‘Over the next few weeks, Stefa will need nursing,’ she told me. ‘I can take over in the evenings, but you may have to quit the Lending Library. Her clothes were infested with lice, of course. To be safe, I had her sheets taken away to be washed. And Papa will have your apartment sprayed with carbolic acid later today. By all accounts, you should be under an order of quarantine, but he managed to avoid that. Listen, Erik, you may be infested, too.’
Her efficiency disoriented me. Ewa – with her small, determined eyes – now seemed one of those timid and reticent women who turn into Joan of Arc when their loved ones are threatened. A useful person in a war.
‘Are there medications that will help?’ I asked.
‘Some ghetto physicians say that a Swiss serum has produced good improvements in patients, but it costs a thousand złoty a vial.’
‘My God! Can your father get me some?’
‘Yes, though I don’t know how long it will take him.’
‘I’ll go and see him. I’ll sell Hannah’s engagement ring to raise the money.’
‘No, please, don’t do that!’ she said sharply. Then, sensing she’d only heightened my sense of guilt, she added, ‘I only meant there must be something else you can sell.’
‘Not if I need to raise a thousand złoty in a hurry.’
Sitting on the floor in front of the clothes chest I’d shared with Adam, I opened the bottom drawer, clawed my way past his tangle of underwear and socks, and unhooked the ring from its hiding place. Holding it in my hand made me feel faint. My mouth was as dry as dust.
I held up the ring for Ewa to see. ‘It’s a two-carat diamond with a gold band.’
I got to my knees but was too dizzy to go any further. Ewa helped me up and fetched me a glass of water. After a long drink, I sat down on my bed again.
‘I’d appreciate it if you would sell it for me,’ I told her.
‘Me? My God, Erik, I don’t know anything about selling jewellery.’
‘Neither do I, but you’re a pretty young woman, so you’ll get a better price. You can say it’s yours – for sympathy.’
When I held it out to her, she moved her hands behind her back. ‘No, don’t make me,’ she pleaded. ‘I’ll get nervous and ruin things. Please, Erik…’
Tears appeared in her eyes and her shoulders hunched; she had transformed back into her usual self, so I didn’t insist.
When I asked if she knew where Rowy Klaus might be, Ewa glanced at her watch and told me he was giving a piano lesson on Sienna Street, which was in the Little Ghetto, a relatively well-off section of our territory that was separated from the bigger – and poorer – section by Chłodna Street. In fact, Sienna Street was the most elegant address in the ghetto.
I left right away; I needed to question him about Anna and could elicit his advice on selling my ring at the same time. On the way, I got myself deloused at the disinfection bathhouse at 109 Leszno Street.
What unlikely marvels I saw in the shop windows that afternoon while waiting for Rowy! – six big fresh trout lying in a tub of ice; a burlap bag brimming with coffee beans from Ethiopia; and a bottle of Sandeman port from 1922. In the window of M. Rackemann & Sons, Tobacconists was a Star of David made out of twenty-four mustard-coloured packets of Gauloises cigarettes. The design had the unexpected, peculiar beauty of a Dadaist collage.
A blonde young prostitute with caved-in cheeks and frantic eyes soon caught my attention. She stood outside the Rosenberg Soup Kitchen, rubbing her spidery hands together, gazing around nervously, as though waiting for an unreliable friend. Had she been an art student? She dressed like the subject of an Otto Dix painting, with red stockings on her stick-figure legs and a lumpy, fox-headed stole slung around her neck.
When she asked me if I was looking for some affection, I thanked her for her interest but told her she’d have better luck with a younger man.
By the time Rowy emerged, the sun was going down. He was dressed in grey except for a crimson woollen scarf, which coiled around his neck and ribboned behind him in the wind like a banner proclaiming his youth. His walk was eager and untroubled – as though he were bouncing along on daydreams. I hailed him with a wave.
His face brightened on seeing me, which pleased me.
‘Greetings, Erik!’ he said as he approached.
‘I like your scarf,’ I told him, and we shook hands.
‘Ewa – she knitted it for me,’ he replied.
From the way he smiled, I could see he was deeply in love – and that his new way of walking was meant to let the world know. Maybe this was his first great passion.
‘I just found out that you studied with Noel Anbaum,’ I told him.
‘Man, that was years ago!’ he replied in jaunty German, adding in Yiddish, ‘I hope you didn’t come all the way across town just to confirm that.’
‘No. What I really need to know is if you knew his granddaughter Anna.’
‘Sure did. She auditioned for the chorus. Noel set it up for her. Why?’
‘She’s dead – murdered just like Adam. And her hand was cut off.’
