Once 1 Once Read online

  I peer over at the other side of the cellar. Barney is still in bed, snoring. When he’s been out at night he usually sleeps pretty late.

  “All right,” I say.

  It’s worth a try. And not just for me. It might be good for Zelda too. She might see an aunty or uncle or something.

  “I can’t see my mummy and daddy yet,” says Zelda. “Can you see yours?”

  “Not yet,” I say.

  I get a firmer grip with my bare feet on the wobbly pile of beds, hold Zelda’s arm tighter so we don’t both fall, press my glasses harder against the crack in the wall, and try to see something that isn’t feet and legs. That’s the problem with looking out into the street at ground level, you don’t get to see the tops of people.

  It’s very confusing. I can see hundreds of feet and legs milling around out there. With this many Jewish people in Poland, how come Mum and Dad’s shop didn’t do better?

  “I can see my mummy’s feet,” yells Zelda. “Over there, in her brown shoes.”

  “Shhh,” calls Chaya from down below. “You’ll wake Barney.”

  “It’s all right,” says Jacob, his voice strained from helping Chaya prop up the pile of beds. “Barney’s a heavy sleeper.”

  Zelda’s eyes are pressed to the crack in the wall.

  “Over there,” she squeaks. “Mummy’s feet.”

  I know how she feels. I thought I saw Dad’s dark green trousers. Until I saw another pair. And then three more.

  I try to see if any of the feet and legs look as if they’re doing the sort of things that Mum and Dad do, like carrying big piles of books or having discussions about books or reading somebody else’s book over their shoulder.

  I can’t tell. The feet and legs could be doing anything. I can identify those two pairs of legs over there. They belong to two men who are wrestling on the ground over a piece of bread. And those there belong to another man who’s just collapsed and is lying on the cobbles while people step over him. But the rest of the feet and legs could belong to anybody. The only thing I can tell for sure is that none of them belong to kids.

  I press my nose to the crack in the wall and try to get a whiff of Mum’s perfume.

  Nothing.

  I cram my ear to the crack and try to hear Mum’s and Dad’s voices.

  All I can hear is trucks arriving and people yelling. Some of them sound like German soldiers.

  Suddenly all the feet and legs are scattering and running away.

  “Mummy,” yells Zelda.

  She’s jiggling up and down. The pile of beds underneath us is toppling.

  “Look out,” yells Jacob.

  I plummet toward the floor.

  Luckily the beds break my fall. So does Jacob. When my head stops spinning and I find my glasses, I help him out from under a sack. And almost step back into Barney, who is standing there, hands on his hips, glaring at us.

  I can’t give him my full attention yet, not till I’ve made sure Zelda is all right. If she landed on this stone floor…

  Phew, there she is, crawling around on her hands and knees.

  “Where are my slippers?” she’s saying. “I need to put my slippers on so I can go and see Mummy.”

  I look at how desperately she’s searching and suddenly I know I have to tell her. I don’t want to, and I don’t know how to, but I have to. The poor kid can’t go on like this. She needs to know the truth.

  “You’re sure they were both dead?” says Barney quietly as we watch the other kids put the beds back into position and Zelda put her slippers on.

  I nod.

  I tell him about the feathers I held under their noses.

  “They’d been shot,” I say. “So had the chickens.”

  I try not to think about the blood.

  Barney frowns.

  “You’re right,” he says. “Zelda does need to know.”

  I wait, but he doesn’t say anything else.

  “Will you tell her?” I say.

  Barney frowns some more.

  “I think it’s better if you do it,” he says. “You’ve been through a lot together and she trusts you. And you were there.”

  That’s what I’ve been dreading he’d say.

  “I don’t know how to,” I say quietly.

  Barney looks at me. I haven’t noticed before how red his eyes are. Must be because he works at night a lot.

  “Just tell her the story of what you saw,” he says. “You don’t have to make anything up.”

  “All right,” I say.

  I wish I could make things up for Zelda. I wish I could tell her a happy story. About how my glasses were affected by the heat of the fire, and how her parents aren’t really dead, and how they’re just having a holiday on a desert island with a cake shop, and how they’ll be coming back for her as soon as their suntans are completed.

  But I can’t.

  I tell Zelda the story of what I saw.

  She doesn’t believe me.

  “No,” she yells, throwing herself onto her sack.

  Barney puts his hand gently on her shoulder. The other kids watch silently, their faces sad.

  I tell her again, still without making anything up.

  This time she doesn’t yell. For a long time her body shakes in Barney’s arms without any sound at all.

  I’m trembling myself, partly at the memory of what I saw, and partly because, for Zelda, my story has made her parents dead.

  Now several of the other kids are crying too.

  Ruth stops brushing her hair and lets her tears run down her face.

  “Once,” she whispers, “some goblins hit my dad with sticks. They hit him with sticks till he died.”

  Barney reaches over and squeezes her hand.

  Jacob is sobbing too.

  “Nana was burnt,” he says, tears trickling through his blinks. “I got home from school and they were all burnt. Nana and Popi and Elie and Martha and Olek.”

  Henryk stands up and kicks his bed.

  “I hate goblins,” he says. “They killed Sigi and cut his tail off.”

  Chaya puts her good arm round him and holds him while he sobs. She lowers her gentle face and speaks quietly.

  “Once a princess lived in a castle. It was a small castle, but the princess loved it, and she loved her family who lived there with her. Then one day the evil goblins came looking for information about their enemies. They thought the princess knew the information, but she didn’t. To make her tell, the goblins gave the princess three wishes. Either they could hurt her, or they could hurt the old people, or they could hurt the babies.”

  Chaya pauses, trembling, staring at the floor. I can see how hard it is for her to finish her story.

  “The princess chose the first wish,” she says quietly. “But because she didn’t know any information, the goblins made all three wishes come true.”

  We’re all crying now. Moshe is still chewing his wood, but tears are running down his face too.

  A whole cellar full of tears.

  I take Chaya’s hand for a while. Then I go over and Barney lets me hug Zelda. I can feel the sadness shaking her whole body.

  All around me poor kids are crying for their dead families.

  My tears are different.

  I feel so lucky because somewhere out there I know my mum and dad are still alive.

  I told Zelda a story that made her cry, so I lay on her sack with her for hours and hours until she fell asleep. Then I started writing down the African story for the Nazi officer until I fell asleep too.

  Now Barney is shaking me.

  “Felix,” he whispers, “we’ve run out of water. I need you to help me find some.”

  I sit up and put my notebook inside my shirt. I reach for my shoes and the rags to pack around my feet.

  “Try these,” says Barney.

  He hands me a pair of boots. I stare at them in the candlelight.

  They’re almost new. I’ve never had an almost new pair of boots before. When I was little Mum and
Dad used to get my shoes from other families with bigger kids who liked reading.

  I put the boots on.

  They fit.

  “Thanks,” I say. “Where did you get them?”

  I can see Barney doesn’t want to tell me. I remember something he once said.

  “You don’t have to make anything up,” I add.

  Barney smiles.

  “I bought them,” he says. “Three turnips.”

  I stare at him, horrified. Three turnips is a fortune. We could have made soup for all of us with three turnips.

  “Water hunters need good shoes for running,” says Barney. “In case the water tries to get away.”

  I look down at Barney’s shoes. They’re both split open and wound round with rope.

  Barney sees me looking.

  “All right,” he says quietly. “I’ll tell you the truth. I got you the boots because everybody deserves to have something good in their life at least once.”

  I don’t know what to say. That is one of the kindest things I’ve ever heard, including in stories.

  “Thanks,” I whisper. “But…”

  I’m confused. Surely Barney knows I’ve got lots of other good things in my life. More than anyone else in this cellar, probably.

  Barney locks the trapdoor and I follow him through the dark printing factory, an empty bucket in each hand, my feet snug and grateful in my new boots.

  As we get close to the big rusty door, Barney suddenly blows out the candle and puts his finger on my lips.

  I can hear it too. Voices and footsteps out in the street.

  It’s after curfew time. Everybody’s meant to be indoors.

  We creep over to a window. Barney rubs a small patch on the dusty glass and we peep out.

  The street is crowded with people, all trudging in the moonlight, all in the same direction. Jewish people, I can tell by the armbands on their coats. Some are carrying bags and bundles. They’re so close I can hear their voices, even through the glass.

  “Yes, but where?” says a woman wearing a scarf.

  A man with his arm round her rolls his eyes. He looks like he’s done it before, so he’s probably her husband.

  “I don’t know exactly,” he says. “The countryside. Does it matter where? For each day’s work we get a loaf of bread and sausage and marmalade. That’s all that matters.”

  The husband and wife are too far away now and I can’t hear them anymore because their voices are mixed up with all the others.

  A man with a loud voice is passing the window.

  “Please,” he’s saying, “which is it? Russia? Romania? Hungary? You must know where we’re going.”

  I shrink back. The person he’s talking to is a Nazi soldier.

  “Countryside,” says the soldier. “Beautiful. Much food. Easy work.”

  I look at Barney to see if he’s thinking what I’m thinking.

  The Nazis are taking the Jewish people to the countryside to work. Farming, perhaps, or looking after sheep. Anything to get their minds off books, probably.

  That means Mum and Dad will be going there.

  “Barney,” I whisper, “can we go too? Zelda and Henryk and all of us?”

  Barney looks as though this is the worst idea anybody has ever had in the history of the world.

  “No,” he says.

  “But it could be great,” I say. “A farmer could let us live in his barn and we could make cheese and sell it.”

  Barney isn’t even listening, just peering out of the window.

  The street outside is empty now. I can hear the last of the Jewish people and the Nazi soldiers fading into the distance.

  “Come on,” says Barney, unchaining the big door. “We’ve got water to find. Let’s go.”

  In the cool night air my thoughts are clear.

  I don’t say anything more about the countryside. I know what I’m going to do. Once me and Barney have found some water and got it back to the cellar, I’m going to finish writing my African story and give it to the Nazi officer and ask him which bit of the countryside Mum and Dad have been taken to.

  Then I’m going to wake Zelda up and we’ll go there on our own.

  I don’t believe it.

  Barney just walked into an apartment without knocking. He just looked around the stairwell to make sure nobody was watching, pushed the door open and barged in.

  Luckily the stairwell was deserted.

  “Is this your apartment?” I ask him.

  “No,” he says. He’s saying that a lot tonight.

  He stops in the hallway. His shoulders slump. I see what’s caught his eye. On the floor is a Jewish candlestick, the type that holds a row of candles. It’s completely squashed, as if somebody’s stamped on it.

  “This place belongs to friends of mine,” says Barney quietly.

  I understand. They must have gone to work in the countryside and forgotten to lock up.

  I follow Barney into a room. It’s an unusual sort of room. I need a moment to take it all in.

  The big leather chair.

  The two sinks.

  The robot-arm drill.

  Now I understand. It’s a dentist’s surgery.

  “See if the water’s on,” says Barney.

  I don’t waste time. I take my buckets over to one of the sinks and turn the tap. Nothing.

  “It’s off,” I say.

  Barney is rummaging in cupboards and stuffing things into his pockets. Metal syringes. Packets of needles. Small bottles filled with liquid.

  “That’s not water, is it?” I say, puzzled.

  Barney looks at me and I get the feeling he wishes I hadn’t seen what he’s doing.

  “It’s a drug,” he says. “Dentists use it to stop their patients feeling pain.”

  “I know,” I say. “My mum had it once.”

  Barney comes over and crouches down so his face is level with mine.

  “I don’t want you or any of the others to touch this,” he says, holding up one of the little bottles. “It’s very dangerous. Only dentists should touch it.”

  “Why is it dangerous?” I ask.

  “If a person takes too much,” says Barney, “they go into a very deep sleep and never wake up.”

  Something about the way he says it makes me shiver. But at least his patients will have something else to dull their pain when I’m in the countryside with Mum and Dad and Zelda and can’t tell them stories.

  I remember why we’re here.

  “I’ll look in the other rooms for water,” I say.

  “There’s a bathroom down the hall,” says Barney.

  We go into the bathroom and straightaway I can see we’re in luck. The bath is full of water. I scoop some out with one of my buckets.

  “Hang on,” says Barney, taking the bucket from me and tipping the water back. “Somebody’s had a bath in that. It’s dirty. Better not risk it.”

  I stare at the water, confused.

  That’s not dirty. It’s just a bit soapy with a few hairs in it. One person’s been in that, two tops. If Barney wants to see dirty water he should go to an orphanage on bath night. There’s not even any grit in this as far as I can see.

  “See if there’s any food in the kitchen,” says Barney. “I’ll fill the buckets from this.”

  He’s lifting the lid off the toilet tank. Which I have to admit is a good idea. Two buckets of clean water at least.

  I go down the hall to the kitchen, wondering why there are cooking utensils on the hall floor.

  In the kitchen things are even worse. The floor is covered with broken plates and bits of cooked food. I crouch down, wondering if Barney is going to be fussy about food that’s been on the floor.

  Then I realize there’s someone else in the room.

  Oh.

  It’s a little kid, about two, in a high chair.

  I can’t tell if it’s a girl or a boy because there’s too much blood on the little body.

  Oh.

  I scream for Barney.r />
  He comes running in and he almost falls over himself when he sees the poor horrible sight but then he grabs me and drags me out into the hall.

  “It’s a little kid,” I sob. “They shouldn’t shoot little kids.”

  “Shhhh,” says Barney. He sounds like he’s sobbing too. He pushes my face into his coat.

  “Why didn’t the parents do something?” I sob. “Why didn’t they take their kid to the countryside?”

  Barney is shaking. He hugs me very hard.

  “Sometimes,” he says, his voice shaking as well, “parents can’t protect their kids even though they love them more than anything in the world. Sometimes, even when they try their very hardest, they can’t save them.”

  I can feel Barney’s tears falling onto me. For a while he doesn’t say anything, just strokes my head.

  I stroke his hand.

  Something tells me he needs it too.

  “Your mum and dad loved you, Felix,” says Barney. “They did everything they could to protect you.”

  Loved? Why is he saying that as if it’s in the past?

  “I’m going to find them,” I say. “I’m going to live in the countryside with them.”

  I feel Barney give a big painful sigh.

  “There is no countryside,” he says quietly. “The Nazis aren’t taking anyone to the countryside. They’re taking Jews away to kill them.”

  I stare up at him.

  What?

  That’s the stupidest story I’ve ever heard. Didn’t he hear what the Nazi soldier said to the Jewish people outside the window?

  I kick and struggle to get myself out of his grip so I can go and find Mum and Dad before the Nazis take them to the countryside. But Barney is holding me too tight. His arms are too strong. I can’t get away.

  “It’s true, Felix,” he says. His voice sounds like he’s at a funeral.

  “How do you know?” I yell at him.

  “Somebody escaped from one of the death camps,” he says. “This man came to the ghetto to try and warn the rest of us.”

  My head is hurting.

  Death camps?

  “You’re making this up,” I yell at Barney. “If it was true, you would have warned the people leaving tonight.”