Elzunia didn’t know how long she’d been stumbling along unfamiliar streets, brushing against buildings for support. Only one thought spurred her on: to put as much distance as possible between herself and the smouldering Ghetto. As though in slow motion, her knees buckled and she leaned against a large plane tree, shivering in the cool May evening. Plastered to a lamp-post nearby, large black letters proclaimed that any Jews caught outside the Ghetto, and those who sheltered them, would be shot. She broke into a cold sweat. So she had merely exchanged one set of dangers for another. She had thought that if she could dodge the bullets and the flames, avoid being buried alive in collapsing tunnels, and get to the other side of the wall, she’d be safe. But now she realised that this had been an illusion. No matter where she was, her life was still in peril.
Her limbs were heavy and she wanted to crawl into a dark corner and sleep, but she knew she had to keep going. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to move on. Warsaw had become an alien, hostile city where dark buildings threw malevolent shadows and people cast suspicious glances as they hurried to reach home before the curfew hour.
Home. Elzunia swallowed hard to hold back the tears. She had no home, no parents, not even a roof over her head. Her identity card! Where was her identity card? She plunged her hand into her skirt pocket. Thank God, it was still there. But a moment later she realised the card was useless on this side of the wall, worse than useless. She had to get rid of it and fabricate some plausible story to explain how she’d lost it in case a policeman or Gestapo agent stopped her. She had to get off the street. But where could she go?
Think, quick, think, she urged herself, but the more panic-stricken she felt, and the faster her heart raced, the more paralysed her mind became. There must be someone she could trust. She recalled all the parties, dinners and happy occasions they’d celebrated with her parents’ friends, including her own name day. Surely someone would shelter her. She thought of couples she had particularly liked, and visualised the delight on their faces when they opened the door and saw that she’d survived. She could almost feel the warmth as she fell into their arms.
Then she remembered that some of them had turned against her mother when they’d discovered she was Jewish, while others made sympathetic noises but had done nothing to help. Perhaps her father was out there somewhere, longing to tell her how desperately he’d tried to get the three of them out of the Ghetto, but she knew that was a fantasy.
Her girlfriends — how could she have forgotten Gosia and Lydia; surely they’d persuade their parents to take her in. Then she remembered. Her friends had no idea she was Jewish, and she doubted whether they would help her when they found out.
The acrid smell of smoke mingled with the cloying stench of burning bodies wafted over the street, and as she looked up and saw the smoke billowing above the city she thought about her mother down in the bunker and blinked away the tears. And Gittel. What had become of her? She hadn’t seen any trace of her in the bombed-out bunker. Was she wandering around, scared and hungry, in the burnt-out streets of the Ghetto? At the thought of the child being frightened and alone, Elzunia choked back a sob. She should have stayed in the Ghetto and died with all the rest. Unable to walk any further, she sank into a doorway. Let them arrest and shoot her. She was too exhausted to care.
Elzunia fell into a slumber as deep and dark as a well. She heard someone demanding to see her papers, calling her a thief and a murderer. I’m only waiting for my father, she kept saying. He said he’d come, he’ll be here any minute now. But the voice grew louder and more insistent and a hand was shaking her shoulder. Her eyelids fluttered open.
Someone was leaning over her. She sat up. Her father had come! But the dream faded as she saw an old crone with a hunched back and quick dark eyes leaning on a walking stick. Elzunia shrank back in fear. With her sunken mouth and jutting chin, she reminded Elzunia of Baba Yaga, the witch who kidnapped and ate children in fairy tales.
The old woman was peering into her face. ‘What’s the matter, dearie? You were tossing around and moaning. Are you ill?’
Elzunia shook her head, still dazed by her dream and repelled by the Baba Yaga in front of her who was clucking her tongue.
‘You’re as skinny as a fieldmouse. How long since you’ve had something to eat? Come upstairs and I’ll give you a bowl of hot soup.’
Elzunia’s eyes darted around for a way to escape but the old crone seemed to read her thoughts. ‘Don’t look so worried. I only want to help you. You’ll get picked up if you stay out here.’
Elzunia hesitated but the light was fading and soon the curfew would start. She couldn’t remember when she had last eaten something, and the prospect of hot soup and a place to sleep was too strong to resist.
‘I’m Granny Koszykowa. You can call me Granny. Everybody does,’ the old woman panted as they climbed the dusty staircase. Finally they were on the top floor and Elzunia almost fell inside with exhaustion as soon as Granny turned the key in the door.
She caught sight of herself in the small pitted mirror on the wall and screamed. Looking back at her was a blackened face streaked with tears and covered with blisters, and singed, matted hair that stuck out in clumps all over her head. Granny’s appearance had scared her, but she looked even more frightening. It wouldn’t have been necessary for anyone to inspect her Kennkarte; one glance would have told them who she was and where she’d come from.
Granny placed a steaming bowl of soup on the table but Elzunia was so exhausted that without touching the soup she crumpled onto the bedding that the old woman had made up on the floor, and fell into a dreamless sleep.
When Elzunia opened her eyes, she felt the sun shining on her face. The window was open and shafts of light were streaming in between little pots of scarlet geraniums lined up on the sill. She looked around the room. Every surface was covered with ornaments: flowered dishes with scalloped edges, wooden statues of priests and peasants, jugs with fancy handles, pottery elves with red hoods, and porcelain dogs with pink tongues lolling out. There were snow-storms from Zakopane, gilt-edged saucers from Sopot, and watercolours from Gdansk. One shelf was filled with dolls. Polish china dolls with braids, red boots and head-dresses trailing ribbons; Dutch dolls in clogs and aprons; and Japanese dolls in kimonos and obis. It seemed that Granny never discarded anything. The effect was so cheerful and homely that Elzunia’s spirits rose.
The old woman had gone out, but she’d left a plate of buckwheat kasza on the worn oak table. As Elzunia started spooning it greedily into her mouth, suddenly such sadness overwhelmed her that tears rolled down her cheeks and salted the kasza, which stuck in her throat. Unable to eat, she walked over to the window. Birds were twittering in the plane tree as they hopped around among the large leaves that had begun to unfurl. In a nest, wedged into the fork of two thick branches facing the window, three fledglings opened their beaks as their parents flew back and forth, dropping insects into their waiting throats. As Elzunia watched, she felt something quicken inside. She hadn’t struggled so hard and endured so much to give up now. Facing the smoke that was still billowing from the Ghetto, she made a vow. ‘Gittel, wherever you are, I promise I’ll never stop looking for you, as long as I live,’ she whispered, fighting back the tears.
As she stared out of the window, she thought she heard a skittering sound in the ceiling and looked up. The noise stopped but a few moments later it started again, and this time it sounded like scurrying feet. Perhaps a cat with kittens. She strained to listen but the noise had stopped and she returned to the view out the window. A strong breeze shook the branches and with a sharp flap of their wings the birds flew away.
The key turned in the lock and Granny hobbled in, puffing. After looping her cane over the back of a chair, she took a heavy metal pannikin from her string bag and placed it on top of the tiled stove.
‘So you’re awake at last, dearie,’ she said. ‘Did you know you slept for two whole days? I was getting worried but I suppose after what you’ve been through, you needed rest more than food.’
While Granny bustled about, chattering as she put away her parcels, Elzunia felt her stomach twisting. Soon she’d have to leave this safe haven, but where would she go and how would she live?
Granny was standing by the window, looking in the direction of the Ghetto, shaking her head until her jowly chin wobbled. ‘There’s nothing left of it now but rubble and ashes. Those poor souls. But one day God will punish the evildoers, you’ll see.’
Her wrinkled mouth was working as though she were whispering to herself. After a pause, she asked, ‘Do you have anyone you can go to, child?’
Elzunia shook her head.
Granny lapsed into a thoughtful silence again. ‘I could do with a bit of help around the house,’ she said. ‘If you can do a bit of dusting and washing, you can stay with me.’
Elzunia threw her arms around the old woman’s neck and promised to do whatever she asked, although she couldn’t understand why someone living alone in one small room would need help with the housework.
‘There are lots of busybodies in this building so keep yourself to yourself,’ Granny cautioned her. ‘But if anyone asks, you’re my great-niece from Bialystok. You ran away from home to stay with me because your stepfather was a drunkard and used to belt you.’ She gave Elzunia a searching glance. ‘Anyway, until those blisters heal, and your hair grows back, you’d better stay out of sight.’
That night, while she lay on her bed on the floor, she heard faint noises again and glued her eyes to the ceiling. How did cats get in there, and how would they get out?
It was still dark when she woke up and saw a shadow moving across the room. Without making a sound, she propped herself up on her elbows. The old woman was tip-toeing to the bathroom. Elzunia lay down again but heard two distinct taps. She sat up. A few moments later she heard the skittering sound again, before drifting off to sleep.
‘I’ve heard some funny noises up in the ceiling,’ she said the next morning while she was sweeping the wooden floor.
The old woman nodded. ‘Mice, probably. Or rats. These old buildings are infested with them but with everything else that’s going on these days, who’s going to bother about rodents?’ She picked up her worn handbag. ‘I’m off,’ she said. ‘Can you cut these vegetables up while I’m out?’
As Elzunia peeled a few soil-encrusted potatoes and turnips and cut up the cabbage, she wondered what had become of yesterday’s barley soup. Granny certainly had a hearty appetite.