HALINA
With my suitcase and satchel settled on the floor beside the bed, I take a quick moment—the only quick moment I’m allowed, to sit along the edge, the lumpy wool flattening into matted knots as I sink. I spot the mentioned booklet of rules and responsibilities on top of the writing desk. From here, I can easily make out the words:
SERVANTS ORDERS
I reach toward the desk to take the booklet as anger sears through me. Why should I be a servant? I dare not ask again if they plan to pay me, not when the other option would be prison. Still, I’ve done nothing wrong. I wasn’t loitering, and I wasn’t begging. I assume the man with the hammer is a prisoner—the blue and white stripes on his uniform says so. How many others are there?
The thin, gray covered booklet is several pages, bound by woven thread along the left edge. Above the bold title is an embossed emblem of the Imperial Eagle holding a wreath,framing a swastika—a branded version of their artwork from downstairs.
The Nazis are nothing new to Poland. They’ve been pushing the Polish out, taking over, and claiming this country as theirs since September 1939. It’s been almost three years, but I could be convinced it’s been a decade. After spending my entire life in the orphanage, I had plans to venture out into the world and start from scratch somewhere. But then when I turned eighteen, I came to realize how difficult it would be to start anything from scratch without a single coin to my name.
My plans changed and Julia offered me a job, allowing me to work for the orphanage for a year, save up some money, then set out to make a life for myself. The war had other plans for me, though. Instead, I’ve been living under German law, told to fear the world beyond the walls I lived between.
I open the booklet to the first page, finding faded fingerprints along the edge of the hand-scripted text.
Servant Name:Paulette Sawla
List of Servant Rules and Responsibilities:
Servants must rise by five a.m. each morning then report to the kitchen.
Personal belongings must be kept out of sight.
No conversation between servants and prisoners.
Servants shall not leave property without consent from the officer or his wife.
Failure to comply with rules and responsibilities will result in removal.
Removal?
Servant meals are to be eaten within living quarters, out of sight from the family.
Do not enter the officer’s study, nor his and his wife’s bedroom.
Do not question orders.
Anything seen or heard within the household is to be kept confidential or consequences will be enforced.
A servant may be removed from your position at any given time, without warning.
A servant is here to work, not think.
I study the name at the top of the page and trace my finger over the letters, trying to make out the name beneath the scratched-out lines. What did they do to the last person?
I flip the page, the booklet weighing heavily in my hands as I find a detailed daily schedule for the children beginning at six a.m. sharp, breakfast waiting for them in the dining room downstairs. We followed a schedule in the orphanage, both as a child and a caretaker, but nothing like what I’m reading here.
The bedroom door creaks open and my stomach knots. I peer up from the booklet in my lap, finding the man from earlier, the one with a hammer in a prisoner uniform. His hands, now empty, grip the top of the doorframe. The question of whether he’s dangerous returns…
He glances back down the stairwell before straightening his posture. “May I?” he asks, his voice eager and unguarded.
“Uh—well…” I know better.
But the look in his eyes doesn’t give me a sense of danger. More like…an ally of sorts.
I peer down at the booklet again, biding my time as I think of a response and thumb back to the first page.
“No conversation between servants and prisoners,” I enunciate, quietly.
