What World is Left

MONIQUE POLAK

Text copyright © 2008 Monique Polak

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be
invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Polak, Monique
What world is left / written by Monique Polak.

ISBN 978-1-55143-847-4

1. Theresienstadt (Concentration camp)--Juvenile fiction.
2. World War, 1939-1945--Children--Netherlands--Juvenile fiction.

I. Title.

PS8631.O43W43  2008    jC813'.6      C2008-902648-9

First published in the United States, 2008

Library of Congress Control Number
: 2008927295

Summary
: Anneke, a Dutch Jewish teenager, is sent with her family to Theresienstadt, a “model” concentration camp, where she confronts great evil and learns to do what it takes to survive.

Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided
by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry
Development Program and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British
Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

Design by Teresa Bubela
Cover image used with the permission of the United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum, courtesy of Ivan Vojtech Fric
Additional photographs by Monique Dykstra
Author photograph by Elena Clamen

The views or opinions expressed in this book, and the context in which the
images are used, do not necessarily reflect the views or policy of,
nor imply approval or endorsement by, the USHMM.

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11  10  09  08  •  4  3   2  1

For Ma, with love

What World is Left
could never have been written without the support and love of many people. I owe a huge debt to them all. Filmmaker Malcolm Clarke, director of the documentary
Prisoner of Paradise
, encouraged me to do the research for this book. When he learned that my mother had been a prisoner in Theresienstadt, he advised, “Make her tell you. Tell her she has to do it.” Malcolm also put me in contact with Czech writer Eva Papouskova and filmmaker Martin Smok, who were of great assistance, both personally and professionally, when I traveled to the Czech Republic in the summer of 2007. Eva accompanied me on my visit to Theresienstadt, along with my friend Viva Singer from Montreal.

The Conseil des Arts et des Lettres du Quebec believed in this project and funded my research trip to Holland and the Czech Republic. Writer friends Claire Rothman Holden, Elaine Kalman Naves and Joel Yanofsky provided encouragement at various stages along the way. My neighbors Liz Klerks, Joanne Morgan
and Don Kelly read the first draft of this book. The team at Orca Book Publishers—Bob Tyrrell, Andrew Wooldridge and Dayle Sutherland—brought the book to life. My editor at Orca, Sarah Harvey, was the midwife who helped me deliver it. Sarah, I can't thank you enough for your wisdom and sensitivity and for taking me where I had to go.

My daughter, Alicia Melamed, has always been my anchor and my sunshine both. My father, Maximilien Polak, helped in ways too numerous to mention, but his sense of humor is at the top of the list. My grandparents, Jo and Tineke Spier, remain with me in spirit every day and hovered close when I was working on this book. My husband, Michael Shenker, was with me every step of this difficult, exhilarating journey. But I owe the greatest debt to my mother, Celien Polak, who agreed to share her story after some sixty years of silence. Though my book's protagonist was inspired by my mother, Anneke's thoughts and feelings are entirely the product of my imagination. Sharing her story and allowing me the freedom to turn it into a work of fiction are my mother's greatest gifts to me and ones for which I will always be grateful.

My bed is warm and cozy. I think I'll sleep a little longer. I let my head sink into my feather pillow. The duvet feels so soft against my skin. I sniff the air. Yesterday was Thursday—laundry day. Sara, our new housemaid, hung out the sheets and pillowcases, and now they smell as sweet as the clover that grows by the canal behind our house.

I pull the sheets up so high they cover my face. A real Dutch face, Father often remarks when he looks across the kitchen table at my blue, blue eyes, my blond ringlets and my turned-up nose.

Tomorrow I will wear my favorite brooch, the one Johan gave me when I turned eleven. It is shaped like a tiny golden mirror with a curly handle on its end. I'll pin it on my new blue sweater from Opa, my grandfather, and all the other girls at school will admire my brooch and my new sweater.

I yawn; yesterday was such a busy day. What fun it was to go fishing behind the house with Father and Theo. I caught a striped perch, reeling him in all by myself,
without Father's help. Theo, who is only ten, wanted a story, so I invented one about the perch. How his parents and his sister were caught by other fishermen and how he longed to join them on the land. “I'd rather be served for supper with a slice of lemon and a little mayonnaise,” I said, pretending to be the perch in my story, “than have to swim here in the canal all by myself.” Theo laughed at my imitation of the perch, and even Father seemed to enjoy the part about the lemon and the mayonnaise.

I yawn again and stretch my arms. But there's isn't room to stretch. In fact there's someone else—who can it be?—lying beside me. A girl I don't recognize.

At least not at first.

I want to push the girl away, but there isn't room. There's someone else next to her too. Oh, this is awful to be crammed so close.

And then I feel something bite the inside of my ankle. I reach down and swat at whatever it is.

That's when I realize where I am. Not in my warm cozy bed in Broek, the feather pillows fluffed, the sheets smelling like clover. I am in Theresienstadt.

I slap at my shoulder. Don't bedbugs ever sleep?

I shift my body and turn to face the other direction. At least Mother is next to me. Not all of the other girls are so lucky.

Because the lights—three incandescent bulbs hanging loosely from the ceiling beams—are always on in our barracks, I can see Mother's face. Even asleep,
she looks tired. How long ago was it that she stood at the potbelly stove in our kitchen, wearing her apron with the tulips on it and frying up that perch I'd caught? “Butter,” she'd said, adding another spoonful to the fry pan, “makes everything taste better.”

I scratch the skin around my shoulder. I know I mustn't, but I can't help it. I am itchy everywhere. I fight the urge to jump out of the bunk. Besides, there is no place to go. We are prisoners here.

If only
this
was the dream, and I could wake up and return to my old life.

If I jump out of the bunk, I risk waking Mother, and then the other women will squawk. They are always squawking about something. “Don't make such a racket!” “Why does a girl your age have to use the bathroom so often?” “That's my peg you've hung your jacket on!”

I have to be careful not to bump my head. There are only a few centimeters of space above me. I hear rustling and the soft sound of someone else groaning in her sleep.

“Don't leave any spots. None at all.”

“Yes, Frau Davidels,” I call from inside my metal cauldron. The cauldron is so huge I had to climb on a chair and crawl into it. I've been scrubbing with a long wire brush for nearly half an hour, and the muscles on my arm are already sore. My whole body is damp with sweat. I hate cleaning.

But I know I mustn't complain. I was lucky to get this job in the diet kitchen in one of the camp's small infirmaries.

Cleaning toilets would be worse. My stomach turns at the thought of the long row of wooden latrines where I did my business this morning. To think that at home in Broek I minded having to share a bathroom with Theo. Now I have to squat next to at least a dozen other girls and women and wipe my bottom with scraps of torn-up glossy magazines.

“That's a good girl,” Frau Davidels says, her voice fading as she walks down the corridor, supervising the others who work in the diet kitchen. Frau Davidels only pays compliments when there are no Nazis about. If there are Nazis in the diet kitchen, Frau Davidels' lips get small, and her voice turns sharp. “Scrub harder!” she tells us. “Can't you see that spot you've missed in the corner?”

Frau Davidels wears a white bonnet and apron. But because I've seen her when she isn't working, I know that underneath the bonnet, she has sleek dark hair that falls to her shoulders. Mother told me Frau Davidels is the widow of a Jewish Czech banker. I imagine the two of them, walking arm in arm down the cobblestone streets in Prague. It's a sunny day, and Frau Davidels is carrying a parasol.

Frau Davidels was sent to Theresienstadt with her only child, a son. But he was sent away on a transport. “The poor woman!” Mother said. “I don't know how
she finds the strength to carry on. First the husband, then the boy. It's too much for one soul to bear.” And so, when Frau Davidels uses her sharp voice, I try to remember how she must suffer. Doing that makes her sharp voice less hard to bear.