Fires in the Dark

by Louise Doughty

  Yenko shrugged again.

  ‘There’s one other thing …’

  Yenko looked at Blažek.

  ‘We’ll have to pay him a bit extra.’

  Yenko leaned back in his chair, exhaled, then said with gentle, mock-amused emphasis, ‘We?’

  ‘Well, I can hardly tell him the stuff belongs to Heda’s family. He hates her. He’d be down in that basement before they’d left the city limits.’

  *

  It was dangerously late by the time Yenko left the inn. Curfew would start soon. He took a short-cut down the set of steep stone steps that led out of the far corner of the courtyard and down to Lázeňská. The quickest way back was across Charles Bridge, which he didn’t like using in the evenings. It was always crawling with SS. He cursed Blažek for holding him up. Moving the stuff had taken longer than they had expected and he had had to leave Blažek to secure the attic and escort Heda back to her family. The man had gone quite mad. To risk everything for a gadji whore, and a German one at that.

  The sun had gone in. The evening would be dull and chilly. He noticed as he hopped down the steps that the silver head on his walking stick – his rovli – was wearing smooth.

  *

  What a man in his haste could not be expected to notice were the rows of basement windows which accompanied each stone step, at foot level, narrow glass rectangles covered with sets of iron grilles.

  Peering out of one of the windows, at his hasty, stick-aided descent, was the small face of a young woman, a girl. The girl knew she was not supposed to peer out of the window, but she had been inside all day, as she was most days. Now the streets were quiet, she could not resist the temptation to look out, just for a moment. She saw the smart-looking young man as he came hobbling down the steps: or rather, saw his legs and his stick and his shoes. She noticed that although the brown brogues were polished to a deep shine, one lace was black and the other brown. Even smart young men were having difficulty getting hold of matching shoelaces. She found the thought reassuring. In her predicament, it was hard not to believe that every single person in Prague was better off than herself. The girl considered herself to be the most unfortunate person in the world, although the thought filled her with guilt, as she also knew she was lucky to be alive.

  Yenko had already passed when she glanced up at the rest of him, so she only saw a back view; the brown jacket and the leather gloves clasped in one hand; the trilby tipped back on his head. But even if she had been able to see his face from her subservient angle, it was unlikely she would have recognised him. He was just a smart young man with a limp, in a hurry to get home before curfew.

  She turned away from the barred window with a deep, sorrowful sigh.

  CHAPTER 28

  Yenko rose early, that day. He wanted to track down Blažek – he hadn’t seen him since their drink at Old Stano’s place, a week ago, and they had things to discuss. In the last few days, business had become impossible. Everyone was terrified. The SS had taken a new batch of hostages over the weekend. One of them was the manager of the restaurant on Strosmeyer Square where they did regular business. Who knew what a man might say to get himself out of trouble?

  He stood before his closet, in his vest, wondering which trousers to wear. If he couldn’t find Blažek in the Little Quarter he would have to come back for the bicycle and cycle all the way out to Krč.

  In the last few days, the tension in the city had become a physical thing, in the air, like a smell. Everyone hurried, everywhere. Children were being kept off the streets altogether. The German soldiers were as unpredictable as dogs – and German civilians were fleeing in droves, making their escape while their soldiers were still there to protect them. Every day, another group of families could be seen heading out of the city with wagons or handcarts. Anything that still had wheels was piled high with belongings. They wouldn’t have to go far to reach the American lines. Some said Patton had occupied most of the Sudetenland, others that he was poised to take Pilszen any day.

  The rest of the city waited – but some were already taking matters into their own hands. Yesterday, Yenko had seen a group of men and women surround an SS jeep in Bethlehem Square, jeering openly. The driver of the jeep had had to reverse quickly to get away. Afterwards, Yenko had stopped to talk to an old man in the crowd. He said the Germans would never leave without setting fire to the city. All the bridges had been prepared for demolition. ‘They will tear down the buildings and kill us all before they go, mark my words,’ the old man said.

  Even the weather was erratic, alternately hot and cold, the light so bright in the mornings it seemed unnatural to sleep.

  He made himself coffee, standing over the stove and watching the black liquid bubble in the green enamel pan, warming his hands and letting his fingers bathe in the steam. He remained standing while he drank, as was his habit, sipping noisily, the coffee just off the boil. It scalded his tongue.

  He picked up his rovli, locked the door of his apartment behind him and slipped downstairs. He let himself out of the building, closing the door quietly, so as not to disturb his landlady, standing on the step for a moment to inhale the cold air and enjoy the emptiness of the sky.

  *

  At the corner of Masná Street, two SS Ordnungspolizei were standing talking to each other. No one else was about. Yenko stopped, tucked his stick under his arm and reached into his jacket pocket for his identity card. The Ordnungspolizei had gone wild recently, pulling people off the streets and breaking down doors in the hunt for Resistance workers. The Russians were dropping parachutists into the Protectorate, they said – so were the British, apparently. The wireless was broadcasting constant warnings: spies were everywhere. The Germans were crazy with paranoia. Quite apart from the hostages, they were picking people up, almost anyone, and forcing them to dig anti-tank ditches on the outskirts of the city. Yenko wasn’t sure a pronounced limp was much protection under the current circumstances.

  As he hobbled towards the two men, the identity card clasped securely and visibly in his palm, he felt a thrill of fear. If this pair had a quota of arrests to make before they came off their shift, then he could be in trouble. As he passed them, he turned to give them an open smile. There was no point in scurrying past trying to look insignificant. You might as well paint a target on the back of your jacket.

  The Germans ignored him. They were talking to each other quietly, shaking their heads.

  As he turned the corner, he stopped by the newspaper stand. The seller had just arrived and was bending down outside his closed kiosk, cutting the string from his piles of papers. Yenko stuck his hand in his trouser pocket and pulled out a handful of change, picking through it for seventy hallers. As he passed Yenko the paper, the newspaper seller nodded once and said quietly, ‘There’s a couple of SS behind you on that corner, so don’t react.’

  Yenko turned from the stand, flapping open the paper. The front page was dominated by a large photograph of Hitler. It was a studio portrait, head and shoulders, in profile. His military cap was pulled low over his forehead, his nose a sharp angle. The photograph, and accompanying story, were surrounded by a thick black border.

  Yenko stood for a moment, staring at the paper, his gaze running over the newsprint in an effort to gather in information as quickly as possible. The Führer had died, the article said, fighting to his last breath against the evil of Bolshevism.

  Yenko turned in the street, and turned again. The SS men were gone. The newspaper seller had disappeared inside the kiosk. He bit at his lip, overwhelmed by the urge to run through the silent streets waving the paper and shouting up at the windows. Hitler is dead! Wake up, everyone! Hitler is dead! No, no, that wasn’t what he wanted to shout. He wanted to shout, Hitler is dead but I AM STILL ALIVE. That man, that evil colossus – the gadjo to end all gadjos who spread poison over the earth, he is dead and I, whom he thought to squash like an insect, I AM STILL ALIVE.

  He thought these things standing perfectly still, glancing nonchalantly
around as if someone had just told him that rain was expected later that day. He tucked the paper under his arm, and turned back towards Masná Street. The one person he could disturb was Ctibor.

  *

  Ctibor’s shop and apartment building were still firmly locked and no amount of banging raised the inhabitants. Yenko paused in the courtyard, looking up at the firmly shuttered windows. He could go round to the other side of the building, the one that looked out over the street, and shout up, but that would attract the attention of any patrolling SS. It would be absurd to get himself shot now, on this day of all days. Come to think of it, that was probably why nobody was answering. They were probably wide awake but cowering under the bedclothes. He laughed at his stupidity. You didn’t go banging on people’s doors just after dawn, not unless you wanted to give them a heart attack.

  He turned out of the courtyard, towards home, abandoning his plan to go over the river. He would go and make himself some more coffee, and then take his landlady a small present from the cache he kept at his apartment, a couple of sausages, perhaps. He could read the paper to her while she fixed him some breakfast. He could always go over to the Little Quarter later.

  It was only when he was back in his apartment, the newspaper spread across the wooden counter-top while the coffee bubbled, that he calmed down enough to wonder whether, actually, most people would stay at home today. Who knows what is going to happen out there, with the SS in this mood?

  *

  His landlady answered the door in her dressing-gown, frowning. When she saw him, she smoothed the dressing-gown down and tightened the sash. Yenko said nothing, merely raised the front page of the paper to her.

  She broke into a smile, ‘I came up last night but your light was off!’ she declared, opening the door for him. ‘I couldn’t sleep until the small hours. You didn’t hear the broadcast?’

  Yenko shook his head as he entered her tiny parlour and offered the two sausages in their paper packet. ‘Breakfast, Mrs Stropová, to celebrate.’

  ‘Wonderful!’ she said, turning to her stove. ‘I can’t believe you didn’t hear it.’

  ‘I’ve given up listening to the wireless,’ he said cheerfully, seating himself at her little square table.

  ‘You’d better start again,’ she said. ‘Things are going to move pretty quickly now.’ She bent to lift her frying pan from the cupboard beneath the stove. Then she stopped, the cast-iron pan loose and heavy in her hand. Her frown returned.

  She straightened and stared at him. He stared back. ‘My dear Mr Michálek,’ she said sombrely. ‘Do you really think it’s true, this time? I haven’t been outside or spoken to anyone last night and all night I lay awake thinking maybe I would go mad with wondering if it was really true.’ Mrs Stropová’s husband had been in the Czech army. He had escaped just after the Occupation began. She had had word later that he had been killed in France. She always wore her sorrow lightly in front of Yenko, but he sensed she was about to let go of something, to put down a burden she had been carrying for over five years. She was a plain, decent woman, who had never asked him anything about himself. He had been grateful for her discretion. Tears stood in her eyes as she asked him, ‘Will it really all be over soon?’

  Embarrassed by her candour, he looked down at the newspaper on the table and coughed. ‘I suppose everyone will go a little mad now,’ he muttered.

  Rebuffed, she placed the heavy pan on the front ring of the stove and unwrapped the sausages from their greasy paper packet. ‘How kind of you …’ she murmured. ‘Sausages, to celebrate. The whole city will be celebrating today.’

  It is a little early for that, Yenko thought.

  *

  Later, she asked him to escort her to her brother’s shop off Wenceslas Square. She was afraid to go out on the streets on her own. Yenko agreed. It would be good to take a look around, see what was happening, and he could go on to the Little Quarter later.

  He went upstairs while she got dressed. He wondered whether he should have suggested going out later in the day, to give him time to drop in on Ctibor – but if Ctibor had heard the broadcast last night then he would sleeping it off right now. It would make more sense to call in on the way back.

  *

  They skirted the Old Town Square. The clusters of loudspeakers on the corner of each building were blasting out sombre music. As they left the square, they passed an elderly man and two German soldiers involved in a confrontation. From the corner of his vision, Yenko saw one of the soldiers reach out and snatch the hat off the old man’s head, throwing it to the ground. The old man was expostulating. As Yenko and his landlady hurried away, they heard a single shot.

  Mrs Stropová gasped. Yenko grabbed her elbow and hastened their step. ‘That poor man,’ she whispered, ‘just when it’s nearly over.’

  Železna Street was crowded. Everyone was heading towards Wenceslas Square. Yenko looked around for more soldiers but the Germans seemed to have withdrawn. From a second-floor window above their heads, he saw a man hanging out the tricolour flag. A group beneath the window stood looking up and cheering. At the window next door, another man was tossing out handfuls of paper, official documents of some sort, which flapped and flew above the heads of the passers-by.

  The mood was infectious. By the time they reached the Square, they were both smiling. His landlady detached herself from his arm and said, ‘I’ll be fine from here, thank you, Mr Michálek,’ and disappeared into a cheering, jumping crowd. On a stone bench nearby, a white-haired man stood tapping one foot and playing the accordion, his head thrown back and eyes closed. A group in front of the bench had formed a circle and in the middle of it a couple was dancing, arms interlocked at the elbow, whirling round. The woman’s hair and skirt flew in the wind. The man’s mouth was open in a shout of glee. The bystanders clapped in time.

  He wandered down the square. Everywhere the shopkeepers were dismantling their German shop signs, or standing on ladders and painting over them with white paint. It can’t be this easy, Yenko thought, shaking his head. The Germans will never let them get away with this. All the same he unbuttoned his jacket and the top buttons of his shirt as he strode, swinging his stick and smiling back at the glad, grinning gadje around him. So white people did know how to celebrate, after all.

  At the top of the square, he looked up at a tall block that loomed over the Bat’ a shoe shop. The upper floors were offices with wide windows that curved the corner of the building. Leaning out of one of them was a man in dark clothing, watching the crowd with binoculars.

  *

  After an hour of wandering around the square, he set off up National Avenue, to see if it was possible to get over the river and into the Little Quarter. All along the boulevard, he passed smiling Czechs walking past him to join the crowds in the square: the end of the Avenue marked the end of the celebratory atmosphere. As he approached, he saw a barricade made of sandbags with a narrow opening in the middle guarded by German soldiers.

  There was a small queue of people at the opening, waiting to be searched and have their papers checked before being allowed through. A few others were hanging around, debating whether or not it was worth joining the queue. A woman was walking just ahead of Yenko, pushing a baby in a pram. She came to an abrupt halt when the barricade came in sight, turned the pram sharply and started striding back the other way. Her about-turn was too hasty: two soldiers on guard in front of the barricade spotted her, withdrew their pistols from their holsters and ran after her.

  The milling crowd parted to allow the woman to flee. She glanced once behind her, then stopped and snatched up the baby, abandoning the pram to run down a side street. The crowd closed up. The German soldiers began shouting and pushing people aside. Then one of them pointed his pistol at the sky and fired. Everyone dropped to the pavement. Yenko crouched down against a nearby lamp-post.

  While the two soldiers pursued the woman, another two ran forward to the abandoned pram, now standing alone in the middle of the boulevard, surrou
nded by crouched passers-by. One of them lifted his foot and kicked the pram over. It crashed to the pavement and Yenko stared as a pink knitted blanket tumbled out, followed by half a dozen pistols, two larger weapons and two square metal objects. Radio transmitters, maybe? he thought.

  The crowd was rising cautiously. The German officer was shouting at them to line up. Yenko stood and, with one or two others, began strolling casually back down the Avenue.

  *

  Ctibor was not at home. Mrs Talichová told Yenko she had heard him go out half an hour ago. Who knew when he would be back? She lifted her hands resignedly. Yenko walked back to his own lodgings, feeling deflated. Today was the one day he might have been prepared to open a bottle with the old man.

  The loudspeakers were still going in the Old Town Square. The music had stopped and they were broadcasting threats in alternate German and Czech. Public order must be maintained … Anyone caught sheltering traitors would suffer the severest penalties … The German army would never surrender to the terror of Bolshevism … The sanctity of German civilians must be respected … Reprisals would be severe …

  Back in his apartment, he lay on his bed with the window open, listening to the loudspeakers’ indistinct malevolence. He blew smoke rings in the air and thought about turning on the wireless. The next few days will be like this, he thought idly, one arm bent behind his head, a brass ashtray resting on his stomach; a little risk, and hours of boredom. Some people will stay on the streets. Most won’t. All over the city, there are people waiting, just like me. The key thing – the most important thing – is not to get involved.

  *

  The next day he tried to cross the river, again in search of Blažek, and again failed. This time it was not the German army who stopped him but a group of three men who came running towards him as he cut down a small street called Anenská. One grabbed him by the shoulder of his jacket and hustled him down two steps into a low stone doorway. While he pinned Yenko against a recessed wooden door, another stood next to them clutching a short iron bar and the third kept a lookout back down the alley.