Original subtitles

None of us thought we would have to leave Lviv.

ENVIRONS OF WROCŁAW, 1946

They put us onto cars, and we headed west, to Breslau.

Or rather to Wroclaw.

A city covered in propaganda posters, the Soviets, People's Poland

and the pervasive repatriation.

Hell, what repatriation?

This is expatriation from my beloved Lviv,

from the Borderlands, from my beloved homeland.

Into the unknown.

We shouldn't have left Lviv.

The Polish Lviv doesn't exist anymore.

Department of Public Security, ID checking.

They are looking for me. We will meet in Wroclaw.

Through Father Blicharski.

- Don't go, maybe it's not for you. - I'll see you in a few days.

Don't leave me.

Department of Public Security, document control.

Where is Edward Popielski?

Where is he?

ERINYES Goddesses of Vengeance

Chapter 9 Phlegethon

IF THEY DO NOT PAY ME FIT ATONEMENT FOR THE KINE

I WILL GO DOWN TO HADES AND SHINE AMONG THE DEAD.

Homer, Odyssey 12, 382-3 (the words of Helios, Sun deity)

Where is Edward Popielski?

Where is he?

Popielski's whereabouts are unknown to me.

Popielski's whereabouts are unknown to me.

It is unknown to me.

Popielski's whereabouts are unknown to me.

Popielski's whereabouts are unknown to me.

Popielski's whereabouts are unknown to me.

Get up, whores!

Move your asses!

Cunts up, go on!

Listen, you whore.

We have already lost patience with you.

You will go to a special room.

This room is dark.

And so low that you will have to sit.

You will be there many days and many nights.

Completely naked.

Let's go.

Colonel Placyd Brzozowski.

And back there

Miss Jadwiga Molakówna.

Stenographer.

Even in this cesspool you remained a lady.

This is not for you, Jadzia.

How much sugar?

Two teaspoons.

How about a bunn?

With jam.

No, thank you.

Jadzia, observe the interviewee and learn fortitude.

Our pigs eat better than this lady.

And she despises it anyway.

The best bunn, from Spychała.

And do you know why Miss Tchórznicka endures it?

Because she loves the man we are asking her about.

Because she loves Edward Popielski more than life

and doesn't want to give him up to us.

And Mr. Edward Popielski,

lieutenant of the Home Army, alias Cyclops,

is not worth

even a tiny bit of such great love. He is a knave.

Have you heard of the Banderites?

Fascists who collaborated with Hitler and their terrible crimes?

- Yes, I have. - That's it.

A few months ago, the Banderites attacked in Hrubieszów.

There they fought side by side with Polish fascists from the WiN.

Their death squad

executed two Polish soldiers.

One of the attackers was identified

as the pre-war Lviv policeman called "Baldy".

I know nothing about the wartime experiences of Edward Popielski.

It doesn't matter for him whom he kills.

According to our intel,

he was an enforcer during the war.

He burned Ukrainian villages.

And now, together with Banderites, he murders Polish patriots.

An APB has been issued for him. He is a murderer!

Please, tell me.

Where is he hiding?

I don't have the slightest idea about the whereabouts of Edward--

slightest idea.

I understand you, ma'am.

I understand you like a woman understands a woman.

Eat something.

Here you are.

Yesterday, in broad daylight, a tall, bald man

kidnapped the colonel's daughter.

Lusia.

They suspect it was your cousin's doing.

And I overheard that the colonel is able to trade you for Lusia.

Please, tell me at least.

Where is he?

I will run this case.

I won't tell you anything.

Our Soviet comrades will not wait any longer. They want Popielski.

Tear my food out of her.

Go.

I despise the happy residents of Wroclaw.

Just as one despises vagabonds making their nests at cemeteries

and pretending that this is their eternal homeland.

For me the war is not over.

I want the blood of the Soviets and their collaborators torturing Leokadia.

And above all, I want to return to Lviv.

Look, Józek!

These sons of bitches can afford anything.

Where do they get all this money from?

Not from work, damn it.

That boy with baskets, password: "Oskar Uhlman".

Wroclaw is full of Kliparov drunkers.

And every one of them would rat on me to the SO

for giving them a hard time before the war.

Oskar Uhlman.

Cheers, Commissioner.

But fate can sometimes be kind to me, too.

The epilepsy medication started to work.

I got rid of the dark glasses which made me recognizable to every Lviv bum.

Thanks.

- Praised be the Lord. - Now and forever.

God bless.

Cocoa.

Pioneer.

Pioneer. Pioneer for you? Father?

Pioneer.

Pioneer.

Pioneer.

Pioneer.

Pioneer.

No need.

God bless.

On September 23, 6-year-old Lucyna Brzozowska

was abducted in Szczytnicki Park.

A very high reward awaits anyone who provides

the distraught father with information that could help find the girl.

Praised be Jesus Christ.

Now and forever.

Laudetur Iesus Christus.

In saecula saeculorum.

Father Franciszek.

Ladies, it will be ready for Monday.

- Good. - Goodbye.

In Lviv I would have mocked your choice of profession

every time I visited this store.

But the war took away my sense of humor.

A Jew running a devotional articles store is nothing

compared to Commissioner Popielski in priest's robe.

I don't want you to come here too often, Commissioner.

I don't want to know where you are, what you are doing now.

Is there any news from Lodzia?

Brzozowski is not the real name of the head of the SO.

It is this bastard, Hanas.

I didn't say anything to him. I'm scared.

Did you know?

There were rumors that our gangster king from Lviv

had got himself a big job with the new government.

But he hardly ever appears in public.

He moves around with bodyguards. We weren't sure.

What do you know about the kidnapping of his daughter?

He offered a thousand bucks for the kidnapper's head.

Undercover agents hang out in pubs and dens

and tell that the guy was tall and bald.

They give your description.

Someone is setting you up.

That's why I agreed to help you.

But this is the last time.

Everyone repeats a strange detail of the kidnapping.

When the bald man was running with the child,

white flowers were falling out of his coat pocket.

This river is the river of corpses, the river of Hades.

Do you still remember the names of the rivers from the Aeneid?

Our classics middle school.

Reading Virgil.

It was in some other life that I cannot recall.

But if this city is hell,

then the river that flows here

is the river of fire and smoke, Phlegethon.

We left behind the Poltva, our Styx of Lviv.

And we ended up here.

Only infernal rivers, my friend.

The kidnapped Lusia Brzozowska returned home.

She was found in a ruined factory.

Rumor has it that the child had been defiled by her kidnapper.

Brzozowski doubled the reward.

Almost one million zlotys on the black market, get it?

A manhunt is underway in the city for tall, bald men.

For God's sake, don't go out without a cassock.

Jasiu.

Before the war, I ran a similar case.

It may be the same man, although the description doesn't match him.

But there is one detail that made me think of this bastard.

It may be a trap, but if I catch him,

I will offer the SO a deal, the bastard for Lodzia.

I can't do it alone, help me.

We tracked down the former chief of police in Breslau.

Eberhard Mock survived the war?

He is hiding here.

But soon he will have to make it through to Germany.

He remembers you from a case you ran together before the war.

He will help.

Good you are finally here,

because otherwise I would really have to hear someone's confession.

What happened to you?

Burning tar paper and hot tiles are not good compress for the skin.

Since when are you a priest, my friend?

Since I attacked with partisans the Security Office in Hrubieszów

and freed the political prisoners tortured there.

And you? How do you hide from the NKVD?

The war is over.

The Austrian feldwebel went to hell.

My scars were never included as distinctive marks

in the Abwehr files in Wroclaw, which fell into the hands of the NKVD.

I live discreetly.

The Security Office is torturing Leokadia.

They want her to turn me in.

Will she tell them anything?

She won't give me up, and they will torture her to death.

My son died just before the war.

All I have left is her.

Ebi, I know how to get her out of there.

You've heard about the kidnapping of the daughter of the SO chief.

I still have ears in this city--

and eyes.

The description of her rapist fits your description, Edward.

Yours as well.

I know.

I know who this bastard is,

who rapes girls and scatters flowers.

If you help me get him, I'll offer a deal to Brzozowski.

Do you believe in deals with the SO?

With this officer, yes.

He changed his identity and made a deal with the new authorities,

but before the war he was the king of Lviv gangsters.

In 1939, his daughter was kidnapped and raped.

The rapist's name was Gustaw Lewicki.

Dr. Gustaw Lewicki. A psychiatrist.

Lewicki had an unusual specialty.

He treated retarded and neurotic children with music.

If he didn't change his profession,

he must work with musicians to obtain recordings for therapy.

The entire orchestra of the Wroclaw opera house is German.

I have my contacts there.

It is not easy now for a German to find a job in Wroclaw.

Is it possible to make a living by working in the opera?

It's not easy to be the former head of the German criminal police in Wroclaw.

Do the Polish authorities know that you are still here?

To the point, Commissioner.

I'm looking for a man who commissioned short recordings.

Tall, bald. Middle-aged.

He might have said he was a doctor who treats children with music.

I will pay.

Bald and tall.

No.

But go to Karkonoska Street.

Polish Radio has been broadcasting from there recently.

Ask about engineer Kukla.

I know he's been inviting musicians for private recordings.

The radio was taken over by the new ones from Lviv.

Maybe he did it discreetly

so that no one would know that he was giving work to the Germans.

Kukla works long hours.

POLISH RADIO IN WROCŁAW

You will have to wait.

Goodbye.

Good night.

Do you understand German?

A little. Don't hurt me. Please! I have money.

Doctor. Psychiatrist. Tall. Bald.

His name is Gustaw Lewicki.

Do you provide him with records?

There is someone like that, but his name is no longer Lewicki.

Speak German to me.

And he is not bald.

His name is Eugeniusz Stabro now.

He lives on Piastowska Street.

Praised be the Lord.

Now and forever.

Father doctor Łysiak from Father Blicharski, right?

Could you remind me the purpose of your visit?

I came to pick up the flowers that the professor

came by at the request of Father doctor.

Are you the mitered prelate's representative for library affairs?

That's right.

May I ask why Fr. Dr. Blicharski asked specifically for stephanotis?

Father would like to have a rare, exotic flower

that could please the eye of the alumni in the reading room.

And how big is this reading room?

About the size of professor's office.

You know, this is a dangerous flower.

It can cause severe allergies.

If an allergic person was in a small room with it,

they could lose their breath and--

Die?

Yes.

Even die.

God bless you, father.

Baldy.

Why the hell do you need this flower?

Is my information insufficient?

I need to be sure that it's Lewicki.

I found a doctor on Piastowska Street.

He treats neurotic children with music and hypnosis.

Everything checks out.

I need to be sure that Lewicki did it.

I hadn't finished that case before the war.

The testimony incriminating Lewicki was given under duress.

I was only sure that he wanted to frame me, not that he was guilty.

I have to finish the experiment.

Will the fact that Lewicki is allergic to this flower

be conclusive evidence?

Dixisti.

It is here.

No. 25 Piastowska Street, apartment 5.

He lives here with his wife.

Just the two of them.

Edi?

Are you all right?

I've seen this place before.

A long time ago in Lviv.

In my dream.

Come on. Let's go.

Who is there?

A patient to see the doctor.

You will get the money.

Should I be a good girl?

When a patient comes, you will get rid of them.

Nod that you understand.

How will you do it?

- I'll say the doctor sick. - Repeat.

The doctor is sick.

Will you remember that, Ebi?

Do you think every person who doesn't speak Polish is an idiot?

He did all this and crafted it so that it's on me.

Me?

I raped her?

Hanas, she doesn't want to listen to him.

One more minute.

You will tell something to your master.

Repeat.

It's about your daughter Lucyna Brzozowska.

I have the kidnapper and rapist of your daughter.

Where and when?

Under no circumstances.

You'll go straight into the hands of the Security Office.

And what if Brzozowski doesn't agree to release Leokadia and catches you too?

- I'm going with you. - No, Ebi.

I know Brzozowski.

When it was about his daughter, he was like an overcooked egg.

I will not expose you. It's settled and final.

You don't need to clean yourself. You're not going on a date, Edi.

You need to greet death with dignity.

What do you want, Baldy?

I know nothing about any kidnapping of Brzozowski's daughter.

Shut up, you scumbag!

Wait here, and we will bring the executioner.

Did you understand?

Did you understand!?

Yes.

No. 22 Pszczyńska Street, basement.

There will be vodka and cold pork waiting for you.

- We will drink to-- - To what?

To Leokadia's health.

Hanas.

Cuff him.

In a minute I want to know which way he got in here.

Yes, sir.

Hold the men back, Hanas.

The entrance to the nether region is in the sacristy.

I have Lewicki.

It was a bait, Baldy.

My man, similar to you.

He pretended to kidnap Lusia. And left flower petals.

I knew that an old unsolved case would lure you out of the den.

Edward Popielski.

And Lusia was safe at home all the time.

I am only interested in you.

HA lieutenant. Cyclopes.

For whom the NKVD offer such a beautiful reward.

I've been looking for you for so long.

Comrade Colonel, there's an entrance in the sacristy.

Go in.

Wait, Hanas.

I really found Lewicki.

I looked for a long time, but I found him.

I found the man who hurt your daughter Elżunia

in Lviv before the war.

And then we lost him.

I'll hand him over to you.

You will be able to do whatever you want with him.

But first you have to release my cousin

and promise we'll be safe in this town.

And then

you can tear apart the monster that hurt your daughter.

You will be safe.

Tomorrow I will make an announcement that my Lusia is safe.

And unharmed.

You will be safe in this city as long as I am in it.

And I will gouge the bastard's eyes out with a spoon.

Slowly, longly and careful.

But first I will show him Lusia.

I'll let him look at his daughter.

Lusia…

is his child.

He got Elżunia pregnant.

I don't want to criticize you, man,

but the colors of your tie don't harmonize well

with your shirt and jacket.

Your tie doesn't go with the outfit either.

I have a gift for you.

I bought it at Shaberplatz a few days ago.

Do you remember this Greek myth?

The myth of the river of forgetfulness?

What's this, Ebi?

First you give me a tie, and now you're testing me on mythology.

People drank water from the Lete.

One of the rivers of Hades.

They then forgot their past lives.

In order to reincarnate in new bodies.

My past life…

was the two colors I have on my tie.

Yellow and red.

The colors of Wroclaw.

And these are the colors of Lviv.

Blue and red.

We leave our cities, Edi.

Forever.

We will never return there.

You have already left forever.

And I won't be able to hide anymore.

I'm leaving tomorrow.

I bought it after our Minotaur case.

In Lviv.

Ten years ago.

I waited for you to open it.

It's our goodbye.

This is our water from Lete.

Goodbye.

for Gosia

THE SERIES IS AN ADAPTATION OF MAREK KRAJEWSKI'S BOOKS:

Erinyes, Charon's Numbers, The Rivers of Hades, In the Depths of Darkness

Subtitled by: Izabela Tereszczuk-Prusakowska