Mila 18 - Leon Uris

“Careful, and bring back water.”

Tolek and Wolf once again dislodged the manhole cover and shoved it back into place.

Wolf lowered himself once more and went back to the other sixteen.

“We are three hours from Prosta Street. We can make it by daylight if everyone tries with all they have. Tolek has gone out for water. He will be waiting for us.”

“No! No!” a girl shrieked. “We’ll never make it! No!”

“Keep her quiet,” Wolf barked.

“No!” the girl screamed again. She began drinking the sewage in her thirst madness.

Wolf went back and lit a match and fished for her head and jerked it out of the contaminated bilge. The girl was insane. In a moment the poison hit her stomach and she gave a last two or three writhes of agony and was dead.

Wolf let her loose, and she was washed into the merging waters, spun in a whirlpool, and swept into the larger Kanal.

“Listen, all of you! We’re going to live! I promise you we’ll live! Two more hours and there will be water to drink! Fight! Live!” he pleaded.

They took hands and pressed north into the whirlpools. The rushing water broke their line, and before they could pull it together another Fighter who was moving in a coma was swept under and drowned.

“Together!” rasped Wolf. “Hands together ... push ... push ... we’ll be through this intersection in a minute.”

They pressed north again in foggy oblivion. Each agony-filled step, each one called upon God unknown.

“I’ll live ... I’ll live ... I’ll live ...”

“Survive ... survive ... survive ...”

“God help me live ... live ... live ... live ...”

Chapter Twenty-three

TOLEK ALTERMAN WOVE HIS way through the streets of Warsaw with the skill of an alley cat. Years of moving around in the ghetto, later in rubble and flame and falling walls, made this trek seem like child’s play by comparison.

It was four-thirty in the morning when he stopped before an apartment door on the top floor of Dluga 4. The name read “Alena Borinski.” He knocked sharply. The door opened a crack, stopped by the night latch.

“Who is it?” Gabriela asked cautiously from the other side.

“Don’t scream when you see me. I've been in the sewers.”

Gabriela flung the door open. Tolek tumbled in and looked around desperately for the kitchen. He stumbled to it and turned on the water faucet and let the water spill into his throat and guzzled it like a lunatic. She locked the door behind her and looked at the scene of madness. He emitted animal-like grunts as the water found its way to his caked innards.

A gray stinking creature from another planet, unrecognizable as human, sucking at the faucet. He drank too fast and began vomiting in the sink and drank again, and sharp pains hit his belly. At last he was appeased and he slipped to the floor, weeping hysterically.

Gabriela ran to the phone. “Kamek! Come to my flat as soon as the curfew is over. Bring clothing and any food you have.”

“Have they arrived?”

“Yes.”

Gaby dipped a rag in alcohol and wiped Tolek’s forehead and comforted him.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry ...”

“Please tell me about it ... please.”

“Twenty-two or twenty-three of us went into the sewer ... Did you get our signal?”

“Yes, but we couldn’t distinguish it. Good Lord, have you been in the sewer for twenty-four hours?”

“Yes. Maybe sixteen, seventeen left. Few went crazy from thirst ... drank the sewage ... told them not to ... some others drowned.”

“Where are they now?”

“Trying to make Prosta Street. We’ve got to get water to them.”

“There’s nothing we can do for another hour and a half, until it turns light and the curfew is lifted. Kamek will be here by then.”

Gabriela studied the thing before her. “Your voice. Don’t I know you?”

“Tolek.”

“Oh, my poor dear. I didn’t even recognize you.”

“Don’t suppose anyone could.”

“Who else is down there?”

“Christopher de Monti. We must get him out.”

She nodded and her eyes widened. “Who else?”

“Rachael ... Wolf ... Ana ...”

He stopped, and the pained expression she bore both asked the wordless question and answered it. She stood up and walked to the kitchen chair and sagged into it. She bit her lip. The last tears she had left in her trickled down her cheeks. Andrei was still out there in the ghetto ... leading cavalry charges ... Andrei would never come out. She knelt beside Tolek once more and helped him to his feet.

“Come,” Gaby said, “let’s steam you out so you look presentable.”

Gabriela filled the last of four shopping bags with bread, cheese, and bottles of water. Each bag had a rope tied to the handles so it could be lowered quickly into the Kanal.

Kamek was a picture of his usual calm. “Today is Sunday,” he recited for his own benefit. “Sunday is trouble. We cannot ride through the streets with a load of hay on Sunday. I must get a covered truck and try for the best.”

Tolek came in from the bathroom. He had been soaking and scrubbing for two full hours. It brought him back to the semblance of a man. He tucked a short crowbar into his belt for lifting the manhole cover quickly and took two of the shopping bags from Gabriela.

“I hope they made it,” Tolek mumbled. “They were in a bad way when I left them.”

Kamek stood up. “After you get that food and water down to them, wait in the café down the street. Watch for my truck.”

“Hurry with that truck,” Gabriela said. “They’ve been down there almost thirty hours.”

“Leave it to Kamek,” Kamek said.

“It’s day,” Wolf said, looking up to the manhole cover atop him. “It’s day and we’re at Prosta Street Today we’ll be saved.”

Weeping ...

“Our Father which art in heaven.”

“O Merciful God ... save us ... save us ...”

Christopher de Monti leaned against the bricks. He held Ana with one arm and Rachael with the other. Both of them were semi-conscious.

Death closed in with each passing second. There were only twelve left.

“O help us, merciful God ...”

“Today we’ll be saved,” Wolf cried. “Today we’ll be saved.”

Christopher skidded to his knees and struggled to his feet, pulling the girls up. Feverish fire tore through his body.

Shadows over them!

“Shh ... someone’s up there ... silence ...”

“Merciful ... merciful ...”

“Sshhh!”

Their eyes looked up in terror. The cover slipped off. It’s me, Tolek! It’s me, Tolek! Are you down there? Are you down there?”

“Help ... help ...”

“Tolek ... help ... us ...”

“Thank God! They’re alive. Listen, down there. We are lowering bread and water. We will remain close by until the truck arrives. Do you hear me?”

“Water ... water ...”

“Water!”

“Water!”

“Water!”

“Quiet,” Tolek commanded. The bags were lowered. “There is smelling salts in one of the bags.”

Mass weeping broke out as the bottles were opened and they gurgled and wetted their dehydrated bellies. They tore at the bread and the cheese with the savagery of starved animals and grunted and wept and prayed.

Even the calm Kamek was worrying. He was running out of chances. Two covered-truck owners had their vehicles in repair. Three others were out of the city in the countryside to bring in food from villages.

It was almost eleven o’clock.

Church bells pealed. The pious were coming and going to Mass.

Kamek walked into the Solec to the house of Zamoyski, the teamster of thieves. He did not like to do business with Zamoyski. He was a slimy crook. Kamek had no choice. From time to time on desperate occasions the People’s Guard used Zamoyski’s truck ... for a price.