‘I’ve already told you.’
‘Not yours, the child’s. What was written down on the forms?’
‘None. I didn’t choose one.’
‘All right, no grave problem — ’ he spoke as if it most certainly was — ‘that’s what we might call a hiccup. But we have the surname.’ of course, so we can-’
‘No.” said Roza, paling. ‘The space was left empty…’
‘Ali.’ His hairy fingers tapped the desk. ‘Now that causes me some difficulty Considerable, I’d say The name’s the key without the key I can’t open the lock:
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Filing systems, Madam Majewsky Formalities,’ He lowered his head as if to duck the attention of his secretary ‘Frankly I’ll be honest. I’ll break a rule to show my goodwill. I remember placing your child. Nice woman, expensive shoes. Handmade, I’d say Classy all round. But I wouldn’t know her from Adam… or Eve, for that matter. I’ve no idea where she came from or where she went. I never do. From our end, once everyone’s happy, we send off the forms to Section Three and they put them in a red binder, but without a name, well.’ what’s to be done? There’s nothing to ask for. I can’t ask them to find something if there’s no label. Can’t use the index. Can’t look up “None”. God knows where they’d put “None”. Never thought of that one.’
‘But that’s not possible,’ protested Roza. ‘All it takes is a little-’
‘Now don’t you start blaming yourself.’ Madam.” said Mr Bondel.’ freeing the bottom button of his waistcoat. ‘There’s nothing we can do. None is none. I shouldn’t have raised your hopes, that was my fault and I ask your pardon. But you can rest assured that all the children who pass across this desk go to the best of homes — ’ he tapped his fingers as if they were tiny feet — ‘and the lady I met was altogether captivating. A cut above your usual-’
‘But I was tricked,’ whispered Roza.’ Harshly.
‘Madam Majewsky you got out of prison.” he whispered back, kindly ‘Your child did, too. Be grateful. It doesn’t always end that well, as you should know’
‘I was tricked.’
Mr Bondel’s tone dropped even lower. ‘Madam, allow me to give you some sound advice of a general character. Always fill in the forms. Tick the boxes. Sign the bottom. It’s what makes the world go round.’
‘I want my child back,’ persisted Roza.
‘Unfeasible.’
‘You have to listen to me, forms or no forms-’
‘No, you listen.’ Mr Bondel’s patience with the criminal classes abruptly snapped. Disgust and disapproval, previously suppressed.’ boiled to the surface, making scum of his certified courtesies. ‘I shouldn’t have seen you, and I did. I’m a family man, and 1 felt sorry for you. But no one can help you find nothing. Your bird has flown. You let it go.’ not me.’ He stood up, short and ridiculously imperious, crumbs trapped in a fold of his waistcoat. ‘Olga,’ he bawled. ‘Madam Majewsky is leaving.’
The door opened. Roza walked hesitantly away from the man who’d filled in the forms, turning round when she reached the thin, terrified woman.
‘My name is Mojeska,’ said Roza, quietly, to Mr Bondel. ‘M-o-j-e-s-k-a.’
‘Quite right. I’ll make a note. Olga, jot that down, will you?’
When she’d left the antechamber and walked twenty or so yards down the corridor.’ Roza swivelled on her heels and strode back to the reception desk, her limbs shaking, her teeth grinding. The lean assistant recoiled and made a weak scream as Roza reached over and grabbed the typewriter. In a wild swinging movement, ablaze with rage, she hurled the machine straight through the panel of frosted glass.
Roza stepped out of the alley and began her long walk back to the Old Ghetto, choked by impotence, blinded by tears. The Temporary Fourth Assistant to the Second Deputy Director knew exactly how to find her child, but he wouldn’t; and probably couldn’t. He was just as much a cog in the wheel as she was. They turned in opposing directions, that’s all, their teeth meshing in a kind of obedience to the vast grinding machine that shaped their lives, determining what was possible, establishing an order of right and wrong, free from appeal or question. The only difference was that Mr Bondel moved willingly In a way he was a collaborator — the most contemptible kind because he knew he would never be blamed: all he’d ever done was go through the motions. Just then, Roza’s hand found the bullet in her pocket. Pausing in the middle of the street, she took it out.
Brack said it had been meant for her.
Why, then, had he kept her alive?
Roza stumbled on, turning the thing around in her hand. He’d kept her alive not from any residue of affection or friendship, but because he hoped she’d lead him one day to the Shoemaker. His commitment to the machine was without limitation. He would never tire or waver in his purpose. Roza was only alive so that someone else might be brought to death. At that instant, she felt watched, tabbed and tailed. She heard the clatter of a typewriter and the clang of the return carriage. Her file would never be closed.
‘Why have you gone this far, Otto?’ said Roza, out loud, stumbling forward aimlessly ‘Wasn’t killing my husband enough?’
Shouts of warning rang out, seemingly far off.
‘Is it all because I went north and you went south? Is this my punishment?’
Roza was wavering on the pavement holding up the bullet as if she were Hamlet talking to that skull. Passers-by looked on as if she were mad. Suddenly, she closed her fists and started walking, head down, wondering how she would ever face tomorrow.
Roza moved on to the day shift. Sitting between two other women at a long table she sewed ribbons on to hats for export to the Soviet Union. Each evening on the way home she found an empty pew in Saint Klement’s and listened to the silence. After an hour she went home to her side of the wardrobe. Then she ate, slept and went to work again. Occasionally like a drunken masochist, she’d rise to watch Bernard sleep, listening to his breathing, feeling the cut of a saw’s teeth with each intake of air, with each long, slow exhalation. Events passed her by Talk of riots and deaths somewhere in the north or strikes on the coast were like distant noises, not entirely real, sounds from other people’s mouths. If Brack had arranged for someone to follow her.’ he’d wasted his time. Roza was going nowhere that would interest him. He’d played too hard and gone too far. He should have left her with some purpose in life, something to fight for, a reason to go back to the Shoemaker. Whereas she had nothing left. Her days were empty Their meaning had gone, flown from her own hand.
Part Four
Chapter Eighteen
Anselm examined the sequence of framed maps on the wall of an airy well lit office, situated on the fourth floor of the IPN. They charted the loss of national sovereignty to the Prussians.’ the Austrians and the Russians.’ their invasions in blue, brown and red constantly rearranging the green homeland throughout a hundred and fifty years of resistance, at one point erasing it completely I’m in an obstinate country, he thought; one that waits for spring.
The display had been brought to his attention by a red-haired woman dressed in a white trouser suit, who’d then left him to retrieve the Shoemaker material for his inspection. Presently she returned carrying an oblong cardboard box. She placed it on the desk beneath the maps and turned on a lamp. Unable to speak English or German, she pointed once again at the maps, as if seeking confirmation that Anselm had got the message. Loud and clear, he nodded. After she’d gone, clipping the door shut behind her, Anselm polished his glasses on his scapular, conscious that his task to find a secret police informer was part of that greater picture of shifting boundaries; that the losses and gains were moral and spiritual and not just national; that even a single betrayal in 1982 carried the entire weight of a people’s devastated expectations. John had warned him as much.