‘But before we start...’ Ruth unfastened the knot of the sack nearest to her. ‘I’ve always wondered what the white feathers are.’
‘What are you doing?’ Dorotha gasped, but it was too late. Ruth had already emptied the contents of the sack onto the floor.
‘Shmatte,’ she murmured. ‘Coats, dresses, petticoats.’ She ripped open the next sack and a feather eiderdown slithered out, disgorging white feathers, which spiralled over them.
‘Where have these all come from?’ Dorotha asked, feeling foolish as soon as the question slid from her lips.
So, it was true. The deportees’ clothes had returned from Chelmno. But not them.
Dorotha picked up a white damask tablecloth by her foot. The name Abramowicz was embroidered in delicate golden yarn by the hem. Images swallowed by the dark, hungry throat of war crawled over her.
Her frail parents pushed into a covered truck. Milk teeth on the doorstep. Children tossed from windows.
Ruth reached over and gently picked off a white feather that had settled in Dorotha’s hair.
‘The world must know about this,’ Dorotha breathed.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ Ruth said with a shudder. ‘I feel like I’m drowning among the dead.’
They bundled the clothes and quilt back into the sacks, retied them and slipped out the way they had come in.
They walked in silence, keeping to the shadows and shooting glances over their shoulders, the ice splintering under their feet like cracking glass. Finally, they came to the first street on the list, Kelmstrasse. Dorotha held up four fingers to signify the flat number and they slipped inside the dark stairwell. Together,they crept up the stairs, clutching the crumbling concrete wall for support. The stench of damp and urine was so strong, it made her eyes water. Fear clamped her heart. There were no sounds but for the drip, drip, drip of water and their heavy, laboured breathing. They found the apartment easily enough. Its doors were hanging off its hinges and spiders had spun fine webs around the frame. Gingerly, Dorotha pushed open the door.
The room was an empty shell. The deportees couldn’t possibly have taken it all, so people must have trawled through it looking for food, clothing and furniture to burn for fuel. She tasted the disappointment, sharp and sour on her tongue.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ she mouthed.
On the way out, Ruth stumbled. ‘Wait,’ she whispered. Bending down, she worked at the edge of the loose board until it came free.
‘They did leave something behind,’ Ruth said, her eyes gleaming triumphantly in the dim light.
Dorotha plunged her hand into the dark void and then she felt it. Paper. A thrill rolled through her.Books!She pulled them out, one after another.
Stories in Yiddish and Hebrew by the great classical writers Isaac Peretz and Sholem Asch. There must have been a dozen or more hardback books hidden beneath the floorboards. Not just novels, but short stories, poetry and plays too.
Ruth looked at her and winked, her fear giving way to chutzpah. ‘I knew you’d need me. If you want to know where anything is, ask a library assistant.’
‘Yes, yes,’ Dorotha grinned. ‘Very good, my friend.’
She picked up one of the books and inhaled. It was the smell of leather and dust.And home.
Her thoughts soared. The things she could do with these books. She remembered the joy stories had brought her parents and the children of the orphanage. To those of them left behind,counting down their days on death row, these books could be passports to hope. And in the absence of all else, hope was a precious commodity.
‘Whoever lived here was a bibliophile,’ she declared, feeling a strange sense of kinship with the departed. ‘They must have hidden them for their protection.’
‘Come on, we have many more addresses to get through before dawn,’ said Ruth.
By the time the sun rose up over the ghetto, they must have salvaged close to seventy books from empty homes, taking as many as they could carry back to the secret library before striking out again. They would have carried on too, but light was streaking over the horizon, a gauzy wash of gold and apricot, like the sky in a French Impressionist painting. It was a rare glimpse of beauty.
In each room, Dorotha had seen the last valiant attempts to cling to life. Here a bullet hole. There a pan of soup, long grown cold and congealed. An upturned chair.
A part of her felt dishonest, creeping around under cover of darkness and taking other people’s precious books. But then she reminded herself: their owners would not be coming back. Better she should treasure and protect these books than see them be burnt by a Nazi.
By five a.m., her feet were blocks of ice, rubbed raw inside her heavy clogs, but her discomfort had been worth it. She would need time to inspect and catalogue the rescued books, but already she had seen such treasures. From family heirlooms and holy books, to manuals on gardening and children’s fairy tales. Books in Yiddish, Polish, German, French, and even one in English. Such treasures in the abyss. Words and pictures, scriptures and stories that could hold back the tidal wave of despair.
She and Ruth had turned the corner to Brzezinska, yawning and dreaming of thick wool socks, warm scented baths and hot coffee, when a black car overtook them and screeched to a halt by the kerb. Only Nazis drove cars in the ghetto.
‘Don’t talk,’ Dorotha ordered Ruth. It all happened so fast. The car door opened and a black boot emerged.
