Beyond the Shadow of Night

by Ray Kingfisher

  “Thank you.”

  “Have you heard from them?” she said.

  He gave his head a disconsolate shake. “They were deported, I’m left to assume.”

  “Oh. I’m . . . I’m sorry.”

  “Do you know where to?” Asher said.

  Josef stared at each of them in turn. “You must have heard?”

  “We’ve all heard rumors.”

  “Of course,” Josef said. “I don’t know the details for certain. Some say they become slaves, some say they are all shot. I only know they are never seen or heard from again.”

  “So it’s possible they’re still alive?”

  “Let me put it this way.” He took a deep breath. “If a dozen people leave the city and you never hear from them again, so what? If a thousand people do the same—just disappear—it’s suspicious. But hundreds of thousands? Something is very, very wrong.”

  Rina’s face creased up.

  “I’m sorry,” Josef said. “Your parents. Your sister. I’m being insensitive, but I’m trying to be realistic.”

  “That’s all right,” Rina said, wiping away a tear.

  “Right.” Josef put on an artificial smile. “We have to keep our spirits up so that—”

  A sound made him stop. Asher recognized it: the oven door was opening. Then there was a distinctive rap on the hatch.

  Josef held a finger up to his lips and took a step back. He lifted the piece of wood holding the hatch shut and pulled out his pistol, pointing it at the hatch.

  A body fell through—a young man, not much older than Asher. He pulled on the string to close the oven door.

  Josef held out a hand to help the man up and they exchanged a few words. Asher only half understood, but this was clearly the final member of the group Josef had mentioned.

  “This is Anatoli,” Josef said. “He’s a Russian soldier. He’s not Jewish, and for that matter, neither is Adolf. But they both believe in the cause. They fight for humanity rather than their countries.” He glanced at them both. “And because they are Gentiles, it’s easier for them to smuggle guns and food to the resistance.”

  “So where are our guns?” Rina said.

  Josef looked embarrassed, a crooked smile slightly spoiling his revolutionary demeanor. “We only have three. But you won’t be left out. I promise.”

  Chapter 18

  Warsaw, Poland, 1943

  Asher lost track of the days and weeks passing in the dark cocoon they were all hiding out in, but Josef was true to his word about including him and his sister in missions to disrupt the Nazi cleansing of Warsaw, although for the first few missions Asher and Rina were little more than observers.

  Then came their first practice. Josef stressed, as he always did, that Rina and Asher could stay in the hiding place if they wanted to, but were also welcome to come along. Each time, it was an easy decision: the hiding place was like a prison cell.

  Asher and Rina kept low while the other men shot an isolated group of four SS guards at a sentry point. On the way back, the group detoured through an abandoned hall of some sort, and Rina and Asher took turns to shoot at targets scraped into the bare plaster walls. “Learn quickly,” Josef said. “We can’t waste bullets.”

  The next mission was more involved—and more frightening, as far as Asher was concerned. They’d climbed onto the roof of a housing block and were all leaning over the edge, looking down at a regiment of guards—SS, Wehrmacht, or police, it was hard to tell from above.

  Josef offered the gun to Asher. He hesitated to take it.

  “I’ll try,” Rina said.

  And she did, keeping both hands on the gun and gently squeezing the trigger as she’d practiced. Directly below them, a splash of blood appeared on the top of a cap, and a man collapsed to the ground. Before his body hit the earth there were more shots, killing six or seven guards, Asher guessed. In the course of the arguments and panic below, some guards looked up, spotting the source of the gunfire.

  “Follow me!” Josef shouted.

  A jump across onto another roof, onto a third by balancing on a length of piping, down a flight of stairs, through a hole in the wall, down more stairs, and out into a backstreet. Into and out of another house, around a corner, then into the house where their dummy oven lay waiting for the heroes to return.

  “You did well,” Josef said to Rina between hard breaths, as they rested on the floor of their hiding place a few minutes later. He glanced at Asher. “You can shoot on the next mission.”

  Again, Josef was true to his word.

  Asher was told it would be a simple mission. Ground level. Along the way, Anatoli disappeared for a few minutes, rejoining them with a large box under his arm. The team made their way through ruined buildings—too many for Asher to keep count of—before settling inside one, crouching below three large holes in the wall, which afforded good views of a small square outside.

  “Our intelligence tells us they often meet up here,” Josef whispered to Asher. “It’s just a question of waiting.”

  Walls full of holes and no roof to speak of allowed a bracing wind to cut through, and as Asher hunkered down he had time to work out where they were—or what this place had once been. Blackened objects, row upon row of them, occupying equally black shelving cabinets of some sort. A few fragments of printed paper, shapeless and edged in brown, fluttered down next to Asher. This had been a library, a place of peace and learning, now of no use except as a barricade, a piece of guerrilla-war machinery.

  The noise of a vehicle approaching snapped Asher out of his thoughts.

  Josef handed him a gun, but held Asher’s hand down. “Wait,” he whispered. “There will be more.”

  He was right. Within minutes more vehicles had arrived, guards were chatting, helmets were removed, and cigarettes were being exchanged. One or two guards opened small flasks and swigged from them.

  “Okay,” Josef hissed, and nudged Asher toward one of the holes in the wall. He turned to Adolf and Anatoli, who nodded, then he whispered a countdown.

  Asher pointed the pistol at the nearest soldier, stilled his breathing, and squeezed the trigger. Before the man’s body fell to the ground there was more gunfire from Josef and Adolf, and then an explosion made Asher jump. He looked left to see Anatoli lobbing hand grenades over the top of the wall.

  Asher looked through the hole in the wall again. The soldier he’d shot was sprawled, lifeless, on the ground where he’d fallen. Asher should have been pleased with himself; he should have been proud. It was an excellent shot for a first kill. One less Nazi. But he felt sick, and for a few seconds was unable to breathe. He’d always thought ending any life was unacceptable. And he still did. But there was no time to consider his feelings: the return fire had started.

  “Let’s go,” Josef said, not panicking, not shouting, merely speaking as if suggesting it was time to leave the library for the matinee performance of a show.

  They started running.

  Again, Asher couldn’t keep track of the number of ruined buildings they entered and exited, nor the number of streets and alleys they crossed. At one point they came under fire again, and Josef shouted for them all to go back. They turned, and Anatoli took the lead. Asher didn’t know how, but Anatoli somehow led them all back to the hiding place, and they got through the oven before the guards even reached the same street.

  Whether Asher liked it or not, and even though it sounded ridiculous, this dark, fetid place was now his and Rina’s home.

  In the darkness, they stayed silent as the sound of the guards came and went.

  Josef put an arm around Asher and squeezed him. “You’re getting used to it,” he said. “Aren’t you?”

  Asher nodded, although it wasn’t true.

  The next mission was a similar operation, an ambush of soldiers taking a break. The ruin they were in was even more unsettling than the library. It had once been a synagogue—one Asher had been inside when it was in full possession of its glory and solemnity. Today, it was mere
ly another part of a battlefield.

  Asher shot and killed two guards—they looked like local police. Again, the feeling was one of nausea, not glory, and he felt unable to shoot more. Josef grabbed the gun back and continued. This time there were no hand grenades, and they quickly ran out of bullets.

  And this time the retreat to the hiding hole didn’t go so well; bullets flew around their ears as they weaved and ducked. At one point Anatoli—in his customary position bringing up the rear—yelped in pain. Asher looked back. The man had taken a bullet in the shoulder. He shouted at Asher, telling him to carry on, and quickly.

  They reached their street and dipped into the house, to the sound of guards running after them. After a frantic clamber through the oven, Josef pulled the door shut only a few seconds before they heard the clatter of boots on the kitchen floor.

  As before, Asher heard the guards talking, arguing, walking out then back into the house, all melded with the sound of the five resistance fighters gasping for breath but trying to keep those gasps quiet.

  When the guards could no longer be heard, Josef lit a candle, which showed off his crooked smile of crooked teeth. By now Asher had a lot of respect for this man. After all, he’d been living in these horrible conditions for much longer than Asher and Rina, and seemed happy to kill guards, whereas Asher felt uncomfortable ending someone’s life. The same could be said of Adolf and Anatoli too.

  And Anatoli was now paying the price for that bravery.

  “Anatoli took a bullet,” Asher said to Josef.

  But Josef was more interested in Adolf, and was staring, wild-eyed, across at him. Asher, Anatoli, and Rina looked too. Adolf had a concerned, almost pained expression on his face—as if he were the one who had been shot.

  Josef asked him a question in German. He didn’t reply. Josef asked again, more firmly. Now Adolf replied. Asher couldn’t understand, but there was no doubting the fear in the man’s voice.

  Josef and Adolf exchanged a few more words, then a deep frown sat itself on Josef’s forehead.

  “What is it?” Rina said. “Tell us what Adolf said.”

  Josef pursed his lips for a moment, then drew breath and spoke in a measured tone.

  “He heard a little of what the guards outside were saying. He said they kept mentioning the kitchen wall, how it doesn’t look right from the outside.”

  Even the warm, flickering candlelight could not imbue the faces Asher saw with any confidence. They all bowed their heads, rubbed their chins, scratched their heads. Anything but speak the unspeakable.

  “We have to be honest here,” Josef said after a few minutes. “Perhaps we should move. There are other hiding places—ones Adolf, Anatoli, and I know about.”

  “You think we’ll be safer there?” Rina asked.

  Josef looked at the other men. He faced Adolf and opened his mouth to speak, but suddenly turned to Anatoli. “I’m sorry, Anatoli, I forgot. You have a bullet wound?”

  Anatoli screwed his face up slightly and pushed one side of his jacket over his shoulder, revealing a bloody shirt. “I think it’s just a nick,” he said.

  The amount of blood implied otherwise, Asher thought. Yes, this was a brave man, but one in need of medical attention.

  Josef and Adolf talked some more in German, then Josef addressed the others.

  “From what he heard, Adolf thinks they will come back here later, perhaps take some measurements. He suggests we pack up what food we have and leave here as soon as possible, and I have to agree. If they find us, they’ll kill us.”

  The others nodded.

  “I could do with some iodine and bandages,” Anatoli said. “What about the hideout in the basement of the medical center?”

  Josef nodded, then asked Adolf, Rina, and Asher. All agreed.

  “Good,” Josef said. “We’ll wait ten minutes for things outside to settle, then go there. In the meantime, we celebrate quietly. We all did well today.” He looked over to Asher, and even by the flickering light of the candle, Asher’s unease at killing must have showed. “It’s hard, I know,” Josef said. “You know you’re snuffing the life out of someone—someone with a wife, a mama and papa, perhaps children.”

  “I think it’s more that he’s lovesick,” Rina said.

  Asher told her to shut up. There was a little laughter. Asher joined in.

  “Ahh,” Rina said. “He’s pining for his violinist girlfriend.”

  “No, I’m not,” Asher said. “Well, perhaps a little.”

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Josef said. “I miss my wife every minute of every day.” He let out a frustrated sigh and gazed into the darkness. Then he forced a smile onto his face and said, “This violinist girl of yours, she’s not the black-haired one who used to play on the east side of the sector every day, is she?”

  “How many black-haired girl violinists do you know within the sector?” Asher replied.

  “Asher, don’t be rude,” Rina said. “Please excuse my brother.”

  “No, no,” Josef said. “It’s a fair point. She’s a good musician, and very pretty too.”

  “You mean, she was,” Asher said with more than a hint of bitterness.

  “Was?”

  “She . . . she disappeared a few months ago.”

  “You mean, she disappeared from the Jewish sector.” Josef cast a questioning glance over to Anatoli. “Isn’t that what you told me?”

  Anatoli nodded. “I heard that the nuns smuggled her out.”

  Asher crawled over and grabbed him by the arm. “What did you say?”

  “I don’t know for certain. I just heard.”

  Rina scolded Asher once more from the other side of the room.

  “I’m sorry,” he said to Anatoli. “But please, tell me what you know.”

  “I don’t think they told me her name.” He paused, recalling. “But I think she used to play in some café run by her parents before they put the wall up.”

  “Café Baran?”

  “Yes.” Anatoli nodded, uncertain at first. “Yes, that was it. Café Baran.”

  “So, what nuns are you talking about?”

  “There are Catholic nuns in Warsaw,” Josef explained. “The authorities trust them and they’re, shall we say, sympathetic to our cause. They’ve smuggled hundreds—perhaps thousands—of children out of the Jewish sector, and quite a few adults too, usually because they’re sick and in need of medical attention.”

  “And where is she now?” Asher asked them both.

  Josef and Anatoli both shrugged. “We have no idea,” Josef said. “I take it this girl means a lot to you?”

  Asher hesitated. Rina spoke for him.

  “He was in love with her. Well, as much as anyone can be in love in this place.”

  “I’m sorry we don’t know any more,” Josef said. “But we have contacts. We can ask.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” Asher said. “You’ve given me hope.”

  “We all need a little of that,” Josef said. “But now we should go. Let’s collect up what food we have and head for the medical center.”

  They all stood up, and Josef moved toward the shelf of food.

  Before he reached it, they all heard a deep, threatening rumble from outside. They stopped completely still, each holding an uncertain, worried stare.

  “What in God’s name is that?” Josef hissed.

  Then the whole room shook, and a wall crashed in as if a sudden earthquake had hit. Asher tried to crouch down but felt his frame being bowled over by the force of a dozen bricks, and saw the whole room engulfed in a billowing cloud of dust. He got to his feet and took a few seconds to check himself. There were some nasty cuts and bruises on his arms and legs, but nothing more serious.

  He looked up at a vision that was almost celestial. Where there had once been the clear yellow light of the candle, there was now bright white light. And yet, he could hardly see his hand in front of his face. Then the tickle in his lungs was too much, and he convulsed into a coughing fit, leanin
g over, hands on knees.

  His ears were still full of the sounds of others coughing and a dull ringing, but beyond those he couldn’t ignore the shouts.

  They were angry shouts.

  In German.

  Asher, blinking and trying to clear his eyes with dusty fingers, realized the bright light was sunshine streaming through the haze of brick dust. A few seconds later, the fog cleared enough for him to make out the four figures of his fellow resistance members, all gasping for fresh air and wiping their faces.

  He went over to Rina. They briefly held hands, and Asher wiped a chunk of mortar out of her hair.

  The haze cleared more, to reveal a pile of bricks in front of them. Beyond the rubble, an armored vehicle of sorts reversed away, its brakes squealing as it stopped, then sped off down the street.

  Also, a few yards in the distance, Asher could just about make out those uniforms he had come to despise and fear. They stood in line, ignoring the dust whirling about them. Oblivious. Victorious, even.

  One of them approached the resistance members, picking his steps between the rubble, and started shouting, his rifle aimed at them.

  There was no mistaking “Hände hoch!” All Jews had heard those words before. The same could be said for “Kommen Sie her!”

  In seconds there were more guards and more guns, and no way out other than over the rubble and through the large hole in the wall.

  Now the shouting conveyed more anger. “Hände hoch!”

  They all obeyed, struggling to keep their tired arms aloft.

  Anatoli was the first to start clambering over the bricks, occasionally dropping his hands for balance, each time being reminded not to by a bullet flying a foot or so from his head. The others followed, each stumbling and falling but somehow keeping their arms away from their bodies.

  A few minutes later, all five stood in a row outside, hands aloft. All were frosted in brick dust, flecked blood-red in parts. Each one had a guard standing a few feet away, a rifle pointing at their head. Now, in the daylight, Asher noticed a wound above Rina’s eye, and a dust-caked streak of blood down one side of her face.

  For a minute or so, nobody spoke—not even the guards. And in the silence, Asher’s mind momentarily drifted off to a better place. There had been too much terror, too much killing. If they wanted his body, they could have it.