“On the windowsill. In the corridor.” He snapped the ledger shut.
By the time she finished her account, the line had exhausted. The man took her report, read it through. “You speak German?”
“I do.”
“Good?”
“Yes.”
A look of indefinable emotion ran over his otherwise inexpressive face. He rose from the table and waved her to step out of the room with him. “Wait here.” He hastened along the corridor almost at a trot, clasping her report to his chest, and soon disappeared around the corner.
Meanwhile, Ulya studied the surroundings: the doors along the wall, in front of every one a longer or a shorter line, people solemn and gloomy. She was the only person in front of number six. Most likely, the strangers were few.
Men with the red and white bands hastened by. A young woman in a starched white apron and headband passed, a plate with a teacup and some cookies on it. For a fleeting moment, the air became saturated with the aroma of coffee. Ulya inhaled deeply and smiled at the memory: SHON. Herr Wagner. The western manners and the coffee etiquette.
The clerk returned in about thirty minutes, his eyes shifting. “Would you mind coming tomorrow at eight? You’ll get your new document and you’ll . . . talk with a responsible person.”
28
Natasha
July 31, 1941
A gun shot roused Natasha from her drowsiness. Her stomach turned. She slipped from the bed and tiptoed to the window. First, she heard cries and swearing in Russian and Byelorussian coming from the neighbor’s hut then noticed several Polizei. Observed by a German officer with his hand resting on the pistol holstered to his belt, Byelorussians waved their rifles, herding Polina’s old parents and her two daughters with small children to an open truck.
It was already packed with people. Among them, Natasha recognized Moishe, his face that of a martyr, but as long as she remembered, he always bore this tormented expression. Hugging his wife Golda on her shoulder with one arm, in the other, he clutched his youngest child, the two-year-old Marishka, to his chest. His older sons with their wives and children, one smaller than the other, huddled together. No one cried. No one begged.
Meanwhile, the man, whom Natasha saw from his back, ordered Polina to hurry up. “You, woman, ten minutes to gather your things.” A familiar voice. Natasha winced at the recognition. Her former co-worker pushed Polina toward the hut. Displaying his power, he kept strolling in front of her huddled family, playing with a truncheon in his hand.
Natasha threw her gown over her shoulders and ran to the street. “Anton, what do you want from these people?”
He spun and a momentary look of discomfort crossed his face. “Natasha! We are resettling the Jews to special quarters.”
“But Polina’s family is not Jewish, Anton.”
“I have an order and I’ll execute it,” he said, bringing authority to his voice as though trying to convince his accomplices of his loyalty to his new masters.
“If you care so much about these filthy Jewish scum, we can take you with them to the ghetto,” one of the Polizei blurted out and burst out laughing, supported by a roar from the other three Polizei. “Shut up!” Anton barked and turned back to Natasha. Leaning to her ear, his voice fell almost to a whisper. “Vanish.”
“You go, go out of harm’s way, Natashen’ka,” Polina’s daughter offered, her eyes filled with unshed tears.
Angry at herself for her helplessness but even more furious with Anton, Natasha hurried home. But what could she do?
“What’s going on out there?” Natasha’s aunt asked, her voice groggy.
“The Polizei are sending Jews somewhere—Polina’s family among them. And your Moishe, too.”
“But maybe it’s better,” she mumbled and went to sleep. Most likely, she didn’t even get it, dead tired after the twelve-hour night shift in her hospital.
29
Ulya
August 1941
Feeling her way through the debris to the Council, Ulya wondered what life had in store for her.
In the Council, she headed to room number six, and at the “Come in” after her knock, she entered.
The same clerk jumped to his feet. “Greetings, comrade—” He became red in his face. “Fräulein Kriegshammer. Bitte—Please. If you’d be so kind as to follow me.” Taking quick, nervous steps, he led her along the creaky corridor then up the central staircase and through the double doors. Behind these, a young man of heavy build with a Polizei armband on his sleeve looked Ulya up and down and gestured for them to wait. “Klimko is here and a woman,” he reported to somebody after opening the inner door.
“Let her step in,” a voice came.
The guard released Klimko with a wave of his hand and stepped aside, letting Ulya into a rather big room with dark red curtains draped against the early but already strong sun. The semidarkness was broken by a lamp on a big table at which a man sat, not old yet but his receding hairline betrayed his age. She made a quick assessment. He was not a German, perhaps a local, judging by his suit. Heavy smoke screened his eyes, and she moved her gaze to Hitler’s portrait suspended on the wall behind the man’s back. A new master. Of them. Again, she mentally excluded herself from them.
“Fräulein Kriegshammer, sit down, bitte—please.” The man motioned her to the chair in front of the table. From the moment she took a seat, she felt a presence of somebody else in the room, most likely in the left corner by the entrance, but decided against turning around to check.
Now she could make out the eyes of the man in front of her. They were watery blue, and hooded.
“We welcome you in our city,” he started in an authoritative voice, “and hope you’ll like it here, especially now that our area is free from the accursed Bolsheviks. I learned from your report, you too suffered from them a great deal, but let me assure you, and I’m talking in the name of our new . . .
