Men of Snow (32 page)

‘If that’s what they’re saying.’

‘No,’ Leon repeated.

‘You should go.’

‘It’s....it’s a trick. They’re going to kill us.’

‘I don’t think so. This sounds different.’

Adam grabbed him by the shoulder and with difficulty stood up.

‘It’s a trick,’ Leon tried again.

Adam told him to get up.

Leon did not move as he said, ‘You’re supposed to be a friend. Do you want me shot?’

‘Come on you stupid bastard, get up. This is a chance. It sounds like a chance. You have to go.’

The Poles continued, their stringent voices becoming louder, becoming more agitated as the white hooded figures stood back from the train.

‘They’re looking for Poles who...who were in the Polish army.’

‘That’s you,’ Adam insisted.

‘It...it doesn’t make sense.’

‘What are they wanting you lot for? Why are they here? Why?’

‘I’m trying to listen.’

More of the prisoners were pushing their way to the edge of the wagon as one of the guards started shouting his own orders.

‘You’d better get a move on,’ Adam said.

‘I’m going nowhere.’

‘This might be a chance. Where this train is going there is no such thing.’

‘No,’ Leon muttered.

‘Just listen to what they’re saying.’

‘I am. I am. They’re.....they’re saying....that....that the Germans have invaded Russia.’

‘The Krauts,’ Adam muttered.

‘And that because of this....this act of treachery the Poles are now....now Russia’s allies. Stalin has promised.’

‘What’s old Joe promised?’

‘That all Poles should be freed.’

‘Jesus Christ!’

‘Poles should be freed. Any Poles here on the train are to be....be transported south to the nearest town where they will then have....have to make their own way to the nearest recruiting station, the nearest recruiting station for the new Polish army that will be fighting on the side of Russia and America and England. That’s what is being said. ‘

Adam bent down to him, ‘So you must go.’

‘They’re going to kill us,’ was Leon’s exhausted answer.

‘You have to go.’

‘I can’t. I’m....I’m too tired....too tired and too hungry. I’ll never make it.’

‘Come on,’ Adam said strongly as he jerked Leon up onto his knees, the frost and ice breaking off his clothes and boots.

‘There’s nothing out there,’ Leon groaned, unable to resist as Adam started dragging him towards the open doors.

Leon was so numbed off he felt nothing except the pain in his legs and the sensation that his bones were going to snap.

Adam was croaking with the effort as he tried to push through the group of prisoners near the door.

‘Tell them you’re Polish. Tell them you understand what they’re saying. That’s the only way they can tell. That’s who they’re looking for.’

‘No,’ Leon moaned.

‘Talk to them.’

‘Leave me alone.’

Suddenly he had been pulled into the light, holding up his hand to try and shelter his eyes. Again his vision exploded in a dancing brightness from a low creamy sun shining across the flat distance.

Not far away there were three trucks that had wood fires burning under their engines and a few huts half buried under snow.

‘Are you Poles?’ one of the men asked.

‘Tell them,’ Adam insisted.

‘No.’

‘Tell them.’

‘We want Poles, just Poles. Do you understand what I’m saying? What is your name, your name?’

As Leon was about to turn away Adam pushed him out of the wagon. The guards were shouting at the other prisoners to get back from the doors.

‘He’s a Pole. He is. He’s a Pole,’ Adam kept repeating.

Momentarily Leon looked up, squinting to see where Adam had gone.

‘He is as well! He is as well!’ he cried out as loud as he could before one of the Poles pulled him to his feet.

At the start of the journey Adam had told him that he had to change his name.

‘Yours is too Jewish. It won’t do. We’ll have to think you up a new name.’

‘Pol Waneski, that should do. Met somebody with that name once, God knows where. Sounds Polish enough, that’s the name for you, Pol Waneski.’

Now he was desperately trying to remember what they had agreed on as the Pole started asking him quick, confusing questions.

Along the train came other Polish voices and the shouts of the guards as the engine blew out steam, huge clouds of it spreading over everybody.

Again more questions came. Leon could feel the edge of the sun’s warmth against the freezing air. As he remembered what name he was supposed to say he glanced at darkening snow clouds on the far horizon.

Then suddenly came the sound of the doors being closed further up the train. Leon turned and started shouting for Adam, the panic in his voice blasted by more steam as the wheels started and then stopped again, creaking over the iced up rails.

With a lunge at the doors he stumbled forwards onto the snow, his body unable to follow what he needed it to do. 

‘He’s another Pole,’ he was muttering, ‘Another Pole. You....you can’t leave him. Listen to me,’ came muffled words smothered in the snow,’ He’s a Pole. You have to get....get him out of there. You have to get him out of there. You can’t leave him. You can’t.’

But the train was moving again, the guards scrambling into their carriage as it skidded forward, the whole thing grinding and creaking against the rails, more steam blasted into the darkening air.

‘You come with us.’

Leon looked up at the end of the last carriage and then to the side at some of the men being lead over to the waiting trucks.

‘You come with us.’

The shape of the slowly disappearing train was like something being pushed through him. He could hardly breathe.

Again he was pulled to his feet and turned round.

‘Get moving,’ he was told.

‘There...there....’ he tried.

‘Now, you get moving now.’

MEN OF SNOW

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PART FIVE

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CHAPTER 14

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‘I am grateful for all your kind messages and gifts. You have all been very generous. I would also like to thank you all for coming on such a miserable night.’

Franz paused and looked across the huge function room with its maroon coloured walls and carpet and the people sitting around their tables covered in the debris of a finished dinner.

‘Retirement is necessary or so I am told,’ was his attempt at humour as he glanced up at the line of chandeliers running down the centre of the ceiling, ‘And yet I see it as a time full of promise. Of course I will be sad to leave all my colleagues, but I am confident of the future for this company. It has shown remarkable progress over the last years, something that you all should be proud of. I know I am leaving it in the strongest shape. Like Germany itself things have come together. The company is successful and I am sure it will continue to be so. You know what respect I have for you all as people and as colleagues. You are the reason this company will have a very bright future. Thank you again for everything.’

He stood accepting the applause. He had been preparing himself for these moments for a long time.

‘Come, join us,’ Victor was shouting over the clapping.

Franz smiled, bowed again to all his colleagues before coming off the band stand.

Everybody was being asked to move into the bar so that the tables and chairs could be removed and the band could set up its equipment for the after dinner dance.

‘You always keep it short and sweet,’ said Clara, the wife of Michael one of the other directors, who was dressed in a black dress with her hair brushed up and huge earrings dangling.

‘They know how I feel,’ Franz answered.

Two photographers came forward and the group stopped, turned and smiled.

‘Just the local press,’ Victor told him.

‘I never thought that....’

‘Of course, the people of Hamburg are interested. The company is becoming a large employer.’

Franz blinked at the flashes, momentarily losing his composure.

‘Do you think they could stop now?’ he said a little too strongly.

Bronia laughed, ‘You should enjoy the publicity Franz.’

‘And the company,’ Victor, the other director, added.

For Franz there was the expected hollowness. He understood that tonight was already part of the past. The guests, workers of the sportswear company, were only here as a gesture. Tomorrow there would be no difference. Nothing would change in the office and the factory. They were saying goodbye to somebody who had really already left.

‘Are you sure you won’t try a drink?’ Michael asked knowing that Franz would refuse.

‘Surely, just to join us,’ Bronia tried, there with her deep red dress and lipstick and nail varnish.

‘Healthy to the last,’ was Victor’s comment.

‘No drinking, no smoking,’ Clara slurred.

‘And we’ll add no marriage but that doesn’t mean no sex.’

Franz tried to smile at Michael’s comment.

Others came up to wish him well. Because it was Franz it was all rather formal. Some of them had worked with for him for over thirty years and were still unsure how to respond to him. He had always been polite, restrained and private to the extent that people knew little about the rest of his life outside company hours except that he enjoyed keeping fit and took walking holidays in the Alps.

‘Surprise us Franz, just this once,’ said Bronia, still trying to provoke him.

He wanted it over with. He had asked for something low key but both Michael and Victor had rejected the idea.

‘Not at all, come on Franz. This is your retirement. It only happens once. The company demands a good night,’ Michael had told him, ‘not just for you, but for everybody who wants to celebrate your time with the company.’

Now he was feeling the strain, the edginess. He hardly recognised anybody in the crowd around him. They were here because that is what you did, what the company expected. They were getting drunk and loud and it was beginning to bother him.

‘So, how do you feel?’ was Michael’s question.

Franz wanted to tell him he felt bored and empty but he resisted, ‘Relieved I suppose.’

‘You’ll be fine.’

‘I think so.’

‘Of course you will so long as you promise to come to our annual dinners, to keep up with everybody.’

He made no response only tried to appear in agreement with his vague smile, wishing now for the evening to end so he could get away from the noise and the stench of cigarette smoke.

‘Thirty two years,’ Clara announced as she grabbed his arm, ‘My God how did you manage it?’

‘I never thought of it as managing,’ was his answer, ‘It never felt like that.’

Finally as the band started up and everybody moved back into the main reception room he told them he was leaving.

After resistance and complaint, which he knew was purely a required gesture, they let him go, except for Michael, who came with him to the hotel’s front door where a line of taxis were waiting.