The Woman with the Blue Star, Pam Jenoff [highly recommended books txt] 📗

to reveal meat of some sort and broke it into two halves, then handed one piece to my mother and the other to Pan Rosenberg, splitting the meager rations evenly between our two families. “It’s golonka,” my mother whispered. “Pork knuckle. Eat it.” Though I had never had it before, my stomach growled.

But Pan Rosenberg looked at the meat Pawel offered and wrinkled his nose in disgust. “It’s trayf,” he said with distaste at the notion of eating something that was not kosher. “We can’t possibly eat that.”

“I’m sorry. It was all I could get on short notice,” Pawel said, sounding truly contrite. He held it out once more, but Pan Rosenberg waved it away. “For your mother and son, at least?” Pawel tried again. “I’m afraid there won’t be anything else for a day or two.”

“Absolutely not.”

Pawel shrugged and brought the extra meat to Mama. She hesitated, caught between wanting to feed us and not wanting to take more than her share. “If you’re sure...”

“It shouldn’t go to waste,” he said. Mama took a small piece of the pork for herself and gave the rest to me. I ate it hurriedly before Pan Rosenberg could change his mind, trying to ignore the baleful eyes of his son. The elderly woman hung closely behind her family, not complaining, but I wondered guiltily if she would have liked some. I looked at the Rosenbergs in their strange dark clothing. What had they done to earn the saving graces of the sewer worker? They were so different from us. Yet we were all to live here together. We had been spared the indignity of sharing an apartment in the ghetto. But now hiding in this small space together with these strangers was our only hope.

And then Pawel was gone, leaving us alone in the chamber. “Here,” Mama said, pointing to one of the benches. She pointed to a spot so dirty and wet she would have scolded me a day earlier for sitting there.

My foot throbbed as I sat, reminding me of my earlier wound. “I cut my foot,” I offered, though it seemed silly to mention in light of all that had happened since. Mama knelt beside me, the already filthy hem of her skirt dipping into the vile water. She lifted up my right foot and removed it from the soaked shoe, then patted it with a dry bit of her dress. “We must keep our feet dry.” I didn’t understand how she could think of such things at a time like this.

She reached for the satchel she had packed, the one Papa tossed to me just before he fell in the water. What was in the bag that my father had paid for with his life? Mama opened it. Medicines and bandages, a blue-and-white baby blanket, and a spare pair of socks for me. I crumpled into a little ball, grief crushing me anew. “Socks,” I said slowly, my voice heavy with disbelief. “Papa died for a pair of socks.”

“No,” Mama said. “He died to save you.” She drew me close. “I know it is difficult,” she whispered, her eyes shining with tears. “But we must do what is necessary in order to survive. It’s what he would want. Do you understand?” She wore a steely, determined expression that I had never seen before. She leaned her head against mine and the soft curls of hair around her ear still smelled like the cinnamon water she had sprayed after her bath the previous day. I wondered how long we would be down here before that glorious scent would be gone.

“I understand.” I let her put salve on my foot, then changed into the clean pair of socks she had given me. As I reached down, I glimpsed on my sleeve the armband with the blue star that the Germans had made us wear to identify ourselves as Jews. “At least we don’t need this anymore.” I tugged at the armband and the fabric tore with a satisfying rip.

Mama smiled. “That’s my girl, always seeing the bright side.” She followed suit and tore off her own band, then gave a satisfied chuckle.

As my mother went to close the satchel, something small and metallic fell from it and tumbled to the sewer floor. I hurried to pick it up. It was the gold chain my father had always worn under his shirt, with a pendant bearing the Hebrew word chai, or life. Jewelry was not common among men, but the necklace had been a gift to my father from his parents at his bar mitzvah. I had assumed he was wearing it when he fell, that it was lost to the sewer river as well, but he must have taken it off before we fled. Now it was here with us.

I held it out to my mother. But she shook her head. “He would want you to have it.” She fastened the clasp around my neck and the chai lay on my chest, close to my heart.

There was a clattering outside the chamber. We stood up, alarmed. Had the Germans come so soon? But it was only Pawel once more. “The light,” he said, pointing to the lone carbide lamp that hung from a hook. “It’s giving off steam on the street above. You must turn it off.” Reluctantly, we abandoned the only source of light we had and the sewer went cold and dark once more.

5

Ella

April 1943

Spring had always come slowly to Kraków, like a sleepy child unwilling to get out of bed on a school morning. This year, it felt as if it might not come at all. Dirty snow still covered the base of the bridge as I made my way from the city center toward Dębniki, the working-class neighborhood on the southern bank of the Wisła. The air was frigid, the wind sharp. It was as if Mother Nature was personally protesting the Nazi occupation as it dragged through a fourth year.

I hadn’t expected to find