We Were the Lucky Ones Read online

  ‘One loaf per head,’ the two-starred lieutenants call in unmistakable Polish as swarms of bodies, bone-thin, envelop their carts. A second pair of soldiers follows behind pushing a gleaming silver urn inscribed in choppy Cyrillic letters: KOFE. Two years ago, Genek would have turned up his nose at the thought of sipping grain coffee. But today, he can’t think of a more perfect gift. The brew is hot and sweet and, coupled with the still-warm bread, he and Herta drink it down with enthusiasm.

  The exiles are brimming with questions. ‘Why are you here? Is there an army camp here? Are we enlisting now?’

  The lieutenants behind the carts shake their heads. ‘Not here,’ they explain. ‘There are camps in Wrewskoje and in Tashkent. Our job is just to feed you and to make sure you continue on your way south. The whole Polish Army in the USSR is on the move. We’ll reorganise in Central Asia.’

  The exiles nod, their faces falling as the train’s whistle sounds. They don’t want to leave. They climb reluctantly back aboard and lean over the tracks as the train pulls away, waving furiously. One of the lieutenants throws up a two-finger Polish salute, igniting a roar amid the exiles, who return the salute en masse, their hearts racing to the clack-clack-clack of the train’s wheels as it picks up speed. Genek wraps an arm around Herta, kisses the top of Józef’s head, and beams, his spirits fuelled by the sight of his sharply clad countrymen, by the kofe warming his blood, the bread in his belly, the wind on his face.

  The bread and coffee at Aktyubinsk station would prove to be the closest thing to a meal they would encounter on their journey. As they clatter on toward Uzbekistan, the exiles go days without eating. Genek and Herta have no concept of when or where the train might stop. When it does stop, those with something to trade or a few coins in their pockets barter with the locals, who flank the tracks with baskets of delicacies in their arms – round loaves of lepyoshka bread, katik yogurt, pumpkin seeds, red onions, and, farther south, sweet melons, watermelons, and dried apricots. Most of the exiles, though, Genek and Herta included, know better than to waste their time looking hungrily at the food they can’t afford – instead, when the train stops, they leap from the cars and line up for the toilet and the water tap – or a kipyatok, as the Uzbeks call it – waiting as the dry, empty remains of semyechki seeds whirl about at their feet, listening intently for the hiss of steam, the first tug of the train’s engine, indicating that their ride is leaving, as it often does, without warning. The moment they hear the train stir, it’s a race to get back to their car, whether or not they’ve had a chance to use the toilet or fill their water buckets. No one wants to be left behind.

  After another three weeks of travel, Genek finally finds himself in line at a makeshift recruiting centre in Wrewskoje. A young Polish officer mans the desk.

  ‘Next!’ the officer calls. Genek steps forward, only two bodies separating him from his future in the Polish II Corps. The line had wrapped twice around the small city block when he took his place that morning, but he hadn’t minded. For the first time since he can remember, he is filled with a sense of purpose. Perhaps, he thinks, this was his fate all along, to fight for Poland. If anything, it’s a chance for redemption – to make right the poor decision that had cost him and Herta a year of their lives.

  Genek has been told nothing yet of when or where accepted recruits will report for duty. He hopes their stay in Uzbekistan won’t be long. The single-room flat they’ve been assigned, while better than the barracks in Altynay, is hot, dirty, and teeming with rodents. He and Herta spent their first few nights being jarred awake by the disconcerting feeling of tiny feet skittering across their chests.

  ‘There must be some kind of mistake,’ the recruit at the front of the line says.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ the officer behind the desk replies.

  Genek leans in to eavesdrop.

  ‘No, it has to be a mistake.’

  ‘No, sir, I’m afraid it isn’t,’ the officer shakes his head apologetically. ‘Anders’s Army isn’t accepting Jews.’

  Genek’s stomach turns. What?

  ‘But –’ the man stammers, ‘you mean to tell me I’ve come all this way … but why?’

  Genek watches as the officer lifts a piece of paper and reads: ‘“According to Polish law, a person of Jewish heritage belongs not to Poland but to a Jewish nation.” I’m sorry, sir.’ He says this without malice, but with an efficiency that suggests he’s eager to move on.

  ‘But what am I supposed to—’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, it isn’t up to me. Next, please.’

  With the issue put to rest, the man slinks from the line, muttering under his breath.

  No Jews in Anders’s Army. Genek shakes his head. He wouldn’t put it past the Germans to deprive a Jew the right to fight for his country, but the Poles? If he’s unable to enlist, there’s no telling how he and Herta will manage. In all likelihood they’ll be thrown back to the wolves, to a life of forced labour. To hell with that, Genek seethes.

  ‘Next, please.’

  A single body now separates him from the officer at the recruiting desk, from the paperwork he’ll be asked to complete. He balls up his hands into fists. Beads of sweat congregate on his forehead. That form is a deal breaker, a voice inside declares. It’s life and death. You’ve been here before. Think. You haven’t come this far to be turned away.

  ‘Next, please.’

  Before the man in front of him has a chance to step away from the desk, Genek pulls his cap down low over his brow and ducks quietly out of line.

  Weaving his way through the dry, crumbling town, his mind races. Mostly, he’s angry. Here he is offering up his manpower, possibly even his life, to fight for Poland. How dare his country deprive him of this right because of his religion! He wouldn’t be in this whole mess in the first place if he hadn’t stubbornly labelled himself Polish. He wants to yell, to punch a wall. But then his mind flashes to his year in Altynay, and he orders himself to think clearly. I need the army, he reminds himself. It is the only way out.

  He pauses at a street corner, at the entrance to a small mosque. Staring up at its stout gold dome, it hits him. Andreski.

  On paper, Genek and Otto Andreski have little in common. Otto is a devout Catholic – an ex-factory worker with a perpetual scowl and a chest as big as a bass drum; Genek is a lithe, dimpled Jew who has spent his career, until recently, behind a desk at a law firm. Otto is a brute, Genek a charmer. But despite their differences, the friendship the men forged in the forests of Siberia is a solid one. Lately, in their few moments of spare time, they have taken to throwing a set of hand-carved dice, or to playing kierki with Genek’s deck of cards, which is now in a pathetic state from overuse but somehow still complete. Herta and Julia Andreski, too, have grown close, have discovered, even, that they competed on rival ski teams at university.

  ‘I need you to teach me to be a Roman Catholic,’ Genek says later that evening. He’s just finished explaining to Otto and Julia what had happened at the recruiting centre. ‘From here on in,’ he announces, ‘Herta and I are Catholics, if anyone asks.’

  Genek is a good student. Within days, Otto has taught him to recite Our Father and Hail Mary, to cross himself with his right hand, not his left, to rattle off the name of the reigning Pope, Pius XII, born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli. A week later, when Genek finally works up the courage to return to the recruiting centre, he greets the young officer behind the desk with a strong handshake and a confident smile. His blue eyes are steady and his hand doesn’t tremble when he prints the words ‘Roman Catholic’ in the box marked RELIGION on the recruitment form. And when his name, along with Herta and Józef as family members, is added to the roster as an official member of Anders’s Polish II Corps, he thanks the officer with a salute and a ‘God bless.’

  On the eve of their first official day as new recruits, Otto invites Genek and Herta to his flat to celebrate. Genek brings his playing cards. They pass Otto’s secret stash of vodka, sipping from a dented tin fla
sk between hands of the agreed-upon game, oczko.

  ‘To our new Christian friends,’ Otto toasts, downing a swig and passing the flask to Genek.

  ‘To the Pope,’ Genek adds, taking a sip and handing the tin to Herta.

  ‘To a new chapter,’ Herta says, glancing at Józef, asleep in a small basket beside her, and for a moment the foursome is quiet as each wonders what exactly the next several months will bring.

  ‘To Anders,’ Julia chirps, lightening the mood, reaching for the flask and holding it victoriously over her head.

  ‘To winning this fucking war!’ Otto howls, and Genek laughs, as the prospect of winning a war being fought worlds away from Wrewskoje – a dusty Central Asian town whose name he can barely pronounce – seems as unlikely as it does absurd.

  The vodka makes its way again to Genek. ‘Niech szczęście nam sprzyja,’ he offers, the tin raised. May luck be on our side. They are low, it seems, on good fortune. And something tells him they’ll need it.

  DECEMBER 7, 1941: Japan bombs Pearl Harbour.

  DECEMBER 11, 1941: Adolf Hitler declares war on the United States; on the same day, the United States declares war on Germany and Italy. A month later, the first American forces arrive in Europe, landing in Northern Ireland.

  JANUARY 20, 1942: At the Wannsee Conference in Berlin, Reich director Reinhard Heydrich outlines a ‘Final Solution’ plan to deport the millions of Jews remaining in German-conquered territories to extermination camps in the east.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Mila and Felicia

  Outside Radom, German-Occupied Poland ~ March 1942

  It’s warm inside the train car, despite the cold March air whipping at their cheeks through the open window. Mila and Felicia have been standing for over an hour, packed in too tightly to sit, but the mood is bright, giddy almost with excitement. Whispers of freedom, of what it will feel like, taste like, circulate throughout the car. They are the fortunate few, the forty-odd Jews from the Wałowa ghetto who have made the list: doctors, dentists, lawyers – Radom’s most liberal and educated professionals – selected to emigrate to America.

  Mila was sceptical at first. Everyone was. America had declared war on Axis powers in December. They’d sent troops to Ireland in January. Why would Hitler offer up a band of Jews to a country that had designated itself an enemy? But he’d sent a group to Palestine the month before, and despite what everyone thought – that surely the Jews had really been shipped off not to Palestine but to their deaths – rumours had begun flying through the ghetto that they had made it safely to Tel Aviv. And so when the opportunity arose, Mila was quick to put her name on the list. She believed it: this was her chance.

  Felicia stands with her arms wrapped around Mila’s thigh, relying on her mother’s balance to steady hers. ‘What does it look like now, Mamusiu?’ she asks – it’s the same question every few minutes. She’s too little to see out the window. ‘Just trees, love. Apple trees. Pastures.’ Occasionally Mila hoists her to her hip so Felicia can see. Mila has explained where they are going, but the word America has little significance in Felicia’s three-and-a-half-year-old mind. ‘What about Father?’ she’d asked, when Mila first told her of the plan, and the sentiment had nearly broken Mila’s heart. Despite having no memories of him, Felicia worried that Selim would return to Radom only to find that she and her mother had disappeared. Mila had assured her as best she could that she would send an address as soon as they arrived in America, that Selim could meet them there, or they could return to Poland once the war was over. ‘It’s just that right now,’ Mila had said, ‘staying here isn’t safe.’ Felicia had nodded, but Mila knew it was hard for the child to make sense of it all. Mila herself had no concept, really, of what to expect.

  The one thing that was undeniably clear was just how dangerous it had become for Felicia in the ghetto. Hiding her in that sack of fabric scraps – and then walking away – was one of the hardest things Mila had ever done. She would never forget waiting outside the workshop as the SS conducted their raid, praying that Felicia would remain still as she’d instructed her to, praying that the Germans would pass her by, praying that she’d done the right thing in leaving her baby girl there, alone in the workshop. When the SS retreated and Mila and the others were finally allowed to return to their desks, Mila sprinted to the wall of fabric scraps, nearly hysterical, crying hot grateful tears as she pulled her daughter, shivering and wet, from the sack.

  Mila vowed that day in the workshop to find a safer place for Felicia to hide – somewhere outside the ghetto, where the SS wouldn’t think to look for her. A few months ago, in December, she’d tucked her daughter into a straw-filled mattress and held her breath as she dropped the mattress from the flat’s second-storey window. Their building lay on the perimeter of the ghetto. Isaac waited below. As a member of the Jewish Police, he was allowed outside the ghetto walls. The plan was for him to take Felicia to the home of a Catholic family, where she could live, under their care, posing as Aryan. The terrifying two-storey drop, thankfully, was a success. The mattress broke Felicia’s fall, just as planned. Mila had cried into a clenched fist at the sight of Isaac leading Felicia away by the hand, as petrified of leaving her daughter in someone else’s care as she was relieved that Felicia had survived the fall. Anything had to be safer than the ghetto, though, where disease spread like wildfire, and where every day, it seemed, a Jew without the proper papers, or too old, or too sick, was discovered and killed – shot in the head or beaten and left to die in the street for everyone to see. She’d done the right thing, Mila told herself over and over again that night, unable to sleep.

  The next day, however, Mila found a note from Isaac beneath the door to the flat – Offer renounced, it read. Returning the parcel at 22h. Mila would never learn what went wrong, whether the family changed their minds or whether Felicia was deemed too Jewish-looking to pass as their own. At ten that evening, she was returned to the ghetto, clinging white-knuckled to a rope of sheets dangling from the same second-storey window. To make matters worse, a week later, feverish and short of breath, Felicia was diagnosed with a severe case of pneumonia. Mila had never wished harder for Selim to return – surely he would tend to their daughter more effectively than any of the doctors at Wałowa’s clinic could. Felicia’s recovery was slow; twice Mila thought she might lose her. In the end, it was the steam from a boiled eucalyptus branch Isaac smuggled in that finally opened up her windpipe, allowing her to breathe again and eventually to heal.

  A few days after Felicia was finally back on her feet, the SS announced they would send a select group of Jews from Wałowa to America. And now, here they are. Mila tries to imagine what it means, to be American, envisioning warm homes filled with well-stocked pantries and happy, healthy children and streets where, Jewish or not, you were free to walk and work and live just like everyone else. Resting a hand atop Felicia’s head, she watches the leafless domes of beech trees speed by through the window of the train car. It is a thrilling prospect, the idea of a new life in the States. But of course it is also devastating, for it means leaving her family behind. Mila’s throat tightens. Saying goodbye to her parents in the ghetto had nearly broken her resolve. She brings a hand to her stomach, where the pain is still sharp, like a fresh stab wound. She’d tried hard to convince her parents to put their names on the list, but they refused. ‘No,’ they said, ‘they won’t take a couple of old shopkeepers. You go,’ they insisted. ‘Felicia deserves a better life than this.’

  In her head, Mila takes inventory of her parents’ valuables. They are down to twenty zloty, and they’ve sold off most of their porcelain, silk, and silver. They have a bolt of lace, which they could barter if they needed to. And of course there’s the amethyst – thankfully Nechuma hasn’t had to part with that yet. And better than any wealth, she has Halina now. Halina and Adam had moved back to Radom not long after Jakob and Bella arrived. They live outside the ghetto walls with their false IDs, and with Isaac’s help they are able to sneak
an egg or a couple of zloty into the ghetto every now and then. Her parents also have Jakob nearby. His plan, he told Mila before she left, was to appeal for a job at the factory outside of town where Bella worked. He would be less than twenty kilometres away and promised to check on Sol and Nechuma often. Her parents are not alone, Mila reminds herself, and that brings her some comfort.

  Outside there is hissing, brakes screaming. The train slows. Mila peers out the window, surprised to see nothing but open fields on either side of the track. An odd place to stop. Perhaps there is another train meeting them to take them the rest of the way to Kraków, where, they’ve been told, a group of Americans from the Red Cross will escort them to Naples. The door slides open and she and the others are ordered to disembark. Outside the car, Mila’s eyes follow the length of the tracks splayed out before them; they are empty. Her stomach flips. And just as suddenly as she realises that something is amiss, the group is surrounded by a throng of men. She can tell right away that they are Ukrainian. Burly, dark haired, and broad chested, they look nothing like the fair-skinned, sharp-featured Germans who’d piled them into the train car hours earlier at the station in Radom. The Ukrainians shout orders, and Mila tightens her grip on Felicia’s hand, her plight instantly and horrifically clear. Of course. How could she have been so naive? They’d volunteered for this, thinking it was their ticket to freedom. Felicia looks up at her, eyes wide, and it is all Mila can do to keep her knees from buckling. This was her decision. She’d brought this upon them.

  The group is arranged into two lines, marched twenty metres into the field, and handed shovels. ‘Dig!’ one of Ukrainians yells in Russian, his hands cupped around his mouth in place of a bullhorn, the metal barrel of his rifle catching the waning rays of the afternoon sun. ‘Dig or we shoot!’