Chapter 7
“Ah, Pan Marko, why are you home so early?” A guard, or what in Lviv they call a shimon [doorman], greeted me.
“I have work, and I don’t work anywhere as well as I do at home.”
“Yes-yes, I know that myself. In your own little nest, it’s warmer and cozier than anywhere else.”
Pan Ambrozyak was a sweet, respectful old man. Sometimes I exchanged several words with him and treated him to a small glass when he used to come to pay his respects at Christmas or Easter. The guards didn’t receive pay but were entitled to a service apartment on the ground floor and collected payments from residents for opening the gate after ten o’clock in the evening. That’s why, half an hour before ten on the streets of Lviv you could see great animation. Everyone tried to make it home on time, althou
