Richard Zimler - The Warsaw Anagrams

‘She’s been murdered. What else could go wrong?’

‘Plenty! So why don’t you tell me what you want to know about her and I’ll see how much I want to say.’

I spoke of my nephew’s death until she gripped my arm. ‘I’m sorry,’ she interrupted, ‘but please don’t tell me any more about Adam. Since Anna’s murder… Look, what’s been bothering me is that she refused to tell me who the father was, and that started me thinking. I thought it was probably Paweł, but she wouldn’t confirm that – or deny it.’

‘Who else could it have been?’

‘Your guess is as good as mine. But listen, whatever you do,’ she said, grimacing, ‘you can’t tell Anna’s parents about any of this.’

‘Why not?’

‘Mrs Levine has a temper. She drinks. And she used to beat Anna with a wet towel.’

‘Why a wet towel?’

‘It hurts like hell but doesn’t leave marks.’ Henia sneered. ‘Anna always said her mother was clever – ugly but clever . She used to call her Fraulein Rottenmeier – from Heidi .’

‘Yes, I know,’ I replied bitterly; Dorota had fooled me; she’d been protecting herself, not her husband. The unflattering photograph of her daughter had been meant to show me that Anna deserved the abusive treatment her mother meted out.

‘No one knows what I’m telling you,’ Henia continued. ‘I’m not even sure Anna’s father knows how bad things were, though she was furious at him for never protecting her. I don’t know how Fräulein Rottenmeier will react if you let on that you know what she was up to. And if you tell her Anna was pregnant…’ Henia groaned to indicate the disaster that would engender.

I stopped to consider whether Anna’s own mother might have been involved in her murder. It seemed impossible, yet so did Adam’s death.

‘No more questions?’ Henia asked.

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Bye, Mr Honec,’ she said cheerfully, and then she strode away.

After a few seconds, I called out to her. ‘Henia, did you lend Anna money?’

She hesitated, then rushed on.

‘You have to tell me!’ I shouted.

She stopped, unsure what to do. Trudging back to me, as though punished, she took off her aviator’s hat. Her face was solemn. ‘How did you know?’ she asked.

‘I’m beginning to understand more about what you children are going through.’

She bit her lip. ‘I gave her twenty złoty. But you can’t tell anyone!’

‘I understand. An abortion is…’

‘No, you don’t understand, Mr Honec! I didn’t care whether she had an abortion or not. I did something unforgivable, something that…’

‘You stole money from your parents,’ I cut in – to relieve her of the need to speak her crime aloud.

‘No, from my younger brother,’ she whispered, and her eyes moistened. She rubbed the tears away roughly, as if she didn’t deserve them. ‘God forgive me, I took two ten-złoty notes out of his wallet. He’d been saving them for months. Mr Honec, he’d even ironed them to make them perfect. He cried for days when they went missing. And my parents were furious with him.’ Henia shook her head at her own treachery.

‘Anna was desperate,’ I told her. ‘You helped her. You were a good friend.’

‘But I betrayed my brother – badly.’

I gazed into the distance, at the brick wall blocking off Próżna Street, trying to read what to say to Henia in our landscape of confinement. ‘On this island, even a mitzvah can cause harm,’ I told her. ‘Though I wish none of us had to learn that.’

‘Making my brother feel hopeless wasn’t a mitzvah !’ she declared, unwilling to be prised free of the moral trap she’d stumbled into. ‘And I couldn’t ever face my parents or brother again if they found out what I’ve done. Never! So you can’t say anything!’

‘I won’t say a word. I promise.’

Henia put her hat back on. ‘Mr Honec, do you… do you have any idea why the Nazis killed Anna?’ At that moment, she seemed a small girl imprisoned high up in the tower of her best friend’s death.

‘No, not yet,’ I replied.

‘Then I want you to do me a favour. If you find out, don’t tell me – at least, not until we get out of here.’

‘But why?’

‘Because I’d kill myself if I was in any way responsible.’

‘Don’t say that!’ I pleaded.

‘But it’s true.’ She fixed me with a hard look. ‘And my death would only make things harder for my parents and my brother.’

Anna had needed to talk to Paweł because she was pregnant – and possibly for him to contribute to the cost of her abortion. Had Mrs Sawicki found out about the girl’s condition? Maybe Anna had demanded that Paweł marry her, and his mother had murdered her to safeguard his independence.

Or maybe Mikael had performed an abortion on her – one that ended tragically. Terrified of being held responsible, he’d discarded her in the barbed wire, so that we’d assume the Nazis were responsible. But to do so, he’d have had to obtain permission from the Germans to cross over to the Christian side, and they would have surely discovered he had a girl’s body with him. It seemed highly unlikely. And in any case, neither of these scenarios could explain why Mikael, Mrs Sawicki or anyone else would want Anna’s hand.

I headed off to Mikael’s office to speak again to Anka, his nurse, and to see if he’d already secured Stefa’s anti-typhus serum.

At first, Anka spoke to me brusquely, insisting she had nothing more to say to me, but by telling her about Adam and his connection to Anna, I managed to draw her out to the stairwell, where we could talk alone.

‘You don’t approve of abortions,’ I whispered to her as soon as we were hidden.

‘So you found out.’

‘As you wanted me to.’

She crossed her arms as though to defend herself and said, ‘Let’s get one thing straight – I do approve of abortions. These starving girls can’t bring a baby into this goddamned mess! But one girl died after her operation.’

‘And you were there when that happened?’

‘No, Dr Tengmann performs the procedures in the evening. But this girl, Esther… After going home, she went to bed, saying she was feeling a cold coming on, but in the morning her parents found her soaked in her own blood, unconscious. It was too late to save her. Maybe we’d never have found out, but her father came here asking questions. He’d known his daughter was pregnant, though he wasn’t sure she’d come here. He caught us off guard. Dr Tengmann admitted that he’d seen her, but he denied having given her an abortion. That was very wrong!’ At the thud of a door closing somewhere in the building, Anka flinched. When she spoke again, it was in a whisper. ‘I can’t forgive him for lying. And I can’t trust him any more. I’ve tried, but I can’t.’

‘If you didn’t help with the operation, how can you be so sure of all this?’ I asked.

‘I know a nurse who assists Dr Tengmann at night.’

‘Then she can tell me if Anna also got an abortion!’

‘I’ve already asked her. She never met any girl with that name.’

‘Anka, I’d like to talk to her myself. Can you give me her name and address?’

‘No, I’m sorry – she wants to keep her identity a secret.’

‘Then would you be willing to show her my photograph of Anna?’

‘Of course.’

I handed her the picture.

‘I’ll send you a message with what I find out,’ she assured me.

‘Listen, was anything… a hand, a leg… taken from Esther?’

‘Her father didn’t mention anything like that. God, I hope not!’

‘Can you give me his name and address?’

‘If you want. But I need my job here – you’ll have to be discreet.’