Enchanted, Ella took the book from her and traced her finger over the Snow Queen’s silver gown and ermine cape. She stared for a while at Kai being whisked away into the night on her sleigh pulled by two flying horses. ‘Where is she taking him?’ she asked.
Lodzia made dramatic eyes, and her expressions were such that they filled her child with awe. ‘To her snow palace in a frozen land.’
‘Where’s that?’
‘They call it Spitsbergen; it’s very close to us – near the North Pole but the Snow Queen travels all over the world with the snow.’
A shadow passed across Ella’s little face. ‘There’s a lot of snow here. Will she take me away too?’
Lodzia slapped shut the book and put it aside. ‘No, kohanie; it’s just a fairy-tale; it isn’t true.’
‘Yes it is.’
‘Now you’ve frightened her,’ Mother said. ‘You shouldn’t be filling her head with such things. Some of those fairy tales are frightening.’
‘It’s not the fairy tale, it’s this damned place. Even I can sense the oppression.’
‘She’s three and a half. She can’t sense anything.’
I could see a row brewing and put down my work. ‘It’s six-thirty; do you think the shop’s open yet?’ I said, already wiping the tar from my fingers. ‘Szefczuk said they bake at two. It won’t hurt to be first there.’ Anything was better than this horrid job.
Lodzia buttoned-up Ella’s coat, pulled her little hat over her ears and stuffed her hands into mittens.
‘You’re not taking her with you,’ Mother said. ‘Leave the child here.’
‘The fresh air will do her good, as will a change of scenery.’
Instead of jumping into the snow from the top step, Ella walked down and looked about. ‘Mama, will you make me a snowman – a big one? Please.’
‘Not now, kohanie; we need to fetch the food.’
‘Please.’ So urgent was her need, she wouldn’t stop until Lodzia promised.
‘We’ll both make one when we return; how’s that?’
Ella agreed.
To our dismay, a lengthy queue had already formed outside the shop.
The stars were bright and clouds scudded across the moon. ‘Makes you wonder whether they’ve been here all night,’ Lodzia said. Ella nagged her further about the snowman, forcing Lodzia to snap, ‘I don’t want to hear another word about this blessed snowman; do you hear me? I wish now I’d left her at home with Mama.’
We wrapped our arms around our bodies and stamped our feet to keep warm, but I was feeling optimistic; perhaps Szefczuk had got fresh supplies.
Once inside the shop, the queue snaked back and forth on itself three times, but the shelves were already empty.
‘We’re too late!’ Lodzia was livid.
‘Lodzia, is everything alright? You seem very strung up today?’
She stared back at me. ‘It’s not alright. Nothing’s alright and never will be. We’re all starving – and look at this place. Empty. Gerhard’s panicking. He said if he, Tatta and Karol don’t get some proper food soon, they won’t have the energy to meet their norms. Then where will we all be?’
We drew nearer the counter, and I could see Szefczuk slicing and weighing out the bread. He worked at a snail’s pace, careful not to give away too much as if every precious crumb had a currency. His wife was helping – a comely Ukrainian woman with rotten teeth, which she revealed when she spoke. Each of her slices was wonky, thinner on top, working down to a wedge at the bottom.
Szefczuk reprimanded her each time the scales thumped against the base. ‘Cut straight, woman!’ We heard him shout. However, I hoped we would get her slices because they were more generous than his.
The constant queuing bored Ella and she made her displeasure known, tugging at Lodzia’s coat to ensure she hadn’t forgotten her snowman.
‘Mama hasn’t forgotten,’ I reassured her, before Lodzia dragged her, protesting, to the cantina for soup, where another lengthy queue awaited us.
When we returned to the shack, Karol’s bike had disappeared and Mother was in a state.
‘Smirnov and another NKVD came to fetch it. They said they banned it because it was a means of escape. When I protested, Smirnov told me to shut up – Karol should think himself lucky they didn’t throw him in the kartser and made him do solitary confinement. They picked it up and walked off with it. It’s the one thing he treasured above all. Why couldn’t they have taken his accordion instead?’
Because you can’t pedal that thing, I thought, and almost laughed, but stopped myself.
Darkness fell and the passing hours had Lodzia and Mother wringing their hands, glancing at the clock. It was now seven at night, fifteen hours since the men had left for work.
‘I wonder if they’ve got lost,’ Lodzia said.
I too had been gazing out of the window earlier, watching the sky changing from dusk to blackness, darker to the east, and lighter to the west.
‘Dear God, Anna.’ Father stumbled through the door half an hour later followed by my brothers who were too exhausted to speak. They could only stagger to the slats and slump down.
‘Come on, get those wet clothes off,’ Mother tugged at Father’s coat, and Karol kicked off his boots. Lodzia marshalled Gerhard back to their room to change, and I hung up the wet coats and stood the boots beside the stove to dry.
Gerhard paused at the door, ‘That’s a fine snowman standing guard outside.’
‘I made him, Tatta,’ Ella boasted, ‘to look after us all.’
‘I think he’s protecting her from the Snow Queen dragging her off to her winter palace,’ Mother said.
He turned to Lodzia, ‘Who the devil’s put that frightening thought into her head?’
‘It comes to something when you can’t even read your child a fairy tale without her turning paranoid.’
It was then that Karol noticed his bicycle was missing. He stared at the wall, then at Mother and back at the space, before he turned around and scanned everywhere else.
‘Smirnov took it,’ she said. ‘He said they didn’t allow them.’
‘How dare he! I want it back.’ He got off his slats, ripped his coat off the line, and everything else fell off.
‘Sit down, son. He threatened you with the Black Hole and solitary confinement if you made a fuss. It’s not worth it. It’s only a bicycle.’
‘It was mine! He had no right.’
‘Here, eat your dinner.’ Mother set the warmed-up soup before him.
‘Where have you been working, Tatta? Was it far to walk?’
‘Ahh kohanie, they took us deep into the forest, across the Levashka River, over a shaky bridge. They piled it high with tree trunks stacked on the riverbed, and a raft-like contraption that started on one bank stretched across the logs and finished on the opposite bank. It was a bit nerve-wracking, not to mention dangerous, I can tell you.’
‘Is there anything else to eat?’ Karol set the empty plate on the table and looked at Mother.
‘I’ve nothing to give you. Didn’t you get anything at lunchtime?’
‘Huh, a horse and cart arrived with a vat of soup. It was like eating washing up water. It’s not substantial enough. We need meat – vegetables – eggs, anything but this.’
‘The forests are a mess,’ Father said, ‘overgrown with brambles, fallen trees everywhere – not as straightforward as they try to make out. How did the girls get on at the shop? Has Szefczuk restocked the shelves?’
‘There was nothing to buy; they came back with just the bread.’
‘I promise you, Tatta, we were in that queue at a quarter to seven, but it seems everyone who’s too young or too old or sick to work, got there before us. I’ll make sure we’re there before them tomorrow.’