“Paula is so happy, and Fluff too. They climb down and Paula rides on Fluff’s back as he walks them out of the forest. Once they are in the meadow, Paula hugs him and thanks Fluff for keeping her safe.”
The children all cheered and Mother Brinkmann said, much too soon, “Time for bed, children.”
They all lined up one by one, to receive a warm hug from the woman who had taken on the role of surrogate mother for them all. Mindel wrapped her small arms around her, and then watched as even Laszlo accepted a hug.
She crawled onto the mattress and for the first time since arriving at this camp, Mindel fell asleep feeling confident that tomorrow would be better than today.
14
Rachel’s throat was hurting worse than usual. Her hair had grown some more, and its orange hue was getting stronger. She coughed constantly and her eyes were stinging like hell. There was nothing she could do about it but take a couple of shallow breaths, relieved when the tickle in her throat subsided.
“You fine?” the woman working next to her asked.
“Is anyone working in here fine?” Rachel asked. The sentence was followed by another coughing fit. She wished for a bit of water to swallow down the irritation, but food or drinks were forbidden during work. She pondered whether she might ask the foreman if she were allowed to go to the latrine, just to inhale some fresh air. In here, it was so thick and dusty, she could barely breathe.
Suddenly, a brilliant light flashed and there was a sound like rushing wind through a narrow space, and before Rachel knew what had happened, she was engulfed in a torrent of pain and heat. She screamed at the top of her lungs and fell backward, breathing in the hot air and gasping as her throat was singed. Her hands and arms burned in a fiery sensation like she’d never experienced before.
From somewhere loud voices screamed and she felt people grabbing her, beating on her as she fought them. Her eyes were momentarily blinded by the flash of light, but as her vision returned, she realized her clothing had caught fire.
Apparently, the gunpowder had exploded, because dark smoke hung in the air and several other women were lying on the ground, smoldering. The guards yelled and shouted, although Rachel couldn’t make out the meaning of their words with her confused brain.
Someone lifted Rachel to her feet, half carrying and half dragging her to another part of the factory. Her left hand screamed with excruciating pain, pain that was a hundred times worse than anything she’d ever experienced before, including when she’d burned her hand with hot water as a child.
She whimpered and moaned, drifting in and out of consciousness. Every time she woke, the pain was so intense, she immediately sank back into the calming darkness engulfing her. Some kind soul brought a bowl of lukewarm water and told her to keep her hand in it.
Relief washed over her, as the water cooled the burns. When she finally dared to open her eyes, she saw burned black skin, raw flesh and blisters forming on her hand. The injury barely hurt in the water, but when she attempted to take her hand out of the bowl, the searing pain returned immediately making her dizzy and she quickly immersed her hand again.
The guards shouted at the women, “Leave the injured and get back to work. We have a war to win, lousy dimwits!”
Rachel was slumped against the wall, whimpering, when the factory medic came around to take a look at the casualties. He grabbed her hand from the water to inspect it and she screamed out in pain.
“Shut up, filthy Jew!” he said, dropping her hand back into the bowl, splashing precious cool water. “It’s just a burn. Clench your teeth and don’t be a crybaby.”
She would happily have stabbed a dart into his heart if she had one, but settled for glaring at him.
“This one can’t continue to work,” he said to the SS guard standing behind him.
“Alright, we’ll request a replacement and send her back.”
Rachel was hurting too much to grasp the meaning of his words, except that she didn’t have to finish her shift, which she was very grateful for. Despite the pain, exhaustion took over and she slept through the rest of the shift, until a guard kicked her with his boots.
“Get up, lazy-bones, it’s time to walk home!”
Home? For a short moment, Rachel believed he wanted to send her to the farm, but soon realized that home meant the Tannenberg camp.
She screamed when he took away the bowl of water, which earned her another kick in the midriff. In order not to infuriate him further, she did her best not to whimper as she used all her strength to get up. Without the cooling water, her hand felt like she was holding it in raging flames.
The image of medieval witches burning at the stake came to her mind and she all but vomited on the guard’s boots. Forcing the bile down, she staggered and stumbled to catch up with the rest of the women waiting for the injured to start the trek home, with aching ribs and singed clothes.
As she left the factory building, she caught a glimpse of several charred corpses and felt a twinge of jealousy. Those women had made it, they would suffer no more. Outside, the cold November air hit her body, causing her jaws to chatter, but at least it had the beneficial side effect of cooling her burned skin and easing the pain.
At the camp Rachel was immediately taken to the infirmary, where the Jewish doctor could do nothing for her but bandage her cracked ribs and put the hand in water again, until the SS came to put her on the next transport back
