Wartime lies - Louis Begley [34]
There was a unifying theme in Hertz’s repertoire of addresses. We were received by a landlady who seemed astonished that a mother and a child were seeking a room in her establishment. Having been told that there was no mistake, that this was the very house Tania had been referred to by a faithful client of hers from Lwów, the landlady, a certain Pani Jadwiga, agreed to take us on the condition that we stay no longer than a week: this was a place for transients, there were no cooking privileges, we would share the toilet with the ladies down the corridor; it would be better if Tania kept me in our room so I didn’t get into people’s way. Rent was payable for the week in advance. The room she gave us was somewhat larger than our last bedroom in Lwów, with an ampler bed, two little settees covered with red plush, some red plush straight chairs, and a dirty rug. We left our suitcases there and went to mail a letter to grandfather, asking him to meet us in the main entrance of the Cathedral; we would be there at noon every day, beginning the day after tomorrow, until he was able to come. Tania didn’t know Warsaw. It was the only suitable monument she could think of that would do equally well in good weather and in the rain.
We were very hungry, and neither of us wanted to bring food to eat in our room. Tania decided we would go to the Central Station buffet for lunch; our disoriented, out-of-town appearance would not make us conspicuous there, but first we had to buy a street map of Warsaw. We studied it over our meal, Tania saying that we had to figure out the city immediately, so that we could get around without asking directions and attracting attention. Then we walked along a route she had memorized to the Saxon Gardens and sat there for a long time on a bench in the feeble afternoon sun. A woman and a little boy spending an hour or more in the park would not seem unusual. We returned to our rooming house the long way, taking Nowy Świat to Aleje Jerożolimskie. By that time, we were so tired that the vision of the plush settees and the bed seemed cozy; we didn’t want to return to the station. There was a butcher nearby and also a bakery. Across the street from the house, we found a mleczarnia, where one could buy milk and cheese. We pushed a settee to the table, ate our bread and sausage, drank some milk, at last detached the money and jewelry packages from our bodies, and got into bed. Tania said she wasn’t going to look at the sheets; she didn’t care what they were like.
We took the street map of Warsaw to bed with us. Tania decided we had to study it during every free moment, segment by segment, until we knew it by heart, like a poem. We would quiz each other, and we were going to start right away, because one always remembers best the things one learns just before going to sleep. When we finished, Tania said that she knew I was sleepy, but there were so many problems to solve that she had to talk. She couldn’t bear to think about them in silence. Perhaps grandfather would have all the answers, but even so, we had to think through the problems first for ourselves.
To start with, what were we to do with the jewelry and the gold and all those bank notes? We couldn’t wear them glued to us all the time, it was too uncomfortable; people got stopped for document checks, and we might be searched. Getting caught with that hoard meant giving most of it away if it was the Polish police, or being taken to the Gestapo if we were caught by the Germans. On the other hand, how could we leave anything of value in this house or any other rooming house we might move to? There was also the question of how to sell the gold or jewelry once we had spent our cash. She couldn’t imagine simply walking into a jewelry shop and putting a couple of rings or a bracelet on the counter.