by Mary Wood
‘Contact him, Baruch, and let him know about my disguise. It’s good that he has this rapport with the Germans. He can make a further joke when I turn up and am a frump, rather than the beauty they are possibly imagining. I’ll cut up my bedding to pad out my body, and dress in some of the dowdy clothes I have brought with me. With that, and the hair and glasses, it will look as though he was hoodwinking them, for the fun of it. All distractions are good, and this is a perfect one to stop them wondering why I am really coming to Krakow.’
Stefan came to seek out Elka within a day of her arrival. Two German officers were in Adok’s pharmacy, having a laugh over her with Adok. ‘So, is this the fair Fräulein you told us of? Ha, Adok – for a Pole, you have a good sense of humour.’
Pretending to blush, Elka kept her head down, but this didn’t stop her spotting a man who fitted the description Baruch had given her, sitting on a bench in the square, watching. Adok had seen him, too. He turned to her and said, ‘Why don’t you take those medicines over to the hospital? You remember where it is, from your visits here?’
‘Yes, I do, in Skawinska Street.’
‘Good girl. It is many years since you were here, so you remember well.’
She hadn’t left the pharmacy long, when a voice beckoned her into an alley. Looking into the darkness, she saw the same man again. ‘Stefan?’
‘Yes. Are you Elka?’
For a moment she was annoyed, thinking that Baruch had used her real name, but then she realized that as Stefan had known Baruch and Ania before the war, he would also know of her. ‘Yes, but you must call me Nina at all times.’
‘Of course I will. Tell me, what are your plans?’
‘Let’s go further into the alley. I don’t want to be seen with you.’ A nerve tightened in her stomach. Her mind focused on the knife in her pocket.
‘Yes, we will not be seen down here.’
She followed him into the dimness, made all the more so by leaving the bright sunshine as they walked between the tall buildings. The cobbles beneath her feet made her progress unsteady.
‘Now, tell me quickly: how can I help you? Would you like a job at Gestapo headquarters, like your sister had? Your disguise is good – I wasn’t sure it was you, as you look nothing like Ania.’
Her name on his lips uprooted the deep anger and hatred that were stored inside her. As if accidentally, she dropped the package she held. Stefan looked down at it. In one swift movement she kicked it away, extracted the knife and drove it into his neck, moving like lightning to avoid the blood that was spurting at her as he slumped to the ground.
Without stopping to think, Elka lifted the parcel and ran to the entrance of the alley. She loitered there for a while. One or two people passed by – hungry-looking people wearing purple badges with the letter P in the centre. None of them looked at her. Slipping into the street, Elka continued to walk towards the Vistula river. She would need to cross the bridge to get to the hospital. All around her lay signs of change to her beloved city. Swastikas hung from the majestic buildings, rubbish lay in heaps, rotting and stinking. A tram rumbled by.
Turning left, she walked along Podgorska, her destination about a mile away. Here, with the river on her left, she breathed in the fresh air that blew towards her from the water and walked purposefully forward.
‘Halt!’
The shout from the German soldiers coming towards her made Elka jump.
‘What have you there?’ One of them poked at her parcel. She understood, but didn’t want to let them know that, so she asked in Polish, ‘Do you mean my parcel?’
‘This – this.’ One of the soldiers snatched the bag. As he did so, she saw the blood stain on its underside. Grabbing it back from him, she plunged her hand inside and lifted out the box of tablets. ‘It is for the hospital. From the Apteka, Orzeł Powyżej.’
Flicking his hand across her face, the soldier took the box roughly from her and opened it. Elka prayed the thick glass bottle hadn’t broken, and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw it hadn’t, although the next second she exclaimed as the soldier threw it to the ground with such force that the glass splintered in all directions. Some of it cut her legs. Before he thought to snatch the bag, she bent down and wiped her leg with it. Fresh blood stains covered the ones she hoped he hadn’t noticed.
‘Clean that up. Do it!’
Some of the fear she’d seen on her fellow countrymen’s faces, and had sensed in poor Ania’s letters, entered Elka as she bent once more to do the soldier’s bidding. A vicious kick sent her reeling. Pain made her catch her breath, as a jagged piece of the bottle dug into her cheek.
‘That’s where you belong, you fat, ugly sod!’
They walked on, leaving her lying on the hot flagstones of the pavement. The sun beat down on her despair. This is what Ania had put up with. Oh, Ania, my Ania, I have avenged your death. Elka stood up, as this thought breathed new life into her. She could see that some of the tablets had been trodden underfoot, but others remained intact. If she picked them out carefully, she could rescue most of them. Then she would brush the glass to one side with her feet. At the hospital they would see to her wounds, but most importantly she would have delivered what she could. Medication was scarce.
‘It’s done, Adok.’
‘Already? My, you are a quick worker. But look at you – did he struggle?’
‘He knew nothing. His death was swift.’
‘Come on then, let’s get you inside. I will get a message to Baruch, once you tell me what happened.’
Elka followed Adok through the pharmacy. The shop bell still rang in her ears. The sharp smell of medicines she’d taken as a child in this very room assailed her. Nothing about it had changed. The walls were still a dark moss-green. The dark-wood cabinets stood in a line in the middle with their glass doors, still displaying a mirage of coloured thick-glass bottles that caught the reflection of the sun through the window. The wall to her left was covered in a dark-wood cabinet of drawers with shiny brass handles, and to her right was a dark-wood counter.
A moment from her childhood came back to her again as she looked at this. In her mind’s eye she could see herself and Ania trying to see the top of the counter. They had stood on tiptoes, until Adok had bent down and picked them up, sitting them both on the cold marble slab that topped it. Behind the counter were rows and rows of shelving, which held cream-coloured ceramic pots with brown necks and huge cork stoppers. On the counter top stood a set of scales, and behind it to the right on a shelf was something she didn’t know the name of, but which looked like glass test tubes in a wooden structure, with rubber tubes and balloon-shaped glass containers entwined within it. It had always fascinated her, but that day it had seemed like something out of a witch’s tale to her and Ania.
A tear traced a path down her cheek.
Adok said nothing. Walking back to the door, he closed it and turned his shop sign over to read, ‘Back in five minutes’, then he took her arm and steered her into the room beyond. His storeroom. From here, stairs led up to his living quarters.
Elka walked to the window and looked down on the square. More memories assailed her: two little girls running around with joy in their hearts, Mama and Babcia calling to them to be careful. Oh, Ania, we were so happy and carefree.
Her eyes traced the buildings that formed a small part of the Jewish quarter. Would the Germans really enclose it and force all the Jews to live in this one area? How would that work?
‘Will you move, if the planned ghetto goes ahead, Adok?’
Her words faded against the sound of liquid tinkling against glass. As she turned, he offered her a beautiful cut glass, at the bottom of which some vodka swirled.
‘No, I will stay put if I can, as this building has been in my family for generations. If I abandon it, I may never get it back. Now, do you take it neat or with water, my dear?’
‘I think I need it neat right now, thank you.’ She swallowed the liquid in one gulp and felt the effects of the
warming alcohol. An involuntary cough made Adok laugh.
‘That’s better. I’ll pour you another, but sip it this time.’
He smiled at her. As he did so, his dark eyes twinkled. He was a tall man who was still very handsome, with his black hair swept back and held in place with hair cream.
‘We can’t undo what has been done, but we can have the satisfaction of making someone pay for it. You’re not to spoil what you’ve done, by feeling guilt. That man doesn’t deserve a jot of guilt wasted on him. You have done a great service to the Jews of this quarter. Stefan was one of the worst kind, sucking up to the Germans and often doing their dirty work. People were afraid of him. Only last week I saw him take some soldiers to that apartment over there. A family were dragged out into the square – a mother, father and two children. They had hidden behind a wardrobe during the last round-up. The father had pulled it across the door of a small bedroom. The Germans shot them all.’
‘No! Oh, Adok, no.’
‘This kind of thing is happening all the time, my dear. I’ve seen countless atrocities, and I fear it will get worse.’
‘Can I do anything? I will stay, if I can help in any way.’
‘No. I didn’t tell you immediately, as you were in a state, but while you were out I received an urgent message from Baruch. You have to go back.’
‘But I have only just got here! I hoped to gather some intelligence. I thought that maybe you could secure me a job such as Ania had, by letting it slip that I speak many languages and that I was simply shy. Besides, we need to set up new routes in, for Baruch and the others. What is he thinking, sending for me to return so soon?’
‘I don’t know. He just sent a code-purple message. This means it is imperative it is carried out. He must know of some kind of danger that you are in. Besides, the longer you are here, the more likely it is that someone will recognize you. There are many Jews trading any information they can, to save their skins. For that reason I’m relieved you have to go. If your true identity is discovered, then I am compromised too, and I have much work to do here. I can gather a lot of information, just by being here and being trusted by everyone. A lot is discussed in my presence.’
Defeated by this and by her training, which had instilled in her always to follow orders, Elka didn’t argue any more. ‘If I must go, then I must, but how will you explain my sudden disappearance?’
‘You have been taken ill. An ambulance will be here shortly. They will carry you out on a stretcher. Tomorrow you will be with Baruch, but I will be mourning your death. I will have a coffin buried tomorrow afternoon and a headstone with your name on it – at least the name you were given for this assignment, Nina Warszawski. There will even be a death certificate.’
He’d hardly finished speaking when the ambulance arrived. People milled around it. ‘Now, my dear, time to be an actress; you need to look ill, in case any soldiers come and look. I want to take some blood from you and have it coming from your mouth. I will only have to say the word “typhus” and everyone will scatter. You must just tremble and mumble.’
‘Ha! I hope those soldiers who attacked me make the connection between the woman they mistreated and the woman dying soon afterwards – I would love them to feel fear for a few weeks, as they search for symptoms of typhus, thinking they have caught it from me. But won’t people avoid you, too?’
‘No, they believe a pharmacist has magic powers. My assistant and I will be seen to scrub out the shop, and that will be that.’ Chuckling, Adok said, ‘Have a happy death! Look me up, when you are resurrected after the war.’
As the ambulance tore through the streets towards the hospital, Elka felt in awe of Adok – his endearing, sunny countenance in the face of all he witnessed, his resourcefulness and the wonderful work he did to help the Jews. He already had a new courier in position. He was a truly remarkable man.
Her thoughts turned to the reason why she had to return to camp so quickly. Please let it be because my darling Jhona has turned up.
Upon arriving back at camp, Elka scanned the faces looking at her. They all held pity.
‘What is it? Baruch?’
‘I’m sorry, Elka, but we have reports that Jhona has been caught. I didn’t know he was even in this country! They have taken him to Auschwitz.’
27
Jhona
Auschwitz, September 1940 – Arbeit Macht Frei (Work Sets You Free)
The barbed wire tore at his skin as Jhona worked in a party of prisoners to remove the fencing from the wooden posts. Once a section was free, it was taken by another work party and fixed to new concrete posts standing just over three feet high. Attached to these posts was an electric fence that – rumour had it – would, once commissioned, project four hundred volts of electricity through anyone who touched it.
Up to today, he’d worked on the renovation of buildings that once housed the Polish Army. Some had been made ready by prisoners before he came, but others had been decaying and lice-ridden. Just like his own body.
Food for the five thousand or so prisoners was frugal: one bowl of watery soup a day. And sanitary conditions were almost non-existent, with a trickle of water being fought over for five seconds or so, and only two minutes each allowed on the long gutter-like toilet each day, alongside other prisoners.
For him and a few others, life was even worse than it was for the Polish dissidents, because they were beaten more than the dissidents were, and were treated as if they were the dregs of society, to be spat at and given whatever was left over when others had eaten. This was because they were Jews.
Each day more prisoners arrived, and more and more of them were Jews. A sickening ritual took place after each intake. The older, weaker men and the very young boys were taken into hut eleven and never came out. Sounds of systematic gunfire – bang . . . bang . . . bang – could be heard, and then later in the evening a work party was put together to take the bodies from the enclosed yard for burning. Twice now he’d been one of the work party. Tired beyond endurance, his body had wept as he’d helped to load the naked bodies onto a truck and then fed them into the raging fire of the furnace.
When he’d first arrived, Jhona had thought that would be his own fate. Captured in the forest on his way up to Zakopane, with Russian firearms and ammunition on him, he’d stared down the barrel of a gun, aimed at executing him on the spot. But then one of the soldiers of the patrol who had come across him asleep, and had kicked him awake, cautioned that their superiors might want to question Jhona. Dread had settled in the pit of his stomach, as he’d known what that might entail. He’d tried to get to his cyanide pill, but they had grabbed and trussed him and then dragged him for miles until they reached Zakopane, an alpine town he’d once loved – it had been peopled by a jolly population, but was now teeming with Germans, and the locals walked around with their heads bowed.
Thinking about it, he knew he wouldn’t have taken the pill. With life, there was hope, although many times in the days that followed his capture he’d not thought there was any, due to the agonizing torture he’d experienced – being burned with cigarettes, made to stand for days on end in a confined space and then, worst of all, having his hands tied behind his back and being hung backwards from the crossbar of a scaffold-like structure. Excruciating pain had racked him, as his shoulders had pulled against their sockets, and within minutes he’d passed out. Water hit him in the face and brought him back round, to experience the indescribable pain once more. He’d prayed he would die. But then Elka had come dancing into his mind, giggling in that beautiful way she had, teasing him and loving him, and he’d found an inner strength to survive.
Throughout, he’d stuck to his story. He wasn’t Russian, he was from the Ukraine. He’d wanted to escape to the Tatra Mountains. No, not to join the Resistance or the Freedom Army, but just to live out the war. He’d been walking for weeks. He’d related the exact story of how he came to have Russian ammunition. The one thing that seemed to make them believe him was when he told the
m he was a Jew. Admitting to that must have made them realize that Jhona would not be able to work as a spy, or hold any other official position, in Russia.
That was when he thought he would be taken out into the yard and shot. But they must have thought that was too good for him, because they’d spat at him that he would die like a dog. He had been put into quarters that mostly housed Polish dissidents and young men who had been rounded up to work on getting Auschwitz camp ready for the purpose of being a concentration camp. Within a week he had been moved to another block, where he was housed with other Jews. There the mood was one of desolation. They were forbidden to practise their religion, but in the depth of the night they huddled together and prayed.
With the fifteen-hour days of hard labour, hardly any food and being bitten by lice until he was red-raw, his body weight had dropped by many kilograms in the four weeks he’d been here. His head had been shaved, and blisters had formed on his feet and in the palms of his hands. Yes, he was dying like a dog.
Finding sleep difficult, Jhona watched the searchlight flicker once more through the window and illuminate each corner of the room. A shadow darted to the wall and just avoided the shaft of light as it swept past. Moving his aching limbs, he turned to watch Ephraim coming towards him. Ephraim’s whisper was hardly audible. ‘I have word out that you are here. Maybe London will do something now?’
Jhona couldn’t speak. Does Elka know that I am here? Please God, I pray she doesn’t.
‘How did you manage that?’
‘I have my ways, I told you. If you have things to bribe with, anything is possible. Here, I have a chunk of bread. It is stale, but eat it, there is still some goodness in it.’
‘Shouldn’t we share with the others?’
‘No. We will be doing them all a greater service by keeping up our strength. I have plans.’ For a moment Ephraim was silent as he looked around. He seemed to be waiting. Listening. ‘It is all right – no one is awake. If they were, they would have begged for a piece of the bread. Eat it, Jhona, and listen to what I have to say. I am forming a Resistance group. I want you to join. We aim to cause disruption where we can without detection, and to aid escapes.’