It didn’t take long to get where they were going. Bruno opened his eyes in wonder at the things he saw. In his imagination he had thought that all the huts were full of happy families, some of whom sat outside on rocking chairs in the evening and told stories about how things were so much better when they were children and they’d had respect for their elders, not like the children nowadays. He thought that all the boys and girls who lived here would be in different groups, playing tennis or football, skipping and drawing out squares for hopscotch on the ground.
He had thought that there would be a shop in the centre, and maybe a small café like the ones he had known in Berlin; he had wondered whether there would be a fruit and vegetable stall.
As it turned out, all the things that he thought might be there – weren’t.
There were no grown-ups sitting on rocking chairs on their porches.
And the children weren’t playing games in groups.
And not only was there not a fruit and vegetable stall, but there wasn’t a café either like there had been back in Berlin.
Instead there were crowds of people sitting together in groups, staring at the ground, looking horribly sad; they all had one thing in common: they were all terribly skinny and their eyes were sunken and they all had shaved heads, which Bruno thought must have meant there had been an outbreak of lice here too.
In one corner Bruno could see three soldiers who seemed to be in charge of a group of about twenty men. They were shouting at them, and some of the men had fallen to their knees and were remaining there with their heads in their hands.
In another corner he could see more soldiers standing around and laughing and looking down the barrels of their guns, aiming them in random directions, but not firing them.
In fact everywhere he looked, all he could see was two different types of people: either happy, laughing, shouting soldiers in their uniforms or unhappy, crying people in their striped pajamas, most of whom seemed to be staring into space as if they were actually asleep.
‘I don’t think I like it here,’ said Bruno after a while.
‘Neither do I,’ said Shmuel.
‘I think I ought to go home,’ said Bruno.
Shmuel stopped walking and stared at him. ‘But Papa,’ he said. ‘You said you’d help me find him.’
Bruno thought about it. He had promised his friend that and he wasn’t the sort to go back on a promise, especially when it was the last time they were going to see each other. ‘All right,’ he said, although he felt a lot less confident now than he had before. ‘But where should we look?’
‘You said we’d need to find evidence,’ said Shmuel, who was feeling upset because he thought that if Bruno didn’t help him, then who would?
‘Evidence, yes,’ said Bruno, nodding his head. ‘You’re right. Let’s start looking.’
So Bruno kept his word and the two boys spent an hour and a half searching the camp looking for evidence. They weren’t sure exactly what they were looking for, but Bruno kept stating that a good explorer would know it when he found it.
But they didn’t find anything at all that might give them a clue to Shmuel’s papa’s disappearance, and it started to get darker.
Bruno looked up at the sky and it looked like it might rain again. ‘I’m sorry, Shmuel,’ he said eventually. ‘I’m sorry we didn’t find any evidence.’
Shmuel nodded his head sadly. He wasn’t really surprised. He hadn’t really expected to. But it had been nice having his friend over to see where he lived all the same.
‘I think I ought to go home now,’ said Bruno. ‘Will you walk back to the fence with me?’
Shmuel opened his mouth to answer, but right at that moment there was a loud whistle and ten soldiers – more than Bruno had ever seen gathered together in one place before – surrounded an area of the camp, the area in which Bruno and Shmuel were standing.
‘What’s happening?’ whispered Bruno. ‘What’s going on?’
‘It happens sometimes,’ said Shmuel. ‘They make people go on marches.’
‘Marches!’ said Bruno, appalled. ‘I can’t go on a march. I have to be home in time for dinner. It’s roast beef tonight.’
‘Ssh,’ said Shmuel, putting a finger to his lips. ‘Don’t say anything or they get angry.�