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

with the fragrance of flowering linden trees as I crossed the Planty. More people seemed to be out today than I had seen since the start of the war, running errands or visiting friends or family. They still walked swiftly and kept their eyes low, not greeting one another or stopping to chat, as they once might have. But there was a kind of defiance in their steps, the way they lifted their chins, even briefly, to admire the way the sunlight bathed Wawel Castle in gold. It was as if to say to the Germans, You will not steal this beautiful day in our city from us.

I had gone to see Sadie the previous week on Saturday as promised at the same time, bringing with me a bit of sheep’s cheese I’d managed to sneak from our kitchen. But she had been late and seemed nervous. “I can only stay a few minutes,” she said. “I’m not supposed to come see you. I promised I wouldn’t.” She, too, had others who might notice and mind if she was missing.

“If you can’t come anymore, I understand,” I said, feeling a surprising tug of disappointment. The first time I had returned to the sewer out of curiosity about the girl, the second because I felt bad for her and she seemed to need my help. If she couldn’t meet me again, it really shouldn’t matter to me at all. Yet somehow it did. I liked helping Sadie and even the little bit I had done made me feel as if I were doing something that mattered.

“Of course I will come again,” she said quickly. “Sundays would be better,” she added. “The other family, the Rosenbergs, they stay in the chamber where we live all day on Saturdays to observe the Sabbath, so it’s more obvious when I am not there.”

“Sunday, then,” I agreed. “I’ll try to come every week, even tomorrow, if you’d like.”

“I would,” she said with a smile. “Meeting up, even for a bit, well, it makes the rest of the time down here just a little easier to bear. Does that sound silly?”

“Not at all. I enjoy coming here, too. I’ll come tomorrow. But you’d best go back now.” I didn’t want her to get in trouble and not be able to come anymore at all.

But the next morning, Ana Lucia decided it was time to spring-clean the house. In addition to running Hanna ragged, my stepmother enlisted me, too, with a thousand small chores that made it impossible to get away. It was as if she knew my plans and had devised the impediment deliberately. So I had not been able to go see Sadie that day at all. I imagined her, standing at the grate, disappointed and wondering why I had not come.

Today, though, a week later, I was determined to make it back to Dębniki to see her. I had left early and slipped down the stairs quietly, not wanting to wake Ana Lucia. I reached the base of the river and started for the bridge. The footpath was crowded with pedestrians and I tried to navigate between slow-moving babcias and the mothers bearing too many parcels, their squalling children in tow. The sky had grown dark to the west now, a thick sheet of clouds rolling in and eclipsing the sun unexpectedly. I had not thought to carry an umbrella on such a pleasant morning.

As I neared the middle of the bridge, the flow of people walking stopped suddenly. The man in front of me came to a halt so abruptly that I bumped into him. “Przepraszam,” I said, excusing myself. He did not respond or move, but continued chewing on the end of his cigar. The bridge was not just crowded, I realized, but blocked. The police had barricaded the bridge at the midpoint, preventing anyone from going in or out of Dębniki.

“What’s happening?” I asked the man I had bumped into. I wondered if the police had set up an impromptu checkpoint, as they often did, to inspect Kennkarten. They would not question mine, with the special stamps Ana Lucia had procured from her German friends giving us free transit across the city. But getting through such checkpoints could take hours, and I didn’t want to be delayed in getting to Sadie. The sky was dark gray now, more twilight than midday. From a distance came the low rumble of thunder.

“An aktion,” he replied without looking back.

“Here?” I stiffened with fear. I had assumed that the mass arrests he referenced occurred only in the Jewish neighborhoods.

He removed the cigar from his mouth. “Yes, the ghetto was in Podgórze, the next neighborhood over.”

“I know, but the ghetto was emptied.”

“Exactly.” He sounded annoyed, as if the point was an obvious one. “They’re looking for those who might have escaped. Jews in hiding.”

Hearing this, I grew worried for Sadie. The police had cordoned off the neighborhood around the sewer, looking for Jews who had escaped arrest when they emptied the ghetto. I pushed my way to the front of the crowd. Down the street, I could see that German military and police vehicles lined all four sides of the Rynek De˛bnicki. There was a lone truck as well, which under normal circumstances looked as though it might carry cattle to market. Strangely now it had benches for people to sit on in the back. The police were combing the neighborhood, going from house to house and business to business with their awful dogs, trying to sniff out those in hiding. A cold sweat broke out on my skin. Surely they would search the sewer as well and find Sadie and the others.

I looked around desperately, wondering if there was another way to cross the river so that I could get to Sadie and warn her. But I was blocked by the crowd to the side and behind.

A sudden scream cut across the bridge, ringing high above the Germans shouting orders and dogs barking. On the