, his lung capacity exceeds that of ordinary people. He not only dived under the raft, but also dived across the extremely wide Motlau River. People carefully mixed in among the shipbuilders, and finally among the fanatical crowd, sang "God bless you, wear the crown of victory" with them, and listened to the speech given by the crown prince naming His Majesty's ship "Columbus", applauding desperately .The launching ceremony was over, he was wearing half-dry clothes, and squeezed off the pier along with the crowd.The next day—on which the one or two rescue accounts agree—he was a stowaway passenger on one of the notorious Greek tankers. For the sake of completeness, a third kind of absurd legend must be told.According to the cloud, my grandfather was sent into the open sea by the river like a piece of floating wood. When several Boenzak fishermen saw him, they immediately salvaged him and handed him over to a Swedish deep-sea ship outside the area of ​​three nautical miles. fishing reel.On the Swedish ship, he slowly recovered like a miracle, and made it to Malmö, and so on. These are all nonsense, vain tales made up by the fishermen.And the accounts of the eyewitnesses (there are such implausible eyewitnesses in harbor cities all over the world) I laugh off, too.They said they saw my maternal grandfather in Buffalo, USA shortly after World War I.据说他改名为乔·科尔奇克，做从加拿大进口木材的生意，是几家火柴厂的大股东，火灾保险公司的创始人。他们把我的外祖父描绘成一个孤独的亿万富翁，坐在摩天大楼里一张巨大的写字台后面，每个手指都戴有一枚闪闪发光的宝石戒指，正在训练他的保镖，这些人一色消防队员制服，都会唱波兰文歌曲，以长生鸟卫队而遐迩闻名。