The sun has set, and the lights in her room suddenly go out. For a moment she is in complete darkness. It is then, as her eyes begin to adjust, she turns to the narrow window above the desk, to see the moon. Magda feels her way back to bed.
The next morning, after another good meal of sweet porridge and more bread, she places the chair on the table and ascends the rickety structure to look out of the window. From this position Magda finds herself staring directly into the exercise yard below. She hears whispered conversations, but can’t make out any actual sentences. One of the inmates catches her eye. He looks familiar. Very familiar.
‘Excuse me,’ she calls, thumping the window.
The man stops, looks around.
‘Up here. I’m at the window.’
‘Hello up there,’ he says, with a smile.
‘Are you Mr Klein from Vranov?’ she asks.
He looks surprised and his smile grows wider. ‘I am. And who are you?’
‘Magda Meller. You were my maths teacher – you also taught my sister, Cibi. Don’t you remember me?’
‘Magda! Of course I remember you. But what are you doing here? Is Cibi here too?’
‘No. I’m alone. And .?.?. and I don’t really know why I’m here.’ Magda spies a guard advancing on Mr Klein and she ducks.
‘Move along. Or do you want me to help you?’ threatens the guard.
‘Look after yourself, Magda. I’ll be here tomorrow,’ Mr Klein throws over his shoulder.
Now Magda has something to look forward to. For the next three mornings, she has a brief exchange with Mr Klein. He makes her laugh with stories about Cibi’s behaviour in class. She knows he wants to cheer her up, because she has told him about what has happened to her family.
He can shed no light on what will become of either of them.
On the fourth day, Magda finds herself being marched out of the block, with no breakfast and no warning. In the prison courtyard, now thronging with hundreds of other inmates, Magda waits her turn to climb into one of the trucks. Those who show the slightest sign of hesitation are encouraged with the swipe of a baton or the butt of a rifle.
It isn’t far to the train station, maybe half an hour, and when they reach their destination, instead of carriages with seats, Magda and the others are ordered into cattle wagons.
Inside, it is stiflingly hot and it stinks. She has no water or food – no one does. For the entire journey, Magda alternates between shutting her eyes, praying for sleep and looking for Mr Klein. In neither case is she successful. The journey takes the whole day and the sun is setting when the prisoners are ordered out of the wagons.
Magda leaps down before she is pushed, and lands not on the platform of a station, but onto train tracks. Powerful lights overhead illuminate the scene. Hundreds of people surround her; some have suitcases and bags, as if they’re visiting family. Dogs bark as they strain on their leashes, hungry for something. Maybe our blood, thinks Magda, dazed by the lights and faint with thirst.
And then she spies the emaciated figures in the blue-and-white striped uniforms, darting in and out of the crowd, snatching the belongings of the prisoners.
‘Schnell! Schnell!’ new soldiers scream. And Magda knows this German word. Faster!
‘Where are we?’ Magda asks, catching the eye of one of the thin men.
‘Welcome to hell,’ he says, his eyes darting back and forth between the prisoners.
‘Where is hell?’
‘Poland. You are in Birkenau.’ And then he is gone.
CHAPTER 21
Auschwitz-Birkenau
October 1944
S
eptember has rolled into October, bringing with it a change in Cibi’s mood. She is snappy and short-tempered with everyone, even Livi. Her concentration is suffering, and when her mistakes are pointed out to her in the post office, she answers back, knowing this is risky behaviour, but at a loss to stop it.
When Cibi leaves the post office each day, it is often to the sound of a train pulling into the camp, and she finds herself walking towards the gates. She has no strong desire to be a spectator of the selections, but she does it anyway, whenever she gets the chance. She feels she owes something to these prisoners, a moment of solidarity perhaps, a few seconds of empathy. She is equally hopeful, yet terrified, of seeing her family step off the trains.
Day after day, she sees the new prisoners being shoved out of the carriages, many falling flat on their faces or backs, only to be trampled by the next in line. It’s the same ritual every time: the train arrives and chaos ensues. There is no orderly exit; everything is designed to keep the prisoners in a perpetual state of fear.