Once We Were Brothers (34 page)

“Do you have a camera I can borrow?” he said. “I think we have some visitors outside.”

With Catherine’s digital camera in his hand, Liam walked boldly out of the front door, down the steps, directly to the Camry and tapped on the window. The driver, a stocky man with a buzz cut and a barbed wire tattoo on his neck lowered his window.

“What do you want?”

Liam leaned on the driver’s door. “Are you guys waiting for an invitation to dinner? Because if you are, I regret to inform you that the turkey’s all gone.”

“Very funny, asshole. Get lost.”

“What are you doing out here?”

“Listening to the radio. Is there a law against sitting in my car.”

Liam snapped a picture of the driver and the passenger. “Smile,” he said. Then he stepped back and took a picture of the side of the Camry, the back and the license plate before returning to the driver.

“Tell Rosenzweig that you and this piece-of-shit car have been made. If anyone has an accident, or is bothered in any way, these pictures go straight to the State’s Attorney.”

“You don’t scare me, tough guy.”

“Feeling’s mutual,” Liam said. “Tell your boss to let you use his limo next time. It’s the least he could do for a couple of fine gentlemen like yourselves.” He turned and walked back in to the house as the car pulled away.

“What were they doing?” Catherine said.

Liam shook his head. “I don’t know. Ben said he’s seen them before. The building super, Stefan Dubrovnik, gave me a description of a man with a tattoo – matches the driver. I think it’s time to revisit Mr. Dubrovnik.”

“Why are they watching my house?” Catherine said.

“I don’t know. Ben’s here, you’re here. Keep your eyes open. If you see the car again, call me. We’ve blown their cover, so they may not be back.”

“I’m scared, Liam. For myself and for Ben. Maybe you’re wrong. Maybe Rosenzweig would arrange for an accident. Maybe it’s not Rosenzweig at all, and the real Piatek would try something.”

“Do you want me stay here tonight?”

Catherine nodded. “The guest room’s all made up, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Liam started to return to the living room but suddenly stopped, held Catherine by the arm and said, “They didn’t deny it.”

“What?”

“They didn’t deny Rosenzweig had sent them. When I said, ‘Tell Rosenzweig that you’ve been made,’ they didn’t say, ‘Who’s Rosenzweig?’ or anything like that. They didn’t deny they were watching your house. All they said was, ‘You don’t scare me.’ If we can tie the driver to Rosenzweig, Dubrovnik can put him in Ben’s apartment.”

“It’s him, isn’t it Liam? Piatek. He’s out there. And it’s really Rosenzweig.”

Chapter Thirty-five

“I’m still stuffed from Thursday’s dinner,” Ben said, sitting in Catherine’s winged chair and waving off a breakfast pastry. “You’re a wonderful cook.”

“Thank you. I don’t cook often but I enjoy it.” Catherine picked up her yellow pad and reviewed the previous session’s notes. “I think you had just signed on as a caretaker and courier for the good Father Janofski,” she said. “Tell me about your time in the church.”

Krasnik, Poland 1942

“Father Janofski had a radio in the cellar. A wire, used as an antenna, stretched from the top of the church steeple, down the back of the church and through a hole in the transept wall. It was powerful enough to pick up the Allied stations and with that radio, we kept up with the progress of the war. I didn’t know it at the time, but the radio was also a source for coded messages. At certain times Father Janofski would exclude my father and me from the basement to receive these messages. We were never privy to the code or the information.

“In the fall of 1942, the tide began to turn against Hitler’s Germany. Up to that time, the German army had seemed unstoppable. Rommel’s Afrika Corps was in command of North Africa and the German Sixth Army, using Romanian, Hungarian and Italian divisions for support, was about to take Stalingrad. But Hitler’s objectives were too ambitious and he had outstretched himself.

“We listened in early November as the British under General Montgomery broke through Rommel’s lines west of Cairo at El Alamein, forcing the Germans back seven hundred miles and we listened as American and British troops under Eisenhower and Patton landed in Morocco and Algeria to begin their sweep across North Africa.

“More important for us, however, was the Russian counteroffensive at Stalingrad, which began on November 19th. Father Janofski spoke Russian and we followed the broadcasts closely. More than a million German troops were lost in Russia. The Soviet victory in Stalingrad in January 1943 turned the tide on the eastern front. The Russian army started marching west toward Poland while the British and Americans were storming across North Africa, and then to Sicily. From that point on, Hitler was doomed to fight a defensive war, but his grip on Poland and central Europe would not loosen for a long time.

“Meanwhile, our work at St. Mary’s continued. Hannah, Mother and Lucyna tirelessly sewed garments and helped out in the convent. My father meticulously processed travel documents. I maintained liaisons with the underground resistance groups, shuttling papers and bundles of clothing between St. Mary’s and the safe houses.”

Catherine interrupted. “What about you and Hannah? Tell me about the two of you.”

Ben blushed. “Well, you know, we couldn’t room together and I was limited to the briefest of encounters once or twice a day, but…there were a few times when the locked convent doors were conveniently left unlocked. The nuns, especially a couple of the younger women, were partial to Hannah and sympathetic to our situation. They’d giggle at our dilemma and find ways to promote our romance. Despite the strict rules laid down by the Mother Superior, there were nights when they would forget to bolt the courtyard door. On those prearranged occasions, Hannah and I would meet on the lawn and dance beneath the stars, then curl up in a blanket. Sometimes we’d find a bottle of wine and two glasses by the fountain.”

“And Mother Superior never caught you?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that. She never confronted me, but she gave me a look every now and then that kind of told me she knew more than she was supposed to.”

Catherine smiled and retrieved a pot of tea from the stove. She poured two cups and set them on a table before the hearth with the pastries. Ben continued.

“Spring turned to summer and summer to fall with our lives in relative balance. The women never left the grounds. My father spent most of his time in the cellar and I split my time between church maintenance during the day and my courier duties at night.

“My rendezvous point with the Polish underground was a small brick house on the eastern part of Krasnik, about a mile and a half from the church. My contacts would let me in the back door. I would deliver the forged travel documents and articles of clothing I’d carried in a backpack. They’d hand me a sealed envelope for Father Janofski.

“I learned to find my way in the dark of night. There were no street lights. There was only the moon. I came to know which streets were patrolled and which were not. Which backyard garden gates were locked and which were open. And which homes had barking watchdogs that could alert the neighborhood. It was a zig-zag journey from the church to my contact and it took more than three hours round trip.

“As for Father Janofski, I grew to respect and admire him deeply. He was an extraordinary man who lived his ideals. He risked his life for Catholics and non-Catholics alike, people outside his pastorate, acting in defiance of the most intolerant penal code ever decreed, at a time when most non-Jewish clergy shut their eyes. The nuns adored him and held him in esteem. They followed him willingly, putting their own lives on the line, too.

“He also took an interest in my salvation. By the time I arrived at St. Mary’s, religion was on the back burner for me. I hadn’t thought much about God or Judaism in any way other than the obvious – the realization that being a Jew targeted me for extinction.

“One day Father Janofski invited me to join him in the quadrangle for morning prayers. ‘It would do you good to reconnect with God,’ he said.

“‘Where is God?’ I asked. ‘Why is he letting this happen?’

“Father Janofski raised his eyebrows. ‘That would be a good question to ask Him. Seeking those answers is an exercise in faith. Morning prayers are a solid way to begin each day.’

“Above all, Father Janofski was a man of faith who saw that my soul was starving. We spent many an hour discussing religious philosophies, for he had great knowledge and drew from many religions. He didn’t try to proselytize me, he just wanted me to be a God-fearing man and I credit him for the comfort I now receive from my faith. You know, our philosophies are not so different. The Kabbalah teaches that the goal of man is to bring God into the world.

“We also followed the progress of the war. Father Janofski and I had prepared a map of Europe which we kept in the cellar by the radio, and as we listened to the broadcasts we tried to plot the positions of the armies. So, for example, when Hitler launched his last offensive thrust against Russia in July 1943, we plotted the battles and held our breath. Within two weeks, the German armies had been repelled at Kursk and by October the Russian army was at the gates of Kiev, just a few hundred miles from Poland.”

“You must have been enheartened.”

“We felt that liberation was near. I was confident that my family would survive the ordeal and that we’d return to help rebuild Zamość. We knew of the death camps, but we had no way of knowing the extent of the murders or the extermination of our people. We didn’t know, for example, that by May 1943 every last Jew in Zamość had been deported, almost all to the death camps. Even as I sit here today, it’s beyond comprehension.

“As the Allied armies closed in on Hitler, he increased his fanatical pursuit of the Final Solution, by which he planned to murder eleven million Jews, including five million in Russia, three million in Poland, a million in Romania and Yugoslavia, three quarters of a million in France and a third of a million in England. To this end, he stoked up the ovens at Auschwitz, burning 6,000 bodies a day, and at Treblinka, Sobibor and Chelmno, too.”

“You didn’t mention Belzec.”

“Belzec closed in December 1942 because it was inefficient compared to Auschwitz. The Germans were concentrating their efforts at Auschwitz and Birkenau.

“In December 1943, it was on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, the radio broadcasts told us that the Russians were nearing the Polish border. News of the advance scurried through the church and plans were made for a celebration. That night, after mass, Sister Mary Magdalena locked the church doors and brought out a tray of wine. A small glass of wine was poured for each of us. And then another. Prayers of thanksgiving were offered. Giggles and songs filled the halls.

“Father Janofski and I stood watching the sisters, Hannah, my mother and father and Lucyna all smiling and giddy. He took me aside. ‘See how happy they are, Ben. They’re rejoicing for the first time in years. There’s an expectation of freedom, but sadly, it’s premature. I don’t want to burst their bubble, but this war is far from over.

“‘We’ve all taken refuge in this house of God,’ he said, ‘but there’s a false sense of security here. My Christian brothers are being expelled or killed throughout Poland. Half of the Catholic priests in Chelmno have been murdered, a third have been killed in Lodz and Poznan. Of the thirty churches and forty-seven chapels that existed in Poznan, only two churches remain. We live on borrowed time here in Krasnik.’

“‘But the Russians are on our doorstep,’ I said. ‘Freedom is near.’

“‘They could be months away, Ben. The German army may be backpedaling, but it hasn’t been defeated. There is danger in a wounded animal. We must continue our efforts.’

“‘The Polish underground is increasing its activity,’ he said, ‘and I want to assist in any way I can. We’ll continue processing our documents, but I’ve been asked to transmit information to the British underground and I’d like your help. The message I decoded yesterday told me that microfilms, pictures of German armament factories in occupied territories, will be delivered soon. They’re to be passed on to the Allies through a contact in Rzeszow. If you’re willing, you can take my car, but it’ll be dangerous.’

“I savored the opportunity to handle important missions and readily agreed. Three days later, after evening vespers, I took Father Janofski’s car, a ten-year-old two-seater with a long metal shifter in the center of the floor, and drove out on the road to Rzeszow. It putted along noisily, shaking like it had the palsy, and wouldn’t make more than thirty miles per hour. The passenger seat was filled with religious articles and my cover story was well rehearsed – I was delivering the articles to or from a church in Rzeszow, depending on which direction I was headed. Father had prepared a set of phony papers to use if I was stopped, but we all knew that if the ruse failed, the car would be readily connected to the church and an arrest would mean death for us all.

“Among the religious items was an old, leather-bound Polish bible. A hole had been cut out of the center pages, large enough to conceal a four-inch canister containing microfilms for the British. I was to deliver the book to a Rzeszow antique book store and ask for a man named Poulus. My password was, ‘The good father returns this gospel with his compliments.’