The True Story of Hansel and Gretel (14 page)

“It would save them,” Telek said.

“What if you’re wrong and we hurt the children for nothing.”

“How many children are we talking about?” Bialy tried to remember all the children lined up to get their spoonful of sugar once a week.

“Thirty-one children in the village.” Feliks squinted his eyes and thought. “At least seven are blond.”

“Seven plus you have to count the two of Miron and Ania. Their eyes are blue.”

“Tolek? And Jolanta’s little girl? His ears stick out, and she coughs. It’s T.B.”

“So it’s seven and maybe two more.”

They all nodded in agreement.

“And the girl that Magda took in. The boy is brown-eyed, but the girl is perfect. We have to decide this fairly,” said Bialy. “Pawel has a point. It’s unnatural for a father to injure his own child. His wife might hate him forever, and the child—”

“We can do it by a drawing.” Telek went to a broom that stood against the wall. Drawing his knife he cut six pieces of twig, five of them similar in length. Turning his back he cut one twig until it was only half the size of the others. He arranged them in his hand, sticking up out of his clenched fist, and turned toward the men.

“Six straws. You have to be in it too, Telek,” Pawel’s voice was shaking.

“Six straws.”

Pawel leapt up and nearly tore a straw out of Telek’s tightly clenched hand. “Is this a long one or a short one?” Telek said nothing. Pawel didn’t know if his straw was long or short, but he moved away with a nervous laugh and waited.

Each man took a straw, and Telek’s face hardened.

“You don’t have children, Telek. It’s better for you.”

“Out in the woods all the time. You don’t know the children like we do.”

The men felt humble. They watched Telek as he opened his fist and showed them the short straw that was left. His forehead was beaded with sweat.

It’s my fault that this has come to me, Telek thought. And they will dislike me more when I’ve done it. He knew the village would have no place for him when the war was over. The heart of the village would be closed to him. And Nelka. Would she forgive him for mutilating Gretel?

“But what will you do?” Pawel couldn’t look into Telek’s face.

“Do you think it has to be—” Bialy said, and then he fell silent.

“I’ll think about it. It has to be soon because the SS Oberführer will be back in a few weeks. It can’t look like we did it the day before he comes. It must look as natural as possible.”

Telek threw the short straw into the fire. “Don’t tell anyone yet. Don’t frighten the children. I’ll decide how to do it and then tell you.”

They nodded. The fate of the children was in his hands.

“I’m sorry, Telek,” Andrzej said.

Telek nodded. He wished he could stay, sit by the fire, and share the homemade vodka he knew they would pass around, be slapped on the shoulder and talk about where the Russian line was now. He glanced at them and saw the relief they felt that he was going. He nodded once and went outside, moving quickly down the street, looking ahead to avoid any soldier on duty.

“He doesn’t drink much anyway,” Czeslaw said as he sipped his vodka. The bite of the raw alcohol made his throat thick. “And he doesn’t have children himself. It’s better that he drew the straw. Telek has never been one of us.”

They sat for an hour in silence and sipped the tiny glasses of vodka. None of them could bear going home to their wives yet. They heard the Major going down the street again, drunk now and talking aloud to his dead comrades in German, but they didn’t move. No one wanted to go out into the darkness.

Gretel

“
T
he children are playing too deeply in the forest. They disappear for hours.”

Telek nodded, and without a word to Magda, turned and walked into the trees. He found their footprints moving not toward the road but straight into the forest. The children hadn’t been running but had walked steadily and quietly between the giant trees.

The two had walked with the sun at their backs and had kept it there. He nodded approval. By following their own footprints and watching the sun, they could find the way back to the hut. But even if they didn’t get lost, it wasn’t safe. Too many strangers were wandering in the forest.

The two sets of footprints went on until they reached a clearing. At the edge of the clearing they had stopped and stood. The snow was pressed down in a spot there. He moved across the clearing and saw why they had stood still. The marks in the snow showed where two foxes had been playing. Probably male and female. The children had watched until they frightened the foxes off.

Or something else frightened them off. A crow cawed and then another one, irritated at his presence. They didn’t fly off, so he relaxed and waited. Just silence.

He had walked on for a mile when he heard her singing. She was singing some sort of child’s song. He tensed and then relaxed. Gretel was singing in Polish. A cautious child.

She was sitting on a huge fallen log, having carefully brushed off the snow and climbed up. She sat, the light turning her hair almost white, and the only color in the whole world was the blue of her eyes when she looked around at the forest. She seemed perfectly happy.

Telek watched for a minute, then stepped out from behind an oak tree. Gretel gasped but she didn’t cry out. Hansel peered around the log.

“It isn’t safe to be deep in the woods, children. You mustn’t wander so far.”

They knew him and relaxed, her face smiling that it was Telek. “We saw foxes, and a rabbit, and some animal was in the water. All dark and fat.”

Hansel made a snowball and threw it at Telek.

“It was the beaver. They’re building a dam near where you walked.”

She smiled radiantly. “I keep count, Telek. I’ve seen owls and crows and deer. The deer walk in the snow and lift their legs like dancers. But more beautiful than dancers.”

Telek climbed up on the fallen tree and sat beside her. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a piece of bread and a smaller piece of sausage. With his knife he cut the bread and sliced the sausage into thin pieces that he placed delicately in a single layer on each piece of bread. Hansel climbed up beside them. “Eat.”

They ate slowly, and Telek finished long before the children. “What else have you seen?”

“I think a wolf. Or something.” Hansel growled and slid off the log.

“What was it like?”

“It was dark and didn’t come out from the trees.”

“Did it move like this?” Telek jumped off the log and moved bent over in a smooth trot. “Or like this?” He lumbered slowly from side to side.

“Like you did first.”

“A wolf.”

“What other animals are there?”

“This isn’t like any forest in all of Europe.”

“Why not?”

“Bialowieza Forest has never been burned or logged. It has stood here since forever.”

“No one owns it?”

“God owns it.”

“But we take wood for Magda.”

“Some wood is gathered, but no one has ever torn the forest apart. It is as it was all over Europe thousands and thousands of years ago.”

Gretel breathed lightly. “And what other animals live here?”

“Animals that don’t live anyplace in Europe anymore. There are cranes and storks and hazel-hens. Eight kinds of woodpeckers.”

“Have you seen them all?”

“Yes. And there are elk and roe deer, lynx, wolf.”

“Will the wolves kill you?”

“Not unless they’re starving and you’re helpless.”

“What else is there?”

“The otters play in the spring. Sliding down the banks and leaping around near the river. And frogs and fish in the river.” Telek looked around at the clearing. They reminded him of what it was to be a child and wander alone in the forest. After his mother killed herself, he had wandered until he felt like a wild creature himself. Men came and men went, but this forest was always here.

“Are the deer the biggest animals?” Hansel was busy piling up the snow in a wall.

“No. The wild ponies are heavier than the deer. And the wild boar is stronger. But the king of all of them is the biggest of all.”

Gretel stared at him. “What is the king of all of them?”

“He’s a shy king. You won’t see the bison easily. And he’s like a house he’s so big.”

“It’s magic.” She sighed deeply. “And think, Telek. They just live out here. They can walk around and are free and eat and play and have the whole forest to be their home.”

“We have the forest too, child.”

“But we don’t have it the way they do, Telek.”

He didn’t answer, but he knew what she meant.

“If you promise not to wander so far again, I’ll show you both something special.”

“I love all of it.” Gretel put her hand in Telek’s.

“I know. But if you never again come so deep in the forest, I’ll take you with me when I gather mushrooms in the spring. I’ll show you”—he paused—“I’ll show you everything by summer.”

“Everything?”

“Yes.”

“The bison and the wild boar and the frogs?” Hansel stared at Telek.

“Yes.”

“All right. I’ll wait for you to show me.” Hansel dusted off his hands and jammed them in his pockets.

“Come on,” Telek said. “Let’s see what we find today.”

He led them deeper into the trees through snow that was so soft he sometimes turned and picked up the girl, and the boy clung to his back. He could feel the faster beat of her heart through his coat. He had to hush the boy, but she was as silent as he.

They were closer now to where he had been going, and he slowed, dropping her onto the ground. He put his finger to his lips, but he didn’t have to worry. She had no need for words. Her eyes were big with excitement and blue, like the sky had broken and fallen into her face.

The boy was excited too, but more wary, more cautious.

Telek sucked his index finger and raised it into the air. Nodding at the children to do the same, he watched as they raised their thin fingers, sticky with saliva.

Bending until his mouth was next to their ears he whispered so low that they could barely hear him, “Which way is the wind blowing?”

She shook her head. A city child.

“Which side of your finger is coldest?”

She thought and pointed to the pad of the finger. He nodded. “The wind is blowing in our faces. The animals behind us can smell us on the wind, but any animals in front can’t smell us.”

The boy’s eyes were wide in surprise. “How do you know about the wind?”

Telek shook his head. He had never thought about it. He had known it all his life as if he had been born knowing it. He whispered again, “When you want to see the animals, you keep the wind in your face.”

She nodded and he knew she wouldn’t forget. He walked on very slowly now, straining to see through the trees. First it looked like more snow that was banked and piled, but he knew it was too gray to be snow. He pointed slowly and they stood, the man and the children, and waited.

Through the trees they came, pawing at the snow to uncover the moss and leaves, eating any low-growing twigs and chewing the bark. Gretel caught her breath but didn’t move or speak. Telek took her hand, and they stood in the snow and did not even blink while the ponies came toward them.

They were smaller than domesticated ponies, and their heads were heavy, almost like the heads of donkeys. They were thickly built and moved surely in the snow.

Two mares were in front, the first with a belly swollen by foal. Their coats were dense and pale gray and hung almost to their hocks. The hair hung over their faces, and you couldn’t see any glitter of eye. The younger mare came second and the little stallion, more watchful, pushing them on with a thrust of his head butting their flanks, protected their rear.

They didn’t see the humans, and Telek waited for the moment when either they would see him, or he would make a movement and startle them so they wouldn’t trample the children.

He looked down at Gretel without moving his head so the horses would not run. Her mouth was slightly open and her eyes dilated with joy. She clutched his hand so tightly that her nails pinched his skin.

Before he could raise a hand and end it, the stallion lifted his head and gave a sudden blow of steam through his nostrils. The mares lifted their heads too, and in one movement it seemed, they all three broke and ran toward the east in bounds that cleared the deeper drifts of snow.

Telek gripped Gretel’s hand warningly and didn’t move. He grabbed the boy’s coat collar and pulled him close. Something had frightened the ponies. He saw nothing, but then he smelled it. Tobacco smoke.

“Not a word,” he whispered, and he picked Hansel up and ran to a fallen tree covered with a drift of snow. Gretel followed on his heels. He shoved the children under the tree and knocked snow over the footprints. They disappeared in a shower of powdery white.

Telek ran past where the horses had been toward the cigarette smoke. He saw the man in front of him. He was standing, smoking, and Telek stopped behind a tree and watched.

“Is it you, Telek?” the man called.

Telek moved out from behind the tree and saw the others. It was the Russian and his group.

“Yes. It’s me. Looking for rabbits.”

“What news of your village, Telek?”

“The SS man has come and gone.”

“The same that was in the other villages?”

“Yes.”

“He’s coming back.”

“Yes. We’ll try to deal with it. The Lithuanian warned me about this.”

The Russian nodded. Telek saw that he had two new members. The man was tall and could have been a Jew. The woman was small, but she wore a German uniform and had a pistol. Her hair was white in streaks. Telek nodded but didn’t speak to them.

“Go in peace, Telek. Here.” The Russian reached in his coat and offered a small flask. Telek took it, drank quickly, and gave it back to the Russian.