“You’re a fencer,” she said, gesturing at the photo.
“I coach the varsity team at the university.”
“I took fencing as an undergrad,” she said. “I was pretty awful, but I have fond memories.”
He observed her with new interest. “You must have some European blood.”
“My mother was born in Poland, but came here as a child.”
He watched her for an uneasy moment. She knew there was no love lost between Germany and Poland. The Nazis had murdered millions of Poles in the last war. Apart from the Jews. Maybe it suddenly occurred to him that she was Jewish. Had he been a soldier? What was he remembering?
Finally he said, “You should try it again. I can teach anybody to fence. Want some lessons?”
Erich lifted an eyebrow on his way to the kitchen to help his mother.
“I’d be hopeless. Really. But thanks for the offer.”
“Nonsense! Anyone can do it as long as they’re reasonably healthy. You didn’t have a good teacher.”
Erich helped his mother bring in four steaming bowls of barley bean soup. They passed around a basket of rye bread.
“Why don’t you come to our tournament Saturday? We’re playing the teams from Western and Queen’s. It’s the last one at Hart House before we move into a new building. So it’s special.”
“Dad ...”
“Well, she’s fenced before. She was interested once, maybe we can persuade her again. And if she comes, maybe you’ll come?” He lowered the spoon into his soup. “It starts at one but come at three. The weaker players will be eliminated by then. I know how valuable a doctor’s time is. You two can arrange to meet at Hart House.” He smiled pointedly at Erich. “Maybe you can spare a few hours away from the corpses.”
“This is delicious,” Rebecca said, trying to change the subject. “It reminds me of my mother’s soup.”
Erich snickered sideways at her. “Maybe your mother buys her soup from Daiter’s too.”
Daiter’s was a Jewish delicatessen in Kensington Market.
“I bought some on my way over,” he said. “My mother doesn’t have much time to cook.”
“You’re giving away all our secrets,” said Mrs. Sentry, sending him a half-smile.
“I wanted to thank you for your trouble last night,” Will Sentry said to Rebecca. “It must’ve been a terrible experience.”
“It was very upsetting,” she answered, letting her spoon rest in the bowl. “For all of us, I’m sure.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Sentry. “Very upsetting.” She pushed away her unfinished bowl. “I had trouble concentrating all day. I’m afraid to be in the house alone in case that man comes back. He knows our backyard. If he killed once, he can kill again.”
“Maybe the police have found him,” Rebecca said.
Mrs. Sentry shook her head. “A detective called. What was his name?” She looked at her husband.
“Fitzroy.”
“He said they were still looking for him. They were checking the men’s shelters but hadn’t found him yet. I’m afraid I’m going to walk in one day and he’s going to be inside the house.”
“Oh, honey,” said her husband, smiling fondly at her. “With your muscles, you could knock him down with one good punch.”
“Well, you may laugh,” she said, moving her spoon around in her soup. “But I come home to a dark empty house and I’m nervous. You didn’t see what she looked like, all bloody, her head knocked in.”
The smile died on his face. “Is that necessary?” he said softly.
“I’m sorry.” She looked penitent for a moment, eyes downcast. “But really, doctor, shouldn’t I be frightened?”
How could Rebecca answer that? “The man looked tough, like he’d been in some fights.” The broken nose. “But he ran when I came into the yard — he didn’t attack me.”
“What about the college boys renting next door?” Will Sentry said to his wife. “I’ll ask one of them to come into the house with you when you get home.”
She nodded into her soup.
He addressed Rebecca again. “My wife said you visited the poor woman often.”
“I just saw her twice. All in the past week.”
He leaned forward on his elbows, eyes waiting for more. He was still a handsome man, playfulness in his dark eyes.
“She said some disturbing things when I was walking by. I was concerned for her. How long was she there?”
He sat back, arms across his chest. “She moved around a lot,” he said. “We’ve known her for years. People tried to put her into hospital, and she’d run away. Then she’d turn up in an alley. Or in our backyard. We never knew how long she’d stay. She refused to live indoors. It was too dangerous, she said. People always stole things from her, she said. And always dragging that stupid wagon wherever she went. All her earthly possessions.”
Erich and his mother brought plates of food from the kitchen: a chicken that had been barbecued in some restaurant, baked potatoes in foil jackets, presumably from the same establishment, coleslaw (from Daiter’s, Rebecca guessed), and a bowl of green beans from a can.
“You’re a doctor,” Will Sentry said. “What do you think she had?”
She glanced at Erich. He must have ventured a diagnosis.
When the dish of chicken came by, she speared a slice of breast with her fork and placed it on her plate next to the potato.
“Her speech was rambling — it was hard to follow her train of thought. I’d say she might’ve been schizophrenic.”
Erich threw his father an impatient look as if to say, We’ve been over this before.
“But she did talk to you?”
Rebecca nodded, spooning some sour cream onto her potato.
“She didn’t talk to everybody, you know. You must’ve touched her somehow. Do you remember anything she said?”
She looked at her host, who was cutting up his chicken, along with the skin, and placing neat little pieces into his mouth. Why did he care what the woman had said to her?
“They were strange things. Probably not things you want to talk about at a dinner table.”
“Don’t worry, doctor, we’re not squeamish here.”
“Speak for yourself, Dad.”
His father looked at Erich. “The squeamish pathologist. It’s a good thing all your patients are dead.”
“Ouch.” Erich chewed on some potato.
“Really, doctor. I’d like to know what she said to you. Did she talk about people? Anyone she knew? Or us, even. We knew her a long time, you see.”
Was this why she had been invited? To find out if the old woman had said something?
All right, thought Rebecca. “Her speech was very disjointed — it was hard to follow. She seemed to think people were controlling her. Threatening her. She indicated your house once.”
“Did she say any names?”
He was persistent. “Only a nonsense name. Started with an M. ‘Mit’ something. Mit — Mitverba, I think.”
The couple stopped eating and looked at each other. “Does it mean something?” Rebecca asked.
Will Sentry put down his fork. “Mittverda. It’s from the war. The concentration camp.”
“She was in a camp?”
“We were all in a camp.”
Rebecca looked at them with new eyes.
“So ... you knew her that long?”
He nodded, staring off into the air.
“I thought she was a stranger,” Rebecca said, trying to keep accusation out of her voice.
“She became a stranger,” he said. “Originally she was my cousin.”
Erich glanced at him, then down at the table.
“A very dear cousin,” the elder Sentry added. Rebecca put her fork down. Suddenly everything had changed.
“It’s a shock, isn’t it?” he said. “Once she was a beautiful, intelligent woman. This is the way of the world. It crushes us all, one way or another.”
The pretty woman in the photo. Impossib
le.
“Your accents, are they German?”
“We’re German Jews. A miracle that we survived. More or less intact. Except for my cousin. Luckily it wasn’t obvious when we were questioned by Canadian immigration after the war. She got worse after we came here. Delayed reaction, I guess. Some people bottle things up, then it’s too much and eventually they collapse. The war was too much for her. She saw too much.”
They were Jews. They hid it well, Rebecca thought. “We’re so sheltered in this country,” she said. “I can’t imagine what you went through.”
“It’s nice to be sheltered from such things. Maybe that’s why Canadians are so decent. You were right. This isn’t good dinner conversation.” He picked up his fork and launched into his food.
They all began to eat again.
“And yet,” he chewed on the chicken and the words, “I’m still curious if she said anything you wondered about. Perhaps the police have asked?”
Something niggling was trying to surface in her memory. “I wondered about a lot of things. But the last time I saw her she kept repeating the same words.
‘Where is it? Where is it? You can’t have it.’ I guess it makes sense if she thought people were stealing from her.”
The elder Sentry stared through her to some distant point.
“That’s enough, Dad,” Erich said, before his father could ask any more. “The post-mortem is over.”
chapter sixteen
Cairo, October 1936
My dearest Hans,
I was overjoyed to receive your letter with its eloquent description of Berlin and the Olympics. If only life arranged itself according to our wishes! I would so much have loved to stay for the games, but I could not justify the extra year to my family. I didn’t realize how fond I had become of the city until I returned home. Though I dearly love the city of my birth, the same climate that sustains jasmine and hyacinth vines encourages the growth of cockroaches the size of Berlin mice. No matter how often we clean them out (I think the poison makes them stronger!), before we turn around there they are again, sharing our food. I sorely miss the order and cleanliness of a northern place. A few cold days and all your insects are gone. Though I do not miss the brawls in the street.
I don’t know how you feel about this, but I will only say it is too bad that your “Revolution” has eliminated some of the best doctors from the hospital.
Now that I am home, I am becoming impatient with the attitude here that Egyptians can succeed only at business in cotton or beet sugar or carpets. Though my father boasts about his “doctor son” to his friends, he insists I join him in the cotton business. He longs to add “and Son” to the Hassan Cotton Company. He says a medical degree gets you position in the community, but not enough money to make a comfortable living. I didn’t study medicine for the position!
My father has forgotten how he disobeyed his own father during the European war by going to Turkey with his stocks of cotton and loading them on a ship to Germany. He made his fortune in contraband cotton. His contacts in Turkey later found a German nanny for me — what status! I thank her for my familiarity with the language.
You may remember my fascination with snakes (how many times did I apologize for scaring you with that harmless little devil?). Egypt is home to some of the deadliest. Yet their venom may be employed to help mankind. I cannot think of a better way to spend my life than to work at turning poison into medicine that helps people. But my father rules the family with an iron hand and I shall have to convince him the venture can be profitable. Research with venom requires patience and many small animals for subjects. There is no shortage of small animals, but the transfer of results to human patients will be a tricky business. It will be difficult to develop a drug without harming the people who try it in the early stages. It will take all my powers of persuasion to convince my father that money can be made in snake venom. He has given me a year to prove myself and show him I have some sense. For now I have joined the medical clinic of a cousin who allows me two days to see my own patients.
Despite the upheaval that has taken over your country, the people are far better off than in Egypt. You would not believe the poverty and filth the majority live in. There is no work for them so they live on the edge of starvation. They certainly cannot afford a doctor when they get sick. And yet it is the poor who need medical attention the most. It is enough to break one’s heart. In the city it is an effort to remember that Egypt was a superior culture four thousand years ago, though evidence of it lies just beyond, in the desert. I am still mesmerized by the vision of the three pyramids on the plateau of Giza as you drive southwest of Cairo. There also lies the Great Sphinx with the head of a man and body of a lion, symbols of wisdom and strength. Where is that wisdom and strength now? By the way — you know the famous profile? The nose was shot off by Napoleon’s soldiers for target practice. I’m afraid this is our experience with European “civilization.”
But enough of that — tell me about your medical practice and how things have changed in the hospital — and the city — since I was there. I long to hear about the place I called home for five happy years. And I implore you to remember you always have a place to stay when you visit — and I can promise my mother will treat you like a prince. I know it is a long way to come, but please consider it for my sake.
Your affectionate friend,
Mohammed
P.S. How is your dear mother? I know her illness must weigh on your mind.
Berlin, December 1936
Dearest Mohammed,
Your letter reminded me how much I enjoyed your company during our training. I am only sorry you had to return to your homeland where I am sure you are much needed by your parents.
As to the letting go of the Jewish doctors from the hospitals, yes, some were good, but they took up too many spaces, squeezing out Aryan doctors who had every right to practise. Of course, some people will suffer, but there is a purpose in the end. The system was not working, and now, despite the hardship for some, things have become balanced and German doctors can practise medicine the way we were meant to.
I long ago forgave you about the incident with the snake. I must admit, after I settled down and stopped shaking, the little fellow began to interest me. Your idea about transforming venom into medicine is exciting, and I am sure your father will come round. I hope you will write and let me know how your plan develops.
Thank you for asking about my mother. Sadly, her illness is progressing and she does not recognize me. Her memory is gone — she doesn’t even remember who she is, never mind me. What must it be like, to forget everything? One becomes an empty vessel and the question arises — who are we if we cannot remember? It has made me realize we are our memories, for without them we are nothing. I’m sorry if this depresses you, but I rarely speak of her to anyone.
Since I was a boy I’ve dreamt of seeing the pyramids and the Sphinx. As much as I would love to make the trip and visit you (and all the insects you complain about) I cannot see a time in the near future as my practice is extremely busy. The political situation is also uncertain and makes travel difficult. Perhaps when you have got your snakes together and need someone to scare — a year or two? — things will be more settled here. It is Christmas now and rather lonely with just my brother to celebrate with.
Fond regards,
Hans
Cairo, February 1937
My dearest friend,
In all my years of training to be a physician I never imagined I would see such suffering. I keep it from my father — he would disapprove mightily — but I will confide in you. One day a week I spend treating the paupers who live in the northern cemetery. It is but one of a group of vast cemeteries stretching along the base of the Moquattam Hills. Tourists call the place “City of the Dead.” You must understand Egyptian cemeteries are not like European ones, but are a labyrinth of room-like tombs and mausoleums. The poor who live there left their villages in search of work. They earn a few pennies here
and there, never enough to pay rent in the overcrowded city. Thus they end up squatting in tombs or in hovels where tombs used to be.
After fourteen hours of seeing patients suffering from the most devastating diseases — and who could never afford a doctor — I cannot see straight, and stumble home. Some of my German professors thought I should be concerned with the tropical diseases I would find in my homeland. What romantics! Those are nothing compared to the pervasive infectious diseases arising from the overcrowding and general filth that breeds vermin of all kinds! The feces in the streets (both animal and human), the smell of urine in surprising places, like public buildings where men relieve themselves in the stairwells.
To all this, add the backwardness of folk remedies that defy all logic. Mothers of infants with diarrhea stop feeding them altogether because of some misguided “traditional” advice from their mothers and aunts. What a calamity! When I tell them to give their babies as much liquid as they will take, they shake their heads in puzzlement and tell me I was educated in the West where human bodies must be different. They hang amulets around the child’s neck and say, “Allah will cure her.” And then they are horrified when their children die! I cannot tell you how demoralized I am after such a day. Yet they need my services infinitely more than the middle-class patients who come to my clinic with colds and stomach ailments.
There is an organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, trying to help, set up ten years ago by a devout Muslim schoolteacher named Hasan al-Banna. They send people to deliver food to the poor, set up schools for the children, and organize prayer meetings. Al-Banna is a great admirer of your Adolf Hitler and has written to him many times. He has strong anti-British feelings, as do many here. Though our country has formally been granted independence under King Farouk, in reality the English still control everything here. They are in the barracks, the police, the army, and one is hard-pressed to find an Egyptian irrigation inspector or judge.
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