Perfectly Ordinary People(20)

Oh, I see. That information came from the local police mostly. The SS had taken all the important jobs in the town hall and the police force almost immediately. So they had access to all the lists.

And the French held those sorts of lists? Of who was communist? Who was gay?

Apparently so. It was a bit of a surprise. None of us realised they’d been keeping all this information, but they had. Sometimes there were no actual lists, but even then it wasn’t that difficult to piece one together. The local police knew pretty much everyone’s business in those days and some of the more zealous ones were only too happy to help out. A lot of personal vendettas were dealt with that way too. People informed on their neighbours, sometimes even family members, telling the Germans that they were this or that or the other and, most of the time, by morning they’d be gone. Sometimes people even made stuff up, just because they were jealous, so that they could have someone’s house or their clothes or their horse or whatever. So in a way, even if you weren’t in one of the specific groups the Nazis were targeting, you still felt scared all the time. You never knew when they’d come for you.

But you were still working for the Schumachers. How was that going?

It was awful. I hated them. I hated them for being German and I hated them for having replaced the Rosenbergs. The Rosenbergs had been like family to me.

And how did the Schumachers treat you?

Like a slave. They just barked orders at me all day. It was horrible.

I suppose leaving wasn’t an option?

No. There were no jobs. Food was scarce. Everyone was broke and desperate and hungry. Many women turned to prostitution just to stay alive.

Servicing the Germans?

Yes, they were the only ones who could pay. They had money and bread; they had meat and butter. I don’t know what the going rate was, but I definitely knew of girls who had sex for cigarettes, for example.

For cigarettes?

Yes. You could trade cigarettes for anything, so people would have sex in exchange for cigarettes. So working in the bakery, even a horrible German-run bakery, was a godsend. I was never hungry, and I used to be able to sneak out bread rolls for my family and for Pierre’s family, and for Leah, too.

You knew where Leah was hiding, then?

Yes. She was in a cellar with her husband and newborn baby. It was down by the boathouse where our club had been based. So I’d sneak down there with a roll in my pocket. She was dreadfully skinny and was breastfeeding, so I was worried about her.

Wasn’t that dangerous? For you, I mean?

Everything was dangerous. And in a way, when everything is dangerous, you have no choice but to get used to it. But ultimately I lost my job because of it.

That was the worst day ever. So much happened, I’m not sure where to begin. But Mr Schumacher caught me stealing and sacked me – that was the start of it. I was scared the Schumachers would tell the SS that I’d stolen and I’d be arrested as a criminal so I went straight away to tell Leah that I wasn’t going to be able to bring her bread anymore. But when I got there she was in a panic, about to leave to go to the police station. Ezrah, her husband, had gone missing, and she was heading out to try to find him. She said, ‘Thank God you’re here. I’ll come by your house when I’ve found him,’ and she thrust baby Menashe into my arms and ran off down the street. I was pretty shocked. She was supposed to be in hiding, and there she was running off in broad daylight. Plus I had no idea what to do with a baby. He was only about a month old.

I went upstairs to ask the family who’d been letting Leah hide there if they could look after the baby, but no one was home. Menashe started to cry and so, thinking my mum would know what to do, I took him back to our house.

When I got there, I was greeted by the sound of weeping – it was so loud I could hear it through the front door. Inside, I found my mother wailing in the lounge. Pierre was there too, which was unusual, a look of panic in his eyes.

The local police had taken Dad away for questioning, they explained. Then Pierre looked me straight in the eye and said, his voice really flat, but somehow full of meaning because of it, ‘They’ve, um, arrested Johann, as well.’

I explained about Leah thrusting the baby on me, and my mother shouted at me for bringing him to the house. It was dangerous, she said, and we had enough problems already.

Eventually Pierre headed off to see what he could find out from his policeman friend Matias, who was, you know . . . one of our group.

You mean he was gay?

Yes. No one in the police force knew that, of course, but yes. He was one of Pierre’s conquests, I suspect. So Pierre went off to see if he knew, or could do, anything.

I asked my mother how I could help and she said, ‘Get that screaming baby out of here before the Germans come back and take us all!’ So I scooped him up again and went off to try to find either Leah, or news of Leah, or even just some baby milk to feed him with.

He cried all the way to town – he literally didn’t stop – so I was terrified that he was making me conspicuous. We always tried to be invisible back then, to slip into the shadows, to be plain and boring and discreet. But the German soldiers all just smiled at me as if it was funny, and I realised that in a way the baby, by taking the attention away from me, made me even more invisible than usual.

By the time I got back home, Mum had calmed down a bit. She helped me make a teat out of a rubber glove, and we fed the baby cow’s milk, and thank God, he finally shut up.