‘They say the commandant visits her for sex,’ whispers Cibi.
‘For sex?’ says Livi. ‘She has sex with him?’ The young girl is aghast: she would rather die than sleep with a Nazi. ‘How can she do it, Cibi? Why?’
‘Like us she has chosen to survive, so don’t ever judge her, Livi. Do you think she wants to be in Block 25? Or that she flirted with the commandant? We all choose to stay alive any way we can.’ Cibi is passionate about this idea and she needs Livi to understand. ‘If she refused him, she’d be dead,’ she adds.
‘But I couldn’t do it, Cibi. I just couldn’t.’ Livi hangs her head.
‘Then be thankful you’re not in her position. It must take a certain type of courage to wake up every morning and just carry on.’
In their new block, the sisters are delighted to find clean, warm blankets.
*
The next morning, as if the night before had never happened, they go back to work at Auschwitz in the Kanada sorting rooms. Their very first task is to select suitable clothing, relieved at last to discard the curious cocktail dresses for the rough woollen garments of a prisoner.
But, once again, the sisters are thwarted by the footwear. There are no boots available and frostbite continues to ravage the girls’ feet. As winter rages around them, it is Cibi’s turn to suffer. On some of the colder days, she needs the help of her friends to make it to and from Auschwitz.
Finally, when she can barely put one foot in front of the other, there is nothing to do but ask her boss, SS officer Armbruster, for help. She gathers her courage and makes her plea, and the officer receives her words with a nod of his grey head.
Cibi has already sensed that he is not like the other officers, preferring the quiet of the office to the peacock strutting of so many of his peers. If he doesn’t like what she’s saying, he is more likely to tell her to stop whining and get on with her work than order her death.
But, Armbruster tells her to sit down and take off her shoes. As she gently pulls off her socks, the flesh on the soles of her feet come away, sticking to the socks. There is also a powerful decaying smell which fills the room and makes Cibi recoil. This is what death smells like, she thinks. It’s just waiting for the rest of me to catch up.
Armbruster looks at her feet but says nothing. He leaves the room and returns with a basin of warm water. While Cibi soaks her painful feet in the water, Armbruster once again leaves the room, this time returning with ointment, clean socks, sturdy shoes and a box containing several small canisters. They are filled with tea leaves, some with added herbs and spices, some with tiny, dried flowers. He fills the small kettle and places it on the wood burning stove.
Armbruster asks Cibi to select the tea she would like to drink.
‘Have you any linden flowers?’ she says quickly, her heart suddenly racing.
‘I don’t think so. I don’t know that tea. These are from my wife, who knows I like a cup of tea before I got to bed.’
Cibi unscrews the lids of several of the canisters, inhaling deeply the scent of the leaves. She chooses the most pungent and hands it back to Armbruster.
Without a word he makes Cibi a mug of hot, strong, spicy tea.
For the next few days basins of warm water are delivered to Cibi by Armbruster. She sips on a different tea each day, while her feet soak.
But while the wounds of one sister heal, the other begins to suffer. Livi starts to complain of stomach cramps. She is even paler than usual and Cibi worries she has typhus again.
Cibi begins to rush through her office work, so she can help Livi with the sorting. The train tracks have been extended, linking the camps, and now transports of prisoners arrive at Birkenau too, in their hundreds, day and night. The girls have their work cut out for them in the sorting rooms. Cibi hears the rumours about the ghettos in Poland being cleared, the elderly and very young executed, and the young men and women transported to Auschwitz. She overhears Armbruster discussing with a colleague the large numbers of residents being moved out of the town of Lodz. She doesn’t know where Lodz is, and tells herself it doesn’t matter – what matters is sorting through as quickly as possible the precious possessions they bring with them.
They keep their minds and their thoughts on their jobs.
In the sorting room, Cibi is emptying a suitcase onto the table. She picks through the clothing, separates the underwear from the skirts. A stale waft hits her full in the face. She continues to rummage until she finds the source of the bitter stench. Wrapped up in a piece of cotton is an onion, its juices permeating the garments that surround it.