The Dark Room (12 page)

—I am sorry, but I can’t give it to you. Do you have something?

Lore turns her back and lifts her apron. She tears the hole in the handkerchief pouch a little wider, pulls out Mutti’s silver chain.

—But it’s worth more than the paraffin.

The woman says she has nothing else to give, they can stay an extra night instead.

They undress at the side of the house, hidden from the road by the trees. The old woman pokes at Liesel and Peter’s clothes with a stick, takes them inside and stuffs them in the stove. Lore soaks the rest of their things in the tub of paraffin, biting her lips to stop the tears. Liesel holds Peter, crouching on the ground. The boys are quiet. Lore rubs paraffin into the children’s limbs and chests and hair. Peter screams again, his body red. The oil smarts in the torn skin around Lore’s fingernails, the cracks around her nose and mouth.

The twins rinse the clothes, but there is no soap, so the paraffin
won’t wash out. The woman boils water for them, carries it out from the kitchen in buckets. She brings scissors, too; drops them in the grass next to Lore and looks away while she speaks.

—You should cut the girl’s hair, and the baby’s. Take it all off.

—But you said it would kill them. The paraffin.

The old woman shrugs, Mutti’s chain around her neck. Lore looks away too now, and the old woman goes back into the hourse. Liesel picks up the scissors and cuts off her braids. She sits down in front of Lore and promises not to cry. The twins stand by the wall and watch while Lore works her way closer and closer to Liesel’s scalp with the blunt scissors.

Peter’s curls are long and soft. The blades look huge against his face and he won’t keep his head still. Lore wishes she could save his hair. Send it to Mutti, but she doesn’t know where her mother is. She cries and sweeps Peter’s hair into a pile with Liesel’s, takes it inside to the stove and fills the old woman’s house with its bitter smell. Outside, she rubs the last of the paraffin into the stubble on her sister’s head.

The twins lay their shorts and shirts and vests out in the sun to dry. Lore pulls on wet clothes and walks into the village to get food and something for Liesel and Peter to wear. If no one wants Mutti’s money now, Lore doesn’t know how she can make Mutti’s jewelry last. She is furious, frightened.

A cart comes toward her on the road, the farmer raises his hat. Behind him sit people with bundles. The young man in the black suit is among them, legs dangling from the back of the cart. Boots bound in rags, twisted knots of cloth, huge at the end of his thin legs. He catches Lore’s eye, shrinks back in recognition, hands moving up to cover his face. Lore looks away, too, shock like a clamp around her guts.

She looks back again after the cart passes. The young man is
watching her. He raises one hand slightly in greeting. Lore waves back, hurries on. Blushing in her wet, paraffin-stinking clothes.

Jüri points out the young man again the following evening, behind them in a soup line.

—He wanted the food in that shop, didn’t he?

—Yes. Not so loud.

—Why did the shopkeeper give it to us?

—Because we were there first.

The man has seen them, too. Lore can feel his eyes on her as she asks for an extra portion to give to Peter. They crouch down to eat at the edge of the square. The soup is watery, but it has small chunks of meat at the bottom. Lore fishes two or three out of the steaming liquid and blows on them for Peter to chew. The hot food is painful against her gums. They smear dripping onto the bread with their fingers. The man sits down in the middle of the square, leaning back against the sandbags around the statue, facing the children while he drinks his soup from the bowl. He eats quickly, ravenously. Lore feels him watching them. She rubs dripping into the raw corners of Peter’s mouth, but he licks it away again.

Jüri helps himself to more bread, and Lore doesn’t stop him, takes another slice for herself. Jüri stands up and walks across the square with the fistful of bread and dripping held out in front of him. He stops in front of the man, offers him the food. Lore sees the man take it and push it straight into his mouth. Jüri pauses for a second, watching, then runs back across the square to Lore. He crouches down quickly, as if to duck out of sight, whispers.

—He took it.

Jüri looks at Lore, holding out his empty, greasy hands. His eyes are red and wet, surprised.

—He didn’t say anything to me.

He wipes at his eyes with his sleeve.

—It doesn’t matter.

Lore divides the rest of the bread between them. Jüri passes his share to Jochen. Lore looks over to the fountain, but the young man is walking away from them, across to the other side of the square and out of sight.

They are on a long straight road. Pale yellow-brown sticky clay, with heavy wet fields on either side. It runs along a low ridge and Lore can see for miles: the long walk ahead, and the young man behind. He has been there since dawn, head down, keeping pace with them. Lore has Peter and the bundle, and keeps the children ahead of her, the twins at the front and Liesel in the middle. The boys have spent most of the morning whispering to each other, but they are quiet now. The rain started about an hour ago, a fine mist that wets their hands and faces and works its way through their stockings. Lore wraps Peter in the oilcloth and hopes he isn’t cold. She wipes his face every few minutes with her handkerchief and he smiles up at her each time. She is thirsty, but the children haven’t said anything. Lore guesses they have been walking for around three hours. They will stop in an hour or two. She notes a tree on the horizon and decides to pass it before lunch. They have no more food.

Lore hears a humming noise. Coming from the left or the right. She’s not sure. Her feet are warm and wet in her boots, and Peter smiles when she wipes his face. How long has the noise been there? She looks back along the road, but there is nothing to see apart from the man. In front of her is the tree, their target, and the bulk of the bag strapped onto Liesel’s narrow back. The morning is mapped out. They can easily keep walking like this for an hour or two: tree, twins, Liesel, smiling Peter, and then Lore, and behind them the man. The hum is still there.

She can see something now, a flat black shape moving parallel
with the horizon, seemingly through the middle of the field to the left of the road. A jeep, maybe. The wheels are hidden behind a ridge. It is still a long way off. Half a kilometer. Perhaps not so far. Lore wipes Peter’s face, but he is asleep now and she gets no smile. She looks back at the man and he is still there, no closer, no farther away. She looks ahead at the tree, and that, too, is still on the horizon: their no-food lunch marker. The jeep is a fast thing in a slow landscape, gaining ground. Peter sleeps.

Perhaps we should run.
Lore doesn’t know where they are, who the fields belong to. Maybe they aren’t in Germany anymore.
We should run.

—We have to go through the field.

She tears at the bundle, struggling to pull it off her shoulders, shifting Peter from arm to arm, jolting him. He stays asleep. Blankets trail from his legs, getting wet. Lore grabs handfuls, stuffing them up under the oilskin.

—Through the field. This one.

Still Peter sleeps. The children watch their sister grappling with the baby’s blankets, shocked to be standing still after the long hours of walking.

Lore glances behind her to look for the man. He has seen the jeep, too, and is walking faster now, head up, white smudge of face under a black hat. He has one arm raised, as if pointing to something in the sky, but he looks straight ahead, at them, coming forward, half walk, half trot.

Peter hangs around Lore’s neck, a sleeping deadweight. No warmth comes through the oilskin. Like a sandbag in her arms.

—Take the bundle, Jochen, we have to run.

—Now?

Lore can see the jeep from the corner of her eye, so she knows it is too late. She doesn’t want to look for the man. She’s got it wrong, everything is too close now.

—Yes, come on.

She pushes Liesel forward into the ditch dividing the road and the field. Jochen picks up the bundle but doesn’t move. Jüri slides down the grassy bank on his bottom. Liesel holds out her arms to take Peter and the jeep pulls up next to them. Sharp exhaust in the damp air.

Lore turns her head away, facing down the road toward the man. He is gaining on them, only a hundred meters away now, still walking, trotting.

The soldier speaks. In German. Maybe. She can’t understand him. There are two of them. The soldier speaking at the window, and another pair of eyes in the driver’s seat. Lore looks down the road to the man. He has almost caught up with them, still holding one arm in the air. He is speaking but she can’t hear what he’s saying.
He should be shouting if he wants us to hear.

The soldier speaks again. American, but speaking German, his accent difficult.

—Where are you going?

The other soldier whispers to him. The man is still there, coming closer. Lore can see the mud on his trouser cuffs. Yellow on black wool. His face is wet, like hers, like Peter’s.

—Where are your parents?

—I don’t know who he is.

Lore points at the man as he comes alongside the jeep.

—What?

—She’s talking about this other one.

—I don’t know him.

Lore knows they don’t understand her, but at least they both turn and look at the man now.

His neck is long and thin, and his head is bony. Full of teeth and gaps where teeth used to be. The jawbone works on and on. He is speaking quietly, persistently, and his Adam’s apple jumps between tight cords in his neck. He slows down now and carefully lowers his arm to his side as he reaches the group.

—Do you have papers?

The other soldier is speaking to Lore now. His accent clearer. The man is almost at the jeep, slowing down walking, breathing, talking.

—We lost them.

—We’re going to Oma.

Jochen puts the bundle down as he speaks. Lore watches the soldier for his reaction.

—Not far away. We’re nearly home. She’s waiting for us.

The man comes to a stop next to Lore. Too close. She steps aside and Peter shifts in her arms. The man reaches out and touches the door of the jeep. His nails are wide and pale, his fingers wet.

—I have papers, here, I have papers, look. We need a lift, if you have the room. We’re nearly home. We have people waiting.

He shuffles on the yellow clay, keeps up his slow insistent monologue, hands going through the pockets of his dark suit. Lore can’t look at the soldier, has to keep her eyes on the man. She stands between him and the children, holding Peter hard to her chest, making herself wide.

—I have my papers. Where are you driving? If we could go as far as Fulda with you, maybe, that would be very helpful. Let me find them. We lost the others, you know how it is, but I still have mine. Here they are.

The man has an identity card folded into a damp square of thick gray paper. He pushes up his sleeves and holds out the paper to the soldiers; resting his pale, bare arms against the jeep; keeping up his slow chatter as they consult with each other.

—Anywhere further along would be good. We’ve been walking for a long time, you understand. So if you have the room, the children are tired, you can see that, of course, not strong.

He looks at Lore, smiles and nods. His eyes are friendly. Pale. Lore feels the children edge closer to her.

—Where have you all come from?

The soldier speaks to the man now, and the man stretches out his long, bare arm and points at his sodden papers.

—Buchenwald. You understand? On the card. We were moved to Buchenwald, and we were there until the liberation, you see?

—Yes, but where from today, yesterday, the day before?

—We’ve been traveling from Nuremberg this last week now.

—Movement is strictly forbidden. You did know that?

—No, no we didn’t know. We’re very sorry.

—You have a grandmother where?

—In Hamburg.

Jochen again.

—Yes, in Hamburg, but also in Hemmen. We’re going to Fulda and then it’s not far to Hemmen, as my sister says.

—You are all brothers and sisters?

—Yes.

—Where are your parents?

—They are dead.

The man points at his card in the soldier’s hand.

—You understand? Yes? This is why we have to go to Oma.

Lies pour out of his mouth. Lore’s heart races; the children are quiet, watching her. The soldiers confer. The man doesn’t look at Lore again. He has stopped talking now, but is still restless, breathing through his mouth. The rain grows heavier, rattling against the canvas of the jeep roof. Jochen warms his hands on the hot, wet metal of the hood.

The soldiers hand back the gray square of paper. One of them gets out and folds back the canvas. He motions for them to get in, and the man starts his monologue again.

—Thank you, it’s very kind of you. We are tired, you see. Come on, children.

The soldier helps Liesel out of the ditch and beckons Jüri over from the field. Lore knows the children want to get into the jeep. The man from Nuremberg is standing on tiptoe, eager that they should all climb in. He tries to catch Lore’s eye. Her arms ache with
Peter’s weight.
He knows where we are.
And Fulda leads to Kassel and Göttingen, after which comes Hannover, which is on the way to Hamburg. And Kassel is not so far from Fulda, which is near Hannover, which is on the way to Hamburg. She doesn’t trust the man. Doesn’t want to pretend he is her brother. Lies piled on lies. Hard to keep track. The rain is heavy now. She is tired.
He can’t do anything to us while the Americans are there.

Lore pushes Liesel up into the jeep and hands Peter over to her. Then she lifts Jüri under the canvas and climbs up after Jochen. The man hands her the bag and the bundle, pulls himself into the jeep and sits on the floor. The soldier ties down the canvas, and they are out of the rain, in the dark and on the move again.

The man walks ahead in the dark and the children follow. Lore carries Peter and her arms ache. Their footsteps sing on the wide, metaled road. They walk for an hour, a little longer, turn off the main road onto narrower, rougher surfaces. Lore’s boots have dried tight around her feet. They ate American chocolate in the afternoon and she has stomach pains now, can’t straighten her knees.
Perhaps if we stop, he will keep walking away.
She pictures the man disappearing into the dark up ahead, but feels anxious, not relieved.
He looked at the American map. He knows where we are.
Lore needs to lie down.