Motke the Merchant
"Walk away, with and from."
The words were a shock. Maciej probably only registered them at all for their familiarity. His family had passed down stories of "Motke the Merchant" - some family ancestor who had led a colourful life a few generations ago. Motke was a real ancestor and was a real merchant, too. But by now some of the stories probably had some variations of the tales of Sinbad in them, or Aesop's fables, or any number of true merchant stories from Yiddish memory, or even Polish or Hanseatic memory too.
Maciej might have been named "Motke" himself, but his father thought it might bring him fortune to have a Polish name now that their family had been settled - even thriving - in Poland for so long. A Polish name didn't feel like good fortune today.
The common thread in these Motke the Merchant stories were some deal that suddenly or less suddenly turned sour, forcing Motke the Merchant to walk away from the deal he thought he would have, and choose what things he needed to walk away with, versus what things he could bear to walk away from. A handy framework for wrapping life lessons into bedtime adventure stories any child would happily devour.
Maciej's shock at his father's words came from the context. He was 16 years old now, fully capable of assisting his father in managing this estate or any other estate to the exacting standards of any Polish nobleman. He was probably better than his father at anything to do with managing the horses and the bookkeeping. He wasn't really of an age for bedtime stories any more. And his father seemed to be more talking to himself, here on the hill between the mansion and the stables. And a moment ago, they'd been talking of death coming for all Jews and Poles, from down the river.
40 people had come, all of them Jews, all exhausted save a few who had been riding horses or horse-drawn carts. His father has asked Maciej to bring them water, bread, and any possible comfort, with the help of any of the available serfs. Then his father had gone to greet them.
---
"We come from Cherkasy. The Cossacks came there from Czehryń killed every Pole and Jew they could find."
"Oh... oh... Come: drink, rest. And tell us the tale, as you can."
"Koniecpolski tried to force the wrong Cossack off his land."
"Koniec - "
"I know what you're thinking. This was the son of the old Hetman. He thought it might honour his father's memory to go tell a bunch of Cossacks their land was actually his father's, and now his."
"The Cossacks disagreed, I take it?"
"Yes... though it was more about which Cossacks disagreed. Have you heard the name Bohdan Khmelnytsky? Yes? Respected. Educated. Experienced warrior and leader. The key bit of land was his. Blink an eye, suddenly many peoples grumblingly tolerant of having Poland in charge are armed and allied."
"But doesn't Poland always brush these uprisings off?"
"Scale, my friend. They probably thought this was another uprising like that, and sent the first force they could to crush it quickly. It seems they were crushed instead. That was three weeks ago, and I haven't seen news of any Polish officer of significance alive and not captive. I'd have seen such news, had it come West. Have you heard anything?"
"Not from that way. The family of this estate went West. Safety for their younger children, just in case, and military duty for the older ones."
"We must seek safety for our own, now. The Cossacks will come here. If we are here - including you - we will die. Do you know where we can go?"
"I've always heard Jews are welcome in Warsaw, and Krakow. And though I can't speak for the welcome, I've heard Courland's given up taxing Jews any more than anyone else."
"I prefer our chances farther from Poles, for now. If you have the provisions and horses, we'll head north to Viciebsk in Lithuania, then follow the Daugava to Courland."
"You know the land well, then?"
"Just the maps. Part of my family tree goes back to navigators and mapmakers in Mallorca, before. We've passed down some of the skills. Half the family documents I saved are probably maps."
"Before. I'm sorry."
"We all have some sorry in our stories. Let's try not add much more today and tomorrow."
---
The serfs, under the guidance of Maciej's father, tended to the guests. They would not normally have been accommodated in the house; but normally wasn't today. Normally wasn't Poles and Jews killed wherever Cossacks could catch them.
Maciej took charge of the horses. Every horse and cart from their estate was to be used to travel. The horses and carts the guests had come with needed more tending to; Maciej had others tend to them, and pack any food that could travel well was packed and put on carts or in saddlebags. He asked that they record what was where, and in what quantity. And then he rode to the town, to the synagogue, to tell the Jews to prepare, and warn the Poles... to warn everyone, really.
Then he returned to the estate, and saw the packing and preparations in the stables were well in hand. Most of the serfs - neither Polish nor Jewish - he told to go to their families and stay there. The rest he would need in the morning, after which they too would be let go. By the time he deemed the work and records sufficient, he returned to the mansion. There, he found the refugees either asleep or else staring blankly in a way that might have been nearly as restful as their companions' sleep.
Then Maciej and his father stepped under the stars to walk toward their smaller cottage. Both were bone-tired from helping others, and only spoke what most needed speaking.
"Father, I passed news to the synagogue for them to share. We are provisioned for about four or five days. We will need to resupply as we go. Whatever blankets people are using here they can pack in the morning."
"Thank you, Maciej. Well done. It strikes me that today you are "Maciej the Merchant", worthy heir to Motke the Merchant. Before you sleep tonight, look around our home. We may not see it again. Decide what you must walk away with, and what you can walk away from."
---
Maciej slept. He dreamed of maps and merchants, of men seeking to make it home to their families with wild profits, or else with their lives, or both. Any threads of story were muddled and inconsistent. Merchant stories aren't so different from pirate stories, it's just about how little land is in the telling.
---
When the first rooster crowed, Maciej and his father woke. Maciej went to the stables with the walk away with belongings they'd each decided were too precious to leave behind. He would never enter that house again, but that thought didn't enter his mind. He directed stablehands - liminally, they knew their work - to get packs and saddlebags onto the horses... and everything else. And then he took his favourite horse, "Miko", on a short ride to look at the land around. They expected trouble from the East or Southeast. He saw nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe trouble was out of earshot of roosters.
The guests sleeping in the mansion might also have been out of earshot of roosters. Or else the call of a rooster wasn't enough to break whatever peace or horror they found in their dreams. Maciej and his father woke those that needed waking, prepared those that needed preparing. After a breakfast - mostly the foods that wouldn't travel so well - they were ready to go in an hour.
And in that hour, trouble woke, too.
There were fires to the south, visible in the morning light, and there was dust. Maciej wasn't really sure what signs to look for, but fires and dust seemed enough. He rounded the hill to find his father, who he found speaking to the man - Tevel - who'd spoken on behalf of the Cherkasy Jews when they arrived.
"Forgive me interrupting. Fire and dust They're coming.
"From which direction?"
"South. From toward Uman. Not Cherkasy."
Maciej knew that any raiders from that direction intent on killing Poles and would be headed right to this hill and Bila Tserkva behind it.
His father turned to Tevel, then back to Maciej.
"Show us, son."
---
And so they had rounded the hill again, to see how fast doom was moving. Doom nearly always moves too fast, including on this morning. And this is where Maciej felt utterly displaced to hear his father mumbling, to himself or the coming Cossacks:
"Walk away, with and from."
The hill paused a moment, at that. They did not seem to have enough time.
"Tevel, take the left way around the town. Once Bila Tserkva is behind you, I think you will be safe enough, at least until Bila Tserkva's fate is also decided. Beyond then, may your family's maps guide you well."
Tevel nodded, in silence, and bowed deeply enough to leave Maciej confused.
"My son. I am thinking now on all the stories of Motke the Merchant. Misadventures, discoveries. We've laughed at poor Motke's expense for nearly a century now in this family, yes?" He chuckled, and smiled at Maciej. Then he sobbed. "I know this estate and all it holds. I can give the Cossacks reasons to pause here, as Tevel's people did yesterday. I am hearing the voice of Motke telling me that a deal has been lost. What I must walk away with is the knowledge my son lives. And to have that, I find I am willing to walk away from everything else. Including my life."
Maciej stood in silent shock.
"For it to make any difference, you must go now." He put his arms around his son, so slowly, so firmly. "I love you, my son."
"I..." Maciej's arms finally embraced his father, now that he knew he would never again do so. "I love you."
They held the embrace for a long time, though it could never be long enough. Then his father walked back to the mansion on the hill, without looking back.
---
Nearly three weeks later, hundreds of Jews arrived in Dünaburg, and crossed the Düna river there into Semigallia, which one of Tevel's more fanciful maps showed as the tip of an eel's tail - the furthest inland corner of Courland and Semigallia, with the Baltic end of the country shown as the eel's open mouth. Tevel's people and Maciej were outnumbered by so many from Bila Tserkva who had joined them after Maciej's warning. Others who remained within that town's walls died there, or fled and died elsewhere, or some few fled and lived on elsewhere.
The number of refugees was so great that the Duke himself rode to greet them by the Düna, and decide what to do. At first, Duke Jakob spoke to the leaders of the Bila Tserkva Jews, the most numerous group among these new arrivals. But eventually, they introduced him to the "mapmaker" and the "young man whose warning saved us."
"Welcome to Semigallia. I am Jakob, Duke of Courland and Semigallia. I understand my nation is richer by a thousand or more Jews thanks to" - he held out his hand at you to make clear he was asking for their names - "a mapmaker and a young man who managed many caravan matters."
Tevel bowed. "I suppose I am your mapmaker, my lord. Tevel ben Elisha. Truthfully, more an estate manager than a mapmaker, though."
Tevel's and Jakob's eyes turned to Maciej.
"My lord." For nearly three weeks, his Polish name had felt like a risk or a curse on the one hand, and a last inheritance from his father on the other. But he had other inheritances from his father, too.
"Please call me Motke."
