COME TO YOUR SENSES!!
VOLUNTEER FOR THE TRANSPORTS.
ONLY THOSE WHO REPORT VOLUNTARILY HAVE THE ASSURANCE THAT THEY WILL GO WITH THEIR FAMILIES AND BE ABLE TO TAKE LUGGAGE.
I ADVISE YOU TO REPORT TONIGHT TO THE CENTRAL PRISON OR AT THE ASSEMBLY CENTRE ON 3 KRAWIECKA STREET.
MORDECHAI CHAIM RUMKOWSKI
ELDEST OF THE JEWS
15AUGUST1944
And so, day by day, person by person, the once overcrowded ghetto city emptied. It was an eerie feeling being more or less alone in a deserted city, the streets so still it was as if the plague or cholera had struck. The ghetto had always been such a polyglot of tongues, but now there were no more Hebrew, Polish, Yiddish or German voices drifting up the narrow streets. It was deeply unsettling.
Dorotha saw the faces of Ruth and Oscar at every empty window, intensifying her loneliness.
On 20 August, she reported for her work duty as part of theRaumungskommando. She was terrified leaving Gabriele every morning, but what could she do? Her only hope was that – as she was officially on the register to remain, or rather Ruth’s name was – her room would be left alone.
The sun beat down relentlessly as the group of remaining prisoners were marched through the streets under armed guard. Dorotha had given her bread ration to Gabriele that morning and her empty stomach ached.
Suddenly, she was hit by a wave of hunger and exhaustion so powerful she stumbled sideways. Panic stabbed as what little strength she had left drained from her body. She could have happily lain down in the street and given up, were it not for the thought of that little girl, sitting alone in that miserable room, waiting for her to come home.
A gentle voice sounded. ‘Just breathe. I have you.’ The prisoner next to her gripped her arm and held her steady.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
‘Nathan Rosenthal,’ said her saviour, holding out his hand. ‘I was a book binder from Kraków in my previous life.’
‘Dorotha... I mean Ruth Mordkowicz,’ she said, clumsily stumbling over her identity.
‘You have nothing to fear from me,’ he whispered. ‘I know you’re that girl with the books. You loaned my fiancée her favourite Vicki Baum books.’ He smiled and Dorotha felt her fogginess recede.
‘A trip to see you was always a good news day. And now I can repay the favour.’ He glanced around as they continued walking, before lowering his voice further. ‘Word on the street is that Paris has fallen. The Germans are finished in France, and soon, please God, Poland and Germany. We must stay strong for the final victory.’
As the news spread up the line of a dozen other prisoners, it had an astonishing effect. Dorotha clutched at the Allies’ progress, trying to hide her joy at such encouraging news, the first in a long time.
The August sun was ferocious and, by the time they arrived at Radegast station, a miasma of heat and fear shimmered over the tracks.
There were two trains idling at the station, one heading out and being loaded with the last transports, and one that had just returned.
The Kripo thug guarding them pointed to the platform with the empty train, where pails of water and scrubbing brushes sat inside the doors to the wagons.
‘What are you waiting for,verfluchter Juden!’ he screamed, unleashing his whip. It sliced into the side of Nathan’s cheek, causing him to stagger back. ‘Clean!’
Unsteadily, they climbed up inside the fetid heat of the empty wagons. Dorotha helped Nathan inside. ‘Are you all right?’ she whispered, seeing the blood trickling down his cheek.
‘I’ll get my revenge for this,’ he muttered, wiping the blood away with his sleeve. ‘On Biebow and every Nazi who has ever tormented us.’
Their eyes adjusted to the gloom, and then the stench assailed them.
Faeces, urine and the darker smell of fear was engrained into every nook and cranny of the wagon. There were no windows, only tiny slats in the sides which let in a puff of hot air. She could scarcely imagine the fear when those steel doors slid shut, trapping prisoners inside. Was this the wagon that had transported Oscar, Ruth and her mother on their journey, and perhaps her parents? Where did these wagons go to? Was it a work camp in the Reich with better conditions? How desperately she wanted to believe it. But her instincts were screaming otherwise.
For the next hour, they scrubbed, trying to ignore the blistering heat and the cries and commotion on the other side of the platform, as the Germans loaded prisoners onto the wagons.
‘Look,’ said Nathan, his face pressed to the slit in the side of the cart.
She and the other prisoners stopped what they were doing and looked out.
