The Tattooist of Auschwitz(9)

‘I am a survivor.’

‘Well, then maybe I can help you survive in here.’

‘You have friends in high places?’

Pepan laughs and slaps Lale on the back. ‘No. No friends in high places. Like I told you, I am the T?towierer. And I have been told the number of people coming here will be increasing very soon.’

They sit with the thought for a moment. What lodges in Lale’s mind is that, somewhere, someone is making decisions, plucking numbers from – where? How do you decide who comes here? What information do you base those decisions on? Race, religion, or politics?

‘You intrigue me, Lale. I was drawn to you. You had a strength that even your sick body couldn’t hide. It brought you to this point, sitting in front of me today.’

Lale hears the words but struggles with what Pepan is saying. They sit in a place where people are dying every day, every hour, every minute.

‘Would you like a job working with me?’ Pepan brings Lale back from the bleakness. ‘Or are you happy doing whatever they have you doing?’

‘I do what I can to survive.’

‘Then take my job offer.’

‘You want me to tattoo other men?’

‘Someone has to do it.’

‘I don’t think I could do that. Scar someone, hurt some-one – it does hurt, you know.’

Pepan pulls back his sleeve to reveal his own number. ‘It hurts like hell. If you don’t take the job, someone with less soul than you will, and hurt these people more.’

‘Working for the kapo is not the same as defiling hundreds of innocent people.’

A long silence follows. Lale again enters his dark place. Do those making the decisions have a family, a wife, children, parents? They can’t possibly.

‘You can tell yourself that, but you are still a Nazi puppet. Whether it is with me or the kapo, or building blocks, you are still doing their dirty work.’

‘You have a way of putting things.’

‘So?’

‘Then, yes. If you can arrange it, I will work for you.’

‘Not for me. With me. But you must work quickly and efficiently and not make trouble with the SS.’

‘OK.’

Pepan stands, goes to walk away. Lale grabs at his shirtsleeve.

‘Pepan, why have you chosen me?’

‘I saw a half-starved young man risk his life to save you. I figure you must be someone worth saving. I’ll come for you tomorrow morning. Get some rest now.’

?

That night as his block-mates return, Lale notices that Aron is missing. He asks the two others sharing his bed what has happened to him, how long he’s been gone.

‘About a week,’ comes the reply.

Lale’s stomach drops.

‘The kapo couldn’t find you,’ the man says. ‘Aron could have told him you were ill, but he feared the kapo would add you to the death cart again if he knew, so he said you were already gone.’

‘And the kapo discovered the truth?’

‘No,’ yawns the man, exhausted from work. ‘But the kapo was so pissed off he took Aron anyway.’

Lale struggles to contain his tears.

The second bunkmate rolls onto his elbow. ‘You put big ideas into his head. He wanted to save “the one”.’

‘To save one is to save the world.’ Lale completes the phrase.

The men sink into silence for a while. Lale looks at the ceiling, blinks away tears. Aron is not the first person to die here and will not be the last.

‘Thank you,’ he says.

‘We tried to continue what Aron started, to see if we could save the one.’

‘We took turns,’ a young boy says from below, ‘smuggling water and sharing our bread with you, forcing it down your throat.’

Another picks up the story. He rises from the bunk below, haggard, with cloudy blue eyes, his voice flat, but still full of the need to tell his part of the story. ‘We changed your soiled clothes. We swapped them with someone who had died overnight.’

Lale is now unable to stop the tears that roll down his emaciated cheeks.

‘I can’t …’

He can’t do anything but be appreciative. He knows he has a debt he cannot repay, not now, not here, realistically not ever.

He falls asleep to the soulful sound of Hebrew chants from those who still cling to faith.

?

The next morning Lale is in the queue for breakfast when Pepan appears by his side, takes his arm quietly and steers him away towards the main compound. There the trucks unload their human cargo. He feels as though he has wandered into a scene from a tragic play. Some of the actors are the same, most are new, their lines unwritten, their role not yet determined. His life experience has not equipped him to understand what is happening. He has a memory of being here before. Yes, not as an observer, but a participant. What will my role be now? He closes his eyes and imagines he is facing another version of himself, looking at the left arm. It is unnumbered. Opening his eyes again, he looks down at the tattoo on his real left arm, then back to the scene in front of him.

He takes in the hundreds of new prisoners who are gath-ered there. Boys, young men, terror etched on each of their faces. Holding on to each other. Hugging themselves. SS and dogs shepherd them like lambs to the slaughter. They obey. Whether they live or die this day is about to be decided. Lale stops following Pepan and stands frozen. Pepan doubles back and guides him to some small tables with tattooing equipment on them. Those passing selection are moved into a line in front of their table. They will be marked. Other new arrivals – the old, infirm, no skills identified – are walking dead.