RUNAWAY SUMMER by Renee Ebert, vodka with tonic and lime on ice

RUNAWAY SUMMER

Bonnie was running again on those chubby toddler’s legs. This time along the curb so really in the road. Julie’s mother, Sandra, shouted out to Bonnie, “Stop! Stop right now.” And Bonnie, ever the comedian pretended she was putting the brakes on by pulling back on her arms, stopping in the middle of the road because she had drifted away from the curb.

“Look at her, Mom.” Julie laughed. “Look at my little runaway. Isn’t she so smart, pretending she’s an automobile?  Look how she stands, straight, her head up, like she’s the wheels and the brake.”

Sandra, mentioned, “Yes and the gas pedal as well,” reminding Julie when Bonnie, not so long ago was close to danger. Both women fell into the memory of Ashley Blackstone who came out last year to Peekskill from California. At that time, Sandra couldn’t see the sense of it.

“Why would a fifteen-year-old girl want to come all the way to upstate New York?” Where were Ashley’s friends? Surely, she didn’t expect friendship from a woman she babysat for when Julie lived on the same street in California.   

At the time, Julie’s typical reflex was to defend her decision to invite the girl, “She’s having some issues with her mom.” To her mother’s questions, Julie said, “Ashley’s really a remarkable girl, reads a lot, only one in her family who thinks about college.”

Leaving out the girl had no friends in Mesa, and was lonely, who came by Julie’s house after school, the year Julie and Mark lived there. Julie selfishly refrained from thinking too deeply on any of it when they lived in San Diego County. Lonely herself and working part time a few hours a week from home; her little corner of the kitchen with its desk, phone and computer weren’t nearly enough stimulation when Bonnie was just two, still in babyhood complete with napping most days.

 Ashley filled her visits with rehashing excruciating hours at middle school, the taunts from boys that she was so skinny, her fears of rejection.  Which Julie mollified by painting for the girl a picture of who she was becoming, her slimness may already be captivating some of the boys and their early adolescent way of dealing with it was to insult her. Julie would say, “typical boy stuff.”

Her laments were there last year, and now, a year after Ashley’s visit, Julie breathed the cooler air of upstate New York where green was the color of the day, remembering, not fondly, the bleached brown of San Diego where the only time spent outside in the summer was midnight with ocean breezes cooling the air in their subdivision.  

Julie recalled her mother pursued the subject of Ashley, Sandra muttering, “she’s trying to move up and out, then.”

“Mom for chrissakes, you sound judgmental.” Julie picked up her three-year-old, kissed her chubby cheek, all the while Bonnie squirmed, saying over and over, “Put me down mommy!” until Julie fished a cookie out of her pocket.

“Just observing.” Sandra quickly added, “It’s nice that she sought you out as a mentor, it’s smart of her. I’ll give her that.” Sandra wiped her prescription sunglasses on the edge of her cotton dress, as she sat back down in her chair, breathing the sweet and cool air of upstate New York. Simultaneously both she and Julie looked over to Bonnie, now complacent in her stroller taking small bites out of the chocolate chip cookie and twisting her head this way and that between bites.

In the quiet, Julie remembered a full summer past and the chaos of moving from west to east coast and to upstate New York; back during the move, Ashley, a blessing as a  mother’s helper and babysitter while Julie and Mark navigated the impossible packing. As bad as it was, she knew the difference when Bill Mason, Mark’s dad showed up to help. Bill did the heavy lifting with Mark and Julie concentrated on wrapping dishes, glasses, folding curtains into boxes. Ashley read to Bonnie, and played games with her, away from the mess; Ashley’s quiet and soothing voice while she read to the baby, lulling her to sleep amid all the bustle at the other end of the house.

“We used to talk, and Ashley shared some small pieces of her homelife. It wasn’t always a good picture; a stepfather resenting Ashley, wanting the time alone with her mother.”

“Ashley’s mother was no prize either, hanging out in the cul-de-sac with all her female buddies, gossiping, chain smoking.”

Sandra studied her daughter’s face. “You didn’t much care for those women down the street, did you?”

Julie gently pushed the stroller back and forth as Bonnie’s eyelids began to slant down, her breathing getting deeper. She marveled at how peaceful, watching her baby’s deep breathing, almost hypnotizing Julie into a quieter place in her mind. “No, I really wasn’t into the party mode at four in the afternoon, with all the raucous dumping of their individual life secrets.” Looking over at her mother, Julie asked, “you think I was a snob with those women, don’t you?”

Sandra was used to the accusations that flung out from her daughter’ subconscious, uncomfortable thoughts that she assigned to her mother whenever they were too painful for her to accept. “Not exactly a book club group or the League of Women Voters.” Sandra now offered; the gathering emotional storm clouds dissipated as quickly as they had begun to brew. Julie laughed, “They were on a different playing field, theirs, not mine or yours.” She said, watching  her little girl nod off.

Julie shook her head at the memory of it, not just the women sitting semicircle in lawn chairs with beer cans in one hand and most of them, a cigarette in the other. As quickly, she thought of Ashely striving for something else. What the ‘else’ was would play out over time. Back in Mesa, then, there was Ashley babysitting: first for the extra money and getting out of her mother’s house and Joe, her stepfather’s way. His occasional snarky remarks Ashley considered hints of what he really felt; she was a nuisance. She was unaware of Joe’s unease with Ashley as evidence of his own fading youth.

Ashely bonded with Julie all the time while her husband worked long hours somewhere downtown in La Jolla. Ashley only fourteen sensed Julie understood when she complained about school and her mother.

After the move east, Julie did not find the bond that remained as unusual, and a few texts here and there from the girl remarking on how great it would be to travel east. In late spring last year, Julie relented, inviting her to come to New York.

She didn’t forget her mother’s reaction, Sandra’s head quirked up as she met her daughter’s eyes, “you think that’s wise?” And to forestall what might be a sharp zinger back, she added, “it’s a long way, can they afford to pay her airfare?”

“I don’t see a problem.” Julie’s knee jerk reaction was to justify having Ashley visit, but Sandra picked up on her daughter’s feelings of awkwardness, having a girl she hardly knew travel three thousand miles to stay with her. Secretly, Julie admitted the bond between them was tenuous.

The month went by quickly; late June and Ashley touched down in upstate New York airport, here and real and now. Julie quickly identified the girl though grown several inches taller and slimmer. She waved and after a confused and strained look on the girl’s face, an equally enthusiastic wave back. This is good, Julie thought, we’ll have time to reacquaint and she’s older now, it will be easier. She said these things to herself as she threw a quick look over to her mother. Sandra smiled sincerely toward the girl who encompassed them both in an awkward group hug, her message that she wanted to be a part of whatever they were.

The time jumped out at them, back home from the airport and making dinner.

“I like this one boy in my history class.” Ashley sipped her iced tea and continued, “he’s taller than me, can you believe? That’s really happening, the boys are all getting taller.”

Julie spooned some pudding into Bonnie’s eager mouth while banging her plastic sippy cup. “Does he live nearby? Do you go out on dates?” She spoke over the din of Bonnie’s cup.

“One date so far, Saturday movie, almost a premier but it featured one of the cast that had a small part, so not one of the main actors.”

Typical California faux Hollywood Julie thought as she wiped Bonnie’s face and dislodged her from the highchair. “I’m going to get her cleaned up and settled, she’ll sleep soon with a full tummy.” She smiled at her toddler and kissed her chubby cheek, looking over at Ashley who was silent, absently cutting her remaining salad. “You can come with us?”

Ashley perked up at the invitation, Julie hesitating to ask if she might be tired from the flight but the girl seemed glad to go upstairs, helped with Bonnie’s bath. Ashley continued talking about Jason through the evening, sharing the minutia of the first date.

 

Julie felt a strain from the first, she might not admit it to her mother, but it was there. Ashley was nervous, spoke rapidly to get it all said, shared, seeking comment, approval. The days began to have a sameness about them; Ashley vying for time and attention, Bonnie, tugging on her mother’s leg for a cookie, to share her new toy, wanting sometimes to be held and hugged. Ashley tried to conceal the strained and tightened lips, jealous of the attention Bonnie garnered from her mother, and Ashley covetous of Julie’s waning attention.

Sandra came by and it helped a bit; conversation could flow more easily between the girl and her mentor when Sandra rushed to capture Bonnie away from something hot or sharp. And Julie was glad for the distraction, though glimpsed more than once, her mother’s eyes squinted as she discerned the way things were shaping up. Julie hated to have her mother right in her assessment, could hear her mother’s thoughts, that girl wants something you cannot give her; the home she never had.

A ten-day visit, Sandra predicably signaled might be a bit longish, not family and not a best friend. Julie was glad for once of Mark’s late work schedule, dinner was full of conversation when he did get home earlier and Julie purposely stretched dinner to later, after Bonnie was asleep. The days were planned for parks and picnics near shallow brooks. They took turns with pushing Bonnie in the swing, but the strain had begun to announce itself. Work at her home office escalated for Julie with more research and writing and phone when Bonnie napped, and Ashley pulled into a sullen teenage sulk.

It was near dinner time, the sun was behind a cloud and the breeze had stepped up reviving all of them, Bonnie most of all, discovering the art of running, she laughed and fell a lot on the grass until she found the convenience of the sidewalk’s even ground and buzzed by Julie more than once.

“And my friend Tiffany, she can be annoying, always thinking everyone wants to hear about her and her boyfriend. It’s embarrassing.”

Julie looked up at her, more of the scowl creeping into her brow these last few days. “Do you try to change the subject? You know, ask her about a movie you both saw?” Julie asked.

“She wouldn’t go for that. The best I can think is make up stories about my new boyfriend—.”

Julie interrupted, held up her hand as Bonnie ran by her nearer the street. “Wait.” As she snatched Bonnie from stepping down off the curb. Bonnie spread out a toddler’s giggle as she delighted in being caught. “Bonnie! Not in the street.” Julie held Bonnie’s face, forcing her to look into her mother’s eyes. “Do you hear me?”

Bonnie nodded yes. But the game was on as she ran to the yard, then back to her mother, then to Ashley who rubbed Bonnie’s head absently as she talked on. “I wish graduation was this year.”

Ashley was full into her story about another boy presenting himself as a rival when she and her boyfriend were taking turns surfing on his board. The other boy was Steven Foy from their neighborhood, a year older who got to drive his father’s Subaru. “He clunked down on the sand, and I was busy reading for my English class, David Copperfield.”

“Were you friends with one another?” Julie and Ashley walked along the side street away from the swings with Bonnie, who repeatedly ran away and came back.

“He’s nice but older so I’m not sure about how to talk to him. He’s going to Community college next year and will transfer to U.C. in two years.”

“That sounds promising. You can see him for a year until the transfer if you decide to go to Community college as well. I think you should.”

Bonnie interrupted her mother’s thoughts when she bumped up against her leg, then Ashley’s as she looked from one to the other to notice her standing on one foot. “Look mommy, look at me.”

“What did you say, you said something?” Ashley looked down at Bonnie, “Shush Bonnie, mommy’s talking with Ashley.”

Julie collected her thoughts, “Did you decide on which community college?”

“It’s early yet, I guess, but MiraCosta maybe or Southwestern.” Bonnie was trying to stand on Ashley’s feet. “Stop Bonnie, that hurts on my bare feet.” She dusted off the dirt and firmly held the little girl away. “Just stop.”

Julie swooped Bonnie up and told her No in a firm enough voice, and the toddler’s face contorted to a semi frown then a pretend howl of insult at her mother’s annoyance with her, then the fake crying into her mother’s shoulder.

Things quieted down after the mutual fussing of Ashley and Bonnie, and Julie found herself retreating inward to weigh what was happening, but then relenting on bad feelings toward Ashley, acknowledging that she had as much a right to be impatient with Bonnie. She brought her conscious meanderings into light, relating the incident to her mother later that day. Sandra’s remark was casual, “We all get flustered,” further smoothed out the rough edges coming from Ashley.

Yet Julie became more aware of “things” as she called them. Ashley eager for the night or the nap that meant more time with Julie and without interruption from Bonnie. Though she was understanding and respectful of Julie’s part time work at her desk in the kitchen when she browsed through the novels in the bookcase, choosing and reading rapidly everything from Julie’s college English Lit collection to the new stuff Julie got from her book club.

There was one thing that stuck about Ashely, that she spent less time directly with Bonnie; little and halfhearted efforts, except to read out loud or show Bonnie how to push or pull a toy. She watched more than engaged while Julie did the heavy lifting, showing Bonnie how to match the cutouts and fit them into a toddler puzzle.

 Bonnie sensed this shift in Ashley, acted out an irritability, fussing more when she wanted something, looking to her mother and now, almost never at Ashely. Julie didn’t leave Bonnie in Ashley’s care as she used to, no quick trips to the grocery store for some ingredient  for a meal.

Instead, Bonnie and Ashley now joined Julie, a nuisance of strapping in Bonnie, unstrapping to go into the store because the last time she left them both in the car, Julie returned to find Ashley, arms folded, face red, looking down and angry and Bonnie’s face streaked with tears, her chest heaving with deep breathing that Julie knew had been crying and sobs just minutes before.

Things got quiet.

“Jeff called and we talked a long time. He says he misses me.” Ashley was buoyant for the first time in days. “He asked me a dozen times when would I be coming back. I played it out a little, saying I might be staying till school starts.” Julie heard a sound reminiscent of Ashley’s mother, a tawdry sound that signaled she was about to share an intimate moment she’d had with Ashley’s stepfather at one of the times that Julie joined the neighborhood women with their beer and cigarettes.

The silence filled up a larger and awkward moment as Julie processed the idea of Ashley adding another month to her visit. “What did Jeff say to that?” She avoided any personal remark sensing the girl was actually wanting to stay, and at the same time wondered why that would be, then remembering Ashley saying how her stepfather made it clear he’d like to see her gone. But Ashely’s perception was quick knowing Julie wanted the visit to end.

“Let’s get out in the fresh air, the temperature is perfect, 78 degrees.” Julie grabbed a light sweater for Bonnie in case temperatures dropped. Bonnie was like a pup on a leash as she ran around in rings, making up a sing song chant, “going out, we’re going out.” Julie snagged her toddler’s hand as they filed out, Ashley’s face was stone, her eyes looking angrily at Bonnie’s restlessness, who tugged on her mother to let her go.

“Ashley would you take her hand for a moment? I want to drop Bonnie’s sweater into the backpack on her stroller.” Ashley nodded yes and grabbed the little girl’s hand as they walked rapidly up the hill to the quiet road they used for these excursions. Julie looked up when she heard the sound of cars, the lot was full of tables, some sort of gathering, cars parked on the flat land and some real traffic with cars passing one another. Too many people crowded near where they walked, Julie searching for Ashley and Bonnie. Julie saw Ashely let go of Bonnie’s hand as she ran forward toward the traffic. Julie’s scream came out of a frozen throat as she sprang forward, reaching Bonnie in three steps, grabbing Bonnie where a car’s speed and power had almost brushed her head.

There were no words to follow. Julie turned back from the street, with Bonnie in her stroller, walked briskly toward the house. Her phone in hand she speed dialed the airline. No words as she opened the closet door in the guest room and began to carefully place Ashely’s clothes on the bed near an opened suitcase. Ashley silently began to fold her sundresses, piled her T-shirts carefully on one side of the suitcase, wrapped  her shoes in plastic bags. Her eyes were downcast. 

ll ended as quickly as things began. Ashely’s face was tearstained as she walked toward the airline outside check in and parked her bag for the attendant to place a tag on it. Julie stood apart, alone while her mother looked on from inside the car. Julie hugged Ashley, more dismissive than she wanted to admit.  “Have a safe trip.” As Julie pulled away from the girl.

 

 

About the author

 

 

enee Ebert has a BA from Georgetown University and a Masters in public health from UCLA. When she is not writing, she raises funds for nonprofit organizations in the U.S. and internationally. Her most recent work is support for street children in Nairobi and incarcerated women and children in Cairo.

 

It all ended as quickly as things began. Ashely’s face was tearstained as she walked toward the airline outside check in and parked her bag for the attendant to place a tag on it. Julie stood apart, alone while her mother looked on from inside the car. Julie hugged Ashley, more dismissive than she wanted to admit.  “Have a safe trip.” As Julie pulled away from the girl.

 

 

 

 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee?. Half of what you pay goes to the author the oher half goes to expense se.g. Maintaining hthe web site and setting up The Best of Café Lit book each year.

SAFE HARBOUR by . S. .Nadja Zajdman, vodka,r,

 

                  

                                                             

Into the 1990s my mother Renata became increasingly active in Holocaust Education.  She trained as a docent at Montreal’s Holocaust Center.  She worked as an interviewer and researcher with McGill University’s oral history project Living Testimonies, which was a precursor to film director Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation.   She attended international conferences.  She lectured to students in schools and on group tours, both at home and abroad.  She reunited long-lost relatives and rescued the lost identities of hidden children.  Mum became a wounded healer transforming lives.

          Each spring Mum traveled to Poland, spending an average of three months there.  She became the North American liaison for The Association of Hidden Children in Poland.  In Warsaw Mum roomed with friends, and worked in an office located on the same street where she had lived as a child. 

Some of those in Poland hidden during the war when they were children came late to the recognition of their Jewish roots.  Those who married mostly inter-married, and their children were raised as Catholics. 

At least one became a priest, and several became nuns.  Decades after the war, some were still too frightened to acknowledge their antecedents.  Many lived in poverty.  Mum lobbied for the establishment of pensions for those who were robbed of their parents and inheritance.  The lawyer’s daughter from Warsaw won her case.  She was also integrating her many identities and becoming the Holocaust educator and activist Renata Skotnicka-Zajdman.  

          What she was doing for others, Mum was about to do for herself.  In 1997, during a search to discover the fate of another child hidden in wartime, Mum stumbled on clues suggesting her wartime rescuer Janek Bartczak might be alive. 

During a time of war and a place of horror, friendship flourished between two young men wooing two Jewish sisters.  One of the men was a Polish Catholic; the other, a Polish Jew.  The Catholic youth became a smuggler.  When Warsaw’s Jews were walled into their ghetto, Janek’s business activities allowed him access to the girl he loved.  Unknown even to the members of his immediate family, he had joined the underground resistance movement.

          Janek Bartczak was generally perceived as a dandy.  His brother-in-law, a policeman who patrolled outside the Ghetto gates, dismissed him as a spiritual lightweight.  Janek strutted through the streets of the Ghetto in knee-high black leather boots, a black leather coat, and a Tyrolean-type hat.  His hair was flaxen and his features, Slavic-sharp.  His intimidating appearance made a powerful impression on his Jewish friend’s teen-age sister Renata.  His phantom would swagger through the back alleys of her memory for the next fifty years.  Trying to transmit his image as vividly as she could, Renata came to call her ghost “Richard Widmark,” for the sinister-looking film star.

          During the height of the deportations in the summer of 1942, Janek’s brother-in-law arrested Renata at the Ghetto gates.  The arrest was pre-arranged.  Pawel Golombek used his position to lead to safety the Jews he was supposed to be shutting in.  His apartment became a safe house.  He and his family supported not only themselves, but also the escapees they sheltered, by the smuggling activities of his wife’s two brothers, and by selling moonshine manufactured in their kitchen, as well as his policeman’s salary.  An unquestioned arrest, a child snatched from *Umschlagplatz whom he hid under his coat and delivered to the sanctuary presided over by his wife and mother-in-law—Golombek committed these audacious acts under the noses of the German occupiers and his anti-Semitic neighbours; acts which, had they been discovered, would have led not only to his execution, but to the execution of his entire family. 

         

As of September 1, 1942, there were two Jewish girls sheltered by the Golombeks.  There was the dark-haired, dark-eyed, ten-year-old Isabella whom Golombek’s sister-in-law claimed, to neighbours, to be her illegitimate daughter by a Roma.  There was blue-eyed Renata, whose chestnut-coloured hair had been bleached blonde by her brother.  Three years earlier she’d been setting the table for her mother’s birthday breakfast when the roar of the Luftwaffe, the planes of The Third Reich’s air force, signalled the invasion of Poland.  Since that day she had endured bombardment, homelessness, and refugee-hood.  She witnessed the death of her mother in Soviet-occupied Poland, and was caught in the German invasion of the Soviet Union.  She had slept in ditches and stolen food from fields.  Hiding on a farm, she had been repeatedly raped.  Like any other hunted animal, her throat was cut.  She had been beaten by Polish police,thrown into jail and further beaten in a cell shared with Polish prostitutes.  Preferring to die with family, Renata smuggled her way into the Warsaw Ghetto, to her brother, but her brother, preferring that Renata snatch a chance at life, smuggled her back out.

          On the evening of September 1, the Russians sprang a surprise bombing raid on Warsaw.  To identify their targets, they tossed flares from the sky. The Golombek family, along with Isabella, hastened to the basement of their apartment building.  Renata was instructed to remain upstairs, for fear she’d be recognized as a Jewess and betrayed by neighbours.  Feeling abandoned in the safe house during the bombardment on the anniversary of her dead mother’s birthday, the girl snapped.  She went to the bathroom, found a razor knife and lifted it to her wrist.  On the verge of severing an artery, Renata hesitated.  Instead, she began to scream.   Her uncontrollable cries were so loud they could be heard in the basement, even through the sound of bombardment.  Janek dashed towards the stairs.  “No!”  His sister cautioned.  Janek disregarded his sister’s warning, raced up to the apartment, and barged through the bathroom door.  He was appalled by what he saw.  “No!”  Janek yelled, echoing his sister, and knocked the razor knife out of Renata’s hand before she yielded to despair.  Then he darted to his bedroom, grabbed the blanket from off his bed, pulled Renata out of the bathroom, wrapped her in the blanket and then into his warm, strong arms.  While the flares flashed and the bombs exploded Janek stroked Renata’s trembling head, rocking her and soothing her with visions of survival and a new world at peace and free from humiliation, violence, and pain.  He sang lullabies to the quivering child, who felt like a wounded bird cupped in his hands, until she finally fell asleep. 

 

   In the immediate aftermath of the war, Renata’s brother led her to believe that Janek Bartczak was killed on Warsaw’s barricades during the second uprising in August of 1944.  She mourned him, and in her mind, she buried him.  Over fifty years later, in her capacity as an activist in an international network developing among Jews who survived genocide, my mother Renata decided to find out what happened to the child with whom she shared sanctuary in the Golombek household.  During her search, Mum stumbled upon an old address for one Janek Bartczak.  Like many Poles, it appeared he had gravitated to Chicago.

          My mother considered me her memory keeper, and ran regular spot-checks.  As she got older, the imperative to impart the legacy of her spectres grew increasingly intense.  Deceptively casual, she queried, “Who was Pawel Golombek?’

          Innocently, I answered, “He was a Polish policeman.”

          “Correct,” Mum pronounced, like a schoolteacher who was satisfied, but only for the moment.  “And who was Janek Bartczak?”  The bar was raised higher.  “Ahhh—Richard Widmark?”  Mum smiled.  Close enough.

          “What happened to Bartczak?”  The interrogation was relentless.  I had gotten away with the doppelganger analogy; now I knew I had to get this one right.

           “He was killed in the August ’44 uprising.”

          “Not necessarily.”  Mum was savouring the moment when she could deliver the punch line.  She then called a member of her network in Chicago, a woman for whom she’d been instrumental in re-uniting with a twin brother in Poland.  The woman went to the address the next day.

           “He doesn’t live there anymore.  The neighbours say he retired and moved to Arizona.”

           Within the week Bartczak resurrected, metaphorically enough, in Phoenix.

          “I have to go and see him.”  Mum stated the obvious, and immediately began to plan.  “I’ve got enough flight points on my Visa card to make the trip, but where would I stay?”

          Instantly I turned to the telephone and called Rabbi Grafstein, whom I’d met when she helped to establish Living Testimonies.  After being rejected by a Canadian congregation because of her gender, Sarah Leah Grafstein applied and was accepted as a prison chaplain in Phoenix, Arizona.  She would marry an American ten years her junior.  Together, the rabbi and her husband adopted a half-black boy. 

          “Your mother will stay with me.”  Rabbi Grafstein responded as I hoped she would.  “Meeting Renata changed my life.” 

          “Janek’s story must be told.”  Mum moved into crusader mode.  “But who can interview him?  Regina says his English is poor.”

          “Are you kidding?”  Incredulous, I stared at the woman who was missing the obvious.  “YOU will!”

          “Me?”  Mum was overwhelmed by the suggestion.

          “You’ll conduct the interview in Polish.  Who could do it better?  Everything you’ve done has led to this.”  As I became aware of the obvious, my breath caught.   “You appear to have been chosen.”

          “Oh my.”  As the import of my words sunk in, Mum shuddered.     “But who would set it up?  We have cameras and a technician in the studio here, but how would we do it in Phoenix?”

          Once more, I called Rabbi Grafstein, who then placed a call to California.  Mum was officially registered as an interviewer for Spielberg’s recently established Shoah Foundation.  Technicians and equipment were expedited to Arizona.

          Mum flew to Phoenix at Easter.  The metaphors were becoming outrageous.

          When Mum and Janek reunited, she fell into his arms.

            “You’re alive, you’re alive.”  She huddled against the older man’s chest, the way she had on the night of the bombardment.  “I still can’t believe it.”

          The elderly gentleman held her close.  “So are you,” he whispered.  “This is even harder to believe.”

          Janek was now in his mid-seventies.  He was still vigorous and strong.  His flaxen-coloured hair had thinned out, and what was left of it was white.

Living in freedom and peace had allowed Janek to shed his tough persona, and his natural sweetness shone through the features of his broad Slavic face. 

As they got their bearings, the rescued and rescuer updated each other on what had turned out to be their lives. 

“My brother and I accepted that you were trapped and killed on the barricades during the ’44 uprising.”  Mum gazed at her wartime rescuer, in wonder.  “How did you manage to escape?”

          “The same way you did, moja kochana.”  Janek gazed tenderly at the woman, now in late middle age, whose fate he had accepted would forever remain a mystery.   “I escaped through the sewers.  Unlike you, however, once I got out, I didn’t have far to go.  When I hauled myself out of a manhole I looked up to see a policeman staring at me.  It was Pawel, my very own brother-in-law!”

          “Muj Boze!”  Mum erupted, unconsciously shifting into her wartime Catholic persona.  “My Lord!”

“Oh yes!”  Janek agreed.  “Can you imagine?   I was starving.  I was stinking, I was wet and I was filthy, and I resurface in downtown Warsaw like a vision out of hell!”

          “What a shock for Pawel,” Mum gasped, “But a happy shock!”

“Oh, I’m not sure he recognized me right away, but I recognized him!  I think the shock for Pawel was discovering that I had joined The Underground and fought in The Uprising.  He didn’t think much of me, until then.”  Janek was obviously proud to have earned the respect of his heroic brother-in-law.

 Continuing to fight in the underground resistance movement, Janek was captured by the Germans and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Germany.  He escaped, made his way to Italy and joined the Polish army-in-exile under General Anders’ command.  Janek’s unit was transferred to Britain.  Before war’s end, Polish warriors were shattered by the news that the dream of an independent Poland was lost; betrayed at Yalta by Roosevelt and Churchill.  Like many Polish soldiers and pilots who helped to save the country that ultimately betrayed them, Janek felt he couldn’t go home.  While still in power, Churchill offered British citizenship to displaced Polish servicemen and women.  After he was ousted from power, the new Labour government tried to scare displaced Polish military personnel into leaving.  Like thousands of Polish refugee servicemen and women, Janek decided his future lay elsewhere.  He immigrated to South America.  Only in 1947 was he able to notify his family in now-Communist Poland that he was alive.

 In time, Janek married an Argentinian woman.  His wife was now serving coffee and cake.  In awe, she watched the woman who had risen like a phoenix from the ashes.  So did their son, Antonio, with his Jewish wife and their two young boys.  Their grandfather had never told them of his wartime exploits.  True heroes are silent, or dead.

          Unlike most subjects interviewed for Holocaust oral history projects, Janek was relaxed.  He told his tale as if holding a long-overdue conversation.  He was almost gleeful as he recounted how often and well he outwitted both the German occupiers and his treacherous Polish neighbours.  When Mum asked why he behaved as he had, Janek responded by placing his hand over his heart.  His testimony was a gift to both of them.  The woman whom he rescued as a child was now a rescuer of Memory. 

When Mum returned home, she made it her mission to have Janek officially recognized and honoured by the Israeli government as a member of an elite category known as Righteous Among The Nations.  Israeli law stipulates that at least two living witnesses submit depositions in order to validate the nomination of a candidate.  Having yet to locate the hidden child Isabella (though they would), Mum’s network launched a search for Janek’s wartime Jewish lover.  She was traced to New York City.  In the intervening fifty years Ada had been twice divorced and recently widowed. 

“You’ve got to do this,” Mum commanded.

“Of course I will.”  Ada was in a daze, reeling from the news that her wartime lover was alive.  Ada and Janek reunited over a telephone line, but they would never set eyes on each other, again.

*The central train platform where Ghetto Jews were collected and carted off for mass murder, 

 

           Before leaving for her annual stay in Poland, Mum called Janek to say good-bye.  He was a widower, now. 

 Three days after Mum’s departure, Antonio called me.

 “Oh gosh!  I’m so sorry.  I’m so very very sorry.”

          “Will you tell your mother?’

          “Of course I will.”

          Calculating the time change between North America and Europe, I estimated that I could reach Mum in her Warsaw office.

          “Sweetheart!  This isn’t our usual time to talk.  Is something going on?  What’s up?”

          My silence sent Mum into alert.  “Something is wrong.  What is it?”

          Sadly, I told her.  Janek Bartczak suffered a stroke and died a second and final time.  He was seventy-nine years old.

          “No!  Oh no!  I’d only just found him and now I’ve lost him again!”  Mum was grief-stricken.

          “No Mum.”  My voice was soft with sorrow.  “You haven’t lost him.  Antonio told me his father died at peace because he finally found out what happened to you and to the other child sheltered in his home.  Who he was and what he did won’t be lost because you recorded it.  The Shoah Foundation will keep Janek’s story and memory safe.  He’s safe now, Mum.  He’s safe.  Janek will never be lost again.”

          Mum was in tears, and I was near tears.  Yet, despite her grief, my mother recognized the truth of my words.  Not only had she taken the time to say good-bye but Renata, a wild orphan of war, also found a way of saying Thank You. 

 

Since Janek wasn’t in a position to receive it, a notice was sent to Antonio, summoning him to an Israeli consulate.  In a desert city in the American Southwest, in a ceremony witnessed by his Jewish wife and their two sons, Janek’s son was presented with a certificate and medal for his father’s part in providing a safe harbour during a violent storm, and for his magnificent, and now-stilled heart. 

 

 Abou the author.

. Nadja Zajdman is a Canadian author.  In 2022 she published the story collection The Memory Keeper, as well as the memoir I Want You To Be Free, the story of her late mother, the pioneering Holocaust educator and activist Renata Skotnicka-Zajdman.  In 2023 Zajdman followed up with a second memoir, Daddy’s Remains.  In 2024 Bridgehouse brought out Zajdman’s essay collection, Between Worlds.

         

           

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee?. Half of what you pay goes to the author the oher half goes to expense se.g. Maintaining hthe web site and setting up The Best of Café Lit book each year.

Tree Minutes by P.A. Westgate, a shot of vodka

Three minutes isn’t very long is it? That’s just three single minutes. And one minute’s not very long at all; sixty seconds, gone in a flash. You get sixty in an hour. Even that’s not very long.  No time at all if that’s all you have, say, if you need to nip to the shops and grab a sandwich at lunchtime. So a minute’s nothing much really. And three times nothing much really is still nothing much really. But if you’re all alone, sitting on the loo, waiting for either one or two lines to appear, three minutes is forever.

 

About the author

P. A. Westgate, Paul, lets his imagination run wild through short-story writing. In addition to writing, Paul enjoys an eclectic mix of activities including reading, singing, the Arts and cocktails. He lives quietly in his native Essex where he tries, with varying degrees of success, to keep his house and garden tidy.

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

The Amazing Tale of Ivan Plodsky by Guy Pratt, Russian vodka

Ivan Plodsky was a very ordinary copper on the beat in Moscow during the nineteen sixties. Walking the pavement in the city one day, his thoughts faraway, paying little attention to where he was walking, he tripped on an uneven paving slab and fell heavily forward. As he fell, he clumsily knocked a pedestrian to the pavement who was rendered unconscious as his head hit the stone. Perchance the man happened to be an assassin with drawn revolver on the point of firing at the head of the KGB whose car was passing. Before Plodsky knew it the place was swarming with KGB agents and he was hailed a hero for saving the life of the KGB boss. He was duly rewarded with a placement in the KGB.

Plodsky eventually arrived at the Russian embassy in a Western capital as second assistant to the trade attache. In fact he did not have a lot to do. His main duty, because of his simple nondescript appearance was to collect messages from dead letterboxes. Embassy staff were usually closely watched by the security services in the countries where they were located and any contact with agents already spying within those countries had to be avoided, so the dead letterbox system was a simple way of passing information on, hopefully without detection.

The trade attache, Igor Evetkin, was in fact a KGB colonel responsible for clandestine operations in the country they were located in. He was a nasty piece of work who had risen through the ranks by regularly shopping his colleagues. Only Evetkin knew the full details of the agents, but his first assistant Peter Rodnikov was responsible for sending coded messages to the agents. These coded messages were posted to box number addresses and would request what information was required and detail the time and specific whereabouts of dead letterboxes the replies were to be left at. Evetkin thought the system was fool proof.

For poor Plodsky things never seemed to go quite right. There was the day when someone was to appear casually reading a newspaper seated on a park bench, then get up and leave the paper behind for Plodsky to pick up a few minutes later; the paper contained leaves of secret information hidden between its pages. Just before Plodsky reached the bench someone else sat down picked up the paper and turning to the back page pulled out a pen and started doing the crossword puzzle, then turning to Plodsky muttered something about completing it on the train and stuffed it in his pocket and walked off.

Then there was the microfilm hidden in a tennis ball and dropped on the edge of a playing field. Just as Plodsky was about to pick it he was beaten to it by a big black Labrador dog who with wagging tail raced off with it to his owner. His owner kept throwing it for him to retrieve before they walked off home the dog possessively retaining the ball.

Incidents like this continued with Plodsky failing to collect the goods. At the same time the country’s small but effective security service were starting to round up and arrest Evetkin’s well placed agents. Evetkin began to suspect Plodsky had been turned and become a double agent. His office was next door to Plodsky’s and Rodnikov’s was on the far side. In typically Russian orderly style the layout of each office was identical and if the thin plasterboard walls were removed the desks of the three men would be seen in a precise row.

A loud shout from Evetkin summoned Plodsky to his office. Although lacking proof Evetkin stormed at Plodsky airing his suspicions. He was warned that anymore failures would result in his immediate return to Moscow where he would be interrogated by the dreaded Olga Korsitsoff, feared throughout the service. If Olga didn’t liquidate him he’d probably end his days in a Siberian gulag. However Plodsky was to be given one more chance to redeem himself.

In a quiet backstreet on a neglected building plot was a forgotten pallet of bricks. If Plodsky lifted the brick at the top right- hand corner he would find a small canister lying in the frog, the indentation of the brick below. All he had to do was retrieve this – no crossword addicts, no Labrador dogs, it all sounded simple.

Plodsky entered the deserted street going towards the derelict building plot, only as he arrived he watched with dismay as a forklift raised the pallet of bricks onto a lorry which drove off before he could reach it.

It was late afternoon when Plodsky got back to the embassy and most of the staff had finished work, though light seeping under their doors indicated Evetkin and Peter Rodnikov were still there. Plodsky entered his own office quietly. He pulled a vodka bottle from his pocket; he’d had several swigs at it on the way back and now he drained it to the last. He sat down at his desk thinking of what Olga could do was too much to bear He opened a drawer and took out the standard issue pistol, flicked off the safety catch and stared down the barrel.

With a very shaky hand he squeezed the trigger and was almost deafened by the explosive sound of the shot and sat at his desk in a dazed state of half- drunk bewilderment, a small round hole in the plasterboard behind him. Poor Plodsky could he get nothing right – he couldn’t even terminate his own being.

He must have sat there for three or four minutes in total confusion expecting Evetkin to come storming in, but it was Peter Rodnikov who entered. As the bewildered Plodsky looked vacantly on Rodniknov picked up the pistol and with a cloth carefully wiped off all the fingerprints. Then taking another pistol from his pocket put it in the drawer of Plodsky’s desk. “Come with me” said Rodnikov “and don’t hang about.” Still in a daze Plodsky followed him into Evetkin’s office. The drawer where Evetkin kept his pistol was open and empty and Evetkin was slumped on his desk, a small red hole in his forehead oozing blood across the papers he’d been working on. A fearful Plodsky suddenly realised his shot must have passed through the wall to find a different victim. Rodnikov laid Plodsky’s wiped clean pistol close to the late Igor Evetkin’s hand.

“I’m about to defect” said Rodnikov.”I think you might be looking for a way out too now. Want to join me?” Dull as he was, it didn’t take Plodsky much thought to nod in agreement. Seated in a taxi speeding to the other side of the city, Rodnikov said apologetically “I’m afraid I am in some ways the cause of your predicament, so the least I can do is help you out of it. Shortly all will be revealed.”

The taxi dropped them off and after walking a short way they entered an office in a plain undistinguished building. Two men were seated in the office and Rodnikov said to them “Can you look after my friend for a few minutes while I go and chat with the Major.” Plodsky was given a chair and a sobering coffee he was sorely in need of. As he gazed at the two men he thought he had seen them before and slowly it began to dawn on him – the fork lift operator and the lorry driver.

Then Rodnikov called from an inner office “Plodsky, come through and meet the Major”. Plodsky went through and was soon seated beside Rodnikov facing the major across his desk. Again Plodsky thought there was something familiar about the Major, a paper folded to an unfinished crossword on his desk and a black Labrador dog sprawled on the floor beside him.

The Major looked cheerfully across his desk and said “Mr Plodsky we are a small country not a super-power and our counter-intelligence service too is small but we pride ourselves on our efficiency and between you and your comrade, you have helped us rid ourselves of a network of spies and traitors so we are prepared to offer you asylum, new identities and employment. Mr Rodniknov will enlighten you a little bit more.”

Peter Rodnikov continued the story “Soon after I arrived here I committed a most unfortunate indiscretion. If it had become public knowledge it would have caused a major diplomatic incident and if the embassy had found out I would have been sent home to face a terrible fate at the hands of Olga Korsitsoff.  The Major most kindly offered to arrange for the whole matter to remain secret if I would switch sides. What else could I do? I gave the Major the code and every time I was detailed to send out a message to an agent, which would of course have included details of the dead letter box to be used, I also sent a copy to the Major.”

The Major interjected “…and then it didn’t take long for our small team to put the pieces together and round up all the agents operating in our country”.

In Russian Intelligence circles today when Evetkin’s name is mentioned someone will usually remark “Oh yes, wasn’t he the chap who lost all his agents, then his assistants defected, so he did the only honourable thing.”

In their country of asylum under completely new identities Rodnikov and Plodsky were employed by the local postal service in an area seldom if ever visited by foreigners. Rodnikov goes from door to door delivering the mail. Plodsky has been given a little van and a bunch of keys and travels round emptying public letterboxes and he’s never missed a collection yet.

About the author 

 

Guy Pratt is a retired octogenarian second hand bookseller who enjoys gardening, long walks with his dog and travel. He gravitated into the book trade after earlier years in farming, the army Intelligence Corps and the civil service. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)