Alwine's Tears

Twenty-six

Poland, as a country, had been restored for the second time in the century. With the consent of their Russian liberators, the Communist-backed Polish Committee of National Liberation began to run the country. By February of 1945 the committee was setting up camps all over the former German-annexed lands where displaced Germans, like the Volhynians, were to be gathered. One such camp was set up on a farm on the outskirts of Ossenholz, now again called by its Polish name Osciency. An old barn was converted into sleeping quarters and an office was set up in the house. When it was ready, all the Germans now scattered throughout the area were ordered to report.

Even those who had not tried to run away were now forced out of their homes, as were the few refugees that had been lucky enough to find their homes still empty when they returned from their ordeal on the road. The majority of the Germans were now homeless and were only able to find shelter in their former school houses and churches. Wherever they hid, however, all were ordered to report. This was no longer Germany and there were few places for Germans to hide.

Alwine counted herself lucky to have a friend like Stefan. In his home, although she and her three children had to share a small room that was barely big enough to hold them, she felt safe. Nevertheless, she knew she had to report to the new camp; she had no choice. Alwine knew that it was not hospitality that the provisional government meant to offer them in Osciency, however, staying with Stefan now meant putting him in danger. As terrified as she was to leave even the meager comfort of his small house, she accepted that it was what she had to do.

Stefan also feared for them. Despite understanding that many of his countrymen had used their hatred of these Germans to keep them alive through the ordeals of the war, he feared what the camp held for his friend. In his home Alwine and her children had at least been safe.

In taking them in Stefan had no other intention than to repay the kindness of a woman who had treated him well. Sometimes he imagined that there could be more between them but he did not torture himself by dwelling on it. It became evident to him during their stay with him that whatever fantasy his mind might conjure up for himself and Alwine, was just that, a dream. He was as pragmatic in this as he was in everything else he did. He admired her courage in reporting to the camp voluntarily but he wondered if she had the skills to help her family survive.

Days before they had to leave, he began to explain to her how he had survived. “They tried to humiliate us,” Stefan explained, “to make us a laughing stock, a hiss and a by word.” When Alwine marveled at his understanding he laughed and said that the Polish people were professional survivors. They had survived the whole of the last century as Russian, German and Austrian underlings. Then in 1939 the whole nation was well prepared for the Nazis and now for the Russians.

“Everyone,” he explained, “has his own way of surviving. Some pretend they incompetent and so their masters leave them alone because they can’t do any better. My father told me the best way to survive well is to make yourself useful. You get up in the morning before your master and try to anticipate all his needs, and you are meticulously honest with him. Soon he trusts you more than he trusts himself. Some people call it groveling but they are wrong. You survive and while you are surviving you are also learning. It is important to keep learning so that you know what to do with freedom when you have it.”

It was close to the end of February when Alwine reported at the gates of the camp. She had seen enough of these places in her life not to be shocked by the conditions there. Nevertheless, she and the children soon wished they could have stayed with Stefan. They were assigned to a corner of the barn where hastily constructed bunk-beds stood. Everything about the place was cold and comfortless.

Although Alwine did not recognize all the faces, many of the women were familiar. One of the Hartenberger women was there with her small son, the daughter-in-law and grandson of the man who had built their hearth in Volhynia. Alma Neuman was there, as was Irmagard Thann and so many of her neighbors. They all looked like they were in shock and Alwine knew she looked the same to them. Few people from the community of Belschewo had escaped to the west. Of those who were missing there were terrible rumors. Alwine was shocked when she heard that Erich Winkler had been executed by the Russians. If they shot good men like him then what hope was there for the rest? There was a rumor too that thousands of German soldiers had been shipped off to Siberia and speculation was rampant that the Russians intended to do the same with the rest of the Germans.

It frightened Alwine when she heard such things. She knew the underlying cause of this disaster. She had understood it from the moment she had first set foot on this land, but knowing was no comfort, it did not make it any less painful. She sat on her bed and remembered her father’s teachings on pride and wept. She didn’t exempt herself from any fault. She reviewed all the prideful and hurtful things she had done over the years. Her mind kept coming back to Irene Weiss. It pained her to remember that she had not even gone to comfort Irene when her husband died. How prideful had she been? If only she could find Irene and make it right.

The morning after their arrival Alwine recognized a little girl as she warmed herself by a fire in an old oil-drum. It was Irene’s daughter. Alwine started to look around for Irene but could not find her. For a moment she feared that the little girl was alone and took a few steps toward her to comfort her. Just then she saw Irene coming to collect her daughter. Alwine felt relieved. She wanted desperately to embrace her old friend and let bygones be bygones, but Irene led her daughter right passed Alwine without even acknowledging her.

The National Committee had named a local man to run the camp, but he was rarely seen in the first weeks of its operation. Nevertheless, his staff made it quite plain that it was time for the Germans to pay for what they had done to Poland. They gathered the inmates together to let them know what would be expected of them. “You will work to earn your keep,” they said. “You work where and when we tell you to work. If you don’t work, you won’t eat. Complain and you will get nothing.” Alwine didn’t complain, rather, she remembered what her neighbors had said about the Poles in their service, “They get what they deserve.”

After the truncated lecture the camp staff gave out work assignments. Some would be sent out on daily work assignments and return each night to the camp. Others would have to live on the farms where they would work. There was no choice.

Alwine was prepared to work but she was not prepared for what the Poles wanted to do to her family. Edmund and Hertha were considered old enough to be taken from their mother and sent out to work on their own. Alwine’s heart sank as she learned about it, but she was afraid to protest. With only a short farewell to sustain them the children were taken away and Alwine was given her assignment. Thankfully, Else was considered too young to be out of her care.

Gzelak was an old man who didn’t care about his appearance. He wore dirty clothes and had dirty yellow teeth. Even his hair was a mess. His wife was dead and his children had moved on and so there was no one to care how he took care of himself. His small house was as dirty and smelly as he was. He had told the camp officials to send him a woman who would not be afraid to work.

For the first few days he shouted at Alwine as she cooked and cleaned. He complained too about the expense of feeding the little girl though she barely ate anything. Alwine worked hard in spite of the criticism. When his house was cleaner than it had been in years, she worked every bit as hard in the barn with Gzelak. Soon the old man realized what a prize he had and softened. Overnight, his attitude changed and he began to treat Alwine and Else with tenderness. He became almost too kind.

Alwine was shocked when the old man appeared in the kitchen one day washed, shaven and with his hair wetted down and combed. He had on his best clothes; they were almost clean. Alwine knew something was up. Within minutes he stood up, grabbed her hand and proposed to her. “If you marry me,” he lied, “you won’t have to work so hard.” Alwine laughed awkwardly, hoping to avoid embarrassment for both of them by making a joke of it, but immediately he repeated the offer. This time he came so close that he could smell his foul breath. Bracing herself, she pointed out that she was already married, but it didn’t seem to bother the old man. “Forget him, he’s dead,” he said, tugging at her dress as she pulled away. “We don’t even need a priest,” he laughed as if he were playing a game. She fended him off with her arms, so he became even more aggressive. When she told him she was pregnant he didn’t believe her. He tried to kiss her, but Alwine began to sob uncontrollably. She shoved him away forcefully and his face turned red. She could not be sure if it was anger or embarrassment but he left her alone.

The filthy man reverted quickly to his old ways. Now he expected even the little girl to work for her food. He loaded the chores on Alwine and her daughter. To his consternation Alwine did all the chores he required of her, working from dawn until well into the night and never complained. He took her back to the Osciency camp. “Take her back,” he said, “she’s lazy. Send me a woman willing to work.”

Edmund was shocked when he found himself back on his own farm. He might have been glad to be in the place he knew so well except for the prospect of working for Jerzy Finkowski. The man who was known among the Poles as ‘the American’, was glad to have the boy. As he explained to his neighbors, “If I can’t get my hands on the father, I can at least make his son pay. The bastard had me sent to the Ghetto in Warsaw. By the time I’m through with the boy he’ll curse his father.”

For four years Edmund had watched the Polish girls do the milking and never learned how himself. His father had told him that it was women’s work and he was content to leave it to them. Now Jerzy made him learn. He was pitifully slow. Muscles in his fingers and hands that he never even knew he had, began to hurt. Jerzy chided him for his slowness and cuffed and threatened him if he didn’t work faster. At night his fingers and hands would swell and he cried from the pain. He soon found that that his hands only felt normal when wrapped around a cow’s teat.

Once, while he was under the threat of a beating for being so slow, he tried to cheat. He realized that by not quite emptying some of the cows’ udders he could reduce his time considerably. Finkowski noticed immediately that the volume of milk was down. He checked every udder and came back in a rage spewing filthy language at Edmund. He slapped the boy to the ground and threw a pail at him, demanding that he finish the milking. “Try that again and I’ll break your fingers.”

When Edmund was not milking, he was cleaning stalls. With a wooden wheelbarrow his father had built he cleaned every stall and pen and found to his dismay that once he was finished, he had to start from the beginning again. He spent the whole day in the barn, milking, cleaning and feeding the animals. It was drudgery and Finkowski made sure it was painful.

Each morning, after the milking was done, Edmund was allowed to eat. He received a dry piece of bread and a glass of milk. Edmund’s life revolved around milk now and soon he developed a distain for it. The smell of milk made him nauseous. He requested water instead, denying himself the most nourishing part of his meals. In the evening there was a bowl of hot soup which he took to his quarters. It was thin but it was hot and he held the bowl in his hands and let the heat comfort him long after he finished eating the contents.

His bed was an old blanket laid over flea-infested straw in a converted chicken coop. With only one blanket he was cold in the drafty shed and that made it hard to sleep. He would curl up in a ball and then cover himself in straw to try to keep warm. Eventually he stopped worrying about the fleas even as they crawled through his hair and bit him all night. Warmth was more important. It was hard for him to get up even to go to the bathroom. Often, he woke up wet. He was afraid that he would be punished and tried to cover it up until he realized that neither Jerzy nor his wife cared how clean he kept himself.

When spring finally came, Jerzy Finkowski was not yet satisfied that he had tormented his enemy’s son enough. He called at the camp and requested some day laborers. The camp sent out two women to do the milking and clean the stalls, leaving Edmund and his master free to do the field work. It was work that the boy’s father had done with the help of two strong men, but Jerzy intended to do it with only the helping hands of a twelve-year-old boy.

When it came time to plough the land. There was no fuel available for the tractor so the farmer took the one horse that the farm was left with, and began to plough his fields. He set Edmund behind the plough and began to teach him. However, Edmund was too small and too inexperienced to do the kind of job Jerzy wanted. They ploughed several furrows as the vengeful man screamed and berated him for laziness.

“You stupid German,” he yelled as he grabbed him by the collar and dragged him away, “you lived all these years on the work of others and learned nothing. Your father taught you nothing but I’m going to teach you to work.”

He pulled the boy back to the barn where he harnessed an old milk cow. “You will plough the old pasture by the road with this cow and then you will know what it means to work.”

The pasture that Jerzy Finkowski wanted the boy to plough was a field that his father and Stefan had considered so infested with stones that it was useless as anything else. This stony land was to be the boy’s training ground and his punishment. They made two passes down the center of the field with Finkowski leading the cow and Edmund trying to insert the blade into the rock-hard soil. After the two passes Finkowski left him alone, “You plough this field and do a good job or your life won’t be worth living,” he threatened convincingly. “I’m going back to the grain field but don’t you dare think that you can bag off.”

Edmund had played in this field many times. He thought he knew every corner of it and each stone, but now he looked on it with new eyes. He kicked at the hard ground and looked at the two furrows he and the farmer had made. They hardly pierced the turf and the ground would never be softer than it was now in the spring. He looked at the cow and shrugged his shoulders. He knew the old cow, she was the one his father had called Strumpf, ‘Stockings,’ for her long black legs, but Finkowski called her Olga. She was the largest cow in the herd but she was also the most ornery. Edmund looked at the cow thinking that together he and Finkowski had not accomplished much, how could he handle her alone?

“Hai,” Edmund yelled, “hai, hai, hai!” The cow didn’t move. Again and again, he yelled the command he had heard his father use so often but the cow just turned her head and rolled her dark eyes as if to ask, ‘Who are you yelling at?’ It was then that the boy realized that ‘Hai’ was a command for horses and the cow probably didn’t understand ‘horse language.’ He yelled every conceivable call he had ever heard in German or Polish but Strumpf remained completely stationary. Finally, he walked over and stared her in the face, pleading with her to understand what he wanted. Yet when she shook off a fly trying to land on her eye Edmund took it as a flat-out refusal. He hit her over the head and winced painfully when his fist smacked against her hard skull. She shook him off as easily as the fly.

He would have given up right then if he wasn’t so afraid of Finkowski. He was determined to avoid a beating. Edmund took another approach. He tried tugging at the harness and giving the beast a gentle whip to let it know that it was time to move. She ignored it. Angered by her uncaring attitude, Edmund then used his father’s favorite Russian swearwords to convey his contempt for her. No effect. He then grabbed her by the bridle and tried to pull her along, but he didn’t have the strength of a grown man and she seemed determined not to move. She ignored his tugging until he gave up and sat on the ground. It was while he sat brooding that she started to walk. As soon as she took a few steps, the plough, which was only anchored by a few inches of the tough soil, fell over and dragged uselessly behind her. Edmund sprang up and chased after it trying to right the implement, but the plough was too heavy and too awkward to lift while being dragged. Still, he persisted, and just as he thought he might turn it up, she stopped. Strumpf looked back at him and gave a bawl as if to say, ‘I did what you wanted.’

Once he righted the implement Edmund tried again to get the old bovine to move but he couldn’t shout loud enough or whip the reins hard enough to bother her. In desperation, with tears streaming down his face, he tried planting the plough as firmly as his aching muscles would allow and then going to the front to give her a pulling start. When she finally began to walk, he raced to the rear hoping to reach the plough before it upended. His first attempt was not successful. The second was the same. So were the third, fourth and fifth. He lost track of how many times he had run back and forth. Now he was so angry that he picked up a sharp stone and whipped it into the cow’s hind section so forcefully that she bellowed a loud protest and started to run wildly across the field dragging the plough and Edmund behind her. Edmund was so pleased that he hardly noticed the plough only made a scratch in the crusted soil. When he finally did look down, he tried with all the force he could muster to direct the shear point deeper into the ground and saw with great relief that a deeper, wider furrow was being created. Things were working just fine when the tip caught on an imbedded rock. Edmund didn’t let go, but held on tightly. He felt himself being lifted off the ground and was catapulted into the air, landing right at the cow’s rear legs entwining him in the harness. Strumpf stopped and looked at him balefully as he scrambled to extract himself.

With all his heart he wanted to give up, but now the scratch in the earth mocked him. That furrow, imperfect and meandering as it was, would reveal to Jerzy Finkowski that what he had asked was possible and he would want to know why Edmund hadn’t done more. He would accuse him of laziness. Edmund got up and went at it again.

The longest day of Edmund’s life was not over until the sky was darkening and Finkowski came to collect him and the cow. On the field Edmund had been able to scrape only three of the most shameful furrows that any farmer had ever seen. The disgraceful scratches were neither straight nor deep but weaved superficially over the field. In his great relief at having made the cow pull the wretched machine Edmund had not cared to correct her course. He knew he was in trouble. “The cow wouldn’t work,” he cried. Jerzy grabbed Edmund’s hand and looked at the bleeding blisters, “Well at least you were trying.”

Never in his life had Edmund felt such contradictory emotions. He was so relieved that he had not earned the punishment he expected that he sobbed. His greatest anxiety was about having to come back in the morning for more of the same. He was too sore and too tired to go to the farm house to get his supper. Edmund was astonished when Jerzy delivered his food himself. More surprising was that it included a large chunk of bread and a piece of cheese along with the usual bowl of soup.

With all his heart Edmund wanted to be too sick to work the next day. His hands were sore, his muscles ached and his heart cried to be with his mother and sisters. There was no combination of pains that was sufficient to win him a release. After breakfast it was back to the field with that cow.

As he renewed his struggle with the obstinate animal, his hands were wrapped in cloth that he had begged from Jerzy’s wife. However, a new pain was waiting for him in the field. Several school boys caught sight of his torment as they walked to school on the road beside the pasture. They sat on the fence enjoying his anguish, mocking and jeering at him as the uncaring cow toyed with him again. He refused to add to their enjoyment of the spectacle by screaming or running around after the cow as he had done the other day. Without the intimidation, however, Strumpf refused to pull. That brought more laughter. Edmund found a stick and beat her on the rump and she jumped and began to run bringing shouts of delight as the plough tumbled over again. The boys laughed so hard that they fell off the fence and rolled in the field. “Dumb German,” they called, “don’t you know you’re supposed to use a horse?” Finally, as the sun rose higher, they remembered about school and ran away. Even after they left Edmund accomplished little except that he reached a compromise with the cow. All he had to do to get her to pull the plough was to call her by her Polish name, Olga, and show her his prodding stick.

That night as he washed himself beside the well in cold water he cried from the pain. His hands, his head, his shoulders and his legs all throbbed together. Later, in his bed he prayed like he had heard his mother pray, there was no question of believing or not believing, but he fell asleep before he finished.

The vivacious Hertha was sent to look after the twin babies of a young woman who lived with her parents. It was the kind of situation a ten-year-old girl dreamed about without having any real idea what she was in for. The boys were less than a year old and required constant attention, but resourceful Hertha met the challenge head on. She loved children.

Even to Hertha’s young eyes the girl, Tania, seemed very young to be a mother. Tania was a nervous and excitable individual and it didn’t help that her parents were always yelling and swearing at her. Not that Tania was incapable of fighting back; the young woman gave back everything her parents threw at her and more, and it was not long before the new baby sitter got caught in the crossfire.

The consolation was that Hertha had a warm bed, food and so much work that there was little time to miss her mother. She was, however, on duty at all times of the day and night. Her little girl’s dream turned into a nightmare. She changed and fed the babies, bathed them, played with them and did not have one minute of the day to herself. She was expected to respond to their every peep. It was always her mealtimes and her sleep that were interrupted to care for them. When they were sick, she was expected to stay up and attend to their needs. She was tired out.

One morning, after a long night, Hertha was sitting by the kitchen table feeding one of the boys his bottle. The grandmother was baking bread while the young mother slept. Hertha longed to be in her bed because she felt like she had only slept a few minutes. As the boy reached for his bottle, it was knocked from her tired grip and fell to the floor. Hertha bent over to pick it up but she bent over awkwardly and the baby slid out of her arm. With a loud bang he landed on the floor. He screamed and wailed as Hertha hurried to gather him up and soothe him. Tania woke immediately and came running. She ripped her son out of the girl’s arms. “You stupid, careless girl,” she screeched into Hertha’s face as she grabbed the baby, “you could have killed him.”

The grandmother came running behind the daughter. In her hand she held a wooden cooking spoon. As she hovered over Hertha she was shaking with rage. It wasn’t until the girl tried to say that it was an accident that the Grandmother began to hit her. Over and over again she struck at her with the spoon and when Hertha had the audacity to put her arms up to fend off the blows the grandmother became even more enraged. Screaming terror into the girl’s face she dropped the spoon and started slapping with her open hand.

Finally, as the grandmother tired and then turned her attention to the infant, Hertha was finally able to tear herself away. She ran out of the house and hid in the garden. It was not much of a hiding place, however, and her crying gave her location away. For hours the terrified girl stayed there listening to the two women shout threats and obscenities at her from the house. She contemplated running away, but where could she run?

In the late afternoon the grandfather finally came to haul Hertha out of the garden. As soon as he dragged her through the door, the grandmother slapped her across the face again and sent her straight to bed without supper. She was so weary now that she fell asleep in spite of her pain.

In the middle of the night, however, she woke up. The throbbing in her head had increased. The pain was more intense than ever, yet she couldn’t cry for fear of waking the others. With the kind of tenacity that had frustrated even her mother, Hertha bit her lip and transformed the pain into anger and indignation. In the dark, crying silent tears, Hertha determined that she needed her mother. She stole out of the house making sure that she did not wake the twins. If they didn’t wake, neither would the others.

It was a chilly April night and it was a long way for a little girl to walk with a thin coat and only her pain and indignation to keep her warm. If she had known where her mother was, she would have gone there, but all she knew was that down the road was the Osciency camp. It was the only thing familiar to her and more important it was the last place she had seen her mother.

Close to morning the twins woke. They cried a long time before their mother realized that Hertha was not getting up. “You lazy thing,” she shouted at Hertha, “get up!” Still, the girl did not stir. The grandfather rose and found the girl’s bed empty. He yelled at his daughter to come take care of her children. The disgruntled old man pulled on his trousers and went out to the garden where he thought the impudent girl had hidden herself again. He was not in the mood to search the whole garden so he called out for her. There was no response. He supposed she would return before too long. Where could she go? When she came back, he would teach her to run off.

Hertha walked for what seemed like hours. She was so happy to see the sun come up that she ran the rest of the way to the camp. However, her thin hope of seeing her mother there was dashed when she came through the gate. One of the matrons grabbed her before she could even explain what had happened. “You’ve run away, haven’t you?” the woman accused as she grabbed the girl by the arm. She pulled hard. Hertha screamed. She hurt so much already that she couldn’t bear any more.

“Shut up! You’re going to get what you deserve,” the matron shouted at her.

“What do you think you are doing?” Hertha heard a man ask. “What’s all this screaming about?”

“Commissar Maczowiak!” the startled women explained, “this one’s run away from her work. She needs to be taught a lesson.”

The screaming had brought the man out of the camp office. As he came a little closer, Hertha thought she recognized him.

The man looked down, right into Hertha’s eyes. “You’re Fischerova, aren’t you? Hertha Fischer. Why did you run away?”

“They beat me,” Hertha cried, letting the anger finally give way to tears as she found someone to listen to her. Without thinking, she just rushed into Maczowiak’s arms. He had no choice but to hold her and when the astonished matron tried to save him from the girl the Commissar waved her away.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked the little girl.

“You’re Jan’s father. You used to work on our farm.”

“Yes, Hertha,” he said, “now tell me how you got all those bruises.”

As he carried her into the office Hertha forgot all the embellishments she had built up in her mind and told him the truth. She cried. She knew that she had been careless when she dropped the child but could not believe that she had deserved such a beating.

“No,” Maczowiak said to her, in the privacy of his office, “such things ought not to be. What would you like me to do about it?”

“Well, you could arrest them,” she said sincerely, “and if I could get some pudding I would feel better.”

He laughed loudly. This was the precocious little girl he had known and she delighted him. “Well, what if I just make sure that you don’t go back there? Would that be fine?”

Hertha thought about it and agreed. It was, after all, what she really wanted, not to have to go back.

“Then I will take you home and see if my wife has some pudding that she can make for you and the boys.”

“Could Mama, Edmund and Else come too?”

“No, but I promise you Hertha I will make sure they are well.”

When they realized that Hertha was not coming back on her own, the grandfather and Tania came to the camp to report the run away. They hoped to be able to pick another girl and to bring her back with them. Maczowiak had suspected they would come after her and told his staff to send them to his office. The two were full of anger and accusation as they reported to the Commissar that the lazy and oafish girl, Hertha Fischer, had run away. They needed another to replace her.

“Did you do anything to make her run away?” Maczowiak asked. “You didn’t beat her, did you?”

“Who knows why she ran away?” the grandfather said, “she was a bad one. She stole food and miss-treated the children. Why yesterday she almost killed my grandson.”

“Did that make you angry?”

“Of course,” the daughter replied.

“Angry enough to hit her?”

“All right,” the grandfather admitted, “my wife hit her a few times on her bottom. She was angry but she didn’t really hurt her.”

“Then why did she come back here all black and blue?”

“She came here?” the old man questioned, the tone of his voice changing to reflect the tension he felt all of a sudden. “So, what lies did she tell you? I’ll bet she never told you about trying to kill the baby?”

“She told me she dropped the child. It was an accident.”

“She’s a liar,” the daughter interjected, “she lies all the time, and she’s lazy. She should be punished.”

“I think I know who has lied. You won’t be getting another girl, not from this camp. We send them out to work and earn their keep, not to be abused.”

“You can’t do that,” the grandfather raised his voice at the Commissar, “these are German dogs. We treat them no different from the way they treated us.”

“We’ll go to the authorities,” Tania threatened, “you can’t believe this girl over us!”

“I can,” Maczowiak explained, “you lied, she didn’t. I could put you in jail for this!” It was a bluff but it was a winning one.

Maczowiak thought it prudent not to tell anyone what he was doing. He felt no personal obligation to the Fischer family yet he remembered that Alwine Fischer in particular had been kind.

Before he left camp, he found out where Edmund and Alwine were and then rode off with the little girl mounted behind him, holding onto his waist. After he had put her safely into his wife’s care he rode to Finkowski’s farm and asked to see Edmund. Jerzy was puzzled that the Commissar should interest himself personally in the boy, but led him to the field anyway. There, after three days, Edmund was still struggling to plough with that obstinate cow. Maczowiak looked on in amazement and turned to the farmer as if to ask what he thought he was doing. Jerzy offered no explanation. He just shrugged his shoulders and walked away.

The field was still a disgrace and Edmund knew it. He was tired and almost numb to pain. When he saw the Commissar coming, he recognized him.

“Do you know who I am?” Maczowiak asked the boy.

Edmund nodded.

“Show me your hands. Take off those rags.”

Carefully Edmund unwrapped them. His hands were raw with blisters, some freshly broken and others half healed or torn open again. Blood oozed from the dirty sores but the boy bit his lips to keep from crying.

The Commissar didn’t flinch. This is what he had wanted the Germans to feel, the pain and humiliation of working like slaves. Yet now Maczowiak couldn’t help thinking that they were teaching the wrong people. Women and children and a few elderly men were learning what their leaders should be learning.

“Do they beat you here?”

“No,” Edmund shook his head but kept staring at his own hands.

“The work is hard, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” the boy confirmed but did not complain.

“Yes, I know it is, Maczowiak replied looking at the pitiful boy. It occurred to the Commissar that he should have been glad to witness the humiliation of the arrogant boy. He could remember him strutting around his father’s farm sneering at the Polish help. It would be easy to leave him here and never bother him again, but it was his promise to his sister that he considered now. “Come with me,” he said.

Maczowiak simply told Jerzy Finkowski that the boy was needed somewhere else. In a few days he would get another to take his place, one fit to do a man’s work. The farmer protested, “Don’t take him. He’s only now beginning to be worth something.” When Maczowiak ignored him, Jerzy called him back. “The truth is,” Finkowski blurted out, “my wife has become attached to the boy and we were wondering about adopting him.”

“He has a family,” Maczowiak sneered at the ridiculous suggestion. Edmund was greatly relieved.

After the obnoxious creature Gzelak had returned her to the camp, Alwine had experienced things that almost made her sorry that she had not accepted the dirty man’s offer. The camp officials, believing the story he told them, that Alwine was lazy and rebellious, were determined to teach her a lesson.

She and Else were immediately sent to the farm of a bitter woman named Anna Pilusj. The woman had suffered much at the hands of the Germans during the war and had only one goal left in life, to make every German she met pay for that suffering. Her husband and all her children, except a teenage son, were dead. She told her painful story often, along with her desire for revenge. Now with her one remaining child, a dull-witted and overweight boy of sixteen, she was determined to repay the Germans every ounce of misery she had suffered.

From the beginning, Anna found in Alwine Fischer someone she particularly despised. Onto her, she projected all the venom she held for the German woman whom she had been forced to serve during the occupation. The verbal abuse was unrelenting and if that had been all, Alwine could have suffered through it. However, while she and two other women worked, Anna and her son physically abused them. The milking was done too slowly, the kitchen floor was not clean enough, the stable was not tidy enough; for all these faults Anna kicked at anyone close by.

Slowly, Alwine began to think that it was because of Else that Anna picked on her. Somehow the little girl triggered something in her. “Do you think your little daughter will survive?” she would ask in Polish. “Many, many Polish children were killed by the Germans.” Alwine could not refute her accusation. She remembered how she had felt when her sons Ewald and Einhardt had died. Alwine kept Else close to her side whenever possible.

She did everything she could to avoid drawing Anna’s attention but she couldn’t avoid getting sick. She fought off the pain and fever of the flu for several days with nothing but willpower, but she only got worse. Anna saw her moving sluggishly and used it as an opportunity to pick on her. “Faster,” she cried as she kicked the milking stool. Alwine tried to work more quickly. It wasn’t enough. The bitter woman knocked the milk stool out from under her. Alwine slipped under the cow spilling the milk pail. The startled cow kicked her in the side. Quickly, Irma Thann, her old neighbor, hauled her out from under the animal. Alwine could barely stand.

Anna stood in her face screaming about the spilt milk. “You lazy dog,” she yelled, “no food or rest for you until you’ve cleaned up this mess!” With that she slapped her again, hard.

Alwine could take no more. She thought she would die if she didn’t lie down. Without saying another word, she stumbled out of the stable, her little daughter helping to hold her up. Anna was livid, and shouted for Alwine to return to work. “I’m sick,” Alwine managed to squeak out weakly, “leave me alone!”

She lay down in her bed in the straw in the upper barn but Anna would not leave her alone and followed her. “You are not sick! If you don’t get up right now, you will be sorry.” With that she kicked at Alwine but missed, lost her balance and fell, landing painfully on her hip. She screeched but quickly pulled herself up and limped toward the house. “My son will take care of you,” she said as she left the barn.

However, when she got to the barn door and looked out, she saw something that was even better. “Look who is coming!” she shouted back through the doorway, “You’ll soon regret what you did!” With that she disappeared for a few minutes. When the door reopened, she had Commissar Maczowiak with her.

He came to her bedside and the Commissar asked, “Well how are you feeling Fischerova?”

Anna was prepared to let this cordial greeting pass. Personally, she never even pretended to like these people but she could understand how it could be an effective tease. It pleased her to think that the Commissar was baiting the woman.

“Not well,” came the answer, and with it a smile that surprised Anna. “I have a fever and I feel weak.”

“She’s not sick,” Anna objected, “she’s just lazy.”

“How do they treat you here?” the Commissar asked Alwine.

“I think you know!” Alwine responded.

“We treat our Germans as well as they treated us,” Anna spat out.

“You’re a good person Fischerova,” Maczowiak said with a smile.

“What is going on here?” Anna asked. She could no longer contain herself. “You treat her like an old friend. You are supposed to punish her!”

“I know this woman. If she says she is sick then she is sick. She is not a lazy person and she does not mistreat people.”

Anna groaned. The Commissar was coddling the woman and she could not accept it. She began raving about the injustice. Finally, Maczowiak ordered her to shut up. “I want you to take care of this woman,” he ordered. “Give her more blankets and warm food.”

“I will not be a servant to any German,” Anna protested.

“Then have the other women do it. You enjoy having these women here to work this farm for you, don’t you? Well, if you want it to continue then take care of this woman or you and your lazy son will be working this farm by yourselves. Now get out!”

Anna hesitated, her face twisted with anger and fear. “Get out,” Maczowiak yelled again and she scrambled away.

“Do you know where my children are?” Alwine asked after Anna left.

“Don’t worry about your children I am watching out for them.”

“Oh, thank you,” Alwine cried. They were tears of relief. “If I die, can you see that they find their way to Germany? That’s where their father is.”

“I can’t make any promises like that, but you are not going to die Fischerova. The woman is too frightened to hurt you anymore. I will let her know that I’m coming back in a few days to see if you are better.”

Alwine was able to rest a few days. Else was assigned to bring her mother extra blankets and hot soup, but Alwine allowed her daughter to eat more of it than she ate. Nevertheless, in a few days Alwine was much stronger and the fever was gone. She was still weak but forced herself to work again. The other women had to work harder while she was sick and Alwine couldn’t let that continue.

Perhaps because the Commissar had threatened her, Anna eased up on Alwine. It was not that she totally abandoned her ways, only that the edge was off her abuse. The screaming and swearing continued but there was less kicking.

Shortly after her recovery Anna watched as Alwine applied the advice that Stefan had given her. When the other women had left the stalls, she stayed to clean and straighten up. Without knowing that she was being watched she cleaned and stacked the milk pails and made sure that the cows had fresh straw for bedding. Then finally she went for her supper.

Anna stopped her. She gave her a grudging compliment. “I heard about you, Fischerova,” for the first time attempting to speak to Alwine in her broken German. “You let Poles make ‘schnapps’.” It took Alwine a minute to realize what she was saying. She was referring to the fact that she let Stefan distill liquor. “My woman, no schnapps, no schnapps. Nothing she give us, nothing but work.” She spat on the ground to show her contempt.

_____________

Edmund and Hertha remained with Ivan’s wife for only a few days. Besides the impropriety of a commissar harboring German refugees, his wife quickly grew tired of the extra work and insisted that they be sent elsewhere. Both Edmund and Hertha begged to be reunited with their mother, but the Commissar could not arrange that. Maczowiak was able to find positions for them where they where he could watch out for them and delivered them there himself.

In their new situations Edmund and Hertha began to fear that they would never see the rest of their family again and that they would all be slaves forever. It all seemed like the end of the world and an unbearable load. Yet Edmund wanted to survive, and he found that as he changed his attitude, even this life was livable. Wherever he was sent, he worked hard to make himself useful, but it was Hertha who had the best tools to deal with her captivity, a sense of humor and an intense attitude of self-righteous indignation. The combination made it impossible for people not to like her.

Else, on the other hand, was too small to have developed the means to cope with her situation. The screaming Anna Pilusj frightened her but her overweight son, Jan, terrified her. Even though lately, Anna, had stopped kicking, she could not control her teenage son. He stalked Else, jumping out at her from around the corners and grabbing her. He twirled her around like a sack of potatoes until she screamed. Sometimes hoisting her high above his shoulders, he pretended to drop her, only at the last second would he catch her, but sometimes he would miss. Alwine had to spend her nights comforting the little girl and bandaging her cuts and scrapes.

Luckily for Else, he was lazy. Most of the day he spent either sleeping or drinking beer. Only when he had excess energy to burn was he a threat, but then he always looked for his favorite target. Whenever Alwine noticed him prowling, she told Else to run and hide in the barn, high in the haystack. If she was lucky, she would even fall asleep there until his short attention span made him give up. If she made a mistake, however, and he saw her, there was no stopping him.

One hot June day Else was not careful enough and he caught her. Grabbing her long blonde hair as she came running out of the barn, he dragged her across the farm yard. In the middle of the yard, he dropped her and handed her a barn broom. “You lazy pest, you have to work,” he barked, “sweep the yard!” He handed her a heavy stable broom.

Else was so frightened all she could do was stand there with the big clumsy broom in her hands. “Sweep,” Jan shouted, “sweep, sweep, sweep!” The broom was much too large for her little hands to operate properly. He became angry and kicked at the hills of loose dirt that she had managed to create. “Do it right, or I’ll have to kill you.” Paralyzed with fear she began to cry. “Stop crying,” he shouted, “get back to work!”

Alwine was in the field mowing hay with a scythe when she heard the shouting. She wanted to run to her daughter but Anna stopped her. “He won’t hurt her,” Anna said, “he’s only having fun.” Irma Thann pulled Alwine aside and whispered, “He may not hurt her, but he’ll kill you for sure if you interfere. What will she do without a mother?”

Jan grew angry that Else wouldn’t cooperate with his broom-game. The boy was sweating profusely in the hot sun and wasn’t enjoying himself. He told her that she was useless and didn’t deserve to live. Clutching her arm, he swung her round and round. “Mama, mama!” Else screamed as he made her run faster and faster until her hand slipped out of his sweaty grasp. He was panting hard but he wouldn’t let up. “Keep running,” he shouted at her.

Else could no longer control herself and wet her pants. The boy looked at the puddle that she was standing in, cursed and berated her. He picked her up and flung her over his shoulder. The tears streamed down her cheeks as she screamed and kicked. Finally, her screams stopped as she passed out. While he was wondering what to do with her, he spotted the old well. “You need a bath,” he said, even though the well was dry and not at all deep. He lowered he limp body down and walked away.

When Alwine saw Jan walking back to the house while there was no sign of Else, she ran. Anna could not stop her now. Her mother had not seen the boy dropping her into the well and was frantically searching for her daughter.

Watching her friend Irma Thann yelled, and came running. “In the well, in the well! Look in the old well.”

Irma climbed into the shallow well and lifted Else into her mother’s arms. Relieved to find out she was still alive Alwine carried her to her bed and stayed with her until she revived.

After that Else could hardly be persuaded to come out of the barn and would not leave her mother’s side at all. Seeing Jan as he stalked across the barnyard Else clamped onto her mother. Anna was incensed. The girl was making her worker almost useless.

“You’ve done this to her, now leave her alone,” Alwine chided as Anna tried to tear Else away.

“You can’t talk to me in this way. I don’t care if the Commissar is your friend.” She grabbed a broom and came at Alwine with it. “I’ll teach you.”

Alwine just stood there, her little girl still clinging tightly to her leg. The first blow she fended off with her forearm but it glanced down her side almost hitting Else. As the next blow came, Alwine grabbed the end of the broom and tore it away. It was so incredibly easy that Alwine surprised herself. A strange look came over the woman as she stared at Alwine with the broom in her hand and saw that the two other German women were coming to her aid. She panicked and ran out of the barn toward the house shouting, “They’re going to kill me! They’re going to kill me!” The house door slammed behind her.

“Now we’ve done it,” Irma said, “he’ll be out here with his gun soon. Should we run away?”

“Where would we go?” Alwine asked.

“Perhaps we could go to your friend the Commissar and explain what happened.”

The women looked at Alwine as if it was her decision to make. Going to Maczowiak seemed logical, however, the more she thought about it, the less convinced she was that it was the right thing to do. The women decided to wait to see what Anna and Jan would do.

Strangely, nothing happened. Fifteen minutes passed . . . half an hour . . . and there was no sign of Anna or fat Jan. They expected that by now the teenager would have stormed out of the house brandishing his pistol. He had threatened to shoot them so often that it seemed it was only an excuse that he lacked, yet there was no sign of him, nor of Anna.

“What do you think they are doing?” Jutta, the oldest of the three women asked. Alwine shrugged her shoulders. As they looked out the stable door, they could see that the front door of the house was shut tight. That was unusual on such a bright, warm day. “Do you think they’ve run off to get the police?”

“I don’t think so,” Irma responded, “there is someone in the house. I think they’re just frightened. The little twerp is a coward,” Irma said with a twisted smile. “I should have known; the loud ones always are.” Alwine’s two comrades began to laugh.

It was Alwine who brought a note of soberness to the situation. “This is not good. You never know what frightened people will do.”

Someone had to do something. Alwine, feeling responsible for having created the situation made the first move. Quietly she gathered her courage and walked toward the house, intent on apologizing. If accepting the blame would ease the tension then it was worth the humiliation. Otherwise, the frightened pair might go to the police and tell them some outrageous story. Alwine had no doubt that they would be believed. That was the last thing she wanted to happen.

Alwine fumbled for the correct words in Polish. She had never been good at speaking the language although she understood it well enough. Still, it was important for her to be truthful and sincere. She was sorry. That seemed to be all that was left now in the world, just sorrow.

She could hear shouting as she came closer to the door. At first, she thought it was directed at her and she almost ran back to the barn, but then she recognized the tone. It was Anna, yelling at Jan, belittling him. When Alwine came close to the house, she could see them through the window, faces red with anger, arguing in deafening screams. They didn’t even hear Alwine knocking on the door. She had to bang on it with her fist until they heard.

It was Anna who came to the window and peeked out of the corner like a frightened child. Alwine kept her hands in front of her to show that she had no weapon and was harmless, nevertheless, when Anna opened the door the width of a crack she had the gun. It was pointed at Alwine’s head. Her hand shook nervously but it was up to Alwine to make the first gesture. “I came to assure you that I . . . none of us mean you any harm.”

“You were going to kill me.”

“No Anna, I only took the broom from you. I thought you were going to hurt my daughter. You’re a mother too, you know that a mother will do anything to protect her child. I am sorry for what has happened.”

“You say that because you are frightened.”

“Yes, we are frightened and that’s why we would never hurt you or your son.”

“Shoot her,” Jan said. The fat boy had come to the door and tried to take the pistol out of his mother’s hands. Anna turned her head and with a flick of her wrist struck him across the nose with the barrel of the pistol. “Shut up,” she growled at him, “this is all your fault.” He squealed in pain and Alwine could see the blood running through his fingers as he covered his nose. Anna turned to Alwine and said, “Go back to work.”

After the incident, Anna was much calmer. They hardly saw Jan anymore and could only speculate why. Anna became almost friendly, especially toward Alwine. Before long she was even asking Alwine’s opinion on the running of the farm. All the venom was gone.