by Liz Tolsma
Teodor bit his tongue until he tasted blood.
“She does a pretty good job of keeping me happy.”
If he chomped down any harder, he might sever his tongue.
“Don’t worry. I’m keeping her warm. But today, I think I shall have you shovel coal. We go through quite a good deal of it, especially in such chilly weather.”
Teodor spun around. “I’ll get my coat.”
Fromm blocked his way. “No need. You’ll get plenty warm without it. In fact, leave your shoes here. You won’t need those either.”
Teodor peered at Fromm. The man sneered, a cold glint in his blue eyes. At no time did you take your shoes off and leave them unattended. Not even to sleep. Footwear left lying around had this curious habit of disappearing. He opened his mouth to protest but clamped it shut.
He wouldn’t talk back. Wouldn’t complain or grovel. Fromm wanted nothing more than that. Well, he would wait a very long time before Teodor did any such thing. He slipped off his heavy work boots, tucked them underneath his thin, lumpy pillow, and followed Fromm to the factory yard.
The wind screeched a welcome. The cold ground burned the bottoms of his feet, but he didn’t cry out. Fromm would never break him.
The pile of coal that needed to be shoveled into the furnace room loomed larger than Teodor himself. Likely this job would take all day. He picked up the shovel and got to work. The work kept his body warm. His feet were another matter. Not long passed before pain shot through them. Then they went numb. Every now and again, after scanning the yard to make sure no guards watched him, he stopped and rubbed the feeling back into his toes. Sharp, shooting pins-and-needles pain, but feeling nonetheless. That, at least, meant blood flowed through his feet. Meant he wouldn’t lose them.
Overnight it had rained, then frozen. Ice formed the coal into one giant lump. He scrambled up the pile and chipped at it until it broke into smaller pieces. He stood on top of the mound as a woman carrying a bag made her way down the street in front of the factory.
Not any woman.
Natia.
His breath caught. Here, with no window separating them, he got his first good look at her in over six months. She rubbed her hollow cheek. Wasn’t Fromm feeding her enough? Thin hands peeked out from underneath her heavy, brown wool shawl. At least he allowed her to wear that.
She glanced up and caught sight of him. A slow grin spread across her oval face. Oh, she was as beautiful as all the dreams he’d had of her throughout these long, agonizing months.
“Teodor.”
“Natia, moje slońce.” He spun in a circle to make sure no one watched them. A group of guards stood at the far end of the yard on a cigarette break.
She, too, glanced around, then approached the fence. The smile evaporated from her lips. “Where are your shoes? What are they doing to you?”
“That’s not important. What about you? And this baby?” He pointed to the sling around her middle.
“His mother showed up on the Fromms’ doorstep last night. She passed away, but not before making me promise to care for her child. This is Dominik. He’s pure joy.”
Yet dark half-moons hung under her eyes. “Are you sure? Are you well?”
“Very well, now that I’ve seen you. But you. Oh, Teodor . . .”
He must look a sight. His coveralls hung on him. And he hadn’t had a shave or a bath in about as long as he could remember.
“Hey, you. Who are you talking to?” One of the guards approached.
Nie, not already. They’d had such a short time together. God, why tease me? But she had to get out of here. Before they found her. Before they put her in this horrid place. “Go, Natia, go. Stay well and strong. Keep singing to me. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
Before he blinked twice, she disappeared.
Had she been real or just a hallucination?
Dominik slumbered on the mattress in Natia’s attic room, and Elfriede touched the baby’s head, the dark curls soft under her fingers. Careful not to wake the sleeping child, Elfriede picked him up, hugged him close, and inhaled the fresh, unique baby scent of soap and talcum. “You are a sweet little one. Such a good, good baby. If only you were mine. If I could produce babies for the Führer, maybe then Erich would love me.” Vater had told her that was what good German women did. That was how you earned the respect and admiration of your husband. It was her duty.
One she’d failed.
Much as she’d failed Vater because she couldn’t cook, couldn’t keep house. She could never take Mutti’s place after she died giving birth to a son. Like Erich, Vater yelled and sometimes hit her. And this baby’s arrival only underscored her shortcoming. Just like Mutti’s.
Dominik nestled against her, his little body warm and soft. Oh, to be a mother. What would her child be doing now? Sitting up, rolling over, crawling? Maybe pulling himself to a standing position holding on to the furniture?
Would another child ever fill the empty place in her soul?
While Natia worked in the kitchen, she rocked Dominik and kissed his forehead. If only she could be good enough to bear many children for the Führer.
A picture sat beside the bed. Elfriede picked it up. The man from the rail station and Natia. She wore a white dress embroidered with flowers. A wreath of flowers adorned her hair. This must have been their wedding day. Teodor also wore white with a white embroidered cape over the top. How very handsome he was. And strong. No wonder Natia fell in love with him.
“What are you doing?”
Elfriede startled and Dominik cried. Natia hurried over and tried to rip Dominik from her arms.
“Don’t. I can do it.”
“What are you doing?” Natia pointed to the picture in Elfriede’s hand.
“Your husband nice man?”
“Tak. My husband.” She emphasized the word my.
What had she thought Elfriede might do? “You love him.”
“Very much.” Her voice took on an air of wistfulness, and her shoulders slumped. The tilt of her head, the shimmer in her eyes told the story.
“Why you sad?”
“I miss him.” She pointed to her heart. “Here.”
“I talk to him. Tell him. You see your husband.” It was only right that a married couple be together.
“I did.”
“You see him?”
“Tak. Two weeks ago.” A few of the tears splashed onto her cheeks.
“Then why you cry?”
Natia wiped away the moisture. Her eyes glittered, steely and hard. “It is cold. Very cold.” She said something else Elfriede didn’t understand.
“What?”
Natia went to the window and threw it open. “Outside.” She pointed beyond the window. “Cold.” She rubbed her arms and shivered.
“Your husband outside in cold?”
Natia’s mouth tightened even as she nodded.
Why would that make her sad? That was part of life in this corner of the world. It got cold. Sometimes, from what Frau Rzeźnikowa told her, it even snowed. And this year, so far, she said it was warmer than usual. “So, why sad?”
“No coat. No shoes.”
Elfriede must have misunderstood. That didn’t make sense that a man was outside without his coat and shoes. “I don’t understand.”
“No coat.” Natia mimicked pulling on a jacket. “No shoes.” She mimed tying shoes.
“Nie.” If she knew how to tell Natia she was wrong, she would say it. “Nie.”
“Tak. Tak.” Natia stomped her boot-clad foot.
Maybe just for a minute. To run outside for some reason. Perhaps even men being men. Didn’t they do that sort of silly stuff? Her cousins did. “Why?”
Natia motioned like she was digging. Working.
But that couldn’t be. If so, it was because of some rogue guard not following the rules. Getting out of control. “I tell Erich. He fix.”
“He knows.”
Then the matter was settled. No need for N
atia to be sad. Elfriede wiped her hands to be rid of the topic. “Erich fix. All done.”
Natia grabbed her by the wrist. She rattled off a sentence that went by much too fast for Elfriede to catch. But she heard Erich, make, husband, outside, no coat, no shoes.
Her insides turned as cold as the December weather. She wrenched free from Natia’s grasp. “Nein. Nein. Nein.” She plopped Dominik on the mattress and rushed from the room, covering her ears.
Teodor sat on his bunk and rubbed his painful feet. Ever since his coal-shoveling stint, they throbbed when it got cold. As he had feared, during the time he worked out of doors, his good boots disappeared. He had an older pair he’d brought from home, but the soles had already worn through. He wore his heaviest socks, but how long they would last was anyone’s guess.
Darkness enveloped the prisoners’ dormitory. The few industrial light fixtures strung from the ceiling didn’t penetrate the far reaches of the room.
Or his heart.
Nie, only Natia’s songs brought any light. The pureness of her voice, the perfectness of her pitch, the loveliness of her words, only that pierced his soul. He tucked each of her songs deep inside, recalling them at varying times throughout the day. Each time he misplaced a template, her music filled his ears. For her, he did this. Walked on the edge of danger, the threat of getting caught always hanging above him.
At night, her haunting melodies massaged his aching heart and lulled him to sleep. Only her songs soothed him enough from the worries of the day so he could manage a few hours’ rest.
Without her, he couldn’t endure this. The endless hours at a machine or hauling boxes. The empty bowls at dinnertime. The shooting pains in his feet.
Just as the room fell silent for the night, four guards burst into the dormitory and flipped on the lights. Teodor blinked as his eyes worked to adjust. They wore knee-high boots, black belts, and metal helmets. “Up, up.”
The prisoners tumbled from their bunks as the guards cased the room. They pulled five men from the group. The tallest, brawniest among them swung his rifle around, as if he might shoot everyone in the room. “This is what happens to Polish pigs who dare to cross us, breaking their drill bits on purpose to slow production. And the same fate awaits whoever else would try it.”
Teodor’s heart skipped several beats as the guards switched off the lights. Long after the men were gone, the sound of their cries echoed in Teodor’s head. Some had tried their own version of sabotage.
In the darkness, Jerzy hissed at him. “That could have been us.”
“I know.” What were they doing? Teodor picked at the pilling on his blanket. Then again, best not to do that. He might wear a hole in it. Already, the cold seeped through the bricks and into the room. The one minuscule coal stove in the middle of the barracks did nothing to provide heat.
“Someone was watching out for us.”
Teodor rubbed his temples. “I try to believe God is here. Every day, I truly do. But look around. Is he really caring for us? Nie, he isn’t. That is my job. How can I take care of my wife when I’m stuck in this miserable place? When we married, I promised to be there for her. And I’m not.” Just as he hadn’t been there to take care of Mama when she needed him the most. And that proved to be a fatal mistake. “Now this child comes along. I must protect them both. But how?”
Jerzy lay back on his mattress with a creak of the board.
Teodor stretched the crick in his neck. “There has to be something I can do. If I could get out of here.”
“Don’t even think about it. Getting yourself killed is one way to be sure you won’t be there for Natia and the child.”
“I know. I know. But there has to be more.”
“Aren’t we doing enough? Maybe even too much? Our lives hang by a thread.”
“That’s just it. I don’t know. We’re already making the pieces wrong.”
“At great risk to ourselves.”
“Nie, we’re doing it right. A little bit here and there.” He stiffened as the kernel of an idea struck. “What if the machines didn’t run? What would happen then?”
Jerzy sighed. “I suppose work would stop until they could be fixed.”
Teodor grinned. “That carries a double bonus. It slows the rate at which we deliver parts to Germany. They won’t be able to make as many weapons without them. And it gives the laborers something other than our Sunday break.”
“Are you out of your mind? You saw what happened to the men tonight who got caught.”
Teodor slid under the blanket and pulled the sheet to his chin. “Maybe. Maybe this place has made me crazy. But what other choice do we have?”
“We work for these people and pray for the end of the war.” Jerzy coughed, a dry hack.
“That’s not good enough. We have to do our part.” Was no one else willing to defend Poland, to work to free their families from this oppression?
“We’re doing all we can. I, for one, would like to survive to see my wife and children.”
“If you don’t do something to speed that along, you might not make it out of here alive.”
Phlegmy cough answered phlegmy cough in a circuit around the room. Jerzy added his to the rest.
“Disease is only going to worsen. And if the German losses continue, our overseers will grow desperate. They’ll demand more of us and demand it be done faster. They’ll march off more of us like they just did.”
“I don’t like the idea of risking my life, but I see your point. What is it you propose?”
“I’m a farmer by trade, not a factory laborer.”
Jerzy lay silent for several minutes before he cleared his throat. “The mayor’s motorcar once got sand in it and refused to run. Sat for two weeks until a mechanic fixed it.”
“Sand. Or something to gum up the machine’s inner workings. Tak, that just might do the job.”
“And where are you going to get sand?”
“Maybe not sand, but dirt. From outside.”
“You want to shovel more coal?”
“Of course not. But what if I sneak outside at night when there is no moon? It might work.”
“Success has many fathers. A failure is an orphan.”
“Dzięki. I realize I’m alone in this.”
Another sigh from Jerzy. “Nie. If I can’t talk you out of this insanity, I might as well join you. Together, we’ll topple the Nazi regime.”
“Or die trying.”
A light mist fell as Natia scurried to the village center. She drew her black wool shawl around her shoulders. She’d much rather have snow than this miserable, cold, raw rain. How nice to see the fields covered in white, stretching out in the distance, sparkling in the sun.
She didn’t dare bring Dominik out in such foul weather but left him home with Elfriede. Right now, the baby slept, so Natia had to hurry before he woke up and required a clean nappie.
Today she would have to sing a short song. This one, another tune by Chopin. Their church’s organist had a phonograph and often let Natia listen to her records. She loved those days, when they would sit and sip tea and listen to the beautiful music. The woman had played Chopin so often that Natia knew many of his songs by heart. The words skipped along with the tune.
Were I a sun, so high in heav’n outbeaming
Only on one should be radiance by streaming,
Not upon forest, not upon meadow
Would I dispel the shadow,
Into thy window brightly gleaming
Only for one all day I’ll be beaming.
Teodor didn’t wait long to respond. He had learned the songs as she sang them around the house.
Were I a birdling, blithsomely winging,
Only for one would I ever be singing,
Not for the forest, not for the meadow,
Sporting in sun and shadow,
Under thy window, thy window swinging,
Only for one my song I’d be singing.
She reached up and blew him a kiss. He remembered the
tune, the one they had sung as they sat under the tree where their children were now buried. Her heart twisted a little more. “Only for you,” she whispered as she rushed away, keeping her head down to try to stay as dry as possible.
By the time she reached the town square, the deluge had drenched her shawl and her clothes. She shivered. How nice it would be to sit in her kitchen at home, the fire in the small ceramic stove brightening the dark interior.
And then she peered up, gagging at the sight in front of her. In front of Chopin’s statue lay the bodies of five men, their sightless eyes peering into the gray heavens. Their blood mingled with the rain and flowed over the ancient cobblestones, their faces so disfigured by the gunshots they little resembled men. Adding to the horror, even Chopin had been riddled by bullets.
She covered her eyes and pressed hard, willing the images in her brain to fade. They refused but replayed many times. Slipping on the wet pavement, she ran at top speed to the butcher’s shop. As she entered, the old wood floors creaked under her feet.
Pani Rzeźnikowa came from the back room to the counter, a wide smile gracing her wrinkled face. “Good day, Pani Palinska. The rain is coming down, isn’t it? You look like you’re soaked to the bone.”
Natia pointed outside, her fingers shaking, her entire body trembling. “Wh-wh-what happened?”
“Come sit down. You’ve had a fright.”
“Nie, I won’t. Tell me, how did those men die?” Natia gasped for breath.
Pani Rzeźnikowa rubbed her forehead. “The soldiers brought them from the factory, lined them up, shot them, and then left them there. No one in Pieśń Nabożna is brave enough to take the bodies away for burial. They’re too afraid of what the Nazis will do. My people are cruel.”
“Teodor?” The fleeting thought froze Natia to the spot. Nie, he had answered her song this morning. “Why? Do you know why they executed them?” She couldn’t control the shivering that rattled her.
“You’re going to get ill. Come in the back. I’ll get you a towel and a warm drink. Then we can talk.”