The Warsaw Anagrams by Richard Zimler Read Free Book Online Page B

look at Ewa, then at Mr Schrei, she added, ‘Please excuse me.’
    After a first step, her eyes rolled back in her head and she crumpled. I caught her, and Ewa helped me lay her on the bed.
    I pressed a cold compress to Stefa’s brow and called her name softly. As she came round, Mr Schrei fetched a glass of water, and Ewa held it to her lips. My niece drank in tiny sips, gazing around the room, surprised to find herself at home.
    Ewa helped her sit up. ‘Come, I’ll put you to bed now,’ she said.
    ‘No, please,’ Stefa pleaded, her brow ribbed with worry. ‘Take me to the kitchen.’
    ‘She needs air,’ I observed. ‘Sit by the window, Stefa. I’ll open it a crack. You need to sit quietly for a few minutes.’
    ‘No, I need two towels – one small, one large. Uncle Erik, bring them to me from my wardrobe … the bottom shelf.’ She pointed to her room.
    I understood what she intended, but Ewa must have showed her a puzzled look; Stefa took her hand and whispered, ‘I need to wash my son and make him ready for … for …’
    She stopped there, unable to say the word burial .
    While Ewa led my niece into the kitchen, Mr Schrei stood up. Stepping to the mirror by my desk, he put on his hat and tilted it at a stylish angle. I could see he was proud of being handsome, and I imagined it would be difficult for him to grow old. Like me, in other words, though I’d been vain without the benefit of good looks. Turning to me, he said, ‘Please accept my condolences and those of the council.’ At the door, he added, ‘Just one more thing. We would be most appreciative if you were to refrain from speaking to anyone about your nephew’s missing leg. It could create problems. Please tell your niece and the other woman. I’m sorry, I don’t know her name.’
    ‘Ewa. What kind of problems?’ I started filling the bowl of my pipe again; I was desperate to smoke.
    ‘You know how superstitious some of the rural Jews are, about burying a body that’s incomplete … forced to walk the earth as disembodied spirits and all that rubbish.’ He rolled his eyes at the very notion. ‘Spreading news of what’s happened could cause panic. And since this is an isolated case, it’s best if we just … well, I think you know what I mean.’
    ‘No, actually I don’t,’ I told him.
    ‘A little discretion will go a long way in keeping things under control,’ he observed.
    When he shook my hand to take his leave, I snarled, ‘Do you really believe that keeping things under control is of any importance to me now?’
     
     
    Outside, the undertaker, whose name was Schmul, told me that I would need to go to Pinkiert’s headquarters to pre-pay the funeral. And that he really ought to get going. I gave him five złoty to have him stay with us until Stefa had had a chance to wash her son. He helped me carry Adam into the courtyard. Then I took a couple of swigs from the vodka bottle I’d carried downstairs, put on my reading glasses, kneeled beside my nephew and adjusted the blanket so that it concealed only his face. You see, Heniek, I had only one purpose left.

CHAPTER 7
     
     
    Adam was badly scratched from the barbed wire, particularly on his belly and chest, which was where he must have been gripped by the coils. But none of the scratches were bloody, which seemed to indicate that he’d been dead for an hour or so – with his veins and arteries dry – before being discarded.
    I was unable to find any bullet hole or puncture wound, but button-sized, reddish-brown bruises marked the skin over his ribs, all of them between the sleek rise of his right hip and his sternum: a handprint.
    I conjectured that the largest corresponded to where a thumb had pressed down, and I tried to match my fingertips to the marks but couldn’t quite spread my hand far enough. Whoever had severed Adam’s leg had been almost certainly a man, and probably larger than I was.
    The killer – or his accomplice – must have used his left hand