The Kommandant's Girl (26 page)

My stomach sinks. Warszawa Café, once a posh Polish establishment located directly across the street from the opera house, had become a popular Nazi bar during the occupation. Even in the early days of the war, we had learned to steer away from the area where the German soldiers were densely gathered and often drunk. This is the work of the resistance, I know it. “What sort of explosion?” the Kommandant asks.

“An incendiary device of some sort, sir.”

“You mean a bomb?”

The soldier nods. “There are casualties among the officers, I’m afraid.”

The slip of paper falls from the Kommandant’s hand. His expression is one of surprise. The idea that someone has carried out an action against the Nazis seems more than he can comprehend. Both the messenger and I look at the Kommandant, waiting to see what he will do. Without a word, he retreats into the bedroom. I look at the messenger questioningly, hoping that he will be forthcoming with more details. He does not speak or meet my gaze, though, but rather shifts his weight from foot to foot. Outside, sirens wail in the distance.

The Kommandant reemerges from the bedroom wearing his jacket once more. He adjusts his belt and I can see the silver glint of a pistol in his waistband. He passes by me on his way out the door. “I have to go. Stanislaw will see you home,” he calls over his shoulder, already halfway down the hall. The messenger slams the door shut behind him.

I rush over to the window that faces north and scan the skyline. In the distance, on the far side of the city center, I can see a red glow. Flames shoot toward the sky. So this is what they had planned.
Jacob,
I think.
Alek.
I press my head against the glass, seeing their faces in my mind.
Oh, my sweet, foolish boys, what have you done?

I turn around. I am alone in the Kommandant’s apartment, certain that with all that has happened, he will not be home for many hours. I am free to go into his study, to search through all of his papers and find more information, to tell Alek everything he and the others want to know. All of these months, everything I have planned and done, has been about getting to a moment like this. Only now it is too late. I laugh aloud at the irony, my voice echoing through the empty rooms.

Then I stop abruptly. The world has just exploded and those I love most are undoubtedly at the center of the inferno. I have to do something. I grab my coat and run out of the Kommandant’s apartment and into the night.

A few meters from the apartment building, I pause. Where should I go? Though I know it is dangerous, and the last thing the resistance would want me to do, I begin running wildly toward the city center and the scene of the explosion. At first, people on the street look at me strangely. But as I near the far corner of the market square, my hysteria seems entirely appropriate. Sirens wail, Gestapo police bark out orders and Poles, who for the past several years of occupation have learned to steer away from trouble, run directly toward the fiery scene. I follow the crowd west along Stolarska Street.

A bomb, I hear voices alongside me whisper as we draw nearer to the scene; Nazis killed. They sound almost gleeful. My heart lurches. The fact that a few Nazis were killed is irrelevant to me. I can think only of my beloved Jacob and brave, strong Alek. I am certain they are among those who set off the explosion. Are they okay? Alive?

Just above the square, a police barricade has been erected. “No entrance, miss,” the guard says as I try to pass.

“But I live…” Lying, I point to the other side of the barricade.

The guard shakes his head. “No exceptions. Go around another way.”

I make a left onto Tomasza Street, and then a right onto Florianska, which runs parallel to the street I’d been hoping to take. Though this street is just one block away from the explosion, the police had not thought to barricade it and it is largely deserted. I make my way up the street, staying close to the buildings, hidden in the shadows. As I near the scene of the explosion, thick smoke fills the air, burning my throat and making it difficult to see. Shards of broken glass crunch under my feet. I reach the end of the street where it dead-ends at the Florian Gate. It is here, by the medieval city wall, that Lukasz and I saw the soldiers that terrified him so on our first trip into town after coming to Krysia’s house.

If I follow the wall, stay close to the buildings, I may be able to make it to the scene of the explosion. I start around the corner. Suddenly, an arm shoots out of a doorway and grabs my shoulder hard. “Hey!” I cry, as I am pulled into a dark alleyway by a stranger. Two arms grab me from behind, a hand clamps over my mouth. For a second I wonder if it is the Gestapo. They would not bother with secrecy, I quickly realize, struggling to break free. Desperately, I open my mouth and manage to bite the hand that has been covering it. Suddenly I am released.

“Ouch!” a woman’s voice exclaims.

“What on earth…?” Breathing heavily, I turn to face my assailant. Her face is covered by a heavy wool shawl.

“Shhh!” The stranger pulls back the shawl and a familiar head of dark curls springs out.

“Marta!” I exclaim. Her face is scratched and covered in soot and I can tell she has been to the scene of the explosion. “How did you…?”

“You shouldn’t have come here,” she admonishes, as though speaking to a child. “It’s dangerous. The Gestapo is rounding up anyone who looks like they do not belong here. You could have been arrested or worse.”

“I’m sorry, but I had to come. I was out of my mind with worry. Jacob? Alek?”

“Both alive,” she replies, a catch in her voice. She looks away.

I grab her by the shoulders. “What is it?” I demand, my voice rising.

“Shh!” she repeats, looking uneasily out into the street.

I drop my voice but do not release my grip on her. “Tell me what happened.”

She hesitates and I can tell she is wondering how much to say. “Jacob was injured by the blast….”

My heart stops. “Injured? How?”

“During the explosion. I don’t know the details. He was seriously injured, but he is alive.” Her eyes are dark with concern. I have suspected since our first meeting after the ghetto that Marta has feelings for my husband. Now, seeing her face so heavy with torment and grief, I am certain of it.

“I have to go to him,” I say. “Tell me where he is.”

She shakes her head. “No, Emma, no. Jacob has been taken from the city. Alek has given orders that none of us are to go to him. It isn’t safe. Not now.”

White-hot rage sears within me. “But I am his wife! I have every right to see him!”

Marta’s expression changes and her lips press together hard. “His
wife?
” she spits sarcastically.

I pull back. “What are you saying?”

“I know what you have done all of these months. What has been going on between you and the Kommandant.”

“But…” I falter, stunned. How could she possibly know? Had Alek told her? Had she told Jacob as a way to come between us and get closer to him?

“Jacob doesn’t know,” she replies, reading my thoughts. “I thought about telling him, believe me. But Alek forbade me. He said it would have hurt Jacob too much, been a distraction when the resistance most needed him to be strong. I wanted to tell him. He deserves to know what kind of woman you really are.”

Her words cut through me, sharp and painful. “Marta, you can’t think that…I’ve done what I was asked. What had to be done.”

“Maybe.” She looks me squarely in the eye. Her voice is icy. “But I wonder who it is that you really care for. If you even care for Jacob at all.”

“How can you say that? I’ve done what I’ve done with the Kommandant for the resistance, because it was the only thing to do. I love Jacob!
Only
him!” My voice sounds too insistent, as though I am trying to convince her and myself. “You know that.”

She looks away. “I don’t know anything anymore.” Me, neither, I think. Neither of us speaks for several seconds. Then Marta turns to me again, gripping me by the shoulders and shaking me hard. “Now, you listen to me—you cannot go to Jacob now. The situation is very serious. The Nazis are combing the city, looking for the perpetrators, and they have a pretty good idea who did it. There will be repercussions for what has happened tonight. Alek has risked much by sending me to find you and tell you that Jacob is alive. So you need to calm yourself and go home and say nothing, even to Krysia. And tomorrow you will go to work as though nothing has happened. Do you understand?” I nod. Marta softens a bit. “We care about Jacob, too.” Though she used the plural, I know it is herself for whom she is speaking. “I will send word to you as soon as it is safe. Trust me.” She hugs me quickly and disappears into the alley once more.

I step out of the doorway and, after making sure no one has noticed me, start back down Florianska Street. Crowds of people continue to rush in the direction from which I have just come. At the far side of the market square, I hesitate. I should go back to the Kommandant’s apartment, I think. My basket is still there and I did not clean up the food. But I cannot face him now, not after all that I have learned. Hopefully he will be too preoccupied to notice, but if he asks, I will tell him that the news of the explosion was so shocking, I developed a headache and started feeling ill. It is an excuse not that far from the truth.

As I make my way through the back streets toward Krysia’s, I think of Marta. Her expression was so hard and cynical. I remember then the laughing girl I had met in the ghetto last year, the one who had taken me under her wing and brought me to Shabbes with Alek and the others at Josefinska Street. What has happened to us? She’s just jealous, I tell myself. She spoke out of her feelings for Jacob. Still, her words ring in my head over and over like a bell.
I wonder who it is that you really care for…
It is a question that, despite my best efforts to avoid, has haunted me a thousand times in recent months. I still love Jacob without question. He is my husband. But until his recent visit, I had not seen him in more than a year. The Kommandant…well, I see him every day. And I have been intimate with him many more times these past several months than I ever was with Jacob in our few short weeks living together as husband and wife. But I hate the Kommandant, or should. Sometimes, like after recently learning about Margot, it is easy to despise him. Other times, though, when we lay in the dark and his uniform is gone, he is just a man who brings me pleasure and comfort. I can almost forget who he is, who we both are. Almost. In those moments, I cannot help but wonder if in another life, where no one wore a swastika or wedding ring, I had met both men at the same time, which I would have chosen.

Enough, I tell myself. The point is a moot one. There is no choice to be made. Jacob is my husband and he is injured. Though we cannot be together right now, my loyalty is to him. The Kommandant is my lover, the man with whom I have to sleep for appearances. The truth is as simple as it is ridiculous. Laughing bitterly aloud in the cold night air, I draw my coat closer around me and hurry toward home.

“Are you okay? What happened?” Krysia rushes to meet me as I come through the door an hour later.

“I’m fine,” I say, taking off my coat and boots.

“They said something on the radio about a bombing at Warszawa.”

I do not reply as I follow Krysia up to the kitchen. I am going to tell her, of course, despite Marta’s admonition to say nothing. Krysia is as much a part of this as any of us and she deserves to know. But I remember how Krysia nearly collapsed after the Gestapo came on the night of Jacob’s visit. I must tell her carefully. I wait until we are both seated at the kitchen table with the water boiling for tea before speaking. “There was a bombing,” I reply at last, my voice cracking at the end.

“The resistance?” she asks. I nod. “I feared something like this when Jacob came to visit.” She shakes her head. “Those foolish boys. Many will pay for their bravado.”

I am surprised at her reaction. It is the first time I have ever heard her question the resistance. “You don’t think they should have done it?”

She pours steaming water from the kettle into two teacups. “I understand why they did it. I just don’t think it was the smartest tactic.”

“I think it was incredibly stupid,” I say bluntly. She does not reply. I wait until she has set down the kettle before speaking again. “Krysia, there is one thing more.” I take a deep breath. “Jacob was hurt in the explosion.”

Krysia’s face turns instantly gray and she grasps the edge of the counter. Fearful that she might faint, I jump up and guide her to a chair. “How?” she asks.

“Marta didn’t say what happened.”

“Is it serious?”

I hesitate. “Yes,” I reply. I cannot lie to Krysia. “But he is alive,” I add quickly.

Krysia inhales sharply, her face growing even paler. She is not a young woman and Jacob is like a son to her. I wonder if I have made a mistake in telling her, if the strain of receiving such news might be too much. “Jacob, Jacob,” she moans softly, pressing her fingers against her eyes and rocking back and forth. It is the first time I have ever seen her cry.

“Shh, it’s okay,” I hear myself saying. The words sound foreign and untrue. Inside I am screaming. Jacob is badly hurt. I should be there with him. I look down at Krysia again. Jacob would want me to be strong for her. “It’s okay,” I repeat. I stand over her helplessly for several minutes, my hand on her shoulder.