It’s not luminous like my watch, but that’s not a problem. We won’t need it in the dark. We’ll be at the main camp by this afternoon.
If I can keep moving.
Both my vests are in the medical bunker. This coat is thin and torn and too small, and it isn’t keeping any of the wind out.
I huddle against Dom for warmth.
What’s that noise?
My insides sink. I know what it is.
The safety catch on a gun.
‘Stop or I’ll shoot,’ says a familiar voice.
Szulk steps out from behind a tree. He and Mr Pavel must have got back early.
Dom and I stop.
Szulk grins at the two partisans with him.
‘Maybe we’ll shoot anyway,’ he says to them.
‘No we won’t,’ says one of the other partisans. ‘The kid’s not running and he’s not armed. I’m not shooting an unarmed kid. Let Pavel do it.’
Mr Pavel looks like he will do it.
He stands in the clearing, gripping his gun, glaring angrily at Dom and the snow brush and me.
‘Cunning getaway attempt,’ Szulk says to him. ‘That’s one thing you can say about Jews, they are cunning.’
Mr Pavel doesn’t look like he’s impressed much by cunning people. And he looks like disobedient people don’t impress him at all.
‘It was my idea,’ I croak. ‘Not Dom’s.’
‘Felix,’ calls a loud and alarmed voice.
It’s Yuli, hurrying over to us from the sleeping bunker. As she gets closer, I see her staring at the snow brush.
‘Felix,’ she says angrily. ‘You promised you wouldn’t try out your invention without me there.’
I stare at her. I don’t know what she’s talking about.
Yes I do.
She’s trying to give me good protection.
Mr Pavel is staring at her as well.
‘Invention?’ he says.
‘I was explaining to Felix how snow tracks are a big problem for us,’ says Yuli. ‘He came up with this.’
Szulk gives a snort of disgust.
Mr Pavel isn’t snorting. He’s looking doubtful, but interested.
Slowly my insides unclench.
‘Does it work?’ says Mr Pavel to Szulk. ‘Does it hide footprints?’
Szulk is having trouble saying anything.
‘Yes, it does,’ says one of the other partisans who caught me.
Mr Pavel looks at the snow brush again, then does something he’s never done before.
Pinches my cheek, in a nice way.
‘Give him some pork fat,’ he says to one of the partisans. ‘And oats for the horse.’
I’m breathless with relief. Dom hasn’t had oats since we left the farm. Mr Pavel must be really happy with my invention. And pork fat is a very special reward. The camp supply is buried in a sack in a secret place that only Mr Pavel and a couple of others know about. Yuli says you get a frozen slice of it, salty and fatty and delicious.
While the partisan goes to get Dom’s oats and my fat, Mr Pavel and some of the others get Dom to show them how the snow brush works.
I have a vision of Dom on missions. Helping the partisans creep up on Nazis and then helping them get away without leaving footprints.
Gabriek would be so proud.
Yuli grabs me. Before I can thank her for the good protection, she takes me across the clearing.
‘Shame you didn’t say goodbye,’ she says.
I want to remind her about the hug I gave her yesterday, but I don’t want to spoil it by turning it into an excuse.
‘Because if you had,’ says Yuli, ‘I could have given you the things I got you on my mission last night.’
She takes me into a bunker I haven’t been into before.
Inside I see it’s a storage bunker, where food and equipment and bullets are kept.
And something else. I’ve heard the partisans talking about this. Wrapped-up dead bodies that can’t be buried till the ground thaws.
Piled against another wall are sacks with German writing on them.
‘We ambushed a Nazi supply truck,’ says Yuli. ‘We hoped it was carrying guns or food. But it was carrying stuff from a concentration camp.’
Yuli rummages in one of the sacks and pulls out a thick coat. She throws it to me.
I stare at it, and at the other clothes spilling out of the sack. Clothes the Nazis stole from murdered people. I don’t feel good about this.
Yuli looks at me.
I think she can see what I’m feeling.
‘If you were dead,’ she says, ‘would you mind if your coat was keeping somebody else warm? Somebody who was fighting the people who’d killed you?
I think about this.
‘No,’ I say. ‘I wouldn’t.’
I put the coat on. It’s a bit big. But really warm.
‘You’ll grow into it,’ says Yuli. ‘Unless you pull a stunt like trying to escape again.’
Her eyes flick to the wrapped-up dead bodies.
We look at each other.
‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘I’m sorry I doubted you.’
Yuli looks puzzled.
I’ve started saying it now, so I have to finish.
‘I was worried you might tell Mr Pavel about my escape attempt,’ I mumble.
Yuli stares at me for a while before she speaks.
‘A lot of people have let you down, haven’t they?’ she says. ‘I know they didn’t all mean to, but that’s how it must feel.’
I nod.
‘Well,’ says Yuli, ‘I won’t.’
We look at each other. I can see she means it.
‘By the way,’ she says. ‘A message came through from the main camp. Gabriek is doing well. He plans to be here by the end of the month.’
I try to say thank you again, but I’m feeling too emotional.
Yuli pretends not to notice.
‘I got you something else,’ she says.
She opens another sack. I peer into it. Inside are hundreds of pairs of glasses.
‘Amputation,’ barks Doctor Zajak. ‘Amputation is the only cure for frostbite this bad.’
The partisan lying on the table is unconscious, so he doesn’t hear Doctor Zajak, which is probably for the best.
‘Hot,’ snaps Doctor Zajak, handing me a thin knife which I now know is called a scalpel.
I heat the scalpel in a candle flame.
We get to work.
Doctor Zajak uses another scalpel to slice into the skin of the man’s ankle.
I use the hot one like Doctor Zajak showed me, burning the ends of the veins and arteries so they stop bleeding.
Now I’ve got new glasses I can see exactly what I’m doing.
Doctor Zajak picks up his saw, which has been standing in a bucket of salty water. He saws the man’s ankle for a while. I think I’m going to be sick, but I remember that the partisan has got gangrene and he’ll die if we don’t do this.
At least we don’t have to worry about the partisan waking up. The poor man has been unconscious for three days since a Nazi grenade went off near him. Doctor Zajak says it’s called a coma.
We take it in turns, Doctor Zajak with the saw, me with the scalpel.
Finally the sawing is finished.
I do the last bit of burning, and then wipe the partisan’s ankle stump with vodka. Now that me and Doctor Zajak have been working together for a while, there are some things I know to do without even being told.
Doctor Zajak hands me the partisan’s foot so I can see what gangrene looks like up close. Black and blotchy basically, and oozy.
It’s very horrible, and if today was a couple of weeks ago I’d probably be throwing up. But the Nazis don’t throw up when they see horrible things. If I’m going to help defeat them I have to learn not to as well. Gabriek would understand. He’d call it good education.
I put the foot in the bits bucket.
Doctor Zajak has left some flaps of skin hanging off the end of the partisan’s ankle stump, and
now he’s folding them over and sewing them up.
While he does, I wipe the last trickles of blood away with the vodka vest.
Doctor Zajak looks closely at the finished stump.
‘Good,’ he says.
I know he’s saying it to me as well as the stump. I feel proud. I’ve never helped cut off a foot before.
Doctor Zajak turns to me.
‘Thank you,’ he says.
I stop my mouth from falling open.
‘Help me carry him over to the sleeping bunker,’ says Doctor Zajak.
While we slowly carry the partisan across the clearing, with me stumbling sometimes, I see Doctor Zajak looking at my legs. He’s been doing that a bit lately.
‘You’ve got some muscle atrophy there,’ he says.
I’m not sure what to say.
‘Looks pretty advanced,’ says Doctor Zajak. ‘You’re in for a painful old age. Only one thing’ll save you.’
I stare at him. For a horrible moment I think he’s going to say ‘amputation’.
‘Exercise,’ says Doctor Zajak. ‘Every day. Weight-bearing exercises. And stretching. I’ll show you how.’
‘Thanks,’ I say, relieved.
‘I’ll show you before dinner,’ says Doctor Zajak. ‘Then you can eat, or make another failed escape attempt, or do whatever you want to do.’
He gives me a look. He almost smiles, but not quite.
I smile at him.
I know exactly what I’m going to do after the exercise lesson.
Share my pork fat with Yuli.
Then have a talk to Dom. Tell him we’re staying a while longer. Until Gabriek gets here at the end of the month.
weeks of no medical mistakes, I just made one.
Today of all days. Doctor Zajak’s birthday.
‘Water,’ snaps Doctor Zajak, ‘not vodka.’
‘Sorry,’ I say.
We’re cutting a partisan’s ingrown toenails. Hot water softens them. Vodka makes them harder.
I struggle to concentrate, but I can’t.
Today is the end of the month.
Gabriek said he’d be back by today, and he’s not.
All month I’ve been trying hard not to think about him. Not letting my mind wander while I’ve been helping Doctor Zajak with wound repairs and bullet removals and leg amputations and toenail trims.
But today I can’t help it.
‘Happy birthday, Zajak,’ says the partisan on the table. ‘I’ll drink to your birthday even if the boy’s not interested.’
He grabs the bottle of vodka and takes a swig.
‘I am interested,’ I say. ‘Happy birthday, Doctor Zajak.’
But the partisan’s right. It’s hard to concentrate on Doctor Zajak’s birthday while I’m thinking about Gabriek.
Gabriek always keeps his word. It’s one of the things that makes him such a good person. So why hasn’t he kept his word now?
Doctor Zajak is looking at me. I think he wants me to drink to his birthday. But I don’t drink vodka and the only water here is in the bowl I’m holding and the partisan’s feet have been in that.
‘Sorry,’ I say to Doctor Zajak. ‘Can I drink to your birthday later when I refill the water barrel?’
Doctor Zajak doesn’t say anything.
He looks at me some more, and sighs.
‘Listen,’ he says, and his voice is gentler than I’ve ever heard it. ‘When Borowski said he’d be back by the end of the month, he was probably forgetting there’s a war on. Plans are always changing in wartime. Travel arrangements get delayed.’
‘That’s right,’ says the partisan. ‘I ordered a taxi last July and it still hasn’t arrived.’
You know how when you worry too much it all builds up until you start to get stabbing pains in your chest even though you haven’t actually been stabbed?
That’s happening to me.
It was nice of Doctor Zajak and the partisan to try to make me feel better, but it didn’t work. I’m lying here on the straw, trying to get to sleep, and my brain is buzzing like a swarm of Nazis.
I can’t stop thinking of bad reasons why Gabriek hasn’t come back.
What if his head wound has made him lose his memory? Or he’s gone blind? Or he’s got some other medical complication? I’ve seen it happen. Last week we took a bullet out of a partisan’s neck, and the next day his eardrum burst. He was getting wax out with the tip of a bayonet, but still.
I wish Yuli was back so we could talk.
I hate these mornings when Yuli and Dom aren’t back. Yuli said last night their mission would be a long one, but I still hate them being out in daylight.
Now I’m worrying about them as well.
I take a deep breath.
I tell myself a story. Sometimes stories give us hope. Specially ones that could be true.
For example, the cooking pot at the main camp could be broken and Gabriek could be mending it before he comes back here. It could be a big job if he has to scrape all the burnt stew off first.
Or the main camp partisans could have shot down a Nazi plane and asked Gabriek to use some of the bits to improve the heating system in their sleeping bunker, including making extractor fans from the propellers.
This feels better.
I can probably think of a hundred good reasons why Gabriek isn’t back yet. But I don’t need to. He’ll be here sooner or later, and I’m starting to feel sleepy.
Except what’s that shouting?
It’s the middle of the day. People are asleep. Why can’t those selfish oafs have some consideration?
Wait a second.
It sounds like Yuli and Dom and the others are back from their mission, and it sounds like someone’s been hurt.
I scramble out of the sleeping bunker.
Oh.
Blood on the snow.
Splashes of it everywhere.
I can see why. A partisan is lying near the bunker, blood all over him. I feel for his pulse. He’s dead.
Where are Yuli and Dom?
I look around frantically.
Dom is being tethered to his tree and his official partisan blanket is being thrown over him.
He looks fine.
Then I see Yuli.
Two partisans are carrying her towards the hospital bunker. Her head is lolling and she’s got blood on her face.
I sprint to the hospital bunker as fast as my legs will go. I overtake Yuli, not daring to look at her, and crash in through the door flap.
‘Hot,’ I yell. ‘Clean.’
Doctor Zajak sits up sleepily, stares at me crossly for a moment, then swings his legs off the table as the door flap crashes open again and the partisans carry Yuli in.
‘Hot,’ snaps Doctor Zajak. ‘Clean.’
Once Yuli is laid out on the table, I check her vital signs like I’ve been taught.
She’s breathing.
And speaking.
‘Outnumbered,’ she mumbles. ‘Jumped us.’
She’s also bleeding. But not from her face. From her shoulder.
‘Bullet wound,’ I yell. ‘Right shoulder.’
I feel Doctor Zajak’s exasperated breath on my neck.
‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘But if you check my vital signs too, you’ll find they’re all fine. Specially my eyesight.’
‘Clean wound,’ I say. ‘Bullet out.’
I know Doctor Zajak can see that too, but I have to keep doing medical things so I don’t cry.
I press the vodka cloth onto Yuli’s shoulder and we check her over for other wounds. There’s a lot of blood on her clothes, which must have come from her shoulder because she doesn’t seem to have any other bullet holes.
But when Doctor Zajak pushes up her clothes to make sure her tummy’s alright, we see something else.
Scars.
Old ones.
Bigger scars than I’ve ever seen, all coming from the middle of her tummy like a big star.
Doctor Zajak makes a whistling sound that I’ve never he
ard him make before, and he’s seen some very serious wounds.
‘Incredible,’ he says. ‘If she was able to survive that, she’s not going to be bothered by a simple shoulder wound.’
Doctor Zajak is wrong, Yuli is bothered by it.
I can tell by the way she winces with pain whenever she moves in her sleep. Sometimes she pulls at the bandage as if she wants to take it off.
I watch her carefully in case I have to stop her doing that.
‘Felix.’
Yuli opens her eyes and looks at me.
‘Felix, you have to get some sleep.’
She pats the straw next to her with her good hand.
‘Do your leg exercises,’ she says. ‘Then go to bed.’
I put Doctor Zajak’s thermometer into the corner of Yuli’s mouth.
When I check it, she doesn’t have a fever. Which is strange because she must be delirious, thinking that a medical assistant would even consider going to sleep on duty, specially up the women’s end of the bunker.
I hope she’s not developing complications.
‘How do you feel?’ I ask her.
‘Muscle wounds are always painful,’ she says. ‘But the worst thing is how long they take to mend. What did Zajak say, three weeks?’
I nod.
Doctor Zajak said something else about muscle wounds, but not when Yuli could hear. He said how with a muscle wound, you never know till it heals if the arm can ever be fully used again.
I look at Yuli’s unhappy face and I wonder if she did hear.
I wish there was something I could do. If only we had some of that penicillin stuff.
‘Yuli,’ I say. ‘You know how they’ve got special medicine at the main camp? Why don’t I take you there? Me and Dom. I’ll get a cart.’
She smiles at me.
‘That’s a sweet offer,’ she says. ‘But I’d rather be here where I belong. Being looked after by two top medical experts.’
It’s a kind thing to say, but she’s exaggerating. The top medical expert is whoever mended her tummy.
I don’t say that.
‘Thanks,’ I mumble.
‘Anyway,’ says Yuli. ‘You’d only be disappointed.’
I’m not sure what she means.
‘Why?’ I say. ‘Has the main camp run out of penicillin?’
‘Gabriek isn’t there,’ says Yuli.
I stare at her.
‘I saw him last night on my mission,’ she says. ‘He’s fine. He volunteered to join a sabotage unit. He’s heading north to blow up some trains.’
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