Read Online I Will Plant You a Lilac Tree by Laura Hillman - Free Book Online Page B

me.
    â€œGo away!” I shouted.
    â€œYou are wanted at the front office. You’d better come with me.”
    I obeyed, fearful of being hurt again. When we reached the office, Avraham told me to wait. From beyond the closed door came loud voices.
    â€œYou should have stopped me from bringingher here. You are responsible!” The commandant’s words were angry.
    â€œShe couldn’t tell him anything. She knows absolutely nothing,” Manek responded. “Herr Commandant, we have nothing to fear from her.”
    â€œI want you to get rid of her, now .”
    â€œHerr Commandant,” Manek pleaded, “I have a better idea. Let me take her to Budzyn. Untersturmführer Feix will know what to do with her, and our hands will remain clean.”
    I passed out cold and never heard how it ended.

chapter eleven
    Manek and I had not spoken one word since we boarded the same military truck that had brought me to Kranik some months earlier. Finally, before leaving me at the entrance to the Budzyn camp, Manek said, “I saved your life by bringing you here.”
    â€œIt’s because of you that I am in this predicament,” I snapped. “You should have warned me about that madman. Do you understand what he has done to me? Do you? ”
    â€œI couldn’t take the chance. You might have told him things. What did he promise you?”
    â€œMy freedom, false papers, going to Germany as a foreign worker. I believed him.How was I to know what he was after? What could I have told him? I was kept in the dark the entire time.”
    Budzyn looked like an army compound at first, but the barbed wire and searchlights overhead told another story.
    Quite unexpectedly, my eyes focused on a man standing only a few feet away. He was dressed in a Polish army uniform, complete with a three-cornered hat that could barely contain the chestnut-colored hair sticking out from under it. His uniform identified him as a prisoner of war. A patch sewn to his uniform showed he was a Jew.
    Our eyes met only for a second, long enough for me to notice how beautiful—and sad—his were. The moment was interrupted by the shrill voice of an SS woman.
    â€œYou there,” she said, pointing at me. “Go to the shower, you filthy slut.”
    The shower was big enough for a hundred people, but I was the only one there now.
    â€œSo, where did they find you?” The attendant tried being humorous. He turned the shower on. I felt relieved to wash away the foul odor of Captain Schlesinger even though the water was cold and made me shiver.
    I dressed quickly under the watchful eye of the attendant, who handed me a bundle of clothes. My own had already been taken away. Luckily, I had hidden the photos of my family under a loose plank in the bench. Without the attendant noticing it, I slipped the photos in my shoe.
    Wondering what to do next, I walked back to the camp’s entrance. The man with the beautiful eyes was still there. This time I looked away, ashamed of what had happened to me. My hair hung in wet strings around my face; my dress was even shabbier than the one I had brought from Kranik.
    The same SS woman who had ordered me to the shower was waiting. “Let’s go,” she snapped as she escorted me inside one of thebarracks. “Regina, this one is all yours. Watch her closely.”
    Regina introduced herself as the Blockälteste , the one responsible for this barrack. She, too, was an inmate here.
    As it was early morning, a loud whistle called everyone to the place of assembly. Shaking the straw off their clothing, the women from my barrack filed into the square. I followed them there. All of us were packed tightly together. I was repulsed by the odor of their unwashed bodies. I didn’t know yet why they smelled or why their clothing was stained. I would learn only later that one dress, worn day and night, and only an occasional shower produced that odor.
    Regina was not