Then Read online

  Then

  Also by Morris Gleitzman

  The Other Facts of Life

  Second Childhood

  Two Weeks with the Queen

  Misery Guts

  Worry Warts

  Puppy Fat

  Blabber Mouth

  Sticky Beak

  Gift of the Gab

  Belly Flop

  Water Wings

  Wicked! (with Paul Jennings)

  Deadly! (with Paul Jennings)

  Bumface

  Adults Only

  Teacher’s Pet

  Toad Rage

  Toad Heaven

  Toad Away

  Boy Overboard

  Girl Underground

  Worm Story

  Aristotle’s Nostril

  Doubting Thomas

  Too Small to Fail

  Give Peas a Chance

  Pizza Cake

  Grace

  Once

  After

  Now

  Extra Time

  Loyal Creatures

  morris

  gleitzman

  Then

  VIKING

  an imprint of

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Special thanks to Christine Alesich,

  Laura Harris and Tegan Morrison.

  Not just editors, also angels.

  VIKING

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London, WC2R 0RL, England

  First published by Penguin Group (Australia), 2008

  Text copyright © Creative Input Pty Ltd, 2008

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  penguin.com.au

  ISBN: 978-1-74228-034-9

  For all the children

  who have to hide

  Then we ran for our lives, me and Zelda, up a hillside as fast as we could.

  Which wasn’t very fast.

  Not even with me holding Zelda’s hand and helping her up the slope.

  You know how when you and two friends jump off a train that’s going to a Nazi death camp and you nearly knock yourself unconscious but you manage not to and your glasses don’t even get broken but your friend Chaya isn’t so lucky and she gets killed so you bury her under some ferns and wild flowers which takes a lot of strength and you haven’t got much energy left for running and climbing?

  That’s how it is now for me and Zelda.

  ‘My legs hurt,’ says Zelda.

  Poor thing. She’s only six. Her legs aren’t very big. And she’s wearing bedtime slippers which aren’t very good for scrambling up a steep hill covered with prickly grass.

  But we can’t slow down.

  We have to get away before another Nazi train comes along with machine guns on the roof.

  I glance over my shoulder.

  At the bottom of the hill, the railway track is gleaming in the sun like the shiny bits on a Nazi officer’s uniform.

  I peer up the slope.

  At the top is a thick forest. When we get up there we’ll be safe. We’ll be hidden. The next Nazi train won’t be able to see us as long as Zelda doesn’t yell rude things at them.

  If we can get up there.

  ‘Come on,’ I say to Zelda. ‘Keep going. We mustn’t stop.’

  ‘I’m not stopping,’ says Zelda indignantly. ‘Don’t you know anything?’

  I know why Zelda’s cross. She thinks I’m lucky. I am. I’m ten. I’ve got strong legs and strong boots. But I wish my legs were stronger. If I was twelve I could carry Zelda on my back.

  ‘Ow,’ she says, slipping and bashing her knee.

  Gently I pull her up.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I say.

  ‘No,’ she says as we hurry on. ‘This hill is an idiot.’

  I smile, but not for long.

  Suddenly I hear the worst sound in the world. The rumble of another train in the distance, getting closer.

  I peer up the slope again.

  The forest is too far. We won’t get there in time. If the Nazis see us on this hillside we’ll be easy targets. My shirt’s got rips in it that are flapping all over the place. Zelda’s dress is lots of colours but not camouflage ones.

  The train is getting very close.

  ‘Lie flat,’ I say, pulling Zelda down onto the grass.

  ‘You said we mustn’t stop,’ she says.

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘But now we mustn’t move.’

  ‘I’m not moving,’ says Zelda. ‘See?’

  We’re lying on our tummies, completely still except for a bit of panting. Zelda is clinging on to me. Her face is hot against my cheek. Her hands are gripping my arm. I can see that one of her fingernails is bleeding from pulling up ferns for Chaya.

  The noise of the train is very loud now. Any second it’ll be coming round the bend below us. I wish we had ferns to hide under. Near us is a rabbit hole. I wish me and Zelda were rabbits. We could crouch deep in the hillside and eat carrots.

  But we’re not, we’re humans.

  The Nazi train screeches round the bend.

  Zelda grips me even tighter.

  ‘Felix,’ she says. ‘If we get shot, I hope we get shot together.’

  I feel the same. I squeeze her hand. Not too tight because of her fingernail.

  I wish we were living in ancient times when machine guns were really primitive. When you’d be lucky to hit a mountain with one even up close. Instead of in 1942 when machine guns are so super-modern they can smash about a thousand bullets into an escaping kid even from the top of a speeding train.

  Below us the Nazi train is clattering like a thousand machine guns.

  I put my arm round Zelda and pray to Richmal Crompton to keep us safe.

  ‘Zelda isn’t Jewish,’ I tell Richmal Crompton silently. ‘But she still needs protection because Nazis sometimes kill Catholic kids too. Specially Catholic kids who are a bit headstrong and cheeky.’

  Richmal Crompton isn’t holy or anything, but she’s a really good story-writer and in her books she keeps William and Violet Elizabeth and the other children safe even when they’re being extremely headstrong and cheeky.

  My prayer works.

  No bullets smash into our bodies.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say silently to Richmal Crompton.

  Down the hill I see the train disappearing round the next bend. I can tell it’s another death camp train full of Jewi
sh people. It’s got the same carriages our train had, the ones that look like big wooden boxes nailed shut.

  On the roof of the last carriage there’s a machine gun, but the two Nazi soldiers sitting behind it are busy eating.

  ‘Come on,’ I say to Zelda as soon as the train is out of sight.

  We get to our feet. At the top of the hill the forest waits for us, cool and dark and safe.

  I don’t know how long till the next train, so we have to move fast. We might not be so lucky with the next one. The Nazi machine gun soldiers might not be having an early dinner.

  I grab Zelda’s hand and we start scrambling up the slope again.

  Zelda trips on a rabbit hole and almost falls. I save her but accidentally almost yank her arm out of its socket.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say.

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ says Zelda. ‘It’s the rabbits’ fault. Don’t you know anything?’

  She lets go of my hand and holds her shoulder and her dark eyes fill with tears.

  I put my arms round her.

  I know her shoulder isn’t the only reason she’s crying. It’s also because of what’s happened to our parents and our friends. And because the most powerful army in the history of the world is trying to kill us.

  If I start thinking about all this I’ll end up crying myself.

  Which is not good. People who are crying can’t climb hillsides very fast. I’ve seen it happen.

  I try to think of a way to cheer us both up.

  ‘In the next valley there might be a house,’ I say. ‘With a really kind cook. Who’s made too much dinner and who’s looking for people to help eat the extra platefuls of delicious stew.’

  ‘Not stew,’ says Zelda. ‘Sausages.’

  ‘OK,’ I say. ‘And boiled eggs.’

  ‘And marmalade,’ says Zelda. ‘On bread fingers.’

  It’s working. Zelda has stopped crying. Now she’s pulling me up the hill.

  ‘And bananas,’ I say.

  ‘What’s bananas?’ says Zelda.

  While we climb I tell her about all the exotic fruit I’ve read about in stories. That’s another way I’m lucky. I grew up in a bookshop. Zelda didn’t, but she’s still got a really good imagination. By the time we get to the top of the hill, she’s fairly certain the cook has got mangoes and oranges for us as well.

  We plunge into the forest and hurry through the thick undergrowth. It feels really good to be in here with the ferns and bushes and trees sheltering us. Specially when I suddenly hear a scary sound in the distance.

  Machine guns.

  We stop and listen.

  ‘Must be another train,’ I say.

  We look at each other. The machine guns go on and on, not close but still terrifying.

  I don’t say anything about train people trying to escape, in case they’re getting shot dead. There’s only so much getting shot dead a little kid like Zelda can take.

  ‘Do you want to rest?’ I say to her.

  What I actually mean is does she want to hide, but I don’t say that either because I don’t want her to feel even more scared.

  ‘No,’ says Zelda, pushing ahead. ‘I want my dinner.’

  I know how she feels. Better to get further away from the railway line. Plus it’s almost evening and we haven’t eaten all day.

  I follow her.

  At last the distant shooting stops.

  ‘The house is this way,’ says Zelda, scrambling through a tangle of creepers.

  That’s the good thing with stories. There’s always a chance they can come true. Poland is a big country. It’s got a lot of Nazis in it, but it’s also got a lot of forests. And a lot of houses. And quite a few sausages.

  ‘Has the cook got chocolate?’ says Zelda after a while.

  ‘Maybe,’ I say. ‘If we think about it really hard.’

  Zelda screws up her forehead as we hurry on.

  By the time we get to the other side of the forest, I’m pretty sure the cook has got chocolate, a big bar of it.

  We pause at the edge of the trees and squint down into the next valley. My glasses are smudged. I take them off and polish them on my shirt.

  Zelda gives a terrified squeak, and grabs me and points.

  I put my glasses back on and peer down at what she’s seen.

  Zelda isn’t pointing at a distant house belonging to a kind cook, because there aren’t any houses. She’s pointing at something much closer.

  A big hole in the hillside. A sort of pit, with piles of freshly dug earth next to it. Lying in the hole, tangled up together, are children. Lots of them. All different ages. Some older than me, some even younger than Zelda.

  ‘What are those children doing?’ says Zelda in a worried voice.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say.

  I’m feeling worried too.

  They look like Jewish children. I can tell because they’re all wearing white armbands with a blue blob that I’m pretty sure is a Jewish star.

  Trembling, I give my glasses another clean.

  ‘This wasn’t in your story,’ whispers Zelda.

  She’s right, it wasn’t.

  The children aren’t moving.

  They’re dead.

  That’s the bad thing with stories. Sometimes they don’t come true and sometimes what happens instead is even worse than you can imagine.

  I try to stop Zelda seeing the blood.

  Too late.

  She’s staring, mouth open, eyes wide.

  I go to put my hand over her mouth in case she makes a noise and the killers are still around.

  Too late.

  She starts sobbing loudly.

  Directly below us on the hillside, several Nazi soldiers jump to their feet in the long grass. They glare up the hill towards us. They throw away their cigarettes and shout at us.

  I know I should get Zelda back into the undergrowth, out of sight, but I can’t move.

  My legs are in shock.

  The Nazi soldiers pick up their machine guns.

  Then the Nazi soldiers started shooting at us and suddenly I could move again.

  And think.

  Grab Zelda.

  Get away.

  Hide.

  Bullets are cracking into the tree trunks all around us. Bits of flying bark are stinging us in the face.

  We turn and run back into the forest, jumping over logs, crashing through bushes, weaving around brambles, slithering in and out of tangled undergrowth, scrambling over rocks.

  I try not to think about Zelda’s poor feet in their bedtime slippers or about the poor dead children in their pit.

  Hide.

  ‘Over there,’ I say to Zelda. ‘That big clump of bushes.’

  We wriggle under thorny branches and through thick layers of ivy. With my hands I dig down into last year’s leaves, which are damp and soft and even a bit warm when you get deep enough.

  Zelda digs too and doesn’t complain once about her sore finger.

  We don’t stop until we’ve made a secret place that is dark and quiet where we lie trembling and listening.

  Zelda holds my hand.

  I can hear Nazi soldiers shouting. Their boots are thudding as they run around in the forest looking for us. Nazi dogs are barking.

  You know how when you’re living in a secret cellar in a city ghetto with lots of other kids and you all make a tent with your coats and snuggle inside and try to feel cosy and safe even though outside the streets are full of Nazis?

  That’s what me and Zelda are doing in this burrow, except we haven’t got our coats any more.

  We haven’t got our friends from the cellar either. I say a silent prayer to Richmal Crompton. I ask her to protect our friends who are still on that terrible train. Please don’t let them end up in a pit too.

  Suddenly, thinking about that makes me not want to stay cosy and safe in this hole.

  I want to jump out and find a sharp stick and creep up on those Nazis and stab them hundreds of times until their guts are hanging
out and they beg for mercy and promise never to shoot people ever again. But I wouldn’t show them mercy, I’d keep stabbing them and stabbing them and –

  ‘You’re hurting me,’ whispers Zelda.

  I realise I’m squeezing her hand really tight.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say, letting go.

  I don’t tell her what I was thinking. She’s seen enough killing and violence today without me going on about more.

  I feel ashamed and push the angry thoughts out of my mind.

  Zelda holds my hand again.

  ‘It’s OK,’ she says. ‘I’m frightened too.’

  In the distance the soldiers are still shouting. I don’t speak German, but you don’t have to understand the words to know when somebody wants to kill you.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I whisper to Zelda. ‘The Nazis won’t find us.’

  I hope I’m right.

  I can’t see Zelda in the gloom, but I know she’s thinking about something. I can tell from her serious breathing in my ear.

  ‘Felix,’ she says at last. ‘Those children who were shot. Where are their mummies and daddies?’

  I have to wait a bit before I reply because just thinking about those children makes me feel very sad and upset. I try to imagine them covered up with ferns and wild flowers, but it doesn’t help.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say quietly. ‘I don’t know where their mummies and daddies are.’

  It’s the truth. They could be dead with bullets in them like Zelda’s parents, or sent to a death camp like mine, or they could be alive and just discovering the terrible thing that’s been done to their children.

  I don’t say these things out loud. Zelda is still trembling and I don’t want to upset her even more.

  ‘Did some Nazis make those children dead?’ asks Zelda.

  I hesitate again.

  I know why she’s asking.

  ‘Probably,’ I say. ‘But we can’t be certain. We didn’t actually see them do it.’

  Zelda’s breathing is even louder now and I can tell she knows they did.

  ‘I hate Nazis,’ she says.

  Poor thing. She must feel awful. Her mum and dad were Nazis before the Polish resistance killed them. I’ve seen the photo of her father in a Nazi uniform in the locket round her neck. When I think about my mum and dad being dead, at least I know they were Jewish and innocent. Poor Zelda has to think about her parents being part of a gang of brutal murderers.