On the one closest to the doorway was Sophie, on her screen, an assortment of wedding dresses. She was lackadaisically scrolling through pictures, her chin resting in her hand. Edmund felt like he was watching something he shouldn’t, as if he’d just stumbled upon her researching porn rather than what she would wear once Bill popped the question. He moved back out of the doorway, grunted, paused for a moment, and then entered.
“Mornin’,” she said, turned around to greet him. The rolling green hills of the Windows XP background had replaced the online closet of dresses.
“Morning. Where’s Bill?” he asked, moving past her and taking a seat at the next and only other computer.
“Sleeping. That food didn’t hit right and he was up and down most of the night.”
“He just ate potatoes. Who gets sick from potatoes?” Edmund laughed.
She just shrugged and pulled up another browser on her computer. “This food isn’t for everyone, that’s for sure.”
They sat alone in silence for a few minutes. Edmund, normally proficient with computers, had trouble initially figuring out how to change the language pack on the desktop. It was tough finding English when everything was set to the odd crossings and accents of Polish. The room was chilly, heated only with a tiny, antiquated ceramic heater. When they built Krakus House, whoever they were, the builders probably didn’t envision it would one day include a small internet lab.
Sophie pulled up a games site and promptly went to chasing a ball of yarn with a cat whose body was long like a centipede. There was no sound, but Edmund wondered if relics like these computers even supported audio.
“You can go back to looking at dresses,” he said, without looking over at her. He didn’t want her to feel embarrassed, and he knew he’d feel awful if he saw even the slightest tinge of red hit her cheeks.
“I just feel weird, ya know?” she said, but put the dresses back on the screen, nonetheless.
“Weird? Why?”
She just shrugged, her frown turning up so that it balanced in such a way that she could turn to a laugh or a cry. Edmund didn’t know what he’d say if it became the latter.
“How’s that saying go? Putting the cart before the horse? I don’t know what’s on Bill’s mind these days. I never do. I know I love him and I want to marry him. But on this subject, I don’t even know if we’re on the same page.”
You’re definitely on the same page, Edmund thought. What he said was, “I’m sure he feels the same way as you. They say school sweethearts who make it past high school tend to always stay together.”
“Who says that?” she said, eyebrow cocked.
“You know, experts and stuff. Official researchers.”
She laughed and shook her head, then resumed looking at the dresses. “I like that answer. Thank you, Ed.”
He slowly turned back to his screen, hoping that placated her. For most of his life, he’d been a great keeper of secrets, but this one was different. A part of him wanted to tell her that hey, if only I could figure out what really happened to my comatose friend, you’d get your engagement and subsequent wedding. But we gotta play in Poland for a bit longer, girl.
Edmund turned his attention to the interconnected world that lay at his fingertips. There were answers out there—maybe not about the Ghost Train, but perhaps its origin. Records from the era abounded, but you just had to know where to look. He thought for a moment about what he did know.
A train left Warsaw one cold morning in January of 1943, bound for the Treblinka death camp, but never made it. Already, it was sounding like one of those horrible math questions from the SATs he all but flunked in his senior year. Still, he kept thinking, kept compiling all the data he had thus far.
He knew they were called Special Trains, so that was his entry-point, the spot where he would launch his search. But that was too broad a subject because the Special Trains were in and out of all the concentration camps, from Treblinka to Belzec, from Sobibor to Majdanek. Information specific to Treblinka was difficult to find—that wasn’t where the movies and television and literature chose to show the dark side of Nazi Germany. The spotlight inadvertently always fell to Dachau or Auschwitz. So when Edmund used search parameters of ‘Special Train’, ‘Treblinka’ and ‘missing’, the results narrowed to such a thin band that he grew hopeful.
Holocaust trains didn’t exactly adhere to standard rules and practices. They were hidden from the world, and thus paper trails were hard to follow. Edmund did come across several trains that were logged by the Germans, but only two of them from Treblinka, the majority, Auschwitz. Even then the information was restricted to what the Jews were carrying on their person, inventory records so that Berlin would know what to expect. Edmund wasn’t sure what he could do with the right information even if he found it. He knew nothing about the train, none of the passengers, nor the conductor. Holocaust trains, for research purposes anyway, were all ghost trains.
But then a year came to mind, a date that Marcus Davies, the PI from Surrey, had mentioned. That year was 1948.
About sixty people had gone missing, he’d said. All the way back to 1948.
That led him to the local sites about the Ghost Train. Many people claimed to have photos, but the train was this part of the world’s Bigfoot or Chupacabra. He didn’t think any of the amateur photos were the real thing, certainly nothing came close to the quality of video that Addey had captured. A few puffs of steam beyond the mountain, limned by an ethereal glow was the only ‘proof’ that he thought was halfway viable.
The local sites that spoke of the specific train—a steamer built in 1933 by the Rudnicka company—connected him to the one source that he thought was credible. There was a record of a train, bound for Treblinka, vanishing, but the experts had reason to believe that it simply kept heading east, disappearing past Soviet and German contested Belarus where it was no doubt scrapped, the passengers sent to work camps or press-ganged into the army.
Aboard the train was a notable officer by the name of Otto Herzog. Many years before the War, Otto was caught up in criminal proceedings that involved the killing of children. Many people assumed he was innocent, but just as many did not. What made this story survive was the fact that Otto was catching a ride on the train, hopeful to disappear in the already secretive Treblinka. The going story was that he wasn’t satisfied with Treblinka—it was German run and thus he’d be handed over to a German tribunal. So, he ran. He took the train across the Polish lines and disappeared into the unknown region of Soviet partisans.
Edmund found a picture of him, most likely many years before the fateful ride on the train. Naturally, it was old and monochromatic, faded a stark white at the corners like some negative fire had burned it away. He was wearing a dark, button-up suit. His jaw was set, eyes narrowed to slits, as if he was untrusting of the photographer. Beneath his arm he held his field hat, little glitters of metal shining.
“That’s him,” whispered Sophie, so unexpectedly that Edmund jumped. “I’m sure of it.”
“Maybe,” he said. He’d taken to carrying Addey’s phone around everywhere he went, knowing he would want to show anyone who cared to look at the video. He scrubbed it to the brief clip where the man came into frame holding the alligator wrench. Edmund paused it, but too much time had passed between the man who became the ghost and the bright-eyed cadet in the photo. The bald head matched, as did the nose and the chin. Either way, Edmund chose to believe that Sophie was correct—this was the man aboard the Ghost Train.
He shared all that he’d just learned with her, bringing up the very few credible sources. Lots of people claimed to see the Ghost Train, but not everyone’s story fit. Edmund had a knack for telling when someone wanted their fifteen minutes of fame and those who were telling a story simply because they wanted people to hear it.
“Listen to this,” he said as Sophie moved her folding metal chair over. “In 1948, in the town of Borowe . . . which is just a few miles from here, a pair of kids, brother and sister
, were walking home from choir practice. As many as ten people saw the train that night. Two of them knew it firsthand because they’d been in Warsaw, in the ghetto. They literally saw it leave for Treblinka.”
“And the kids?” Sophie asked.
“Were never seen again,” Edmund said. “Look at this one.” He pulled up another entry on the website. “In 1950, in Klukowo, a woman told her husband that she had a train to catch, that it was going to make her family rich. Husband said he laughed it off, but she went out the door and he never saw her again.
“There’s so many more stories like this, Soph. In 1956 a man named Horace Szuba is heard screaming in the middle of the night. Several people go outside to see the Ghost Train sitting there, and a man dragging Horace toward it with a hook.” Edmund turned to look at his friend and added, “But we know it wasn’t a hook, was it?”
She shook her head. “So why a ghost?” she asked.
“What?” He had no idea what she meant.
“If we look at this missing train from a paranormal point of view, we have to ask that question. It didn’t cross to Belarus where the Soviets or the Germans controlled. Hell, I don’t know the history like you do, Ed. But it never made it to Treblinka. So what happened in between? A real train of metal and wood filled with flesh and blood people went missing. How did we get from that to a ghost?”
He really didn’t know the answer to that, but his amateur work with the Nun Hunters had helped to understand the pseudo-science of ghosts. And by pseudo-science, no science whatsoever.
“We went to an old chapel in Ritter once,” he said, meaning a small town just outside of Lynchburg, Virginia. “Me, Bill, Addey and a couple of other guys who were part of the Nun Hunters.
“Local legend was that a bunch of kids went missing about a century ago, under the watch of a Sister Helena. Lots of people accused her of killing them and hiding their bodies. A lot of angry parents got together, dragged her out of her home and hung her from an old oak tree.”
“I remember hearing this story,” said Sophie, eyes lighting up. “That oak tree is still there, and it’s a huge party spot on Halloween.”
“Right. So anyway, after she’s hung, the real murderer is found. A crazy old man who leads them right to a bunch of shallow graves up in the woods. Whole town feels awful about Sister Helena now. But that’s when people start to see her. You know, normal ghost stuff. Some see her hanging from the tree, some see her walking the streets. My point is this: Something has to make a ghost. I don’t know how the other side works. But when something awful happens, it leaves an imprint on reality, like bloodstains on a shirt. And it’s there forever. Something happened with this train and that’s why we still see it all these years later.”
“Makes sense, I suppose. But one would think this whole area would be overflowing with ghosts if that were the case. Poland has more awful history than anywhere in the world.”
“This is true,” he said, just as he peered over her head and noticed Lena sweeping the floor back in the common room.
Sophie followed his gaze, turned back to Edmund and fixed him with a half-scowl that meant she was partly serious in what she was about to say. “Don’t scare her off or get us kicked out of here, please?”
He stood up, started to walk out. “I like the dresses without all the frilly stuff on the sleeves.”
Lena didn’t see him approach—she’d had her back to him from the beginning and had since stopped sweeping to look out the window. This side of Krakus House was pressed up against the forest.
“Where’s the old lady?” he asked.
The broom clattered noisily to the floor and she whirled around. Edmund did not feel they were off to a good start by the way her normally pale face reddened.
She stooped over to pick it up. “She’s asleep. She’s more of a night owl.”
“Does she speak English as well as you?”
Lena smiled, most likely figuring that it was always best to keep up a ruse to outsiders that you didn’t know what they were saying.
“Perhaps.”
“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable the other night,” said Edmund, daring to take a few steps closer. He leaned against the underside of the stairs.
“You didn’t,” she responded curtly. “I just didn’t want another fight.” She turned and started sweeping toward the front of the common room.
Edmund slowly chased. “Another fight?”
“My grandmother. She doesn’t like outsiders. People who come looking for the train.”
“Why not?” And then, playfully, “It’s just a legend, right?”
She stopped sweeping and turned around, braided hair swinging out far. “You don’t believe that any more than we do. I’ve seen those who fancy themselves as ghost hunters before.”
“Another person went missing,” said Edmund, mind skipping over what she’d just said. “A zoologist from Warsaw.”
Lena nodded. “I know. He won’t be the last.” And then, as if it didn’t matter, she resumed sweeping.
“So why don’t you like it when people search for the train? Seems to me that the more people who understood it, the better.”
“We understand it just fine,” she said without looking back at him. “And we have enough people being taken away without would-be investigators and ghosthunters coming to be added.”
“Just how many people does this train take?”
Her shoulders slumped, and he didn’t have to see her face to know it had softened with sadness. “A lot more than is being reported.”
Edmund dared to approach.
“Look, my friend Addey, the guy who stayed here? He was on to something. I just know it. Please, just tell me where he was found or point me to someone who can.”
She turned back around, and this time Edmund thought he’d pushed too far. Her face was bent into a scowl that he was yet to see on such elfin features. Lena placed the broom against a table and came up to him, and for the first time he noticed just how small and delicate she appeared, as if she were no more than ten, playing make-believe at being an adult.
She said, “Don’t you get it? Don’t you see that I’m trying to protect you?” Her voice had turned pleading.
“I don’t need your protection, I need answers.”
Her eyes studied his for a moment, and when she saw this was the end of his reason, said, “I have to go chop wood.”
“No, don’t,” said Edmund, voice defeated. “I’m sorry. I’ll go.” He circled around her, giving a wide berth, and then mounted the first step to the second floor. He stopped halfway up and said, “Look, have you ever had a friend you loved? A relative? That was Addey. And now I’m going to be home in a few days and he’s going to be in a coma for God knows how long.” He didn’t think his eyes were going to well up with tears, but they were. He didn’t care. And he didn’t care that when he continued, his voice was starting to break down. “I have zero closure. All I wanted was to see where this video was taken.” He’d pulled Addey’s phone out of his pocket.
Lena gave him a curious look.
“What video?”
***
She had said nothing else after seeing Addey running through the woods, coming upon the Ghost Train, then dropping the phone. Her face barely showed any sort of emotion at all, as if she were either incapable of comprehending what she saw or simply didn’t care. Maybe she just didn’t believe. But after the video was done, after Otto—for that was most certainly who he was—had brandished the slightly bent alligator wrench—she just shook her head. Edmund was too spent to follow-up, to make his corollary case when the evidence was so strong. As the saying went, there was no use in flogging a dead horse. She turned to sweep and he turned to go back to his room, the stalemate making his blood boil.
He didn’t go any further than Bill and Sophie’s room that evening, where the three played cards, just as they did on the train from Berlin, what seemed like ages ago. They didn’t go out, as the snow had picked up througho
ut the day, so Lena—clean slate as ever—presented them with meal choices, and the Americans ate lunch and then dinner in their rooms. Edmund heard water running in the eastern bathroom, so he headed to the opposite one to shower, just as he entered into the one closest his room.
That night, after Krakus House, Ozelki, and Poland all went to sleep, and the hush of gently falling snow blanketed the land, Edmund got up and went to the bathroom. As his hand graced the cold wood of the railing, he peered down into the common room and saw Lena sitting at the table, alone, polishing an assortment of figurines who normally lived in the curio cabinet by the fireplace, its door now hanging open. She glanced up because all of Poland could hear the squeal of the floorboards as he walked, and offered him a curt smile which he simply returned.
After his business in the john was complete and he was making the same route back to his room, he glanced over the railing and saw only the chair pushed out, the figurines still on the table, but no Lena. A crackling fire blazed in the hearths. He yawned and closed his bedroom door behind him.
As was his usual bedtime ritual, he responded to the collection of text messages he’d received throughout the day, during American hours of operation. And just when he was about to place the phone where it would charge alongside Addey’s device, the hallway outside his door came alive—footsteps, light but quiet, as if someone were tiptoeing. He watched as the line of light was broken by the shadow of feet and then, something was sliding beneath his door. Then, the light was once more unbroken as the squeal of floorboards danced away.
Edmund took his time throwing back the covers and standing up. Surely it was Lena—who else in this place was so small and so quiet? He stooped down, picked up the folded scrap of paper and looked at it. This was a printout, and Edmund brought it back to the bedside light to see better.
At first he didn’t realize what he was looking at, for the black and white photo wasn’t easily discernable because of the garbled pattern of what turned out to be trees. He was looking at a satellite map, the coordinating planes at the sides marked off in degrees of 10. A large, black circle had been drawn around a square about halfway up the page, right in the middle of the dense forest.
Ghost Train of Treblinka Page 10
