Warsaw (27 page)

His heart pounded as he left the old cafe to the point where
Duritz placed his hand over his chest to feel its powerful, elated throbbing
even more - or he did so in vain hope of tempering the sensation. He breathed
in the damp air of the ghetto backstreet. The meeting with the smuggler had
gone well. Not only could they afford the passage for three but fortune was
smiling upon them in that there was going to be a collection by his Polish
partners as soon as tomorrow evening. Tomorrow night they could be free Duritz
dared to think to himself. He could not believe their luck and also how he had
handled himself - the calm business-like way in which he had bargained for their
lives and freedom. Yet, as Adam began his walk home in the hissing rain, he
sensed how - though he would never admit such a thing for fear of driving his
asking price down - the black-marketer he had dealt with seemed content to do
business just for the satisfaction of seeing people escape from the ghetto. For
was it not now extremely risky for the smuggler to remain in the ghetto
himself? And surely he had made his fortune? Yet the crime boss remained - and
most of his energies were directed in helping people escape and providing
sanctuary for them on the other side. But ultimately Duritz thought little of
the criminal philanthropist, tantalisingly imagining how he and Jessica would
be together and free soon. Rare tears of happiness, like blood from stone, were
even unassumingly welling as a hopeful Duritz made his way through sluicing
showers. Or maybe he just had something in his eye. But everything was going to
be all right.

When they first had dealings with each other Andrzej Nelkin
and Yitzhak Meisel had treated the other with mutual, if begrudging, respect.
Andrzej was the son of a senior Judenrat official. He was a man who could both
call upon favours and deal them out, as he had done for the corrupt Jewish
policeman. Necessity rather than affection had fed their previous relationship
- indeed in truth the pair couldn't help but resent each other. The
supercilious official could barely stand the sight of the depraved miscreant
and the policeman resented the pretentious bureaucrat who treated him with
veiled contempt, as he if were beneath him.

But things had changed. Trepidation rather than arrogance
and loathing filled the hollowed out eyes of Andrzej Nelkin as he took in the
figure from the past who had just intruded upon his life and office. Yitzhak
smirked in satisfaction at seeing the daddy's boy fall from grace. He would
find it easy to get what he wanted from the powerless official. Yitzhak enjoyed
it as he witnessed the flecks of fear in Andrzej's restless aspect as the
policeman unsheathed his cudgel and played with it in his large hands.

Nelkin sat behind his desk, his confidence, rank and wealth
wrung from him. His sapped body reflected the woeful demise of the man's
internal constitution. His nerves were as frayed as his cuffs, his hair as grimy
as the windowsill. Andrzej's rations were now just that, rations. Stress, or
distress, carved worry lines his once porcelain-smooth face.

For a minute or so after bidding his old friend a cordial
(sarcastic) good afternoon the policeman said nothing and just prowled around
the office, enjoying keeping the official in suspense in regards to his visit.
He examined pictures on the wall, leafed through papers on the desk (which
seemed to just consist of lists of names) and then made Andrzej jittery by standing
behind him and placing his hand upon the administrator's shoulder.

"You seem busy Andrzej. Don't tell me that even you now
have to prove that you're an essential worker?"

"I just keep my head down and do my work."

"I don't doubt it, but innocence and usefulness are no
defence sometimes in being selected. You know that as much as I do Andrzej,
eh?" the malicious policeman remarked and chuckled whilst affably patting
the official on the back.

"What do you want?"

"I remember Andrzej how I used to come to this office
and ask for favours. Now I reckon I can demand them. I want you to find someone
for me. I've only got a first name for you, Kolya, but I'm hoping you'll still
be able to help. He's a teenager and runner for some of the smugglers. He's
also got a sister who you wouldn't kick out of bed, or at least you wouldn't
have in the past."

It was when he mentioned the sister that the politic
official realised who the policeman was looking for. He wouldn't even have to
scour the records of addresses and work placements to give the policeman what
he wanted. At that moment Andrzej was firmly in two minds whether to relinquish
what he knew, due to knowing the fate which would befall the Rubenstein’s
should the policeman catch up with them. The official was reticent in giving up
the information before he gave himself a chance of receiving something in
return for it.

"It's not much to go on. It could be difficult, or
costly."

The policeman laughed heartily, mockingly. Yitzhak rudely
sat down on Nelkin's desk, knocking some papers and pens and pencils on the
floor as he did so. He bowed his head over his old acquaintance.

"I'll tell you what Andrzej, I'll make a deal with you,
if that's what you want. Old habits die hard, eh? Your incentive for finding
the boy is that you won't take his place as one of my lucky five in his
absence. Does that sound fair to you?"

The crestfallen clerk clenched his jaw and squeezed a smile
out. He detested the policeman. Meisel challengingly gazed upon the stricken
bureaucrat. Andrzej finally bowed his head before the dog-toothed, treacherous
policeman.

"All right. Come back tomorrow."

Relief and duress flooded through his body in equal measures
as Andrzej watched the policeman leave the building through the dusty blinds at
his window. Later that sleepless evening he hoped that Jessica had already been
taken. For all of the names he had called the girl - and wished her ill as he
sometimes idly thought of his rejection - Andrzej felt twinges of sympathy for
her now. The depraved constable would no doubt take advantage of her - and then
make her one of his five. The boy was also as good as dead. A sickening feeling
stirred in the official's belly, but he had no choice. He would have to give
them up. Andrzej toyed with the idea of trying to warn the woman or the boy
beforehand that the policeman was after them, but he didn't want to get
involved. He didn't have the energy, or courage. Nelkin had read pornography
instead of Virgil in his youth. And things would come to the same end anyway, if
they hadn't already. His stomach grumbled, acids fizzing inside and crying out
for sustenance - like hatchlings chirruping in competition to their mother for
food. The civil servant took a bruised pear out from his desk draw and bit into
it, an epicurean pleasure visible upon a malnourished face. Sour yet sweet.
Andrzej thought for a moment how lucky he was that the tempting fruit wasn't on
the desk when the policeman had entered. He subsequently continued his work of
alphabetising the seemingly endless lists of names spread out in front of him,
some now crumpled or smudged from the vicious oaf having sat upon them.

"Where's Adam?" Jessica exclaimed breathlessly as
soon as she entered the apartment.

"He's still out, arranging things," Thomas
replied, taken back by not only Jessica's tone but also from the fact that that
was the first thing she should say after not having seen him - for what had
sometimes seemed like an age.

"I'm sorry. I'm just worried."

"Would you like a cup of coffee?"

"We don't have any."

"You do now, courtesy of the officer's mess no
less," Thomas said and smiled, that old friendly smile which had once
contained the power to make the girl's day.

"Thank you," Jessica replied and pressed her thin
lips together in a grateful smile. But Thomas could still see that the woman
was concerned about Adam. He got up, lit the burner and began to boil the
water. Whilst Jessica vigorously rubbed her hands and removed her wet scarf
from her neck Thomas cast a covert glance at the Jewess. He smiled, lovingly
(but not ardently), at the young woman. Perhaps he looked upon her with the
fondness that he'd nurtured for Jessica in the past, or Thomas owned such a
strange expression imagining how the girl would turn out should she survive the
occupation. She would be beautiful again, her hair glossy and face comely.
Thomas couldn't help but notice how she took care of Kolya. She would make a
wonderful mother. Was she really suited to Adam though? It would be interesting
to know if Thomas Abendroth posed this in the vein of a jealous rival, or
protective older brother. Perhaps both.

The atmosphere of the room was sown in awkwardness, as
proliferate as the dust which filled in the air. So much was being eloquently
unsaid. How many times had Thomas rehearsed in his head the apology and
explanations that he owed Jessica for the way with in which he had edged
himself out of her life? Or had she edged herself out of his life? But it was
dangerous, for both himself and her, every time he visited her. He was ignoring
his duties, or rather his platoon. He was married - and scared of the
inappropriate feelings that he was having for the girl. He felt like he was
being unfaithful. But none or all of those arguments convinced Thomas
wholeheartedly. All he knew was that he desperately wanted to say sorry to
Jessica. Jessica too was so distracted by thinking upon what she should say
that she failed to actually say anything. She had loved the virtuous soldier -
or rather thought that she had loved him before. But she had been young,
foolish and desperate. It was a schoolgirl's crush she fancied one sleepless
night. Maybe it was just that their timing was out, like Onegin and Tatiana.
What she felt for Adam both was real and transcendent. Yet she had - and still
did - admire the gentile. The German was brave, intelligent and kind. Adam
spoke of Thomas rarely, but highly - calling him "the only Christian I
know who I can call such, without sarcasm choking in my throat". But
bitter remnants of teary, lonely nights blurred Jessica's affection for the
German soldier - and the very fact that he was a German soldier prejudiced her
feelings against him. She would hate them all for all time after taking her
parents. And he had abandoned her without reason. Jessica had at one time
believed that she was but just a curiosity, a source of amusement and
time-filler for the soldier. Or was he kind to her to ease his conscience for
how he had treated other people, Jews? But yet how the introverted woman wanted
to open up her heart now to her old confidant on how she cared for Adam, how he
and she had changed, grown. Perhaps, in part, Jessica wanted to make him
jealous. She wanted to tell Thomas how she could now read her Bible again,
after at one time confessing to him how she could no longer do so.

Jessica relished the warmth and flavour of the sweetened
coffee. Her sigh of pleasure also did something to relieve the tension, as well
as her thirst and chill. The usually self-assured Thomas did not quite know
what to do with himself. He was running the palm of his hand across his
stubbled jaw to assess its growth, working out if he needed to shave for the
party this evening. He saw out of the corner of his eye though that Jessica was
motioning to speak.

"I'm sure Adam has already thanked you from me for what
you are doing for us, but thank you again. You have been a good friend Thomas.
No matter what happens, Adam and I will always consider you a friend - and
remember you."

"Both you and Adam have been far too memorable friends
for me to forget you too," the valorous Corporal warmly replied, his
gentle, trusting expression echoing that from when they had first met.

Both desperately wanted to know what the other felt for each
other perhaps. But it was enough for them to know that what went before could
be remembered with fondness. Both similarly knew that it was for Adam's sake,
as well as their own, that past feelings should remain in the past. It would
remain unsaid that certain things would remain unsaid. Sometimes secrets are
healthy. Some emotions should remain buried.

The brief telemetry between Jessica and Thomas was broken
however as the woman quickly rose at the sound of the apartment door being
opened. Adam was drenched to the bone but Jessica encountered a summery
expression. Jessica beamed back, a fond and silly smile - as if both were about
to break out into laughter for no apparent reason. He wanted to embrace her.
Adam nodded to communicate that everything was fine and then acknowledged
Thomas. On another day Duritz might have felt awkward at being in the room with
Jessica and Thomas (for he knew something of Jessica's past feelings for the
soldier; so too the German knew things about him that he would wish to keep
Jessica in the dark about, and vice-versa) - but Adam grinned at his friend
also.

Kolya woke up with a headache. Dehydrated. He was famished,
yet devoid of appetite - or at the very least unable to hold much food down.
His back ached from having fallen asleep in a contorted position, slumped as he
was against the wall and floor of an apartment that had recently been
evacuated. He had downed the half bottle of diluted vodka almost immediately.
For half an hour or so his face expressed a contended forgetfulness,
dreaminess, but he soon felt tired and nauseous in equal measure. Maybe a month
ago the boy would have been physically sick at having imbibed so much alcohol
but he was getting used to it. And then the oblivion of sleep warmly washed
over him.

The flask of water was as tepid as it was stale but such was
his thirst that Kolya drank the liquid as if he had been thirsting in the
desert. He wiped his wet mouth with the back of his hand and licked his lips,
satiated and unsatiated at the same time. He hastily opened cobweb-filled
cupboards in hope of finding further stores, but it was to no avail. With his
head beginning to throb again Kolya sat back down, this time on the solitary
backless chair which resided in the middle of the sparse room (the back to the
chair, along with its accompanying table, had been used for firewood by the apartment's
former occupants). He did not want to go home yet. His inclination was to rest
some more. He also didn't want to go home to a lecture from Jessica. She didn't
understand. Nor did Adam even nowadays, always siding with his sister in
everything.