, I hope, you’ll be safe, baby boy.
Or girl.
I haven’t had time to check. Sorry about that, I’ve been too busy keeping an eye out for Gogol and his lot. And doing these sudden turns behind piles of rubble, which I always do to throw people off the scent on my way home.
But mostly I’ve been worrying what Gabriek will do when I turn up with you.
It’ll probably be OK. It’s only for one night. Gabriek has lots of customers so we’ll find someone to look after you, little bundle.
This dark’s a bit scary, eh?
Don’t worry, I know these streets. And my eyes are good in the dark. Gabriek spent six clocks on these new glasses for me, so we’ll be fine.
As long as you don’t cry. Please don’t cry. We’re never sure who’s lurking in these buildings, and nothing attracts strangers like a crying baby.
I know you’re probably hungry, little bundle. Gabriek and me will make you dinner. It won’t be milk, but it’ll be something you’ll like. Turnip juice tastes a bit like milk if you add pork fat.
Hear that? Loud, eh? Don’t be startled, it’s just a wardrobe door banging in the wind.
You probably don’t even know this, but before you were born, wardrobe doors hardly ever banged in the wind because all the buildings had walls.
Yeah, I know, hard to believe.
Me and Gabriek are lucky, our place has mostly got them.
Here we are.
Good, isn’t it? You wouldn’t know anyone was up there, would you? It’s because we’ve got sack curtains with tar painted on the inside, which is one of Gabriek’s security inventions. It’s a brilliant idea and the smell’s not that bad really.
I know what you’re probably thinking. How will we get ourselves up through this big gaping empty bomb space between the ground floor and the second floor?
Watch.
See? An automatic folding ladder. Just tug on this hidden rope and down it comes.
Gabriek made it. All from just forty-eight door hinges, sixteen wrecked dining chairs, two pulleys from a bombed-out beer factory and a hook from a dead slaughterhouse.
Not bad for someone who drinks a lot, is it?
At the top, after I’ve pulled the ladder up, I’ll do a secret knock on the door. It’s my name in a code only Gabriek and I know.
It’s another one of Gabriek’s security inventions. They’re his favourite kind of invention these days.
Security means keeping people out, little bundle.
Which is why I’m a bit worried about what he’ll do. After a long day’s scavenging I’ve often turned up with unusal things, but never anything like you.
Gabriek doesn’t do anything.
Just stares.
I hold the bundle out so he can see it more clearly. No point trying to hide a baby.
From the expression on Gabriek’s face I think he’s having trouble taking it all in. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, and rubs his hair, which he does when he’s stunned.
‘It’s a baby,’ I say.
‘I know,’ says Gabriek. ‘I know it’s a baby. Are you crazy? This is a hideout. You don’t bring a crying baby into a hideout.’
‘It’s just for tonight,’ I say. ‘And she’s not crying.’
I’m hoping it’s a girl. Before the Nazis killed Genia, she and Gabriek always dreamed of having a daughter. Gabriek might relax if it’s a girl.
‘Her parents are dead,’ I say.
I tell Gabriek about the woman giving me the bundle and getting shot. I don’t tell him about Gogol and me. No point getting him worried.
Gogol would have been furious when he got back to the truck and found I’d run off, and it’s never good to have a vicious murdering thug furious with you.
Gabriek sits down. I’m not sure if it’s emotion or vodka.
‘We’ll find somebody tomorrow,’ I say. ‘To look after her. Somebody who owes you a favour for fixing their bike or something.’
Gabriek takes a deep breath. The one he does when he’s very cross.
‘It’s a simple rule,’ he says, using the quiet angry voice we have to use here because we can’t shout. ‘No visitors.’
‘She’s not a visitor,’ I reply in my quiet angry voice. ‘She’s a patient. If I’d left her behind, she wouldn’t have survived medically.’
‘You’ve put us at risk,’ says Gabriek.
‘How?’ I say.
Gabriek throws his arms up, exasperated. I’m glad he’s not holding his vodka mug.
‘A crying baby,’ he says.
‘She’s not crying,’ I say, just as exasperated.
The baby, who obviously knows an argument when she hears it, even a quiet one, starts to cry.
At last.
I thought the tears would never stop.
Thank goodness for biscuit soup.
Gabriek let me use our last three army biscuits. Those biscuits cost us a whole repaired bucket, so it was very kind of him. Specially as the baby had just peed on Gabriek’s coat and we’d had the disappointment of discovering it’s a boy.
Well, I was disappointed. Didn’t seem to make any difference to Gabriek. He was just as grumpy about the baby as before.
Luckily it turns out babies really like biscuit soup. You have to remember to strain off the biscuit sludge before you give it to them. And a tiny splash of cabbage vodka in it helps too, specially getting them to sleep afterwards.
Gabriek and the baby are both asleep now. Gabriek in his bed and the baby in mine.
I’m fixing the lock myself.
Gabriek had a lot to put up with tonight so I didn’t want to bother him with it. After the amount of vodka he drank he’s fast asleep and won’t notice the candle.
I’m glad I didn’t tell Gabriek about the lock. Now I’ve got it in pieces, I can see it wasn’t bomb damage that made it break. It was Gabriek. He put it back together wrong after we made the key. A mistake like that would be very distressing to a skilled craftsman like him.
‘What are you doing?’
Gabriek’s voice makes me jump so hard I almost drop the driver pins onto the floor, and we’ve got gaps between some of our floorboards big enough to lose turnips through.
I try to push the lock under my blanket.
Too late. Gabriek is standing over my bed, staring at it.
‘It got sent back for repair,’ I mumble.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ he says.
I can see he’s angry and hurt. I try to think of a way to save his feelings.
‘I wanted to see if I could mend it,’ I say.
Gabriek gives me a hard look. I’m not sure if he believes me.
Then he sighs and sits on my bed. He tries to do it carefully so he doesn’t wake the baby, but he’s unsteady on his feet and the bed lurches. My bed is pretty wobbly anyway. It’s a big sack of sponges from a bombed-out chemist shop.
The baby gives a whimper.
I stroke its head.
‘I know why you didn’t tell me,’ says Gabriek quietly.
I wait for him to say more.
He doesn’t.
It must be hard when you’re a grown-up, to admit you made a mistake because of vodka. I can see how ashamed Gabriek feels.
‘We all make mistakes,’ I say.
Gabriek looks at the baby for a few moments.
‘In the morning,’ he says, ‘take it to the military authorities. Their welfare office, two blocks north of food-drop square. The military work with all the child charity agencies. Much better than trying to persuade one of my customers to take on another mouth to feed.’
I feel a pang of sadness at the thought of handing the baby over to somebody in an office. But I know Gabriek’s right.
‘Will you come?’ I say.
Gabriek shakes his head.
‘Better if you go on your own,’ he says. ‘This city is awash with orphan babies. They might take more pity on a kid.’
I nod. Even though I’m not technically a kid.
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Gabriek reaches for his vodka mug and stares into it.
‘Felix,’ he says.
He pauses. I wait for him to finish what he wants to say.
‘Thank you,’ he says.
For a second I’m not sure why he’s thanking me. Is it for not starting another argument about the baby?
Gabriek picks up the lock.
‘It’s not only these things that give people good protection,’ he says quietly. ‘Thanks for watching out for me.’
He gives me a long hug.
Thirteen is a bit old for that, but the war’s only been over a few months so things aren’t back to normal yet.
As we finish the hug, I feel a stab of guilt. I still haven’t told Gabriek about Gogol.
I’m tempted to tell him now, but I don’t.
Gabriek would insist on coming with me in the morning, and that could muck things up at the welfare office.
It’s not fair to put this baby’s future at risk just because I’m feeling a bit nervous about my own good protection.
I’ll be extra careful.
Gogol won’t see us.
We’ll be fine.
, I hope, I’ll get this little baby safely to the military welfare office and we can both relax.
This trip is stressful for both of us.
I’ve got my hood up and my head down in case Gogol’s men are on the streets. So I’m having to be extra careful not to bump into people or fall into bomb craters.
The baby’s inside my coat for security, but I’m worried he might be getting too hot.
Sorry, little bundle.
I wish we were in an alley. We’re taking this rubble-cleared street for speed, but in an alley it’d be safer to give you a breath of fresh air.
I lift him out of my coat anyway.
There, that’s better, little bundle.
No, it’s not.
A truck roars towards us. I turn to run. My boots slide on wet brick-dust and I half slip over. I hold the baby tight in my arms and brace myself for bullets.
They don’t come.
I sag with relief. I can see now it’s not Gogol, it’s an army truck. Followed by more army trucks. A convoy of them.
I duck down against a wall.
I don’t really have to, this isn’t the Nazi army. The Nazis are mostly all dead or in prison camps. These are American or English or Russian soldiers. But you still stay away from them. It’s safer. Soldiers can search you whenever they like, and sometimes they take you off to displaced persons camps where they think you’ll be happier.
You won’t.
The convoy stops. So do my heart valves.
I tense myself again to run, careful of the brick-dust this time.
Then I see why the trucks have stopped. Kids’ toys have been piled up, blocking the street. It’s an old trick. Gangs who want to stop army trucks hope soldiers won’t drive over little kids’ toys.
This convoy has fallen for it.
There’s the gang, older kids, swarming over the back of a food truck.
Soldiers rushing to stop them.
That’s another part of the trick. Soldiers always think gangs want food. So they concentrate on trying to keep the kids off the food trucks. They forget there’s something they’ve got that’s even more precious than food.
Over there is the real point of all this.
At the side of that truck at the back of the convoy. Somebody kneeling down with a rubber tube, syphoning petrol into a big can.
Somebody wearing a dirty pink coat.
I stare.
She looks up. Straight at me.
Her face is as unfriendly as last time. But sort of curious too. She’s probably wondering why I’m carrying a baby.
I don’t hang around to explain. I duck into an alley and get out of there as fast as I can.
That girl is one person I don’t want to get involved with.
The baby starts crying.
I know, little bundle, it must be scary, rushing along an alley with someone who’s not your mum or dad. And being scared can make you very thirsty, it’s a medical fact.
We’ll have to risk a drink stop.
Just a quick one.
I climb down into the cellar of a wrecked building, away from the eyes of violent patriots and angry customers and unfriendly girls.
The drink bottle I’ve got doesn’t have a proper baby teat, but the baby doesn’t mind. He gobbles the drops as fast as I plop them into his mouth.
It was good of Gabriek to make this sugar water, specially as he was saving the sugar for my birthday cake next year.
He’s a very generous man, Gabriek, but I think he was also relieved to see the baby gone.
I won’t be relieved to see the baby gone. I’m going to miss him.
I try not to think about that. While the baby drinks, I peer around for salvage opportunities, to say thank you to Gabriek.
It’s mostly just typical house wreckage. Rubble, beams, pipes, bits of furniture, scraps of wallpaper, a small pile of poo from a previous visitor.
And a tap, lying on the ground, no pipes attached.
I pick it up. It’s a bit rusty, but not too bad. I put it in my medical bag. Gabriek will be pleased. When the water comes back on, there’ll be a big demand for taps in this city.
I rest the baby on a part of a settee, take out my notebook and scribble a note as usual.
Dear Tap-owner,
Sorry I took your tap. But times are tough and it’s as much as we can do to look after ourselves. When things improve I’ll pay you back as soon as I can if you’re still alive.
In the meantime, try to eat vegetables if possible. They’re quite important medically.
Yours sincerely,
Felix Salinger.
Just because civilisation is in ruins, doesn’t mean we can’t be considerate of other people.
I tuck the note under a brick.
Then I see something half-buried in the rubble.
Pages from a book. With diagrams of bodies on them. It looks like part of a medical book. I grab the pages. But the bodies aren’t human, they’re animals.
It’s a cook book.
I’m not really surprised. Around here, medical books are scarcer than walls.
Ow.
What’s that?
Biting me.
Tiny insects. All over me.
Oh no, and the baby.
Fleas.
Frantically I try to brush them off him, but there are more and more.
This cellar is alive with them.
I wrap my arms round the baby and scramble up into the building next door and straight through it and into the one on the other side.
This should be far enough away.
I tear the baby’s bundle open, brushing as many fleas off his little body as I can, picking the last ones off with my fingernails, crushing them. I don’t like doing it, they’re just hungry like the rest of us, but you have to. Fleas can spread serious illness.
Then I lay the baby on my medical bag and wipe him over with cabbage vodka. He wriggles and yells from the smell and the stinging.
I explain to him why I’m doing it.
He doesn’t look convinced.
Once he’s safely bundled up, it’s my turn.
I strip off and slap and crush and wipe.
‘Haven’t you got a bathroom of your own?’ says a female voice behind me.
I’m so startled I almost drop the vodka bottle. I grab my trousers. Pull them on and turn round.
‘Is that vodka?’ says the girl, taking off her pink coat. ‘Can I have a swig?’
‘It’s medicine,’ I say.
Even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t give her any. She’s probably not even a year older than me.
I grab the baby and my medical bag. At least she hasn’t got any of the boys from the gang with her.
The girl folds her coat and places it on a pile of rubble and sits on it. I don’t know why she bothers. The yellow skirt she?
??s wearing is even grubbier than the coat.
I want to ask her how she found me, but I don’t really care. I just wish she hadn’t.
‘Nice baby,’ she says, looking at the bundle. ‘Yours?’
I don’t say anything. I lay him down close to me while I put on my shirt and coat and scarf. I prefer not to chat with people who’ve threatened me with a gun. Particularly when they may also have seen my private part.
The girl gets up and comes over and looks more closely at the baby. She gives him a couple of gentle prods, as if she’s never touched one before.
Suddenly I want to make it clear that this baby is not up for grabs. Or prods.
‘He’s going to America,’ I say, picking him up. ‘I’m helping him.’
The girl thinks about this.
‘You’re an unusual person,’ she says.
I don’t reply.
‘We can use someone like you,’ she says.
I stare at her.
‘Interested?’ she says.
I try to take this in. Is she asking me to join her gang? I think she is. I’ve never been asked to join a professional gang before. But I don’t need to think about it for long.
‘No, thanks,’ I say.
‘Why not?’ she says.
I should just walk away. Somewhere in that coat she’s got a gun. Never argue with someone who’s got a gun, that’s what Gabriek always says. Or is it an army?
Anyway, I don’t walk away
‘You took the old woman’s bread,’ I say.
The girl looks at me, frowning. I don’t think she gets my point.
She’s not a good person, but I can’t help noticing the way her hair falls into her eyes. It’s wavy and it’s the colour that toast goes, sort of golden brown.
That’s what I hate about being thirteen. Having so many parts of your body, including your eyes, that don’t listen to your brain.
I snap out of it. For all I know her hair is blonde and the toast colour is just dirt.
‘You’ve never been hungry, have you?’ says the girl.
I look at her.
‘Not really hungry,’ she says.
I don’t reply. She doesn’t know anything about me.
‘People who’ve been really hungry don’t walk away from a lump of bread,’ she says.
I walk away from her, telling my legs not to let me down. Wobbly legs can be embarrassing when you’re trying to make a dignified exit.