The Tattooist of Auschwitz (The Tattooist of Auschwitz #1) - Heather Morris Page 0,62

commotion. It takes a few moments for the noises to penetrate his groggy brain. Memories of the night the Romani were taken flood back. What is this new horror? The sound of rifle shots jolts him fully awake. Putting on his shoes and wrapping a blanket around his shoulders, he cautiously goes outside. Thousands of women prisoners are being corralled into rows. There is obvious confusion, as if neither guards nor prisoners know quite what is expected. The SS pay Lale no attention as he walks quickly up and down the rows of women who bunch together from the cold and in fear of what is to come. Snow continues to fall. Running is impossible. Lale watches as a dog snaps at the legs of one of the women and brings her to the ground. A friend reaches down to help her to her feet, but the SS officer holding the dog draws his pistol and shoots the fallen woman.

Lale hurries on, looking down the rows, searching, desperate. Finally he sees her. Gita and her friends are being pushed towards the main gates, clinging to each other, but he can’t see Cilka among them, or anywhere in the sea of faces. He focuses back on Gita. She has her head down, and Lale can tell by the movement of her shoulders that she is sobbing. At last she is crying, but I can’t comfort her. Dana spots him. She pulls Gita towards the outside of their row and points Lale out to her. Gita finally looks up and sees him. Their eyes meet, hers wet, pleading, his full of sorrow. Focused on Gita, Lale doesn’t see the SS officer. He is unable to move out the way of the rifle that swings at him, connecting with his face and sending him to his knees. Gita and Dana both scream and try to force their way back through the column of women. To no avail. They are swept up in the tide of moving bodies. Lale struggles to his feet, blood streaming down his face from a large gash above his right eye. Frantic now, he plunges into the moving crowd, searching each row of distraught women. As he gets near the gates he sees her again – within arm’s length. A guard steps in front of him and pushes the muzzle of his rifle into Lale’s chest.

‘Gita!’ he screams.

Lale’s world is spinning. He looks up at the sky, which seems only to be getting darker as the morning breaks. Above the noise of screaming guards and barking dogs he hears her.

‘Furman. My name is Gita Furman!’

Sinking to his knees in front of the unmoving guard, he shouts, ‘I love you.’

Nothing comes back. Lale remains on his knees. The guard moves away. The cries of the women have stopped. The dogs cease barking.

The gates of Birkenau are shut.

Lale kneels in the snow, which continues to fall heavily. Blood from the wound in his forehead covers his face. He’s locked in, alone. He’s failed. An officer comes over to him. ‘You’ll freeze to death. Come on, go back to your block.’

He reaches a hand down and pulls Lale to his feet. An act of kindness from the enemy at the eleventh hour.

•

Cannon fire and explosions wake Lale the next morning. He rushes outside with the Hungarians to be greeted by panicked SS, and a chaos of prisoners and captors on the move, seemingly oblivious to each other.

The main gates are wide open.

Hundreds of prisoners walk through, unchallenged. Dazed, weak from malnourishment, some stumble around and then choose to return to their block to escape the cold. Lale walks out the gates he has been through hundreds of times before on the way to Auschwitz. A train is standing nearby, belching smoke into the sky, ready to leave. Guards and dogs begin rounding up men and pushing them towards the train. Lale gets caught up in the scrum and finds himself scrambling on board. The gates of his wagon are slammed closed. He pushes his way to the side and peers out. Hundreds of prisoners still wander around aimlessly. As the train pulls away, he sees SS open fire on those who remain.

He stands, staring through the slats of the wagon, through the snow falling heavily, mercilessly, as Birkenau disappears.

Chapter 25

Gita and her friends are on the march with thousands of other women from Birkenau and Auschwitz, trudging along a narrow track through ankle-deep snow. As carefully as they can, Gita and