by Lily Graham
She watched in horror as a man was killed just for tripping and getting in a guard’s way.
After several hours standing around, heart hammering in her chest, Sofie slowly made her way to the other transport, her eyes darting back and forth, amazed that she had managed it. She would give another name, she thought, and perhaps have another fate, she hoped. She needed to live so that she could find Lotte. So that she could find her son.
She was right, as the train she’d chosen took her to Westerbork, a transit camp and ghetto. The one she’d been on was bound straight for Mauthausen, the death camp.
The smallest thing could make a difference, she realised. Going right instead of left. Life or death based on the smallest bit of luck.
Chapter Seventeen
‘Spring is coming,’ said Eva. It was a Sunday, the one day a week where they didn’t have to work, where they were free to roam around outside near their blocks. To meet and talk without fear.
Sofie looked at her in surprise. It was freezing. The snow was ankle deep, and her breath came out in puffs of clouds.
‘Look,’ said Eva, pointing. There in a small drift by her feet was a snowdrop. ‘While all this has been happening, underneath, in the ground, spring is on its way.’
Eva knelt down to look at the unexpected beauty of it in a place so desolate and barren as this.
Her back ached from her long hours working outside, which had begun to take a toll on her health. She tortured herself imagining the housekeeper Kaja’s warm chocolate babka, fresh from the oven. Long summer days by the lake, Michal’s eyes, her mother’s soft smile.
‘Slow-cooked beef goulash,’ said Sofie, carrying on an earlier conversation. ‘That’s what I’d have for lunch today if it were Sunday, not the prime cuts, but it wouldn’t matter, if you cooked it long enough. I’d be at my grandparents’ home, the flat would be warm, cosy. Tomas would be asleep in his crib, fresh from his bath or playing on the floor with the dog. My father would be doing the crossword, and I would have made bread – the way my grandmother had shown me as a child.’
She looked at Eva, her eyes sad. ‘That’s what I would be doing now, instead of this.’
Eva nodded, touched her arm. She didn’t know sometimes if it was better to let their old lives go or not, but it helped to remember them anyway, to be more than the animals they tried to reduce them to.
‘Would there be potatoes in the stew?’ she asked.
Sofie smiled. ‘A mountain of them. My grandmother grew them in her tiny garden in pots, buttery soft, crumbling into your mouth, tasting of tomato and paprika.’
‘Mmmmh,’ said Eva, picturing the taste, mouth-watering.
‘I’ll tell you one thing,’ said Sofie. ‘If I ever make it out of this place alive, I won’t be eating watery soup ever again.’
Eva nodded. ‘Or black bread.’
‘If we ever get out of this, I’ll teach you how to make bread, we’ll have tea and knead dough, and outside it won’t matter if the sky is falling as we’ll be warm and dry with full bellies.’
Eva looked at her and smiled, eyes softening. They both knew that was unlikely, but it made them feel better to think of it, to have hope that maybe one day they could live in that world again.
A week later, and spring seemed like a distant dream. An icy wind had rattled through the camp, and no one spoke of the change in season any more.
Sofie fell behind the others. Eva had gone ahead to speak to a woman she used to know that lived in her neighbourhood, and the two women shared food, and stories. On Sundays, smiles came a little quicker, and feet shuffled somewhat easier.
Sofie’s though were leaden. She’d done her usual routine, spent the morning asking everyone she met for news of Lotte. It was the same thing she did every Sunday, the same thing she would continue to do, except after five months in Auschwitz, she was beginning to lose hope.
Eva came back to her side, handing her a small piece of cheese that she’d managed to trade with one of the other women. Sofie took it but didn’t eat.
‘Are you all right?’ asked Eva, concerned, noting her friend’s vacant eyes. ‘Is it Meier? Has he done something?’
Sofie looked up, past Eva, to where the guard stood near the fence. He was always there. His blue gaze on hers, begging for more.
She shook her head, looked away, her eyes unseeing, past the snaking rows of women walking, some arm in arm, as they ambled outside in the cold wintry light. Suddenly, she straightened. The precious wedge of cheese fell out of her fingers to the ground, in her shock.
‘What is it?’ asked Eva.
Sofie didn’t say a word. Her mouth seemed to open involuntarily and close. Her gaze clamped on a cluster of women who were walking past their block. They were older, and one had a patch of bright blonde hair.
Sofie blinked. Then grabbed Eva’s hand. ‘It’s her – it’s Lotte.’
‘Are you sure?’ breathed Eva, staring across the expanse of churned-up mud to the women walking past.
But Sofie had raced off before replying, Eva in hot pursuit.
Chapter Eighteen
Prague, Autumn 1938
‘Married? Are you mad, Eva? You have only just met this boy. Though I see you have been out with him every night this week,’ her father said, putting his morning newspaper down. There was a frown between his eyes.
Eva’s eyes danced, ignoring his protestations.
‘Still, Papa. We will be getting married. I just thought you should know.’
Eva’s mother laughed, waving a manicured hand as she poured coffee from the carafe on the impeccably laid breakfast table into a fine blue china mug. Outside, the city of Prague was bathed in morning light, and Wenceslas Square below was a riot of autumn colour. Anka’s dark eyes were amused. ‘She’s not serious, she’s just teasing you, Otto.’
‘I am not,’ said Eva. She poured herself some apple juice, and gave them a stern look. ‘It is a fact, that will come true in time. I can carry on at art college when we are married – so there will be no interruption to my studies, or my desire to have a job in illustration or textile design, I still haven’t made up my mind on that just yet – thankfully, he is not one of those men who don’t want their wives to have lives, unlike Mila’s Arnold, though, as you know, Mila is happy to be traditional so long as she can host all the parties,’ she said with a fond grin, ‘… speaking of that, I’m sure babies can wait for a few years while we get our lives settled. We’ll probably live in his small apartment which isn’t far from here so we could still do Shabbat easily with the family, not that we do it that often. Anyway, he will be busy in the day, with his music, so I can come and see you often, as usual. Maybe in a year or two we will start a family though…’ she babbled, painting her vision of the future for them.
Her father’s eyes bulged in shock as he choked on his coffee, which he spat up over the crisp linen tablecloth. He picked up a napkin and wiped his mouth. ‘That is ridiculous. I have only met this man a few times, for goodness’ sake – the first didn’t create the best impression either, when he arrived, as I remind you, unannounced and uninvited I might add, to our private summer house.’
‘Oh, Papa, he didn’t even stay the night, even though Mother offered. He just came to say hello because he missed me, surely that’s not a crime,’ said Eva with a grin.
‘He made the journey just for that – exactly my point!’
‘Mine too!’ agreed Eva, meaning something quite different to her father. To her it conveyed what kind of a person Michal was – the kind who wasn’t afraid to show someone how much they meant to them, no matter the cost to himself.
‘I wish he had stayed,’ said Anka. ‘We had room, besides,’ she said rather wickedly, her slanted eyes shining, ‘he does add a certain something when he’s around, don’t you think, Eva – like that interesting shade to your father’s complexion?’
Her father frowned, glaring at his wife, not about to be teased over such a serious matter. ‘It was not a question
of room,’ he said, ignoring her other jibe completely. Not that Michal had asked to stay, he’d stayed only for the evening, he wouldn’t hear of imposing. They’d gone swimming and by the time he’d left she’d known that what she was feeling wasn’t some schoolgirl crush – it was real love, perhaps for the first time in her life.
‘It’s a question of who he is and whether he would be a good match,’ continued her father, not noticing his daughter’s distracted gaze, as she stared off into the distance, thinking about how she would decorate the tiny apartment. Bijou, she thought, correcting herself. French-inspired perhaps. Lots of colour… ‘Marriage is not something to be taken lightly, dítě.’
Eva’s attention snapped back to him as her father stressed, ‘He has hardly any family, how can we know if he’s a good man or not? I cannot allow this, he hasn’t even had the decency to ask my permission to marry you himself!’
He rested his hands together as if his words had provided an end to the discussion.
Eva sighed, waving a hand in the air to scrub away all her father’s concerns. ‘He is a good man, in fact he is a wonderful person. You know, Papa, people show you who they are when they think you are not looking. When they think no one is watching. And you know what Michal does?’
Despite himself her father blinked and said, ‘What?’
‘He is the sort of person who puts a blade of grass in a stranger’s book when the mother is dragged off to the river to look at the boats by her children, so that she won’t lose her place. He puts a hand out to stop children from crossing the street before the light changes. He gives every woman young or old his seat.’
‘These are little things, Eva, they don’t mean anything.’
‘I disagree. It’s the little things that make you who you are. Besides, he does have family, they have left the city – because of all the troubles, the fears about what will happen with Germany since the Anschluss.’
Her father pursed his lips. ‘So why didn’t he?’
‘He didn’t want to leave the symphony.’
Her father sighed. ‘So, he showed more loyalty to his company than his family?’
‘He didn’t want to abandon his country, and why should he have to leave just because of some rumours? We haven’t.’
Her father shrugged. ‘Maybe we should have.’
Her eyes widened. ‘What do you mean?’
‘It’s just that things are getting worse now. People are worried about the meeting with Hitler and the allies. It’s not certain that he won’t get the Sudetenland, after all.’
‘No one will let that happen, I’m sure – after Austria it would be madness to allow him more territory. Besides, you can’t hold it against Michal if we haven’t left our homes either.’
Her father conceded that at least. ‘I’ve been listening too much to Bedrich, it’s probably all going to be fine. But look, I know you think you are in love with this man—’
‘I don’t just think it, Papa—’
‘Still, I think you should wait. Eva. Wait to know. Marriage isn’t a joke,’ he said, looking at his wife, who gave him an unamused look.
Eva grinned. ‘I don’t need to wait, Papa, I know it the way that I know that spring comes early to Prague, that the sun rises in the east, and the way you always smile without realising when you hear the sound of heels, because it could be Mama coming through the door.’
Anka and Otto shared a soft look at that.
Eva continued, ‘But I will wait if that’s what you want. If you want to get to know him first, to see what I see. But I can tell you right now, he is the man I will marry. If he’ll have me.’
‘Eva!’ gasped her mother, her red-lipsticked lips parting in surprise. ‘You mean to tell us he hasn’t asked you yet?’
Eva grinned. ‘No, not yet anyway. I’m just preparing you.’
Her father stared at her, speechless.
Eva’s eyes danced in amusement. ‘I haven’t asked him yet, if that’s what you are worried about.’
He laughed. ‘Heaven forbid. Sometimes you are too like your mother.’
She looked at Anka. She was the most indomitable person she knew, she’d proposed to the man she loved too – it’s why she was here in this world. ‘Isn’t that a good thing?’
He smiled. ‘Of course. But why don’t you at least wait until he asks you, before we start picking out your trousseau, all right?’
She snorted. ‘I don’t see why. He might take far too long. This is a person who has spent fifteen years composing the same piece of music. I think he is not the sort of person who rushes things. He told me just yesterday that despite the fact that he recently bought new shoes, he still thinks the old shoes he always wears have got a few more good years left. You must see them, they are very old.’
Her father’s lips twitched. ‘I’m beginning to like him more and more.’
Eva laughed. ‘I’ll give him till the end of the year, all right? Then, I’ll ask him myself.’
‘I suppose that will do,’ said her father, giving her mother a helpless look.
In the end she hadn’t needed to – in the autumn, as they had feared, Sudetenland had been incorporated into the German empire, and many were saying that the rest of Czechoslovakia might soon be under occupation.
‘It’s a terrible time to ask,’ Michal said, taking her hand as they sat in her parents’ living room, after they’d listened in horror to the news on the radio. He looked at Eva’s father, then at Eva. ‘I would like to ask your permission to marry your daughter, if she will have me.’
Eva was the only one who found the will to make a joke that it had taken him long enough.
By then, Michal was an accepted part of their lives, and in the few short weeks since Eva had told her parents her intentions, they had seen what kind of a man he was, and how much he adored their daughter.
Her father nodded, then came forward to embrace him. ‘We need good news on a day like this.’
‘But, Otto, shouldn’t we do something now?’ asked Anka. ‘Bedrich has ideas, he has been saying that we should leave, that we might come under occupation. I mean, if the rumours of what they have done to the Jews in Austria is anything to go by… surely they will bring this trouble here?’ Her eyes were wide, fearful.
‘This isn’t Austria. He won’t be able to get away with that here.’ He shook his head. ‘Bedrich is panicking, it won’t come to that.’
Sofie pushed past a sea of women towards the plump woman. ‘Lotte!’ she cried.
She didn’t turn, or stop, as they began to walk away.
Sofie ran forward, her lungs on fire from the short amount of exercise she had done on her weak, malnourished legs. She grabbed the woman’s arm, roughly, shouting, ‘Lotte! Stop!’
The woman paused and looked at her, wrenching her arm out of her grip. ‘What do you want?’
Sofie blinked, then felt as if she’d been plunged in ice. Hot, choking tears threatened to fall.
It wasn’t her.
She swallowed and the woman stared at her, with big green eyes. Sofie dashed away a tear, angrily. ‘I – I’m sorry I thought you were my cousin, Lotte—’ She closed her eyes, and her legs started to shake and she was about to collapse. ‘You look just like her, except for the eyes.’
Eva dashed forward to catch her, holding her close. She had heard the exchange, and her heart ached for her friend.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Sofie, and she nudged Eva so the two could leave. Not-Lotte’s hand came out to stop her. ‘Very similar, you say?’
Sofie nodded, then looked back at her. ‘Yes.’
The woman snorted. ‘I think I know her.’ She looked at the others – whose eyes widened. ‘One of the stupid guards thought I was someone else, asked me why I was not in my usual barracks, why I had been moved, had to recheck the numbers,’ she said, referring to her tattoo.
Sofie opened and closed her mouth. ‘Do you know which one?’
She pointed towards the end of the row of women’s bar
racks in the distance. ‘The last one, there.’
It was getting late and curfew was in place. They were led back to their barracks, and would have to stay there for the night. Sofie waited till the others were asleep, then she snuck out past the Kapo’s room on tiptoe. She had found a bucket with a forgotten potato outside the Kapo’s room, which she broke in two and put in her brassiere, hardly believing her luck, it would come in handy tonight. If she was caught out of bed, she’d just go to the latrine. Maria didn’t police them as heavily as the other Kapos, she was lazy, and far more interested in sleeping. She didn’t worry about the potato, if she hadn’t taken it any one of the hundred women in the barracks would have – it was more likely that their Kapo had forgot about it, else she would never have left it. The guards didn’t patrol the blocks at night, but there were floodlights and if she was caught, she could get shot. But she had to know. She kept to the shadows as much as possible, stopping to hide near a doorway when she heard the sounds of footsteps, and she waited with her heart beating loudly in her ears for them to die down. It took forty-five minutes but she entered the last barrack of the women’s quarters, keeping as quiet as she could. She would sneak into a bunk if the Kapo came past, she decided. They were easy to recognise by their armbands, better clothing, and their air of authority.
Sofie peered at the bottom row of bunks. There were hundreds of women.
She approached one, shaking her arm. She whispered, ‘Do you know Lotte?’ The woman ignored her, and Sofie moved on. She spied one who was sitting up. She asked her too, the woman frowned and looked ready to cry out. Sofie quickly handed her half a potato. The woman stared at it in amazement, then quickly bit into the starchy flesh, her eyes closing in pleasure.
‘Lotte?’ whispered the woman after some time. ‘Blonde woman? Big eyes, plump? Sort of silly?’
