I didn’t know why the memories came. When they did, it took time for me to realize that was all they were. Memories.
I plucked a few blades of grass, broke them into various lengths, and set them up like chess pieces. When a breeze blew them away, I abandoned my efforts. On my path to recovery, I’d had books, friends, and games, but not chess. Even if I’d had pieces, Irena didn’t know how to play, and neither did Mateusz, Franz, or his parents. I could have taught them, and I could have made pieces like Father Kolbe did, but somehow it didn’t feel right. That part of me was missing, and I didn’t know when I’d find it again.
Or Hania. Her absence was another missing piece, one I needed desperately. When would I find her again? She was alive; she had to be alive. If I had left her to die as I had left my family—
“You know, I never thought basket weaving would be a skill I’d acquire.”
I turned to acknowledge Mateusz beside me. He’d spent many afternoons on the farm. Sometimes we took walks or picnicked with Irena and Franz, and sometimes we just talked. We’d gone from exchanging simple letters and having whispered conversations in the basket-weaving workshop to spending entire days together.
When Mateusz held up the tiny, crude basket he’d made from grass and straw, I wrinkled my nose. “After all the baskets we made, why would you ever want to do it again?”
He shrugged. “It wasn’t so bad.”
“Not when your employment was voluntary.”
The words came out far more harshly than I imagined they would. Whenever the memories were on the cusp of overwhelming me, somehow I lost all control.
I gathered the blanket into shaking hands and closed my eyes. Memories, just memories. The debilitating migraine would follow if I couldn’t get ahold of myself. I had to recover before I succumbed, before my friends discovered how the memories crippled me, because if they did, they’d start asking questions . . .
I managed to push the memories down, and the trembles subsided. With a sigh, I opened my eyes and plucked another blade of grass. “I’m sorry, Maciek, that wasn’t fair.”
“War isn’t fair.” He examined his work, then threw it with as much force as he could muster. The tiny basket sailed a few meters across the open field until it disappeared in the tall grass. Mateusz looked as if he wanted to say more, but he noticed Irena and Franz approaching, so he refrained.
“You owe me a new line, Irena,” Franz said. He held up the broken string and looked to us for support.
“It’s your own fault, you idiot,” Irena replied with a grin. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear—its natural brown color, not dyed blond—and sat beside me.
“As a witness to the scene, I agree with Irena.”
Franz shook his head. “I knew I’d get no sympathy from you, Maria.”
“Let me see,” Mateusz said. When Franz passed the broken kite to him, he ran his nimble fingers over it. “It’s an easy fix. Do you have more line?”
“In the barn,” Franz replied. “Help yourself. I’ve got business in town.”
“The hospital, Dr. Meinhart?” Irena asked while Mateusz took the kite and made his way toward the barn.
“Always,” he said with a wry smile.
“Any news on Hania or Izaak?” I asked.
Franz released a slow, sympathetic breath. “You know I looked all over the camp for them.”
While Franz had cared for me on Irena’s and my first day here, I had implored him to go to Auschwitz to find Hania and Izaak—an impossible task at first, as a few SS personnel had remained to guard the camp. A week later, when the Red Army arrived, he had joined the Polish Red Cross and other medics to tend to the inmates. Although he hadn’t found my friends, I’d hoped some of the other medical volunteers might have discovered something by now and passed word to him.
When he didn’t supply further information, I sighed. Irena and I never should have abandoned them.
“They didn’t disappear,” he said. “I’m sure someone found them and took them to another hospital. I promised you I’d locate them, and I will.” Franz picked up his fedora from where he’d tossed it on the blanket, placed it on his head, and kissed Irena’s cheek before crossing the field toward the barn, where he’d parked his car. After the engine rumbled to life, he drove down the dirt road and disappeared along the main street.
Irena watched him go, a thoughtful expression on her face, until she noticed the small smile playing around my lips. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Because I’m happy for you.”
“Good Lord, don’t start.” She plucked a tall blade of grass and fiddled with it before tossing it aside. “He’s German.”
“I thought you’d gotten over the fact that he’s a Volksdeutsch.”
“It’s more than that. Some Volksdeutsche barely have a drop of German blood, but Franz is only a second-generation Pole, and even though his parents grew up here, they’re both full-blooded Germans. He’s German.”
“Your point?”
“You know my point!” she exclaimed, running a hand through her hair while I sat up. “What would Mama do if I brought him home?”
“Your mother isn’t judgmental, and Franz isn’t a Nazi.”
“It’s not that simple. People see an unmarried Polish mother, and they assume she’s either a victim of war or a treacherous slut who collaborated with the soldiers, then they judge me and hate my child. I see it in their eyes every day, and if I married a Volksdeutsch—” She broke off with a huff, shaking her head in vehement refusal before dropping her voice. “I’ll be damned if I make it worse.”
I stayed quiet while Irena got up and paced back and forth in agitated silence. I’d had a feeling this decision had been plaguing her for the past few weeks, but she’d done well keeping it from everyone—especially Franz.
At last she stopped and faced the small farmhouse. “I won’t put Franz in that position, either. After we leave, he’ll find a nice girl, and Helena and I are fine on our own.”
When she looked at me, I nodded. “All right.”
She waited, but I didn’t elaborate. “That’s all you’re going to say?” she asked.
“What am I supposed to say? It’s your life. You decide what’s best for you and Helena.”
I sliced a piece of gołka and chewed it slowly, savoring the cheese’s touch of saltiness while silence lingered. Irena probably knew what I was doing, but I won every time we engaged in this particular game, so I didn’t relent. Sure enough, she heaved a sigh.
“Dammit, Maria, you’re so annoying.”
Although I grinned and she couldn’t resist a small smile, a glimmer of concern remained in her eyes. Unfounded as some of her fears may have been, only time could eliminate them.
After a moment, I spoke in a soft voice. “You can leave whenever you want, Irena.”
“How many times are you going to tell me that?” she replied as she sat down again.
“I know how much you miss them and that you didn’t expect to be away this long.”
“We talk on the telephone, and Mama and Helena are back in Warsaw now that it’s been liberated. You’re nearly well enough to leave. We’ll use the papers Franz got us and keep you as covered up as possible, and he’ll accompany us to make sure we arrive safely. We’ll be home soon.”
Silence fell, comfortable and familiar. Birds chirped in the distance and wind whistled past my ears. The tranquil farm had become our refuge, far different from the hustle of Warsaw or the wickedness of Auschwitz. The war was drawing to an end, but it wasn’t over yet, so the farm was a welcome shelter from the horrors beyond it. Still, agitation consumed me.
I’d given my letter to Mateusz a day after asking him for writing supplies, and I was still waiting for answers. The wait was almost more maddening than my wait for liberation had been.
“Franz doesn’t know about Helena,” Irena said after we’d been quiet for a while. “I’ve shared very little of my personal life with him.” She
poked her finger into a small hole in the blanket. When she spoke again, her voice was quiet. “Mama doesn’t know, either.”
“I hope she does, considering Helena is her granddaughter and she’s caring for her,” I replied with a small smile, but, when Irena lifted her head, the look in her eyes chased away my lingering humor. “You didn’t tell her how the pregnancy happened?”
She winced, then attempted to hide it behind a wry half smile. “Lovesick idiot, remember? I never thought I’d use that damn story, but it worked. When I couldn’t hide the pregnancy any longer, I told Mama I’d been seeing a young man who worked for the resistance, but he’d been caught and executed, leaving me with his child. Since Tata’s death, my dear mother has tried to make me stop swearing, because girls who swear are whores, right?”
“Don’t, Irena, that’s not fair. Not to your mother, and certainly not to you.”
Despite the sharpness in my tone, Irena raised her shoulders in a dismissive shrug. “She was upset, of course, but I assured her I’d learned from my mistakes, and she never held my actions against the baby. Since Helena’s birth, everything has been fine between us. Mama loves her.”
“And she loves you. Why do you want her to believe a lie?”
“Good Lord, it’s not important.” The forced indifference in Irena’s voice wasn’t convincing. “The Nazis killed her husband, and she doesn’t need to know what they did to her daughter, too. Let me worry about my mother, Maria, and you worry about yours.” It took her only a moment to realize her mistake. “Shit, I didn’t—”
I held up a hand to stop her, a hand that no longer displayed every bone. I was still thin, though. My body seemed to have forgotten how to retain weight. Irena fell into pensive silence while she toyed with her necklace, though I caught her eyes drifting to my forearm.
We hadn’t spoken of my time in the camp. Not my arrest, not how I’d earned the five round scars she looked at when she thought I wasn’t paying attention, not the story behind my flogging, certainly not Fritzsch. She was concerned that I was being too quiet—I’d overheard her telling Franz, who assured her I’d be fine—but I was quiet because I had a lot on my mind. Otherwise, our friendship had returned to normal.
I reclined, slipped my hand into my front pocket, and passed my fingers over the rosary beads. Sometimes I forgot I wasn’t wearing my blue-and-gray-striped uniform. Since we’d come to the farm, we’d purchased a few items from town, including new clothes. If any of my garments didn’t come equipped with pockets, I sewed them on.
Brushing flecks of grass off my skirt, I stood, and we cleaned up the remnants of our picnic. I was folding the blanket when I heard Franz’s car parking near the barn, then a shout floated across the field and reached my ears.
“Are you going to say hello to me or not, shikse?”
At once, I dropped the blanket. I’d have known that voice anywhere, but I had to see its owner to believe it. Sure enough, there she was, standing next to Franz and grinning, and I sprinted across the field and didn’t stop until I’d caught her in my arms.
“Careful, you’ll knock us both over,” Hania said, laughing as she returned the fierce embrace. “Let me look at you.”
She took my face in her hands, and I held on to her wrists, reassuring myself that she was real. Releasing her felt like it would wake me from a better dream than any I’d had in a long time. But she was here, truly here, as real as I was. Her familiar dark eyes sparkled with vibrance, and her thick, dark hair was short, but growing back even faster than mine. She wore a simple dress, and it hugged a frame that was reshaping into delicate curves.
After a moment, Hania stroked her thumbs across my cheeks, as if reassuring herself that I was real, too, before kissing them. “You’re more beautiful than ever, Maria.”
“So are you, Bubbe,” I whispered. “Franz, you knew Hania was alive all this time?”
“I spent my whole first day in the camp looking for her, and when I found her, I said shikse sent love to Bubbe, like you told me to. That’s all it took to convince her to trust me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“That’s my fault,” Hania said before he could reply. “Izaak cared for me as well as he could, but when Franz found me, I still had a terrible case of typhus. I told him not to tell you in case I died. I recovered but caught pneumonia a few days later. By the time I was finally regaining my health, I decided to wait until I was well enough to surprise you. Franz has been taking care of me in the Pszczyna hospital.”
I flashed a grateful smile at him, then asked the next question on my mind, praying I didn’t know the answer. “Where is Izaak?”
She pressed her lips together before replying. “As soon as he’d recuperated, he and some Sonderkommando workers left together. I coaxed him into telling me where they were going, and all he said was looking for war criminals.” She looked past me for a moment and took a deep breath. “I don’t want to know what that means. He promised to meet me in Warsaw by the end of the summer.”
Mateusz emerged from the barn, likely alerted by the commotion. “You were in almost every letter Maria sent me, Hania,” he said, grinning. “I’m—”
“No need for introductions. I’ve heard so much about you, Mateusz,” she replied, and his smile widened. When he turned to give Franz the kite he’d repaired, she studied him before leaning closer to me and speaking in a sly whisper. “Mazel tov.”
I gave her a light, discreet shove and pretended I didn’t hear her chuckles. Still, at the sound, one that had seen me through the darkest moments during the past four years, my throat tightened. At last one of my missing pieces had returned. One I never should have lost in the first place. When I caught her hands in mine, she sobered.
“Not once did you leave my side,” I managed, swallowing hard. “But I left yours.”
Hania shook her head. “You and Irena gave me my brother, perhaps saved both our lives. My boys won’t have their father, cousins, aunt, or grandparents, but they will have their mother and uncle. For that, I can’t express my gratitude. And now the three of us are together again, aren’t we?” she added as Irena joined us and pulled her into an embrace. When they released each other, Hania gave her a small smile. “Irena,” she said, emphasizing her name as her eyes swept over the darker hair and civilian clothing that had replaced Frieda’s blond locks and SS uniform.
“Hania,” she replied with the same emphasis, grinning before addressing Franz. “You’ve been caring for her for weeks?”
“A doctor never breaches his patient’s trust.”
“I already have papers, too, thanks to him.” Hania barely contained her delight as she turned to me. “He said you wrote to your friends about my sons. It’s all right if we go home tomorrow to see what they’ve found, isn’t it?”
Tomorrow. I’d promised myself I wouldn’t return to Warsaw until I’d found Fritzsch, but I’d made a promise to Hania, too. It would have been cruel to make her wait any longer, but I wasn’t ready. Not until I’d heard from Mateusz’s connections.
“Of course. It’s time we went home,” Irena said before I could reply. She led the way toward the farmhouse without waiting for a reaction.
Franz watched her go, then started after her, saying something about telling his parents they’d have another guest for the evening.
As we caught up to Irena, I took a deep, calming breath. Mateusz would contact me as soon as he heard from his connections. We’d go to Warsaw tomorrow and see what Mother Matylda and Mrs. Sienkiewicz had discovered about Hania’s children, then I’d refocus on Fritzsch. The order of my plan was changing, that was all.
I inserted myself between Irena and Hania and wrapped my arms around their waists. The two friends I loved most in the world, both with me, alive and well. It had been a long time since I’d had this feeling, a feeling I might have described as akin to true, unbridled happiness.
As I released them to follow everyone inside, a familiar grasp caught my hand and pulled me to a st
op. I turned to face Mateusz, expecting news of Fritzsch until his sober expression told me otherwise.
“There’s no sense in me trying to come up with another way to tell you this,” he said with a half smile once the door closed behind our friends. “I’ll be attending an American university in the fall. In the United States, to be exact. My uncle lives in New York, so I’m staying with him.”
America. I blinked, letting the idea roll around inside my head, before voicing the first thing I could think to say. “You don’t speak English.”
He chuckled. “I’ve started learning. I leave next month.”
Even though I smiled and told him how happy I was for him, I couldn’t help feeling as I had when he’d moved to Pszczyna. Once again, I was losing my friend and my aide in my mission against Fritzsch. Staying in touch from Warsaw would have been challenging enough, but America added a new level of complication. My plan couldn’t be ruined now. Not when I was so close.
I often wondered what might have been if we’d met under different circumstances. These past few months had given me glimpses of it. Long walks across the fields, his hand in mine; baking pączki together and filling the balls of sweet fried dough with strawberry jam; sitting in the tall grass and watching the sunset, serenaded by chirping crickets, his arm around my waist, my head on his shoulder. Each moment, I almost felt like one of those girls I once passed on my walk to and from Birkenau. The kind of girl I might have been. I had believed that our time together would continue, perhaps would take us to Warsaw for breakfast at the Hotel Bristol café, followed by a walk down the Krakowskie Przedmieście and past Saint John’s Archcathedral. Now the moments were coming to an end, taken by a play I hadn’t foreseen.
I wasn’t ready to lose either one—our future moments or my plans.
The Last Checkmate Page 30
