Alexander Altmann A10567 (17 page)

The commander laughed. “You Jews, always thinking about your stomachs. I didn’t bring you here to eat. I brought you here to work. We’re down a Jew.”

“Papa!” his daughters squealed as they swept past Alexander and caught their father on the stairs. “We’ve set the table in the sitting room and Mama’s made us hot chocolate. Please.” They each took a gloved hand and dragged their father back down the stairs.

“Okay,
lieblings
. One cup, then it’s time for your nap.”

“Who’s that?” the girl with the black curls pointed a woollen finger at Alexander. He looked down and saw what she saw – a boy with dirt-streaked skin and a grubby striped jacket.

“No one,” the commander said, taking her mittened hand in his and pushing past Alexander. “Now, where’s that hot chocolate you promised me.”

Alexander stepped into the kitchen, his crusty feet leaving footprints on the floor.

“Wait here. A kitchen hand will be with you shortly,” the guard said, leaving Alexander alone in the room. Alexander waited for the guard’s footsteps to fade before lifting his eyes from the floor. On the wooden table in front of him was a loaf of fresh bread still warm in its pan, a roll of softened butter and a jar of dark plum jam. Alexander felt faint.

“Are you all right?” A woman appeared at the door, holding a basket of peas. Alexander nodded and looked down at his feet. He could feel the woman watching him. From the corner of his eye he could see the hem of a skirt and calfskin heels. He watched them move across the white linoleum and saw them stop at the sink. He heard a cupboard door swing open and the clink of a glass under running water.

“Have a drink,” she said, forcing a glass into his hand. Her nails were painted and on her left ring finger she wore a gold wedding band. A wedding band. Alexander stiffened. The woman was Ziegler’s wife.

Alexander drank slowly, watching her through the refracted glass, her smile deepening the lines around her eyes. Her hair was blacker than her daughter’s, her eyes greener. Alexander drained the water and placed the glass on the table.

“Thank you,” he said, his tongue slippery in his mouth.

“What’s your name?” The commander’s wife asked, sweeping a stray lock of hair from her eye.

“My name?” Alexander straightened. “A10567.”

“No.” She shook her head. “Your name.” She stared at Alexander and when he didn’t answer, she held out her hand and let it hover in the air between them. “I’m Anna Ziegler, Herr Ziegler’s wife. And you are?”

Alexander blinked again.

“Alexander Altmann,” he whispered, the name spiky in his mouth. He held out his hand. “Alexander Altmann,” he said again, just to hear the words, to taste them. The commander’s wife took his hand. She didn’t twist it behind his back or tie it to the table leg. She shook his hand and let it fall, as if shaking hands with a Jew was a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

“Herr Altmann.” She smiled. “Would you like a cup of tea?”

Alexander’s mouth fell open – the commander was in the next room! He forced himself to speak.

“The commander – your husband – sent me here to work.”

“Yes, thank you,” she said, turning to the kettle. “And how about a slice of cake?”

She made him sit down. On a chair. At the table. She placed a slice of poppy seed cake in front of him and a cup of warm tea.

“One sugar or two?”

Alexander held up two fingers. He wished he’d cleaned his nails. He looked from the table to the door and back to the table at the slab of cake sitting there, plump with sugar and eggs. He pictured Isidor with a knife in his hand chasing mice around the stable and his own dinner – a wrinkled husk of onion he’d saved for a week. His stomach growled.

“It’s okay.” She smiled, sliding the plate closer.

He tore at the cake, forgetting his spoon, and sipped his tea, the sugar crystals exploding on his tongue. He sucked and chewed and swallowed, brushing the remaining scraps from the table into his hand before standing up.

“There are a few jobs outside. Perhaps we’ll start with chopping wood.” It almost sounded like a question. “The logs are outside.” The commander’s wife walked to the door. “We usually require two baskets of kindling.”

Alexander shook the poppy seed crumbs into his mouth and followed her out. He didn’t see the wood pile at first, nor the neat rows of carrots planted beside the parsnips, just the thick column of black smoke rising beyond the high brick fence. He cursed and pressed his eyes shut. It had been a good day. A cake day. His stomach was full. He turned his back on the smoke to feel the sun on his back, to forget for just a little while longer.
Is that what she did every time her husband returned from work?
he wanted to ask.
Every time she wandered outside and breathed the smouldering air or saw a half-starved child in blue and white rags: closed her eyes and pretended?

“We’ll see you again, I hope,” she said, turning for the door. Alexander lifted the axe from the ground. He wanted to say thank you, wanted to ask why she’d fed him and what she knew, but he nodded instead and bent over the wood, his confusion spilling out of him and staining his cheeks.

Alexander walked down the commander’s long gravel drive with a gun at his back, returning to Auschwitz in the dead of night. The camp was asleep. Even the dogs were silent. He pulled the barrack door open and, with the help of the moon, felt his way to the bathroom, flicking on the light and closing the door so he wouldn’t wake the Rat. His bruises from the previous day were purpling and his torn palms made worse by the splinters that had found their way under his skin. He plucked them out, one by one, slipped his clothes off and stepped into the shower. The hot water stung his skin but the heat felt good.

He hurried across the cold cement floor, pulled himself onto his bunk, and froze. There was something in his bed, under the blanket. Something small and slick and cold. He reached out with his right foot and nudged it with his toes. When it didn’t move, he dived under the blanket and pulled it out, holding it up to the moon’s light to better make out its shape.

“It’s for the horse,” Isidor said, stirring, “but you can use it too.” Alexander wrapped his fingers around the small glass jar, pried open the metal lid and smelled the contents. Garlic. Garlic and – he touched his nose to the paste – mint. Garlic to clean the wound and mint to dull the pain. Alexander turned to Isidor.

“How’d you know about the injury?”

“I saw you get into the commander’s car.” Isidor propped himself up on an elbow. “I offered to feed your horse and when I saw his leg, well, it looked pretty deep so I went to get–”

“The vet?” Alexander’s face darkened.

“No, of course not!” Isidor sounded offended. “I went to get some medicine. I know someone at the infirmary, a chemist from Prague. I’ve done him a few favours. He owes me.”

“Thank you,” Alexander said quietly into the dark. He knew Isidor deserved more, knew that he owed him a conversation, or at least the beginnings of one, but that would mean tearing down the wall he’d built between them and winding back the silences, and he didn’t know how.

“No problem,” Isidor mumbled, his voice thick with sleep.

Alexander tucked the jar into his cap and slid it under his blanket. His father had always said that difficult times brought out the best and worst in men. Since coming to Auschwitz he’d seen only the dark side, until that is what he’d come to expect. That’s why today had been so unexpected: stumbling into the commander’s kitchen and meeting his wife; having her sit him down in front of a fire and chase the cold from his bones; offering him tea with sugar and poppy seed cake to beat down his hunger. She had looked at him and seen, not a prisoner, but a boy in need of food. A boy who wanted his name back.

Alexander turned over. He’d told himself the commander’s wife was a one-time thing, and because he couldn’t explain it, he hadn’t tried. But now Isidor had brought him medicine and he couldn’t help but think that if there were two good people in this awful place, maybe there were more. Maybe there was goodness to be found in people as well as animals. Alexander closed his eyes, and for the first time in a long time, slept a deep, dreamless sleep, in spite of the cold.

He woke before the others. The barrack was still silent, not the enforced night-time silence, a different quiet, without wind or rain or the small sounds of life – tree branches scraping glass, flapping wings – the sounds one took for granted until they were gone. Alexander pulled his cap on and climbed down from his bunk. Something had changed. He tiptoed to the door, pushed it open and blinked at the bright white. While the camp had slept it had snowed!

Someone stirred in the bunk closest to the door.

“Shut the door or I’ll shut it on your head.” A boot sailed across the room and landed with a thud at Alexander’s feet. He closed the door and waited for the Rat to emerge from his room. If he’d woken at home to a metre of fresh snow, he wouldn’t be waiting. His boots would be on and he’d be flying out the back door. He’d be strapping on his skis to race Spitz down the hill or be building an arsenal of snowballs to hurl at his sister. He wouldn’t be inside watching the world turn white.

When he was finally allowed out, the snow had already been sullied by the guards’ heavy boots. But beyond the main gate, on the forest path that led to the stables, the snow glittered in the cold blue light. Outside the camp the ground was white and soft. The Horse Platoon walked between the naked trees, their feet wet and their fingers numb.

Alexander trudged through the snow, trying to catch the falling flakes with his tongue. His bones felt brittle but he’d slept well, and hidden under his cap was a salve for his horse. He ran to the stall as soon as the kapo blew his whistle. Six days. He had six days left.

Midnight was backed into the shadows and when Alexander entered, he dipped his head and looked away.
He’s still unsure of me
, Alexander thought, stopping by the door.
Of course he is. I abandoned him.
He lowered his eyes to Midnight’s leg. The blood that had dripped from his wound had dried and turned black. Alexander took a deep breath and walked towards him. He didn’t know when he’d started sensing what Midnight was feeling but he knew, as he stood beside him, that the horse longed for his herd.

“I’m sorry,” he said and slowly lifted his hand. Midnight detached himself from the shadows and, nickering gently, bumped his nose at Alexander’s elbow. After everything that had happened, the horse still wanted to trust him. “Thank you,” Alexander whispered. He ran his hands over the Arabian’s neck.“I’ll try to do better; I’ll try to keep you safe.” He wished he could do more – be more – for the horse, but he was just a stablehand. Midnight’s life was in the commander’s hands.

He filled a bowl with water and ran a sponge over Midnight’s leg to loosen the dirt, while the horse explored him with sniffs and nudges. He dabbed Isidor’s ointment onto the wound between feeding him handfuls of sweet hay and brought the horse a bucket of hot mash as a reward for his patience.

“Do you think you can walk on it?” he asked, grabbing a handful of mane. Midnight stepped towards the door with his right foot, then limped onto his left.

“They mustn’t see you limp,” Alexander whispered, and he lead Midnight away from the door. He placed a hand on Midnight’s neck and felt the horse’s slow, steady pulse, and his own pulse slow to match it.

“We’ll have to stay inside until you stop hobbling, but that’s no reason not to work,” he said, slipping from the stall to fetch the commander’s saddle. He returned and dropped it onto the straw and waited for Midnight to grow curious. The saddle was made of brown leather, the seat a soft suede of the same deep brown hue. An eagle and a swastika had been burned into its leather hide and the stirrups had been engraved with the date of manufacture: 1940. The year his father had disappeared.

“It won’t hurt you,” Alexander said, picking up a stirrup and turning it over. Midnight dipped his head and his eyelids sagged.

“We’ll just leave it on the straw until you get used to it,” he said. His own eyelids began to grow heavy. He wished he were more like a horse, able to sleep standing up, only needing two or three hours of broken sleep a night to make it through the day. Alexander yawned and edged closer to the horse for warmth. He thought of his little sister and the time she’d gone missing and how he’d searched for her and finally found her in the henhouse, asleep in the straw. He yawned again.
I won’t sleep
, he thought.
I’ll just rest for a moment.
He leaned against Midnight and let his lids close and, lulled by the drumbeat of Midnight’s heart and his warm breath on Alexander’s cheek, he fell asleep.

“Ow! What was that for?” Alexander woke with a start and rubbed his neck. Midnight bumped him again and tilted his head at the door.

“Just a minute.” He leaped to his feet and brushed the straw from his clothes. “Oh, it’s you,” he said, flushing as the door flew open.

“Thought I’d come and see how your horse was doing.” Isidor smiled and raised his hand to pat Midnight.

“Don’t touch his poll!” Alexander cried, swiping Isidor’s hand away. “You can rub his neck and his nose, but don’t touch the top of his head. He’s head-shy.”