by Leon Silver
He may have done his best for his country, but opinions were divided on which country that was. The man was now suspected of being a multilingual German lieutenant who specialised in Polish. Tolek was again questioned by the military police, as he had asked this officer if, during his time with the Germans, he had found out what was happening to Poland’s Jews. Tolek had no suspicions about the lieutenant, and in fact liked him, even though he’d said that Poland had not been discussed by the enemy when he was with them. But the lieutenant’s story sounded too easy to the interrogating officers, and he disappeared the following day – never seen again.
The night patrols became more dangerous and more men were lost. One night there was heavy shooting and explosions some distance away. The remaining night-patrol soldiers came struggling back, sliding with a thump into the trenches. Tolek and the others crawled out to help the wounded. A soldier carrying another soldier across his back staggered up to Tolek. Tolek could hear him whimpering.
It was Szymanski, hauling Lewandowski’s corpse. Tolek helped him carry the bleeding body to the first aid station, where the medics swooped. It was no use. Lewandowski was covered in blood, arm and half a leg missing. Szymanski was wounded, but refused to let go of his friend’s body. He was bandaged while standing up, sobbing, until he was taken to the back lines with Lewandowski’s body.
After Lewandowski’s death, Tolek couldn’t sleep or eat. Neither could he get time off for two days. All he saw were Szymanski’s and Lewandowski’s faces at the water well at the war’s start. All he heard was their friendly banter when planning the escape from the internment camp, calling him ‘The fixer… the fixer!’
At the first opportunity, Tolek visited Szymanski in hospital. His injured friend lay in bed staring at the ceiling, or sat in a dressing gown staring out the window. The nurse said that it was all he did. Never talked, never slept, hardly ate. Tolek couldn’t be the fixer this time.
When Szymanski rejoined the troops, he was quiet and withdrawn, and slept with his rifle. He mumbled to himself with vacant eyes. Occasionally, revived by whisky, he spoke of his past with Lewandowski. They grew up on adjacent farms, close as brothers since they could crawl. They rode the same horse bareback. Married sisters. Lewandowski was always the jolly, smiling friend.
For Tolek, with so many enemies in plain sight, each loss of a friend was shattering.
* * *
Tolek had a lot in common with the Jewish sharpshooter, Herschel Singer. They had been drafted together, both forced to leave families behind. Like Tolek, Singer had decided in Stryj to take Captain Gultz’s advice to stay with the army. He’d also escaped from the Hungarian internment camp to be reunited with Tolek in Haifa. And he had battled with the idea of deserting and going back to Poland to rescue his family.
War was a team game. They all had their specialisms. In Tobruk the sharpshooter’s job was to taunt the enemy, ensuring they didn’t lift their heads or their rifles, just as the enemy’s sharpshooters sniped at the Poles from their bunkers and trenches. One hot day, Tolek sat in the front trenches eating lunch: cold corned beef, baked beans in tomato sauce, biscuits and a raw onion against scurvy. Tall, muscly Singer was standing beside him. His rifle – wrapped in a blanket so as not to shine – was poked through a hole in the sandbags and his right eye was glued to the rifle’s telescope. He squeezed off a shot now and then while chatting to Tolek, as though on a turkey shoot. He was having a good time – there were plenty of careless heads on the other side.
Tolek leaned back against the dirt wall as the sharpshooter squeezed off another well-directed shot.
‘That’s three,’ Singer announced, as though he had just won the prize at a carnival.
‘Have your lunch,’ Tolek urged him, wiping away onion tears. ‘The Germans can wait. These onions are delicious.’
Captain Kasprowicz came by, ducking below the trench’s rim, offering a tin of hot coffee. Singer boasted of his score, three successful hits, including an officer. Kasprowicz immediately told Singer to change his position – the enemy would no doubt have a fix on him.
Singer ignored the advice and asked Tolek to take a look through the telescope. Lazily, Tolek, got up and peeked through the glass, but couldn’t see anything, so he sat down again. Singer’s eye went back to his rifle, and rat-tat-tat-tat-tat exploded from an enemy machine gun. Herschel Singer’s eye, blood and brains landed in Tolek’s corned beef, baked beans and coffee.
When they buried the sharpshooter Tolek, wrapped in the tallith, said the Kaddish for Herschel Singer: ‘Let the glory of God be extolled, let His great name be hallowed, in the world whose creation He willed. May His kingdom soon prevail, in our own day, our own lives, and the life of all Israel, and let us say: Amen.’
Jan watched intently, without moving. He didn’t dare bring up ‘Poland will not forget her faithful Jewish sons’.
Another Star of David in the Tobruk cemetery. Of the ten Jews from basic training in Latrun, four had been killed and three had deserted in Palestine. That left only three, including Tolek.
Tolek had the frightful suspicion that his luck would soon run out.
12 The Home Army delivers
One night a torrential rainstorm turned the desert into a raging sea. It was lucky that the men were in the open trenches, not in the closed cement bunkers – they only had to worry about the rain from above, as the trench sides were built up higher than the level of cascading water on the ground, but the bunkers flooded quickly. The men in the trenches plugged up the rifle and observation holes with stale bread, turning the walls into a leak-proof dam.
In the morning, all their equipment and clothing, especially from the bunkers, had been swept away into a gully in the no man’s land that separated the enemy camps. The Germans had suffered the same fate. Their combined belongings were tangled in the masses of barbed wire.
A truce was quickly arranged and the Poles met the Germans and Italians in the gully and began sorting out their belongings. They shared bottles of wine, exchanged cigarettes, showed pictures of families back home, even posed with the odd enemy or two for photographs, like it was a picnic in the country. Tolek received compliments over his wife – ‘schöne Frau’ and son – ‘hübscher Junge’ – and was wished a safe army campaign and a speedy reunion with family.
Later, when the troops’ high command found out, they were furious. Fraternising with the enemy, they called it. It must never happen again. Imagine the damage to the war effort.
The high command needn’t have worried. The war went on as it had before. The British broke out of Egypt, chased the Germans into Libya and liberated the fortress of Tobruk. The Poles knew in advance that the British were coming – not from their own side, but from the enemy. The night before the British arrived the enemy packed up and left. Strangely, the Poles were given orders not to harass the departing Germans. No one complained. They were happy to let them go in peace.
Those orders changed when the British arrived. The Poles were to chase the enemy they had just permitted to escape. They caught up to them and, together with the New Zealanders and South Africans, they launched a fierce attack, yelling and screaming and shooting guns, as they were still desperately short of heavy artillery and air cover. But they had plenty of ambulances. It gave the men a great boost of confidence to go into this particular battle with rows of ambulances lined up behind their lines. Better a berth in a British ambulance than in six feet of sandy soil.
Tolek survived by working out that the German artillery shells exploded in a systematic half-moon pattern. He managed to get ahead of the exploding shells, firing his weapon over the edges of the craters.
‘Look at your face, Miracle Typist,’ a colleague said, laughing, when the battle was over, making Tolek grip his face in panic, expecting half of it to be missing. Instead of blood, his face was smeared with black crater soot. Better dirty than wounded, any time.
The Allies caught many prisoners, mostly Italians, and Tolek typed notes in the inte
rrogations. He garnered that the Italians were happy the war was over for them as they were treated like slaves by the Germans: not enough food and, with more wine than water, they were drunk most of the time. They had to be, they said. The Germans were arrogant bosses and used the Italians as cannon fodder.
The Poles were shipped back to Alexandria to lick their wounds. They had suffered heavy casualties. Tolek worked in the office, trying to figure out who was still alive and in one piece. When they got leave, they could drink themselves into forgetting that the war still had years to go, and many of them would not live to see the end. Away from the front it was easier for Tolek to search the military dispatches for news of Poland’s Jews. He could find nothing. The army didn’t care or kept any updates hidden so as not to upset Jewish soldiers and risk them defecting.
On a quiet, sunny day, Tolek was sitting in a British army canteen in Mersa Matruh, drinking a beer with British and Australian soldiers, when a man came in wearing a British flyer’s uniform. Tall and blond with a moustache, he greeted Tolek with booming shouts of joy and powerful claps on the shoulder, yelling, ‘Tolek Naftali Klings, the super refugee advocate, do you remember me?’
Pain cut through Tolek’s chest. But – ‘Goldenstein! What are you doing here?’ he shouted back, ordering the man a beer. Tolek could never forget the man who had offered to bring Klara and Juliusz out from Poland.
‘Living with my family in Palestine. Making a living flying for the RAF.’ He laughed, accepting the beer, and patted the insignia on his sleeve with pride.
‘Cheers – twoje zdrowie – So, you made it?’
Goldenstein’s face dropped and the patting hand stilled. ‘It was bad… Four families left Poland with me, Tolek. The Jacobsons – family of four – murdered by Ukrainian police… We were hiding in the forest, children screaming, we barely got away, ran and hid for days, starving, eating leaves and grass. The Sieleckis – family of six – were offered help by peasants for a price… after they walked away from us, we heard machine-gun fire.’
He took a sip of beer, eyes downcast, shoulders sagging. ‘We were chased through a wet field, our pursuers shooting at us. My son, Alon –’ Goldstein stopped. He drank the glass empty and wiped his mouth. He looked up at Tolek. ‘My son, Alon, tripped into a hole full of water. I was in front with my wife, dragging our two young daughters. I – I let them go, ran back. Before I got to him, two dogs – devils from hell – jumped on Alon. One bit his throat. He was screaming, men were shooting, running up the field towards us. I… I had to leave my son to save my daughters and wife. I –’
Tolek gripped both his hands.
‘I will never forget my son’s last look at me in the moonlight.’
They drank in silence.
‘Come visit us in the Ra’anana moshav.’ He patted Tolek’s shoulder. ‘We’ll make a place for your family in the orange groves after this madness is over.’
Tolek Klings lay awake many nights, tossing and turning over his decision to refuse Goldenstein’s offer. Most civilians who stayed home had survived the Great War. Under the Russians life in Eastern Poland was bearable – but now, under the Germans? He needed news from home, some idea how Klara and Juliusz, Mamme, Tatte and Ijio were doing. He’d have to annoy Jan again, bribe him, beg him. There had to be some contact with the underground.
* * *
Being in charge of processing the leave passes put Tolek in a curious position of power. He couldn’t actually sign the blank leave forms, but if he filled them out and shoved them under the captain’s nose, the officer normally signed them without reading.
One of their battalion cooks, Wojciechowski, a Catholic boy, had befriended a Jewish girl from a Greek family who had migrated to Alexandria. The wonders of war: a Catholic Pole meeting a Jewish girl from a Greek family in Alexandria and falling in love. Wojciechowski was desperate to see her and every time he passed the admin tent he sent big fish eyes to Tolek. Finally, Tolek managed to sneak a five-day pass to him. On his return, Tolek was invited to have his lunch in the kitchen tent, to eat the food reserved for the officers. Wojciechowski’s specials include cold yoghurt and beetroot soup served with hard boiled egg, and chunks of beef in horseradish sauce. A welcome change from the tinned rations.
But that was the least of it. Due to this power, Tolek’s relationship with the Correspondent flourished. Tolek still didn’t quite know if Jan was a friend or foe, couldn’t make up his mind, though he did his best to keep on Jan’s good side. Jan’s alcoholism, deprived during the desert campaign, now flourished in Alexandria, as Tolek got him extra leave passes by sneaking them under the captain’s nose. Tolek even lent Jan the occasional British pound or two. Tolek had plenty of money; he was saving most of his pay for after the war and that dry-cleaning business.
Stanisław Kot’s name kept hammering at the back of Tolek’s mind. Jan was proud to tell him that Kot had now become the Polish Ambassador to Russia, with strong ties to the Armia Krajowa, the Polish underground home army. Tolek had a nagging feeling that this meant Jan would be one of the first to have access to information of the Jews in Poland. But maybe he was using that hope as a handy excuse for the friendship? Maybe he really liked the Correspondent… for an anti-Semite, he wasn’t a bad fellow: highly intelligent, a good sense of humour and well travelled. They spent many a night drinking and reminiscing about the good old times in Lwów. Tolek didn’t mind buying the whisky, as long as he didn’t have to keep up. Otherwise he was sure to die from alcohol poisoning.
The soldiers had light duties, guarding an airfield of no significance. They lay around in the shade, sleeping or drinking or playing cards, or cleaning and reassembling their weapons. They had had enough of the sun in the desert. One quiet day, while sitting with Jan in the shade of a palm tree, smoking, a dispatch rider pulled up next to the two lounging soldiers. Without taking off his helmet or sandy goggles, he handed Jan a small sealed envelope with his name on it. This wasn’t unusual, Tolek had seen Jan get confidential messages before; the Correspondent normally read them, then burned them.
Jan ripped the envelope open, read the few typed lines then lifted his head, his eyes still downcast. Tolek’s heart sank.
‘I’m so sorry, Tolek, really I am.’ He handed the typed note to Tolek. It had no date.
Mendel Klings died of illness… Lieba, Klara, Juliusz and Ijio are managing… Doing well.
Tolek sat frozen in the desert heat. Tatte was dead. His tatte, his hero, the Great War soldier.
Mamme would be so devastated. Tolek should’ve been there to hold her up at the funereal. As oldest son, he should have said the Kaddish. The second candle had been extinguished from the Klings’ menorah. First Lonek, now Tatte.
He trembled with the urgent need to embrace Klara and Juliusz, Mamme and Ijio.
Ijio was now the adult male. His middle brother, the billiards player and gambler. Was he still working? Was Klara? Probably not since the Russians left. Mamme and Klara would push Ijio, no doubt. He’d better stand up to the task as he’d have to give a full account of himself to his older brother when this war was over.
Feeling old and tired, Tolek forced himself to get up. ‘Dziękuję ci, Jasiek.’ Tolek repeated the thank-you a few times, embracing the Correspondent, who stood, immobile.
‘From Kot,’ Jan whispered, nodding at the flapping note in Tolek’s hand. So, his homeland contacts had finally paid dividends.
‘Tatte was a diabetic,’ Tolek said quietly. ‘He took regular insulin shots. The supply probably stopped when the Ruskies marched in.’ Where was his dear tatte when he died? At home? In bed, with his loving family by his side? Did he get a proper Jewish funeral from young Rabbi Zvi?
That night, in the tent, courier note wedged next to Klara’s telegram and the photos and drawing in his breast pocket, Tolek put on his kippah, wrapped his tallith around his shoulders and, facing Jerusalem, recited the mourners’ Kaddish for his father. The same one he had so recently read for his compatriot Singer. He thou
ght of father-and-son times they had spent in the restaurant. How his father’s face had lit up after Tolek had laid the money from his first pay packet out before him. He’d embraced his oldest son then given him back a few notes for pocket money.
He pictured Tatte, a little drunk on the first-floor balcony, yelling down for the staff to open the front doors wide and asking passers-by to step in and enjoy the performing singers and poets. Tatte transforming from a tired young man in grubby soldier’s uniform to the restaurant frontman, a bon vivant with a fancy pocket hanky, chatting up bank managers to secure mortgages or city councillors for this or that licence… Tatte swaying, embracing his oldest son after a successful pub night. Stuffing a few notes in Tolek’s pocket. Go have a good time…
Tatte, offering advice before Tolek’s marriage. His joy as a grandfather, bouncing baby Juliusz on his knees, raving to the restaurant patrons how smart this little boy was, calling the boy Jam-Jam, as Klara sometimes did.
Tolek sat Shiva for Tatte. He covered the small mirror stuck to the tent pole over his bunk, not to be distracted from his grief. He didn’t wash, shave or leave the tent, and said the Kaddish every night facing Jerusalem, the city to which he now had a new, strong connection. For the full week, his head was full of Tatte.
Jan brought him food and water, putting it down silently. He informed Captain Kasprowicz of Tolek’s loss, and Tolek was left alone to mourn.
* * *
A Jewish chaplain from the Australian Army, Rabbi Captain Robert Cohen, walked into the administration tent where Tolek was working and asked, through an interpreter, if Tolek could introduce him to the Jewish soldiers in his battalion.
‘Here I am,’ Tolek told him in Yiddish, laughing. Cohen didn’t understand the Yiddish, but he got it, and hugged Tolek like an old friend. When Tolek took him in to see the Polish CO, the officer was angry – his corporal should have warned him and got permission for the interview. Rabbi Cohen politely requested that the CO assemble all the Jewish soldiers in the Polish battalion. Jewish holy days were approaching and the rabbi had borrowed a villa near Alexandria, where he intended to hold services for three days.