Tomasz and I were packing food into pails to take across to Saul and Eva when he suddenly stopped and looked at me.
“Maybe Saul and Eva could come here, instead of us taking the food to them. That way they could have it all.”
“Will Jan let us get them out?” I asked, uncertainly. Tomasz grimaced and shook his head.
“No, he’d be furious if we woke him.”
“Well, they won’t fit through the latch?”
“Tikva will be easy. And maybe we can very quietly pull away just a few more of the boards on the wall around the latch. We wouldn’t need much more space to be able to pull Saul and Eva through too. Jan wouldn’t be happy, but if we’re careful enough not to wake him, he won’t find it until morning and we’ll all be long gone by the time he even knows. I know it’s only a short-term fix, but it would be so much more comfortable for them here, even if it’s just for a few nights.” He paused, then he nodded, apparently having made up his mind. “Alina, I think I can make this work.”
“My parents won’t mind,” I said unthinkingly. Tomasz looked at me sadly, and I cleared my throat. “I mean, if they manage to come home...”
We decided to at least try—we still had some time to spare, and so we left to make that fraught trek through the fields to the back of the house next door. When we were close, Tomasz pressed his fingers to his lips, just as he’d done the previous night. He bent to check for the rock, then Tomasz stood, frowning. He gave me a hand signal to wait here, and then he inched around the corner and along the wall toward the front of the house. I remained at the back corner, but I stretched my head out from the corner so I could watch him.
When he reached the front corner of the house, his shoulders slumped. As he turned to round that next corner, I caught a glimpse of his face in the moonlight and the pain in his expression was so vivid that it took my breath away. Tomasz was no longer trying to hide—instead, he stepped away from the wall, his hand outstretched as if he was reaching for someone.
I knew he’d told me to wait where I was, but I couldn’t—not having seen the expression on his face. I repeated that same journey he had just made, with careful footsteps along the wall of the house.
“No, Tomasz.” The hoarse words were carried on the otherwise-silent night air. “You can’t be here. They asked about you. What if they came back for you?”
“If you think I am leaving you alone to deal with this,” Tomasz choked in return, “you are sadly mistaken, my brother.”
I wanted to stay at the back of the house, but my legs seemed to have other ideas. They propelled me forward automatically after Tomasz, and when I reached the front corner of the house, I took a deep breath and forced myself to peer around it.
I couldn’t even make sense of the scene before me at first. Under the glow of the moonlight, Saul sat slumped on the front step, Eva’s limp body cradled across his lap. I gasped as I recognized the unseeing face of baby Tikva, her tiny body tucked tightly between her parents’ torsos. Saul’s face was set in a mask of grief too deep to be understood—his jaw slack, his eyes wide—and now that I was closer, I could see that the only movement he made was the sporadic blink of his swollen eyelids and the rattling inhale then exhale of his chest.
“Saul,” Tomasz whispered. “What happened?”
Saul turned toward Tomasz’s voice, but his gaze was unfocused. He blinked again, and then he gave a shake of his head, then a convulsion racked his whole body and he pulled Eva and the baby higher against his neck as a series of sobs broke over him.
I stayed at the corner of the front of the house, unable to look away but far too afraid to move closer. Tomasz, however, sat right beside his friend and slid his arm over his shoulders.
“Saul,” Tomasz said again, and this time, his own voice broke. “I’m so sorry, my friend. I’m just so sorry.”
“The soldiers knew everything—they even knew about you and Nadia.” Saul sobbed, and I caught the full force of agony in his expression as he turned to face Tomasz. “Tomasz, they have taken everything from me now. There is nothing left for me to live for. Run for your life, but let me die. Please, let me die.”
Tomasz sat on the step with Saul for so long that my legs became numb, and I had to sink down to sit on the ground—although I stayed at the corner of the house. I couldn’t bring myself to go near to them—partly out of respect for Saul’s right to privacy as he grieved, and partly because I was sickened by the sight of the bodies and the heavy scent of blood in the air.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw baby Tikva’s face in my mind. She had been sleeping when I held her, but now that I had seen her face set in death, I could no longer remember the innocence of that moment when she was safe within my arms. And the worst thing was that I knew, from having witnessed Aleksy’s and the mayor’s deaths, that this image was a part of me now. I would never be the same again having witnessed this moment in time.
After a while, Tomasz stood, and he approached me. His face and his beard were wet with tears, and as he embraced me, he was shaking.
“Alina,” he whispered. “I have to ask something of you. Can you wait with him?”
“Wait with him?” I whispered back, my gaze frantically flicking to the man and the bodies just a few feet away. “Where are you going?”
“He is covered in their blood,” Tomasz whispered. “He needs fresh clothes—I will have to go back to your house and get something for him to wear.”
“Can’t we all go? Can’t we take him with us?”
“We have to...” Tomasz broke off. His gaze dropped, then returned to mine. “We have to bury them first, my love. It is the very least they deserve.”
I squeezed my eyes closed for a minute, then suggested hopefully, “But Jan’s clothes will be inside...”
“Jan is entirely responsible for the death of Saul’s wife and baby, Alina. I can’t ask that of him.”
I wanted to say no, and the old Alina would have. But I was determined to be an adult now, and to make Tomasz proud of the woman I’d become. Still, it wasn’t easy to agree to remain alone with a man and two horrific bodies in a space where Nazis had clearly been in recent hours, particularly given the likelihood that they’d return. I gritted my teeth as I said, “Can we at least move him into shelter?”
“The inside of the house...it is...” Tomasz trailed off, then shook his head. “Don’t go in there, love. I saw it through the door. It’s a mess.” He brushed my hair back from my face, and he whispered, “I really don’t think they will come back here tonight. He still can’t tell me what happened, but either they purposefully left him alive or he somehow hid from them. And if they do come back, it will be in a vehicle, so you’ll see the lights or hear the engine long before they near the house—take him to the barn and hide. Okay?”
My breath caught, and I bit my lip hard and I forced myself to nod. My chest felt tight, as if the fear could choke the life right out of me too. Tomasz nodded toward Saul, encouraging me to go to the other man’s side, and I whimpered a little as I made myself step closer to the bodies. I told myself not to look at the baby again. I told myself I could sit with him and pretend it wasn’t there.
But I couldn’t look away, and it was Tikva I stared at as I walked. As I came closer, the stench of blood became overwhelming, and my stomach turned over again and again. I battled to clamp down the urge to retch, but I walked to Saul’s side, and I sat right beside him as Tomasz had done.
“Hello, Saul, it’s Alina,” I said, very gently. “Tomasz is going to get you fresh clothes. I’m going to stay with you. You are not alone. We are here for you.”
The man turned to me, and I could see him trying to focus his gaze.
“Thank you for your kindness, Alina,” he choked out. I nodded once, and as I went to look away again, he blurted, “I don’t know if they caught Jan or if he turned us in. But he must have told them everything—everything—where we were hiding, how we were surviving. They wanted us to give Tomasz up, they told Eva they’d let her go if she told them where to find him but she was far too smart for that, my beautiful, brilliant wife. But then they took Tikva from Eva’s arms—”
“You don’t have to tell me,” I whispered hastily, but he didn’t seem to hear me.
“—and they put her on the ground and they shot her in the chest because they thought then we’d talk—but didn’t they realize? Once they shot her, we had nothing left to survive for anyway. And then my wife...”
It occurred to me then that he wasn’t speaking for my benefit at all. This was a repeat of those moments with Emilia each Sunday, on my own front steps. Just like little Emilia, Saul just needed to tell someone what had happened to his family, and I happened to be the only bystander now that he was ready to talk.
“Eva was hysterical, and the soldier who was holding her—he threw her against the wall and she went quiet and I could see her skull was... I tried but...it was...no... So I was hoping I’d be next and we could travel together to the afterlife but I didn’t flinch or try to fight to get away once the others were gone. The sergeant was so angry that I didn’t struggle...he said to leave me. He said it was a worse punishment to let me alone to die slowly.” Saul’s voice broke again. “I begged them to shoot me. I want to be with my family.” I didn’t know what to say to that, and all I could think was to do as Tomasz had done, and to slide my arm over Saul’s thin shoulders. He slumped forward again, utterly broken as he whispered, “How God must hate me...to leave me to suffer like this? Surely...”
“Don’t you say that,” I said fiercely, and Saul startled, as if he’d only just noticed I was there. I was sorry to speak so harshly to him—but I knew all too well that the only way we’d survive the darkness was to hold on to a vestige of hope. There was nothing else I could do for Saul, except to keep my arm on his shoulder, and point him back to what he still had—and all that he had was his faith. “You must believe that if God allowed you to survive this far—there is a purpose to it. You must believe that there is work left for you to do on this Earth before you are released to peace. Hold tight to what you have left, Saul Weiss. And if all you have left is your faith, then you cling to it with every shred of strength you have left—do you hear me?”
He blinked at me. For a minute, I thought I’d gone too far, and I was shaken by an intense regret. Who was I to speak so harshly to this Jewish man about his faith—in the very moment when he nursed the cooling bodies of his entire family? Saul’s shuddering breaths were coming harder and faster, but then he nodded sharply, and he turned his head toward the fields and he closed his eyes.
The string of words that burst from his lips was a language I didn’t know, but our traditions were irrelevant in that moment—the depths of his loss transcended every one of our differences. We weren’t Jew and Catholic, we weren’t even man and woman—we were simply two human beings, grieving an inhuman act.
I squeezed my eyes tightly closed so I didn’t accidentally look down at the face of the baby beside me, and I bowed my head while Saul and I prayed together.
Tomasz was very quiet when he returned, carrying two full pails of supplies, and with a set of clothing for Saul over his shoulders. He emptied the supplies onto the ground, then filled the pails at the well nearby. While I sat some distance away to give them privacy, my wonderful Tomasz helped Saul to clean the bodies, and finally, he helped Saul to bathe and dress himself.
Saul insisted on digging the grave, but he was just too weak and eventually he had to accept help. He would labor with visible difficulty until he had to stop, then Tomasz would work furiously until Saul had rested and was ready to take another turn. There wasn’t time for depth or care—instead, they were seeking only to give Eva and baby Tikva the dignity of a resting place.
Saul carried his wife into the grave first. He was almost calm in that moment, as he carefully set her down and spoke to her gently, then he kissed her forehead. The calmness disappeared when Tomasz handed him the body of his infant daughter. Saul began to wail again, loudly and inconsolably. He bent to place the baby on Eva’s chest, then he carefully wrapped her arms around their daughter. At the very last minute, Saul bent again and took one of the tiny leather shoes from Tikva’s feet. As I watched that man climb reluctantly away from the family he was leaving in the earth, I knew how desperately he wished to be staying with them.
After Tomasz filled the grave, Saul dropped to his knees beside it, and he prayed aloud around shuddering sobs, clutching that tiny shoe against his chest.
Tomasz wiped his eyes and jogged to my side. We embraced, and he whispered thickly, “We’re running out of time.”
“I know,” I whispered back. “But...we can’t leave him here. Is there anyone else we can take him to?” Tomasz stepped away from me, and he stared at me then. “No,” I said automatically. “No, Tomasz. We can’t stay here! You said it yourself, if we stay—”
“I have no intention of us staying,” he interrupted me. “It’s not safe for you—they know your name, they know what you look like—you cannot stay, Alina. There is no chance I am going to sit by and watch while—”
“They know who you are too now,” I exclaimed. “Did you not hear what Saul said? This is exactly why we have to leave.”
“They know who I am, which means it is only a matter of time before they figure out who Emilia is,” Tomasz said abruptly. I hadn’t thought of that, and as he said it, my stomach dropped. “I have to tell my other friends to flee. I have to warn your sister and get Emilia to safety. But...” He grabbed my upper arms in his palms and he held me tightly, his gaze hard on mine as he whispered, “Alina, you must go. We can’t miss this chance.”
“What? No! I can’t go alone, Tomasz!” I cried in shock, and his beautiful green eyes pleaded with me as his voice broke on a sob.
“I know. I know that is too much to ask, and yet, I am asking even more of you than that.”
I stared at him blankly, and then his gaze tracked back to Saul, still sobbing on his knees by the grave.
“Tomasz...”
“He is weak. He is in shock. You are going to have to carry him, if not physically, then emotionally. But you’ll see, once he’s well. He is qualified—a fully equipped specialist with immense knowledge and skill...he can do so much good. He can help hundreds, maybe thousands of people. It would be unforgivable for me to go tonight when he could go in my place.”
“No! Don’t ask this of me! I can’t—”
“Please, moje wszystko.”
“I can’t go without you.”
“I’m begging you, Alina,” Tomasz said. He was still staring down at me with that same intense expression, but I heard the shift in his tone. He had made up his mind, and nothing I said was going to change it.
“How would this even work? Does he even have identity papers? Won’t they be Jewish identity papers? Will they even admit him to the camp?”
“We can’t risk it,” Tomasz murmured. He released me gently, and I opened my eyes to see him reach into the pocket of his trousers. He carefully withdrew a card, which he opened to show me. Illuminated only by the moonlight, I saw his tattered passport. There was a tiny photo of him on the page, but the image was worn and so dark, even I might never have recognized him. “It is from before I even left for college, back when Father used to take me on vacations. Surely the camp will never know the difference. This photo looks nothing like either of us now that we both have beards. And his hair is darker, but the photo is so dark... I am sure he can pass. I am sure of it.”
“I don’t want to do this,” I choked.
“It’s not forever,” Tomasz said, then he stopped to draw in a desperate breath. “As soon as my other friends are safe—as soon as Emilia and your sister are safe—I will find a way to come after you. Henry will arrange to get me false papers, and we will meet up in Buzuluk.”
By then, we were both sobbing—clutching at each other, each one of us desperate to change the other’s mind.
“I’m not strong enough to do this. I’m not brave enough. I’m not clever—”
“You are all of those things, Alina Dziak, and more,” Tomasz said fiercely. “You are the fire that keeps my heart beating and the fuel that has powered my dreams even through this war. You are my everything. I know you better than anyone else, and that’s the very reason I am trusting you and pleading with you to lead this man to safety tonight.”
I couldn’t say no to him. I wanted desperately to—to refuse, to plead weakness, to plant my feet in the soil of my homeland and to cling tightly to Tomasz, even if it meant death.
But I couldn’t let him down. I couldn’t disappoint him. And even at the time, I understood that this was something Tomasz needed to do. Before we could start our life afresh, he simply had to absolve himself of the guilt of his compliance with the Wehrmacht in Warsaw. Given the depth of his loss and the impossible circumstances Saul now faced, Tomasz would never be able to resist the opportunity to offer safe passage from Hell to the man who had once done the same for him.
“Please, moje wszystko,” Tomasz whispered. “Please.” I caught his head in my hands and I kissed him then, and that kiss said everything there wasn’t time to say. “We will always find our way back to each other, Alina,” he breathed, when we broke apart. “Our love is bigger than this war—I promise you that.”