Isabella spoke first, ‘Good afternoon, gentlemen.’
Yuri was amazed by the ordinariness of her sentence. What’s she thinking, wishing these men a good afternoon? They were the enemy, killers and monsters who had invaded their country and burnt down their city, not to mention shooting her sister dead, along with Peter’s mother.
One of the men replied, ‘Good afternoon, Madam.’ His pronunciation was perfect, but it seemed that he was the only one who could speak Russian. Following a gesture from one of his friends, he then had the nerve to say, ‘We smelled bread. Yes?’ The three faces were full of hope.
‘Don’t give them any!’ Yuri muttered to Sarah.
She smiled at him in such a way that he felt like a child who didn’t want to share his toys, and said, ‘Now, Yuri.’ Her response prompted him to look at the soldiers again, and try to see them as she did.
They were not that old, nor that clean. Their uniforms were covered in a multitude of faded stains and they looked extremely tired and pale beneath the dirt on their faces. One of them, the shortest of the three, was wounded; he had an old cut above his right eye which had spawned a dried patch of blood on his cheek. The upper lid was swollen while his eye looked grey instead of white. The third one had his left hand wrapped in a filthy bandage. He was the only one who carried a gun. In fact, he was also carrying a sack. Maybe this was why his bandage was in such a bad state; he obviously liked carrying the important stuff despite his sore hand. In any case, he couldn’t speak Russian so he passed the bag to the first man who said, ‘We have meat. Horse.’
Isabella bowed her head slightly, encouraging him to speak again. He obliged, ‘If you could give us some bread, we would give you some meat? Would that be alright?’
Yuri was suspicious. Why wouldn’t they just point the gun at them and take whatever they wanted? The women, however, acted as if this was all perfectly normal. Anxious to prepare them for the worst, Yuri whispered to Isabella, ‘We can’t trust them, they are Nazis.’ To his shame the first soldier not only heard his warning, he also understood it.
‘No,’ he said, glancing from Yuri to the women. ‘We are not Nazis, we are Germans.’ He babbled some words to his friends, who both nodded hurriedly, to let the boys and the sisters know that they completely agreed with what he had told them.
Sarah, noting the confusion on Yuri’s face, said quietly, ‘There is a difference, Yuri. These men are telling us that they are merely doing a job because they do not have a choice. They would much rather be back home in their own country, with their families.’
The man was much relieved to be understood, nodding his head and holding out his hands to show he was no threat to them, ‘Yes, we only wish to go home, that is correct.’
Peter had finished winding the wool and was deep in thought. It was possible that the soldiers were unaware of him; he had hardly moved since they arrived.
Isabella calmly stated, ‘We can give you the best part of one loaf.’
Yuri admired her courage. She didn’t ask them if that was alright or apologise for not offering more, which made him smirk until he caught Sarah’s eye and stopped smirking immediately.
And then everything went very strange indeed.
Peter, the ball of wool in his hand, walked right up to the soldiers and gazed at each of them in turn. The men, feeling themselves to be under inspection, shifted nervously – or, perhaps ‘guiltily’ is the better word. Peter looked so small, standing directly in front of them. Yuri was sure that Isabella or Sarah would call him back to the table but they didn’t. Instead, they watched him as intently as he watched the Germans.
Quite unexpectedly, the smaller man began to cry. Yuri was astonished at the sight of this tough burly man crying as if his heart was broken.
‘Peter!’
Peter flipped his head around, declaring as fast as he could. ‘I didn’t do anything!’
The man did his best to stop crying, wiping away his tears and, in doing so, dragging grimy streaks across his face. He peered in wonder at the wetness on his palm and then stretched out his hand, as if offering his tears to Peter. Yuri started to move, but Sarah nudged him to remain seated, to let whatever was happening continue. Peter did the only thing he knew how to do to make someone feel better, he smiled brightly but was too shy to take the man’s dirty hand. Instead, he sort of nodded as if to say ‘Yes!’
It was Sarah who spoke first, ‘Is he a father? Perhaps the child reminds him of his son?’
The first man, the sergeant in the group, grew agitated, looking from his audience to his friends, muttering in German. A half-hearted debate took place between the three of them; the man who cried shook his head and said, ‘Nein!’ When he focused on Peter again, his face twitched and tears ran once more. Yuri was bewildered; he had never seen grown men behave like this. The other two soldiers stared at the ground, out of respect for their friend’s misery, their arms hanging loosely by their sides.
Silence returned when the soldier was cried out. Peter informed him, in his most cheerful voice, ‘Crying makes me feel better too.’
The sergeant translated what he had said, and the soldier couldn’t help himself. He startled everyone by taking one step towards the boy and hugging him tightly. As soon as he could, Peter escaped the man to return to Yuri, pushing himself into his lap. Both boys were confused and a little scared.
‘I’m sorry,’ apologised the sergeant. ‘My cousin didn’t mean to frighten him.’ The women accepted his apology without a word. ‘It’s just that he hasn’t slept in days. Every time he tries to sleep he hears children sobbing.’ Still, the women said nothing while the man wanted to say more. ‘There is a hospital for our soldiers beneath the opera house. I was going to leave him there but he refused to stay.’ Perhaps unwisely, he explained to his Russian listeners, ‘There were just two or three doctors for hundreds of men.’
His cousin started to babble again and point at Peter who leant into Yuri. The soldier tried to ignore him, but Sarah asked, ‘What’s wrong with him? What children keep him from sleeping?’
The sergeant stared at her, urging her with his eyes not to ask dangerous questions.
Sarah’s gaze was neither unkind nor kind. Not one of the women had offered a chair to the men who looked like they badly needed to sit down.
The man shook his head, arguing with himself. It seemed he reached a decision and said, ‘My cousin says he is being haunted by some children we met a while ago.’
Yuri couldn’t help himself, ‘You mean ghosts?’
The sergeant smiled thinly. ‘No, not exactly, or maybe it is that exactly. Maybe we are surrounded by the ghosts of what we have done, or didn’t do.’ His voice tapered off to a whisper.
Isabella was blunt. ‘What did you do?’ Her tone did not encourage him to waste any more time.
And so he began to explain, ‘A couple of weeks ago we marched into a small Jewish village with instructions to kill everyone there. The houses were wooden shacks and each one contained a family. We had expected to be confronted with rebels, people who threatened us, but all we found were families. So I asked my lieutenant, a man I respected, who exactly we were to kill and he just repeated, “Everyone”, ordering me to bring the adults into the forest and line them up, side by side. “But, sir,” I asked, “what about the children?” There were ninety of them, mostly babies and toddlers, the eldest ones were about seven years old. The lieutenant gave me a look of impatience and snapped, “They’re only Jews!” before walking away from me.’