Elzunia looped the eiderdowns and pillows over the railing at the back and was bashing them with a bamboo carpet beater, raising fine puffs of dust with each blow when she heard voices in the yard and looked down. Two women with scarves over their hair and black rubber boots halfway up their calves were gossiping as they leaned over large metal basins while they scrubbed their sheets. One of them straightened up, arched her back and waved a soapy arm towards the landing where Elzunia stood.
‘You have to be careful these days. You never know who your neighbours are,’ she said. ‘They’re all over the place now. They change their names and learn to recite the Lord’s Prayer, but I can tell them a mile off.’
Elzunia stopped beating the bedding and flattened herself against the wall.
The other woman placed her hands on her wide hips. ‘Franek says it’s good riddance; we’ll be much better off without them. He and his pals keep going on about their houses, and the gold and silver and stuff that we’ll end up with. I won’t say no if any of it comes my way, but I can’t help thinking that God might punish us for gloating over them.’
The other woman waved a dismissive hand, sending a stream of iridescent bubbles floating over the yard. ‘If you ask me, God meant it to happen. Anyway, the Germans will let us have it if they catch any of them in here, so we’d better keep a lookout.’ Her gaze swept around the yard and lingered for a moment on the back stairs, where Elzunia had been standing a minute before.
Back inside, Elzunia heard the door of the adjacent room open and close. High heels clicked down the stairs. Curious, she peered through the window in time to see a tall brunette in a loose navy coat, a beret set at a jaunty angle on her smooth hair, and a small basket over her arm. She had just turned the corner when two men in trenchcoats banged on the door downstairs. Gestapo. Elzunia’s heart pounded. She couldn’t make out what they were saying. Were they looking for someone in particular or hunting for Jews? Any minute now, they’d bash the door down and find her. If they asked tricky questions about her supposed family in Bialystok, she’d be lost. She heard a key turning in the lock and jumped.
‘Quick,’ Granny whispered. ‘They’ll be here in a minute. Lie down on the sofa and don’t move. I’ll throw the eiderdown on top of you. Thank God you’re skinny.’
Several moments later, there was banging on the door. Feigning an exasperated sigh, Granny opened it, looking older and more stooped than ever. ‘What on earth are you people looking for in a poor old woman’s home?’ she complained as they pushed past her.
‘We know there are Jews hiding in the building,’ one of them snapped, his eyes hard as hammers.
‘Jews? Do you think I’d risk my life hiding Jews?’ Granny scoffed, and sat down heavily on the sofa. ‘If I thought any of the vermin were hiding here, I’d be the first to let you know.’
Groaning, she stretched out on the sofa. ‘I’m that worn out. The doctor says, if I don’t rest, I’ll cark it. With all the hours I spend in queues trying to buy a bit of food, my poor old legs can hardly hold me up.’
On and on she grumbled while Elzunia hardly dared to breathe, terrified that at any moment they’d notice the bulge under the eiderdown. They stomped around the little room, looked in the bathroom, peered over the balcony and then stomped out, slamming the door so hard it almost fell off its hinges.
Elzunia didn’t budge for a long time. When she finally emerged from under the eiderdown, she was still shaking.
‘That was quite an act you put on, Granny,’ she said. ‘But you’re risking your life having me here. I think I should go.’
Granny took her hand. ‘If we can’t help each other, what’s life all about?’
That night, on her bed on the floor, Elzunia thought about the conversation of the two women in the yard and wondered whether one of them had contacted the Gestapo. But how could they have known she was there when she’d never stepped out of the building?
When Granny returned the following afternoon, her whole body seemed to sag and her chin looked more prominent than ever. And for once she hadn’t brought any bags. Although she didn’t say what was on her mind, it was obvious that something was worrying her. Elzunia wondered where she went every day and why she was so upset.
When Elzunia peered into the mirror a week later, she was relieved to see that her blisters had healed. Finally she would be able to stretch her legs and feel the late spring sun on her face. Granny had thrown out Elzunia’s torn and charred clothes, and had altered one of her old dresses to fit her. Looking at her reflection, Elzunia felt confident that she could merge with the crowd without attracting attention.
Intrigued by Granny’s mysterious comings and goings, she decided to follow her the next morning. As soon as the old woman had closed the door behind her, and Elzunia heard her limping down the stairs, she ran to the back door to check that the women were too busy beating their rugs and eiderdowns over the back railings to notice her, and slipped out of the house.
Once outside, she realised how debilitated she’d become and how often she had to stop to catch her breath. Luckily Granny hobbled along, and stopped to rest from time to time too, leaning on her cane. The journey seemed interminable, and the further away from the house Elzunia walked, the more apprehensive she became.
Eventually she saw Granny’s bent figure turn into Nowy Swiat Street, near the Four Seasons Café. Long ago, back in the long-distant days when life was happy and predictable, her parents would sometimes take her there for tall glasses of iced coffee heaped with scoops of luscious vanilla ice-cream, but now the sign in the window said Nur für Deutsche.
A tram was clanging along the road, and she was wondering why Granny hadn’t boarded it instead of walking so far when she noticed the sign on the front. Germans Only. Nowy Swiat was a good name for this area, she thought bitterly. It certainly was a new world, where trams, shops, cafés, cinemas and restaurants were reserved exclusively for German use.
Granny hobbled on until she came to the Square of the Three Crosses, a large tree-lined plaza with its familiar landmark, the baroque dome of St Aleksander’s Church. As soon as she saw the church, Elzunia’s throat constricted. It was here that her mother had undergone her conversion, and, to their misfortune, it was here that Madame Françoise’s cousin had been the parish clerk. Three elderly women in headscarves were entering the colonnaded portico, and Elzunia wondered whether this was where Granny was heading.
But the old woman walked past the terminus where the tram drivers were calling out to each other and cursing while they shunted the carriages and hooked up the cables. Elzunia felt uneasy. She had strayed into the heart of the German district, the forbidden zone of the city that no longer felt like Warsaw.
The sound of hob-nailed boots reverberated through the square. Elzunia flattened herself against a recessed gate as a detachment of SS men emerged from their barracks and marched towards Ujadzdowskie Aleje. They passed the German soldiers’ home, where a Beethoven symphony was blaring from the upstairs windows, and disappeared from view.
Now that the parade was over, Elzunia ventured into the square again and saw some street urchins hanging around outside the soldiers’ home. Some proffered loose cigarettes from their grimy hands, and others held up entire packets, while here and there the young hawkers swaggered around with an assortment of packs displayed on trays suspended around their necks. A German official emerged from the building and was immediately beset by the youngsters vying for his attention as they waved their merchandise in his face and shouted its praises.
‘Egyptians, Klubs, Mewas, roll-your-owns, best prices!’ they shouted.
Elzunia noticed that they weren’t frightened to approach the soldiers, or to argue with them about the price.
‘Those others are crap; that’s why they’re so cheap,’ she heard one girl say in a shrill voice as she sidled up to one of the Germans. ‘If you want quality, you have to pay for it.’
Elzunia looked around for Granny and spotted her in the corner of the square that led to Jerozolimskie Aleje. She was surrounded by some of the cigarette sellers who were all talking at once. In the centre stood a small boy, shuffling in his broken wooden clogs, and from the way he hung his head as the others pointed in the direction of Konopnicka Street, where the SS barracks were located, she guessed he was the subject of their discussion.
Every few moments, he hitched up his trousers, which were fastened with a big safety pin, or adjusted the piece of mangy fur that was wrapped around his thin shoulders with a piece of string. From the way Granny was bending over the boy, it looked as though she was trying to talk him into something. She didn’t smoke so what possible business could she have with these young cigarette sellers, Elzunia wondered. But a few moments later, the old woman walked away from the youngsters and, to Elzunia’s astonishment, entered the soldiers’ home.
Intrigued by the boys and their business dealings, Elzunia edged a little closer. Their clothes looked as if they hadn’t been taken off in months. From their torn and stained jackets and trousers, she could see they were homeless. The tallest boy’s trousers were frayed and reached halfway down his calves, as though he’d outgrown them several years before. Standing next to him was a smaller boy with fair hair and light-coloured eyes. Despite his colouring, something about his features and worried expression reminded her of a kid she’d seen around the Ghetto. Could he and some of the others possibly be Jewish? But a moment later she dismissed the idea as preposterous. It was absurd to imagine that Jewish children would risk plying their trade under the noses of the Germans.
The boys noticed her watching them, nudged each other, whispered something, and moved to the other side of the square. Common sense urged her to move on, but she had to find out whether her hunch was correct. Perhaps they, too, had escaped from the Ghetto. It was a long shot, but perhaps they had come across Gittel or Stefan.
As she walked towards the oldest boy, whom the others called Toughie, he tossed back a lock of fair hair and stuck out his chin, looking at her defiantly.
‘I’d like to buy one of those cigarettes.’ She pointed to the individual ones spread out in a row on his tray.
He gave her a knowing look. ‘Your favourite brand, is it, miss?’
Ignoring the sarcasm, she whispered, ‘Where are you from?’
‘What’s it to you?’
The others had moved closer and were looking at her suspiciously.
‘Who’s the nosy dame?’ one of them muttered. ‘Why’s she hanging around and asking questions?’ He turned to Elzunia and waved his arm as if to shoo her away. ‘Clear off! Beat it!’
Elzunia realised that they suspected her of being a szmalcownik. She was offended that they thought she was snooping around to blackmail them, but their reaction told her what she wanted to know.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not spying on you,’ she began, and hesitated. She was trying to figure out a way of letting them know that she was one of them. Perhaps they had seen Gittel or knew something about her. If she could win their confidence, she might be able to ask them if they knew where the little girl was. But before she could speak, she saw two SS officers striding across the square, and the boys rushed towards them, holding out their cigarettes.
Seeing the SS men, Elzunia was shocked. Distracted by the cigarette sellers, she had forgotten the risk she was taking, wandering around without any documents. It was getting late, and she had to do her chores before Granny returned. She wanted to run but forced herself to slow down, so as not to attract attention. Although her heart was pounding, she held her head high and tried to look confident. Several times she weaved in and out of side streets to avoid Germans who were patrolling the streets.
As she walked, she thought about the feisty young entrepreneurs who managed to make a living on the streets of Warsaw, dodging local extortionists, SS officers, Gestapo, Polish policemen, and Hungarian auxiliaries who had been co-opted into the German militia. She supposed that they were homeless orphans who were desperate enough to earn a living in this dangerous way.
Back home, she almost collided at the gate with the young woman in the beret and trenchcoat she had seen the previous week. She had the same small basket over her arm and Elzunia noticed that it was covered with a fringed white cloth, like Little Red Riding Hood about to take her grandmother some food.
‘I’m Marta,’ the woman said. ‘I don’t think I’ve seen you before.’
‘I haven’t been here long,’ Elzunia said. ‘I’m Granny Koszykowa’s niece. I ran away from Bialystok because my stepfather was bashing me and …’
Marta was watching her attentively. ‘I see,’ she said. ‘That’s very interesting, but I wouldn’t volunteer so much information all at once if I were you.’
Before Elzunia could reply, Marta gave her a friendly wave and hurried off.
Upstairs, Elzunia turned the conversation over in her mind, upset that Marta had seen through her story and had known she was lying. Was she giving her a warning or just well-meant advice?
That night, while Granny snored softly in her bed, Elzunia was washing herself over the wobbly sink in the corner of the kitchen that served as a bathroom when she heard the scrabbling noise in the ceiling again. This time she’d find out what it was. She picked up the broom, climbed up on a stool, pushed aside the manhole in the ceiling and poked her head inside.
At first she couldn’t see anything but after a few moments, when she became accustomed to the dark, she saw something gleaming and held her breath. She was looking into the terrified eyes of a tiny boy wrapped in a mangy fur jacket.