Lale shakes his head. ‘This number wouldn’t have been my first choice of tattoo.’
‘What would you have preferred?’ asks Pepan.
Lale smiles slyly.
‘What’s her name?’
‘My sweetheart? I don’t know. We haven’t met yet.’
Pepan chuckles. The two men sit in companionable silence. Lale traces a finger over his numbers.
‘What is your accent?’ says Lale.
‘I am French.’
‘And what happened to me?’ Lale asks finally.
‘Typhus. You were destined for an early grave.’
Lale shudders. ‘Then why am I sitting here with you?’
‘I was walking past your block just as your body was being thrown onto a cart for the dead and dying. A young man was pleading with the SS to leave you, saying that he would take care of you. When they went into the next block he pushed you off the cart and started dragging you back inside. I went and helped him.’
‘How long ago was this?’
‘Seven, eight days. Since then the men in your block have looked after you during the night. I’ve spent as much time as I can during the day caring for you. How do you feel?’
‘I feel OK. I don’t know what to say, how to thank you.’
‘Thank the man who pushed you from the cart. It was his courage that held you back from the jaws of death.’
‘I will when I find out who it was. Do you know?’
‘No. I’m sorry. We didn’t exchange names.’
Lale closes his eyes for a few moments, letting the sun warm his skin, giving him the energy, the will, to go on. He lifts his sagging shoulders, and resolve seeps back into him. He is still alive. He stands on shaking legs, stretching, trying to breathe new life back into an ailing body in need of rest, nourishment and hydration.
‘Sit down, you’re still very weak.’
Conceding the obvious, Lale does so. Only now his back is straighter, his voice firmer. He gives Pepan a smile. The old Lale is back, almost as hungry for information as he is for food. ‘I see you wear a red star,’ he says.
‘Ah yes. I was an academic in Paris and was too outspoken for my own good.’
‘What did you teach?’
‘Economics.’
‘And being a teacher of economics got you here? How?’
‘Well, Lale, a man who lectures on taxation and interest rates can’t help but get involved in the politics of his country. Politics will help you understand the world until you don’t understand it anymore, and then it will get you thrown into a prison camp. Politics and religion both.’
‘And will you go back to that life when you leave here?’
‘An optimist! I don’t know what my future holds, or yours.’
‘No crystal ball then.’
‘No, indeed.’
Through the noise of construction, dogs barking and guards shouting, Pepan leans forward and asks, ‘Are you as strong in character as you are physically?’
Lale returns Pepan’s gaze. ‘I’m a survivor.’
‘Your strength can be a weakness, given the circumstances we find ourselves in. Charm and an easy smile will get you in trouble.’
‘I am a survivor.’
‘Well, then maybe I can help you survive in here.’
‘You have friends in high places?’
Pepan laughs and slaps Lale on the back. ‘No. No friends in high places. Like I told you, I am the Tätowierer. And I have been told the number of people coming here will be increasing very soon.’
They sit with the thought for a moment. What lodges in Lale’s mind is that, somewhere, someone is making decisions, plucking numbers from – where? How do you decide who comes here? What information do you base those decisions on? Race, religion, or politics?
‘You intrigue me, Lale. I was drawn to you. You had a strength that even your sick body couldn’t hide. It brought you to this point, sitting in front of me today.’
Lale hears the words but struggles with what Pepan is saying. They sit in a place where people are dying every day, every hour, every minute.
‘Would you like a job working with me?’ Pepan brings Lale back from the bleakness. ‘Or are you happy doing whatever they have you doing?’
‘I do what I can to survive.’
‘Then take my job offer.’
‘You want me to tattoo other men?’
‘Someone has to do it.’
‘I don’t think I could do that. Scar someone, hurt someone – it does hurt, you know.’
Pepan pulls back his sleeve to reveal his own number. ‘It hurts like hell. If you don’t take the job, someone with less soul than you will, and hurt these people more.’
‘Working for the kapo is not the same as defiling hundreds of innocent people.’
A long silence follows. Lale again enters his dark place. Do those making the decisions have a family, a wife, children, parents? They can’t possibly.
‘You can tell yourself that, but you are still a Nazi puppet. Whether it is with me or the kapo, or building blocks, you are still doing their dirty work.’
‘You have a way of putting things.’
‘So?’
‘Then, yes. If you can arrange it, I will work for you.’
‘Not for me. With me. But you must work quickly and efficiently and not make trouble with the SS.’
‘OK.’
Pepan stands, goes to walk away. Lale grabs at his shirtsleeve.
‘Pepan, why have you chosen me?’
‘I saw a half-starved young man risk his life to save you. I figure you must be someone worth saving. I’ll come for you tomorrow morning. Get some rest now.’
•
That night as his block-mates return, Lale notices that Aron is missing. He asks the two others sharing his bed what has happened to him, how long he’s been gone.
‘About a week,’ comes the reply.
Lale’s stomach drops.
‘The kapo couldn’t find you,’ the man says. ‘Aron could have told him you were ill, but he feared the kapo would add you to the death cart again if he knew, so he said you were already gone.’
‘And the kapo discovered the truth?’
‘No,’ yawns the man, exhausted from work. ‘But the kapo was so pissed off he took Aron anyway.’