Far to Go - By Alison Pick Page 0,75
he were witnessing a complicated surgery: equal parts curiosity and repulsion. Marta had taken Anneliese at her word, that she would tell Pepik what was happening—children, after all, need to know what to expect—but five days before the departure date Marta found him peering into the depths of the suitcase. “Is Mamenka leaving?” He paused. “Are you leaving?” His earlier premonition had vanished from his mind like a nightmare forgotten on waking.
Marta swept him into her arms: his wonderful weight. The buckle on his suspender dug into her side, and she shifted him on her hip, took him into the bedroom, and pulled him onto her lap in the rocking chair. Before she could second-guess herself, she said, “I’ve got a big surprise. You, miláčku, are going on a trip!”
The little smile that had appeared when she picked Pepik up began to drain from his face.
Marta forged ahead: “You’ve seen all the soldiers in the street? The bad Nazis? You get to fight them. From Scotland. You’ll march away and help protect the good guys.” Pepik’s bottom lip was trembling but she blundered on. “You’ll stay with a wonderful family named the Millings. In a beautiful house! By the ocean.” The lies spilled from her mouth now as if someone else was speaking. “They have a dog!” she heard herself say—where that had come from she had no idea whatsoever. “And a boy just your age named Arthur. So you’ll have someone to play soldiers with.”
“Another little boy?” Pepik’s face brightened. It had been so long since he’d had a playmate of any kind.
“Yes,” she said, “but.” She stopped and held up a forefinger, about to reveal a top-secret piece of intelligence. “Arthur is sick. He can’t leave his bed. So you have a very important job. You’ll be responsible for helping him get better.”
“That’s my job?”
“It’s your duty. Can you do it?”
He nodded solemnly. “I promise.”
She thought later that she should not have taken this approach. She had not meant to unnecessarily burden little Pepik. But, by the time she realized, it was too late.
Pepik was dead. Marta was sure of it.
She went into his room in the morning and opened the wooden venetian blinds; slats of sun slapped on the floor. She said his name once and then said it again, louder. She crouched down and blew softly on his forehead, which usually woke him laughing, but he didn’t stir. Finally she had to take hold of his face and almost yell directly into his ear; he opened his eyes and looked at her, confused, his cheeks flushed.
He didn’t recognize her.
She held the back of her palm to his forehead. He was burning up.
Marta assumed he must be upset about their conversation the previous night, and that if she could just take his mind off his impending departure he would be fine, but as soon as he was able to stand, which he could do only clutching her elbow, he leaned over and threw up into his slippers.
“Oh,” Marta said. “You’re a sick bunny.”
Pepik’s knees buckled and he collapsed on the bed, banging his temple against the ladder between the bunks.
He slept for the rest of the morning. It was as though hearing about bedridden Arthur had given Pepik ideas of his own. Marta spent the day in the rocking chair next to Pepik, watching him drift in and out, a loose piece of driftwood by the shore. She felt terribly responsible, as though he would not have fallen ill had she done a better job telling him about Scotland. He was soaking through nightshirts faster than she could change them. In the end she decided to leave him naked, with cold cloths on his forehead and neck and just above his tiny, circumcised penis. His sleep was punctuated with little grunts and moans. He woke around midnight and looked at her blankly and asked for a rope ladder. Marta didn’t know how to respond and said nothing, thinking he would slip back into unconsciousness, but he furrowed his forehead and repeated the request with force, adding the name Vera at the end. “My rope ladder! Vera!”
He fell back onto the pillow but the moaning got louder. Was he referring to his little cousin Vera, whom he’d not seen for ages? And a rope ladder! Where had he come up with it?
By the second day the fever showed no signs of letting up. Pavel came in to check on the two of them; he crossed the room and