The Pearl Thief

by Fiona McIntosh

  ‘The barouche?’ Lotte said. ‘We haven’t ridden in that for years. We have no horse!’ The little ones giggled at her words.

  ‘We’ve brought one. It’s being harnessed now.’

  I blinked at Rudy in astonishment. ‘So we’re not going down the hill?’

  My father squeezed my arm. ‘Hush now, child. Do as you’re bid.’ He whispered to me urgently. ‘Please let’s not frighten the little ones.’

  ‘The children can ride in our car if you wish, Samuel?’ A look was exchanged between Rudy and my father. I watched my father nod and Lotte gave a brief cheer, as if she’d just been told of a great treat, but I felt only talons of fear claw at my belly.

  It was time to leave; we had no choice so there was no point in protesting further. I began urging the girls to pick up their suitcases but Rudy put a gloved hand on my arm. He made a small tutting sound. ‘Leave it, Katka.’

  ‘But —’

  He tsk-tsked again and I tried not to show my vexation. ‘The men will carry these for you.’ He waved a hand carelessly as though used to giving orders. ‘Off you go, help your father to get your mother into the coach.’

  ‘We need to lock up the villa, surely? And the fire is —’

  He laid his leathered finger against my lips and it took all my willpower not to recoil. ‘Sssh …’ He held up a bunch of keys. I recognised them immediately as my father’s. ‘Samuel has asked me to take care of it all for him. Don’t worry, I’ll be diligent with your valuables.’ As naive of the world as perhaps I was, his smirk told me all I needed to know and I didn’t want to give him another moment of my precious time. I hurried away to my father and the driver, who were struggling to help my mother into the coach.

  ‘Why the barouche?’ I persisted with my father once my mother was finally settled.

  His sunken expression hadn’t changed. ‘So we can travel without being seen. We can pull down the blinds on the windows. He says it is a special consideration he’s showing so no one has to see us leave under armed guard.’

  ‘I don’t suppose that big car is any sort of hint, though?’

  My sarcasm was the last thing my father needed, of course. His look was full of pain when it landed on me.

  ‘I am so sorry, Katerina.’

  ‘This is not your fault.’

  ‘I should have got all of you children away. I shouldn’t have listened to your mother.’

  I thought he was going to weep and leapt in with a hand to his shoulder and a kiss to his cheek. ‘Papa, hush now. What’s the use in regret? We can’t turn back the pages.’

  He held me tight. ‘Oh, my darling girl. Regret is all I have to chew on now in this bitterest of journeys. You are my joy – know that. You have made me proud to be a father.’

  He was crying. I was crying too. This wasn’t forever! I needed him to be reassured, to be my strong father. ‘Terezín’s a camp, Papa. We’ll stay as close as they’ll permit and we’ll draw no attention to ourselves. We’ll survive.’

  My father shook his head slowly and a deep sob erupted. ‘I wanted to tell you about Petr.’

  ‘Hush, Papa. He’s gone. But we’re together. I’m at your side and I fear nothing.’ It was brave talk to somehow lift him back to the pedestal. I needed him calm and strong for me because I wanted to drop to my haunches, put my hands over my head and keen. It wasn’t the cold making me shiver, it was raw fear. No child should watch their father weep or their mother disappear into madness. No child should be forcibly herded into transport with armed men around them. No child should be thinking what I was thinking in that moment as I looked at my father’s haunted face. The truth waggled a finger of glee at me. So rather than accept it, I lied to myself and to him.

  ‘Maybe it’s easier. It’s also more dignified. We don’t have to live in hiding, scratching for food. We can join others and together we can help each other at Terezín.’

  He nodded, sniffing. ‘You’re right, Katerina. This is more dignified for our family. It’s going to take courage but Ruda Mayek has convinced me that all round it’s a better course than what we face.’

  What I didn’t know then is that he’d decided to state the truth, although at the time I thought he was simply joining me in the lie.

  The journey was far shorter than I was anticipating. I’d clung to the vague notion that we were still intending to go down the hill, perhaps taking a back road that only Rudy knew of. But my father had hushed me and I suppose, deep down in my breaking heart, I knew we were not going anywhere but deeper into the woods.

  Katerina stirred as an enamoured couple, arms linked, walked in laughing quietly to each other.

  ‘I’ve changed my mind, Daniel,’ she said. ‘This room of beauty is no place for my ugly tale. Shall we go?’

  He didn’t argue, picking up his hat and overcoat to follow her to where they’d left their umbrellas.

  ‘Still drizzling but lighter. We can make a run for it and find the closest café.’ For the first time, he took her properly by the elbow and they hurried, beneath his larger umbrella, back onto the Left Bank and toppled through the doors of the first café they spotted.

  ‘Something stronger, perhaps?’

  She nodded. ‘All right, but the bill is mine.’

  He held up both palms. They found a booth and sat opposite each other, sliding along the red leather so they were close to the rain-spattered window.

  The waiter arrived. ‘Er …?’ Daniel looked at her. ‘Pastis, perhaps?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Deux Jaunes,’ he said, ‘no ice.’

  The two yellow slugs of aniseed liquor arrived with the customary jug of chilled water, drips beading on its glass exterior. ‘May I?’ Daniel asked, and she nodded.

  He poured the cold water into the yellow liquor that historically came perhaps from the Chinese star anise or more likely from the seeds of the Mediterranean aniseed plant, which was part of the parsley family. He wondered absently whether it had been given an extra lift with licorice or sage. He noted that Katerina was looking pale, distracted.

  ‘To you, Katerina, and happier times,’ he said, lost for whatever else to drink to.

  ‘To happier times,’ she echoed and they tipped their chins back to sip from the narrow, squat glasses.

  She pulled a face. ‘Never enjoyed this stuff.’ At his laugh, threatening to spill the pastis from his mouth, she stared surprised at him. ‘What?’

  ‘Why drink it?’

  She shrugged. ‘Something to do, keep my hands busy, give us a reason to sit here.’

  ‘Would you prefer something else?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘What do you normally like to drink – alcohol, I mean?’

  ‘Champagne would be my first choice but I’m not one for anything sugary.’

  ‘I’d never have guessed,’ he said with light sarcasm.

  ‘But I do enjoy a small fortified wine on a winter evening. That’s my secret pleasure that only you know.’ Before he could respond, she added: ‘But I prefer the sherries using the Spanish Pedro Ximénez grapes.’

  At last he could enlighten her about something historical. ‘Originally from Arabic table grapes.’

  ‘Is that right?’ She chuckled and the sound was deep and genuine … almost like a thankyou for breaking her mood.

  ‘You don’t have to tell me more,’ he offered, hating that he was even letting those words out.

  ‘I do, though, Daniel. I’ve got no one else to share this with … I’m too far into the nightmare to pull out now.’

  He took a slow breath. ‘You were in the barouche …’

  ‘We were,’ she recalled.

  The afternoon light was soft and it had warmed the chilly interior of the barouche, which had not been harnessed to a horse in many years. One of Rudy’s men was driving it. We were supposed to regard being transported in our own carriage as some sort of special consideration by Rudy. I think it only made it more poignant, more painful. I didn’t recognise the
driver but he was likely another Nazi convert from the village. The smell of the leather instantly transported me to a time in my childhood when life was uncomplicated and full of happiness. The twins hadn’t arrived then; it was just me and baby Lotte. I thought of her in the car ahead, being driven with ‘Uncle Rudy’ to … where?

  ‘Papa. He said you’d explain. Tell me the truth now, are we going to Terezín?’

  I watched my father glance at our mother, who was staring blankly out of the window at the thickening forest as the road turned to track and our ride became slower, bumpier. I also noticed he had begun to wring his hands. He wasn’t wearing gloves … why?

  ‘Papa?’

  ‘Terezín is not a happy gathering place for Jews,’ he began. ‘The mayor tells me it is essentially a clearing house to other places. The Jews are being sent to camps to be systematically killed.’

  I frowned at the ridiculous notion.

  ‘The infirm, the aged, invalids, children, anyone weakened, are murdered immediately. Those old enough to do manual labour and any healthy adults are put to work until they are no longer of use.’

  ‘But —’

  ‘“The Nazis are exterminating the Jews”; those were his exact words, Katerina.’ Before I could take a breath to respond, my father continued. ‘No child should be hearing this but I only have you, my girl, to explain this to. The mayor assured me that your mother, each of your sisters and I would almost certainly be put to death immediately on arrival at one of the camps. You alone would likely be kept for working purposes until you could no longer be of use and then you too would perish. However, he gave me a glimpse into all the despair before we would even arrive to be killed. The journey itself, crowded like a tin of anchovies and in train carriages designed for cattle, means a lot of the weak die horribly before they arrive in the frozen wilderness of Poland.’

  He was right, I shouldn’t have been hearing this, but I too had aged these last few days, well beyond my years. ‘Papa,’ I reasoned, ‘how can he know this? He’s —’

  ‘He knows this because he’s been there. He agrees with the killing of Jews. He is entirely enamoured by the ideology of Hitler’s Nazi Party and has joined it, hence the borrowed uniform and his new status. He is impressed by the new Protektor Heydrich; is keen to be noticed by him. He will be moving to live and work at Terezín shortly and after that …’ – he gave a sad groan – ‘he said he would relish the opportunity to be transferred to one of those death camps in the east.’

  My father wasn’t speaking to deaf ears or a mind that hadn’t already suspected something traumatic was gathering us into its bleak hold, but even my imagination couldn’t have conjured the death camps he spoke of. ‘And so, if we are to be spared Terezín, what is this journey about?’ I was torn between wanting to know and wishing I could stop the words spilling from my father’s lips, but they’d begun their journey and neither of us could prevent them filling the space between his anguished face and my stunned one.

  ‘We cannot be spared. We are registered, so we would be hunted down, separated and treated who dares wonder how for trying to escape. The mayor claims that because of our long family connection, he can make it quick and painless. This is the least suffering he can offer us. What could I do but accept?’

  I swallowed but my throat was so dry I felt choked. I tried again and gave a gasp instead. ‘What is he going to do?’

  ‘Katerina, I have asked a lot of you but I have to ask more because I can’t do this alone. You have to stay strong for the babies. We have to turn this into some sort of game, or …’ He shook his head.

  ‘They’re taking us into the woods to kill us?’ I said, my words coming out as more of a hiss than my recognisable voice.

  He nodded.

  I couldn’t even scream, I was so horrified. It couldn’t be possible, could it? This couldn’t really be happening, and yet here we were, rumbling into the loneliest of landscapes, just our young family of six, with a trio of armed bullies.

  ‘It will be quick, he has promised,’ my father repeated, as if that made it any less bitter.

  There was nothing to say. I couldn’t think of a single response that would offer either of us an easier mindset as we moved towards our death. Death. My life hadn’t yet begun and it was about to end, staring at the barrel of a German gun. I would curse Ruda Mayek as it happened. His would be the name on my lips, in my mind as I died, so that in a different life I would remember him and I would hunt him.

  The coach lurched to a stop just moments after I’d made this promise to myself. Nothing more was to be said between my father and I as a soldier was suddenly at the door, urging us out.

  I could hear Rudy insisting we be treated gently but nothing he could say or do would change this moment, or convince me he meant it, for whatever breath I had left in me I would breathe it cursing him. And if I was to be granted any form of spiritual life after death, then I would commit that life to Ruda Mayek; I would not let him leave my soul and one day, if there ever was to be an hour of reckoning, I would be there to watch him pay for this sin. All of this was tumbling chaotically through my mind as I took the hands of the twins on either side of me and urged Lotte to walk between our parents and hold their hands.

  ‘What’s happening, Papa?’ I heard her ask. ‘I didn’t enjoy that ride.’

  ‘Lotte, it’s a special game,’ I ground out. I was past fear now. I was at a new threshold; it wasn’t yet resignation, it was more like a fury. It burned sharp and bright, sucking the air from my lungs. I was breathing so shallowly I could hear the struggle above all other sounds, which had become sharpened. There was the crunch of our footsteps on the leaf litter beneath; I could hear the creak of Rudy’s leather coat, and the birds – far too happy in their early evening song as they watched us pass beneath them. My mother muttered to herself, my father said nothing … dead eyes stared ahead. I think I must have worn a similar mask. I was aware of Lotte glancing my way, trying to catch my attention; she was normally so talkative, it often felt like a full-time task answering her endless questions from why a human baby takes nine months in the womb and is still more helpless than most other young of the mammals, to how the sky can be so many colours in a single day. But she had been silenced, old enough to pick up on the mood of the adults.

  Ettel was the sporty one amongst us, usually jumping, skipping or turning cartwheels, but she walked now with subdued, shuffling steps next to me, not a hint of bounce in her ordinarily jolly gait. Her hand clutched mine tightly enough that I was sure her fingers must be in pain. Darling, sweet Hana was the opposite of her twin; she would give a smiling sigh at her sister’s boundless energy and put her passion into creativity instead. She sketched with a confident accuracy, tried her hand at sewing, knitting, cross-stitch, even baking with a rare fearlessness. Her attention, though, was lost mostly to books with an already precocious talent for literature in one so young; she kept a diary and I wondered how she might be composing this evening’s terrifying entry in her mind. I knew she would never write in her diary again. Above all my panic for my family, I was acutely aware of my shallow breath fuelled by hate and rage.

  I kept repeating in my mind that these were my final moments of life but it was having no effect on me; I don’t know what I expected of myself … should I scream, weep, beg? I suspect I already knew doing so would have little effect on the preordained outcome. If I was honest, I didn’t know how to show that sort of dramatic emotion. Lotte was the dramatic one in our family. I once overheard a friend of my mother’s calling me cold; I’m convinced she didn’t mean it as an insult but more as an observation, wishing apparently that she too possessed such glacial calm. I never agreed with her accusation; I believe what she was seeing was simply someone who had learned early how to control their expression and emotion. Control gave me power over myself and situations. It gave me discipline. It projected strength and that made people trust me. It showed me how to be quiet, how to listen, how to learn from what others were not
saying because it allowed me to observe. But yes, I suppose I came across as dislocated. And while I didn’t feel calm or strong in that moment, my demeanour gave the impression of stoicism. My father was clearly counting on it and so in my last act of devotion to him, I gave it all. I would remain silent, harness the power within and keep my chin high. I would angle my damaged gaze at Ruda Mayek until I was dead and I hope he never forgot my accusing stare … I wanted it to haunt him.

  We’d entered a denser part of the woods, where overhanging branches and bushes had intertwined to form a tunnel of sorts.

  ‘Stop here, please,’ Rudy said, uttering his first words since we’d left the vehicles behind. It was politely asked and we obeyed, shocked by the suddenness of the order. ‘Katka, would you come with me?’

  I blinked. ‘Why?’

  He didn’t answer me, looking instead to my father. ‘Samuel, I wish to say something private to Katerina. Please stay here with your family. It shouldn’t take long.’

  ‘Rudy,’ my father began but our captor held up his hand, making that awful tsking sound again.

  ‘Quiet now, man. Do as I bid. It goes easier if you do.’

  Oh, the threat in those words! If the children weren’t there I think I would have launched myself at Rudy – at least tried to take an eye out with bare fingers if I could. Tears were leaking onto my father’s cheeks and forming rivulets of sorrow into his beard. That image was unbearable. I had to look away.

  ‘It’s all right, Papa,’ I soothed. I couldn’t imagine there was anything worse to come than being led like animals to be slaughtered. I don’t think I cared any more because I realised to fight would only make it go harder, as we’d been warned.

  I took a step closer to Rudy and he gestured the way forward.

  He murmured something in German to his henchmen, but while I was fluent I couldn’t hear it properly; it was something to do with clothes. I didn’t hear enough to know what he meant and then we were walking on alone. I didn’t look back at my family for fear of watching my father break down. I heard Lotte call my name but I dared not respond; besides, Hana had begun to openly sob. There was nothing to say that might console any of us.