Rudi van Dantzig: For a Lost Soldier

We go to the back of the lorry and my father hoists my suitcase over the tail-board.

‘What do you want to do, wait outside or shall I help you in?’

I look at how high the back of the lorry is. I won’t be able to get up there by myself.

‘Please lift me in.’

The iron floor is cold against my knees. There is a pile of grey blankets in a corner, but I daren’t take one.

‘Daddy.’

My father has gone back to the front of the lorry and is looking to the driver again.

‘Daddy, I don’t feel very well. I’d better go back with you, I’m beginning to feel really sick.’

If it had been my mother I would have burst into loud, heart-rending sobs and clung tightly to her. She would have taken me back home with her.

‘Chin up, my boy.’ My father hands me a registration card with a few sheets of ration coupons attached to it. ‘Look after these because they’re going to want them in Friesland. Don’t lose them, whatever you do.’

He hoists himself up on to the tail-board and I throw my ,arms around his neck. ‘Take care, won’t you. And write.’

I can’t get an answer out. My body is trembling with pent-up terror. Through a haze I watch the blue of his coat receding from the lorry. A wave of his arm, lit brightly by the Bun, and then he is round the corner. Gone.

The man in the cab taps against the window.

‘It won’t be long now,’ he calls out, ‘just as soon as everybody turns up.’

The lorry door slams shut. A couple of sparrows are chirping in the sun on the other side of the street. I crawl to the furthest corner of the platform and position the suitcase next to me. I draw my knees up and feel a drop falling onto my leg and trickling down along my thigh.

I am woken up by someone nudging my shoulder. A girl is sitting next to me and is trying, with a great deal of tugging and pulling, to shove a bag behind her back. She is leaning against me, making a sound halfway between laughing and crying. There is a bow in her hair that has come loose and she has a red nose which she keeps clearing with snuffling noises. I sit up straight. At least seven children must have joined us. They are quiet and pale, no one talks. Some are nicely dressed, others look shabby. I see that one of the boys has a shaved head. Nit king. The clothes of the girl next to me give off a mean, stale smell that catches in my throat. Outside, in the sun, a woman with a green headscarf stands by the side of the lorry talking animatedly to the driver.

The town has come to life. People are walking past the lorry, some peering inside inquiringly, as if searching for something. A German lorry is standing a bit further up the street, an armed soldier by its side.

‘Listen, children,’ the woman with the headscarf is leaning over inside, ‘the Germans won’t let us leave until evening. And there are still a few more children to come. Anyone wanting to spend a penny had best come with me now.’

The girl next to me clambers out. I need to pee, too, but stay in my corner. I lay my head on the suitcase and fall into a vacant doze. This lorry doesn’t exist, these children don’t exist, I myself don’t exist. I go on registering all the sounds in the lorry; they seem far away, as if coming from another life.

Time seems to dissolve into waiting. I don’t know how long we have been there, three hours, ten hours, a day even.

Still more children have joined us and now the lorry seems crammed with bodies, suitcases, bags, all thrown chaotically together. The lady is sitting in the middle, her knees drawn up. She has draped the green scarf over her legs, looking watchfully around as if checking up on us one by one.

The light outside has changed; there are hardly any people in the streets any more. I can still see the German lorry, but the soldier has gone.

I raise my hand.

‘I need to go to the toilet.’

Silently the lady beckons. I crawl to the back of the lorry and climb over the tail-board. She holds me by the elbows and lets me down. ‘Do it beside the truck.’ She points. There is a narrow strip of pavement between the lorry and the Palace. My legs feel wobbly. When I try to open my trousers I am too weak to undo the buttons and nearly wet my pants.

I shiver as the jet spatters against the wall. A sound escapes from my throat and my teeth chatter. It is evening, the sky is turning grey. Shuddering, I look over my shoulder and wonder in which direction I would have to go to get home.

This is all a fragile, glassy dream; it feels as if everything is blurred and happened a long time ago. I turn round. The driver is hanging out of the window, watching me pee. I move backwards. There is a dark stain against the wall and on the pavement, a sign I have left behind, a distress signal for anyone who may be looking for me.

I am hoisted back up again and creep into my corner. Each child is an island to himself, one you may not touch.

Opposite me I see a face I recognise. It is the boy who has been sitting with his head half-hidden under a coat. He smiles and I smile back uncertainly.

‘Jan,’ I say.

How can that be, how has Jan ended up in this lorry? Jan Hogervorst, from our street, from the house across the road.

Jan sits up straight. ‘Come over here,’ he whispers and shoves something to one side, ‘there’s room.’

But I know better than to leave my suitcase unattended. Jan crawls across to me, pushing in between me and the girl. Immediately I feel that I can sit more easily. Our legs lean against each other and Jan pushes one hand into the back of my knee.

‘Cold legs.’

He turns to the girl. ‘What’s your name?’ he says bossily.

‘He’s called Jeroen and I’m Jan. Are you going to Friesland too?’

She leans away from him with an unfriendly expression. ‘I live near here,’ she says. ‘In Bloedstraat. My name is Greetje.’

She starts to cry, softly at first, then in long drawn-out wails. The lady turns round, looking furious.

‘Be a bit quieter, all of you.’

‘She stinks like a horse as well,’ says Jan. ‘Shove up a bit, I can’t stand it.’

Grudgingly I draw further back into the corner. I can feel Jan sagging closer towards me, breathing heavily.

Then I too fall asleep again.

I can see the tops of trees flitting by through a gap in the canvas overhead. Flashes of sky and the violent rustle of branches and leaves.

‘We’ve nearly reached Hoorn,’ whispers the teacher, ‘but we’ve been told to wait by the IJsselmeer Dam, until it’s completely dark.’ She looks at her watch. ‘Half past eight.’

I think of my mother, wonder where she is. Perhaps we drove past her and I didn’t know.

She left three days ago, with her sister. Both of them were on rickety old bikes. ‘We’re going to the polder,’ she had said, ‘to get some potatoes from the farmers. Maybe other things too, if we’re lucky. Flour and milk.’

I had watched them go from our balcony, cycling together to the end of the street, empty panniers on their luggage carriers. When she looked up and waved I hadn’t waved back, making sure she knew that I was cross.

By the time she gets back I’ll be gone; only Daddy and Bobbie will be there. She should never have gone away and now it’s too late. Is this the polder that we’re driving through? If I were to go and sit near the tail-board, I should have a better view of the road. You never know, I might suddenly see her.

Will she be upset to find that I’m gone, will she write to me? But perhaps the post doesn’t go to Friesland.

The lorry comes to an abrupt halt. I fall against Jan; a suitcase topples over. ‘The Germans,’ I hear someone say.

There are voices and soon afterwards the tail-board is let down. Outside stands a soldier, yellow light reflecting off his helmet. He is carrying a rifle. A man with a cap looks inside, our driver behind him with his hands in his pockets. The lady crawls through to the end of the lorry and passes .nine papers to the German. It all looks very conspiratorial and reminds me of the war games we used to play in the evenings in the bushes along the canal.