Restitution (16 page)

Seconds passed before he answered. ‘Very well.’ He held out his hand for the knife.

Mami’s room lay across the landing. The thick Persian rug muffled their footsteps. Gregor tapped softly on the door. ‘Baroness?’

The door opened almost immediately. ‘I was waiting for you. He’s sound asleep.’ Her eyes met Alix’s and Alix looked away. ‘You won’t . . .’

‘I won’t kill him. But I will have to hand him over to my superior officer. You understand that?’

Mami nodded. ‘Come in.’

How strange to be back in this room with its thick carpet, scent bottles and hairbrushes. Mami must have been sitting in a chair at the bottom of the bed. Preizler lay on top of the quilt, his
mouth slightly open, breathing quietly. He’d removed his coat and slept in a civilian suit. Mami looked at the pieces of cut rope. ‘Those aren’t long enough.’ She rose and
went to a drawer and took out a pile of neatly folded silk scarves, which Gregor took from her. Preizler grunted as he approached the bed but didn’t move. Gregor tied his hands and then his
feet together and used a scarf to tie the bound hands and feet together so that his enemy was trussed. ‘I need another one, to gag him.’

Mami shook her head. ‘Please don’t do that. There’s no need. These walls are thick and who’s going to hear him outside in a snowstorm?’

‘You’re so concerned about him, even now.’ Alix hadn’t meant to say the words aloud.

‘Darling, it’s not like that, it’s just—’

Alix threw up a hand to silence her. ‘I’ll wait in my room.’ She walked back to her room and curled up on the bed. Gregor returned minutes later.

‘Can we trust her not to release him?’ she asked.

He gave her a long look. ‘At her own request I locked your mother into another bedroom. I gave her Clara Preizler’s pistol. Just in case.’ He stuffed Preizler’s Walther
and a smaller object into his pack.

‘What’s that?’

‘Cyanide capsules. Found them in Preizler’s pocket.’ She dropped her head and examined the quilt.

‘Don’t think about that now, we’ve won a reprieve, Alix.’ He squeezed her shoulder. ‘A few hours before Vavilov gets here. We need to rest and then move you out of
here before dawn.’ Gregor flopped onto the bed. ‘You know what I’d love more than anything else just now?’

She shook her head.

‘A wash in hot water.’ He was looking at the door to her en suite bathroom. ‘I’ve had occasional field showers, but that’s about it.’

‘Go ahead. You could even run the bath if you’re sure we’re safe for a while.’

‘We are. I told you.’

‘There are towels in there.’

‘Wonderful, thank you.’ He sounded like a polite visitor.

She heard Gregor’s sigh of pleasure as he got into the bath. Alix pulled an English novel out of the bookshelf to distract herself and found herself reading the same paragraph again and
again and falling back against the bed’s pillows but unable to sleep.

But then she heard him pulling the plug. He’d have to put on that tattered uniform again. She heard the taps of the basin running. Did Red Army soldiers carry toothbrushes? It sounded as
though that was what he was doing, cleaning his teeth. The door opened.

He was wearing towels, one on top, one round his waist. ‘I’m sorry, I rinsed out some of my clothes. Couldn’t resist the opportunity. I hope you don’t mind.’

‘Hang them out on the towel rack.’ The rack, like the bedroom, was heated by the stove in the kitchen.

He did as she suggested and reappeared in the bedroom. ‘You should get some sleep, Alix. I’ll stay on guard and wake you up in an hour or so. We’ll leave together. I
won’t wait for Vavilov.’

Her heart leaped at the way he made it sound like it would be a shared escape. Perhaps he would come all the way to Cousin Ulla’s with her. They could burn his uniform in the stove
downstairs and borrow some of Papi’s old clothes. Gregor could pretend to be an invalid from the eastern front.

‘I’ll make myself comfortable on the chair,’ he said.

‘I’ll find you some blankets.’ She handed him a couple from the mahogany wardrobe and got into bed, shivering in the cold. She heard him remove his revolver and load it. A
metal object rattled on top of the table. Ammunition? No, the mouth organ. ‘Tell me more about Poland.’ Anything to take her mind off that creature trussed up in her mother’s
bedroom.

Years ago they’d shared midnight feasts, and Gregor had told her stories he’d read in books.

‘You should sleep.’

‘I will. But first I want to know what happened to you when you left Brest. Did you find your friends again? What were their names? Jacob and . . . ?’

‘Reuben. It’s a long story.’ Now he sounded weary.

Gregor

Poland and Russia, 1940-42

God alone knew exactly where he was. Gregor had lost the precious map that he’d bartered his watch for and was now relying on the sun to guide him west; difficult when he
preferred to travel at night to avoid patrols. He’d tried to keep the railway to his right as Reuben had instructed, but the Germans had been moving freight along the line and there were too
many armed guards on the wagons.

Impossible to calculate how far he’d walked now. Maybe eighty or a hundred miles east of the Bug. He must be somewhere near that wretched village where he was supposed to meet the
Gronowskis.
Borki,
he still remembered its name but the other details of the meeting place had gone. He asked a peasant digging up potatoes in a field and the man stared at him in speechless
amazement, either because of his unusual accent or because of his rough appearance after so many days in the open. He pointed along the track.

Gregor stumbled off. He still had no idea how far the village was. His empty stomach was trying to eat away at his brain. Soon he’d forget who he was, who his friends were.

At times he thought of handing himself in to the first patrol he could find and showing them that German passport. But they might take one look at him, filthy, scrawny, and decide he’d
stolen it. He hardly looked like that sleek boy in the jacket and tie in the photograph. A suspicious patrol might just shoot him or throw him into one of those trucks they used to round up people
for forced labour.

He was mad, trying to find the Gronowskis. Perhaps he should try for German-annexed western Poland, and from there head for Pomerania and the protection of Peter von Matke. The memory of the von
Matkes made him forget the growling void inside him. The baron, baroness and Alexandra. Alix. What had they done the last holiday he spent at Alexanderhof? Forget that dinner party, remember
something else, something that was like a small candle flame burning in the night. The kiss. He’d kissed Alix down in that dark cellar. And she’d kissed him back and even though she was
just a kid it had felt like . . .

His tired imagination couldn’t find the word.

He hadn’t found the village by dusk but came across a farmer driving a cart who said Borki wasn’t more than four or five kilometres away. Gregor could shelter in
his stables. He even promised bread and cheese. But then the farmer’s son came into the kitchen, heard Gregor’s thanks and scowled. ‘That’s a German accent.’ He
grabbed Gregor’s rucksack and pulled out his papers. ‘You
are
German.’

‘Yes, but—’

Bellowing like an ox the son grabbed him and dragged him into the farmyard. The father picked up a pitchfork. Gregor waited for the prongs to rip through his chest.

‘You sons of dogs, can’t a man get a moment’s sleep?’

Gregor opened his eyes at the roar. Reuben Gronowski, whom Gregor had last seen just outside Brest, strode across the farmyard, bearded, looking years older, like some Old Testament prophet. The
man and his son scuttled away. ‘Who the hell—?’ Reuben scowled at Gregor, blinked, looked again. ‘I don’t believe it. Gregor Fischer! What the devil are you doing
here? How did you know we’d moved up here from the village?’

‘I didn’t know,’ Gregor muttered, his legs shaking with delayed shock. ‘I lost the map.’

‘Just as well.’ Reuben threw an arm round him. ‘Turned out the Germans had their eye on the place. We were warned not to go there so we’ve been staying here and in other
farms around the area.’ He led him to the barn. ‘Jacob’s here too.’

Jacob sat up on a pallet, yawning.
‘Psia krew!
It can’t be you?’ A grin stretched across his face. He hugged him so hard that Gregor feared for his ribs.
‘Didn’t you like Comrade Stalin?’

‘Not much.’

‘Bastard,’ Reuben growled.

Jacob handed Gregor a piece of sausage. ‘Sit down here. You were lucky to find us. Tomorrow we’re heading to Section North. That’s what the Home Army call the part of Poland
east of Warsaw, you know.’

Reuben gave a slight frown at his brother.

‘I’ve just come from there.’ Gregor shuddered at the thought of walking all those miles back, dodging patrols, farm dogs, suspicious locals. ‘Besides, I thought you
wanted to fight Germans?’

‘You’ve missed the news, haven’t you?’ Jacob laughed at Gregor’s face. ‘Jews have to wear stars now. If they catch you without one, it’s a
bullet.’

‘I see.’ Gregor ate the sausage.

Reuben frowned. ‘You didn’t say it.’

‘Say what?’

‘You didn’t point out that you’re only a quarter Jewish. And you’ve got a German passport. You could tidy yourself up and hand yourself in to them.’

‘I want to stay with you.’ Gregor thought of the lonely months he’d spent tramping cross-country.

Reuben drew in a breath. ‘I wish you could, Gregor. But you’re the enemy.’ He couldn’t meet Gregor’s eyes.

‘I’m not, you know I’m not.’

‘You know what I mean. This occupation is getting even uglier. People hate the Germans more and more.’

Gregor dropped his head and studied the straw on the barn floor. ‘All right. You don’t have to say any more. I’ll keep heading west, make for Pomerania.’

‘To those friends in the big house?’ Reuben walked to a corner of the barn, back to the others and stood silent for a moment. Then he turned back to them. ‘No. We promised
them, your mother and mine, that we’d try and look after you.’

‘I don’t want you to look after me!’ Indignation choked Gregor’s throat. ‘I’m not some damn child.’

Reuben touched his shoulder. ‘No, of course you’re not. You’re Gregor Fischer, known as
psia krew.
And who knows how useful those German papers of yours might
prove?’ His eyes were warm. ‘Let’s sleep now.’

Gregor pulled off his boots. ‘Why are we going to the east?’

Reuben looked down at his own feet. ‘Messages for the Home Army there.’ There was still a note of caution in his voice.

They hadn’t asked him about his mother and Gregor could have blessed them for this.

They kept away from roads and villages, trying to walk at night where possible. For whole days they managed to keep away from other human beings. At times the war seemed to
belong to another world. As they made camp on the first night in a shepherd’s hut Gregor thought of the Gronowski parents and girls. ‘Have you heard from your mother?’

Jacob looked away. ‘One letter. Lydia’d been ill. Pneumonia.’ He shrugged. Gregor didn’t ask again.

As they headed east fields turned to forest. The only sound was the snapping of twigs, animals rustling in the undergrowth, boots scrunching on snow. The Gronowskis had traded in Gregor’s
summer shoes for thick leather boots that kept his feet warm and dry for the first time in weeks. As they tramped Reuben told Gregor they were going to retrieve some children at risk of
deportation. ‘We’re being squeezed in both directions now but there are still some parts of the country where you can hide out. These kids – we don’t know how many there are
– deserve a chance.’

The way he talked about kids made it seem as though Reuben were much older. Hard to remember he was still in his teens too.

They trudged on, the silence broken only by the rustle of bushes as rabbits and deer crept around; a jay’s occasional flash of colour the only brightness.

They’d almost reached the Bug, heading north of Brest this time because Reuben was nervous about the major crossings. He stopped and pulled out a map. ‘The
border’s close. Let’s go through the plan one more time. Fischer, what do you do?’

‘Head for the baker’s in the village, opposite the church. He gives me papers belonging to his son, who’s in bed with scarlet fever. Tomorrow morning I cross the footbridge and
wait for you in the cemetery. If you don’t appear I cross back the next day and wait at the baker’s for a message.’

‘Good. Try and keep your gob shut. That German accent’s deadly.’

Jacob rolled his eyes. ‘He treats us like kids.’

‘Talking of kids, we’ll be collecting the first one tonight. A boy.’ Reuben sounded gruff. Gregor hadn’t liked to ask for too many details of the Gronowskis’ work.
Jacob had talked of a meeting with Home Army leaders in which responsibilities had been handed out. Reuben had taken their orders and had refused to tell his brother much.

‘He thinks I’d squeal if the Germans caught me.’ Jacob sniffed. ‘As if I would. It’s just because I’m younger than him, he likes to rub it in.’

They trudged on through the snow.

The baker put Gregor up for the night and fed him on black bread and cheese.

‘Sorry there’s nothing more.’

‘This is wonderful.’ Gregor hadn’t eaten as much in days. The baker’s wife showed him up to the loft and he slept long and deep. ‘Why are you helping someone like
me?’ he asked in the morning.

The baker snorted. ‘The Germans are Christians, not like those atheistic monsters.’

The wife handed Gregor a parcel of food. ‘We’ve hardly stopped fighting the Russians or the Ukrainians or the Lithuanians these last twenty years.’ She sounded resigned.
‘Poles have many enemies.’

At the footbridge the next morning the Russian guard barely glanced at Gregor’s papers and waved him through with the peasants bringing jars of preserved berries to sell
in the market. He found the cemetery and curled up behind a large gravestone to wait. War or not, chrysanthemums still sat in flowerpots, their petals frosted and crisp. Hard to tell how long
they’d been here. The donors were probably hundreds or thousands of miles east by now. Like his mother. He pushed thoughts of her away. It only weakened you to dwell on missing loved ones,
Reuben said. Keep your thoughts on the present, on surviving the next patrol, the next night shivering in the open, the next hungry day—