Mrs. Yost opens her mouth again, but I interrupt before she can speak. “Can I look at the admission records now?”
She looks like she wants to say something else, but instead nods once, efficiently. “A secretary will pull them for you; you can look right after dinner.”
Dinner. The mention of the evening meal makes me realize I have no other plans for the evening. Nowhere to stay, nowhere to go. Mrs. Yost has already mentioned that the camp is overcrowded.
“And then—and then after dinner could I stay here?” I ask. “Just while I figure out where to go next. If you don’t have a bed for me, I’ll sleep on the floor.”
Mrs. Yost sighs. “I’m not going to put you on the floor. Follow me. I’ll tell the person in charge of housing assignments, then find someone to get you settled.”
I pick up my bag, and she picks up her composition book, the one with the gold-embossed I.G. FARBEN. Something about the name still nags at me.
“What’s that?” I ask. “The name on your notebook?”
She glances down. “Before this site was a camp, it was a pharmaceutical factory. I’m still using some of the office supplies they left until our own shipments arrive.”
“I’ve heard of I.G. Farben, and I’m trying to figure out why.”
“Zyklon B,” she says finally. “I.G. Farben made Zyklon B.”
So that’s where I heard the name. Sometimes, in Birkenau, before they found out I could sew, I would be assigned to unload supply trucks. The yellow containers of Zyklon B had small logos at the bottom identifying the maker, I.G. FARBEN.
Zyklon B was a pesticide. It came in pellets that dissolved into gas. I heard it was originally designed to kill rodents. In Birkenau, I unloaded these canisters, and then guards would take them to the buildings they called the showers. There they would pack hundreds of people inside and use the Zyklon B, and it worked on people, too.
I’VE LOST ALL SENSE OF TIME AS MRS. YOST LEADS ME OUT OF HER office. It’s hard for Foehrenwald to feel real, for any of this to feel real. I half expect that if I blink, I’ll wake up back in my family’s apartment, still sleeping next to Dima, or back in the hospital, still in the ward of broken girls. But I’m not; I’m hundreds of kilometers from home. The doctors said I wasn’t well enough to even leave the hospital on my own, but I’ve managed to get all the way here by myself. My devastation over Abek’s not being here is colored by a small bit of pride.
The sun is low in the sky as we step out the back door. It opens onto a dusty courtyard of sorts, between the administration buildings. A few wooden benches line the perimeter, and behind them are the green sprigs of an herb garden, the smell of dill and parsley. Behind those, through an open set of double doors, I can see round tables in a building that must be the cafeteria. Michigan Street, the road I walked in on, is now filling with people, presumably coming from the fields I passed. Not just the dozen or so I saw tilling the land, but many, carrying hoes and shovels, gathering around the courtyard while talking and laughing. Other groups, not in farming clothes, are approaching from different streets.
“Mrs. Yost?” As soon as we exit the building, a man in a checked shirt appears, picking his way across the dusty courtyard and extending his hand. “I’m from Feldafing.”
“Of course you are.” Mrs. Yost turns to me. “Zofia. My apologies. I’ll find someone else to show you to your bungalow.”
She scans the crowd. “Mr. Mueller,” she calls, gesturing toward a lone figure sitting on one of the benches.
The man who looks up is lean and angled. Suspenders hold up pants that hang low on his hips; a cigarette dangles from the corner of his mouth. He’s working with something in his hands, using a sharp metal tool to bore holes into a leather strap. A horse’s bridle, I think. He sets it down when Mrs. Yost beckons him. “Could you come and carry Miss Lederman’s bag to Breine and Esther’s cottage?” she asks.
From a distance, I’d thought Mr. Mueller was much older, but as he approaches, I can see he’s actually just a few years older than me: dark curly hair, gray eyes, a lean sinew to his body. He takes