Page 3 of The Nanny Outside the Gates

TWO

HALINA

Eva darts out the church doors and makes a beeline for the clearing in the woods. “Eva, come back here,” I shout, already breaking into a run.

Her little feet smack the dirt road, shoes too tattered to soften the clamber.

Dirt clouds up behind her like smoke. She bolts forward with the worry-free confidence only a child can have, arms pumping, curls flying in the wind.

It’s as if the forest is hers to claim. She doesn’t even hesitate at the split that breaks into several directions, just continues down the one where several low weather-worn branches arch toward the ground.

Every weaving motion is methodical, like this attempt to flee was pre-planned. I’m sure it was.

This seven-year-old little girl is going to give me gray hair, but she reminds me of her at the same age. This must be my retribution.

Eva’s heading straight for the bridge, the connecting seam between what’s left of civility on our side of the Vistula, and the Reich-occupied restricted zone on the other.

What was once Polish-owned is now property of the Reich. The people of Poland should have the right to cross whichever road we please here, but that’s a war we won’t win.

At twenty-two years old, I’m more staff than ward now.

Julia took me in when I was left on the church as a newborn, an orphan, and I’ve lived here ever since.

It’s barely a church anymore, more of an aged sanctuary being utilized as a shelter.

That’s just the facade though. Julia and the other housemothers keep the inside warm, clean, and as close to home as anything I’ve known.

No one in their right mind would choose to live beside Reich soldiers, but we weren’t given a choice.

Nearly four years ago, they forced all Polish citizens out of the forty-square-mile area of land surrounding O?wi?cim and its nearby villages, sealing it off like a fortress and declaring it a “restricted zone.” It’s off limits to anyone not branded by the Reich.

The orphanage sits less than fifteen minutes from the nearest checkpoint of the SS settlement area, and thirty minutes from the front gates of Auschwitz—the former Army barracks turned prison labor camp for war criminals.

But no Polish citizen truly knows what happens behind those forbidden barriers—or the road that leads to the smokestack—unless they’ve been taken inside.

In winter when the trees are bare, gunshots echo between frozen embankments. In summer, when the air is thick and sticky, the stench of smoke weaves through the branches.

“Eva!” I shout, this time through a harsh whisper, winded as my lungs threaten to splinter my ribs.

I don’t know how this little girl is so much faster than me.

“Stop running! Let’s talk about why you’re upset.

I can help!” I don’t know how I managed to let her slip past me.

I’m better than that. I must have been distracted—something I’m not allowed to be when taking care of children. How could I have let this happen?

She doesn’t bother to look over her shoulder toward me.

Just keeps on running, taking all the correct turns between the maze of trees as if she knows exactly where she’s trying to go—where she’s not supposed to go.

Most people would get themselves lost trying to get in or out if they didn’t have directions.

Not her, though. Nope. She doesn’t understand the danger that looms in the distance.

The humid air catches in my lungs as I continue after her, finally gaining more speed, or she’s becoming tired. I catch her by the wrist just as she sets foot on the road, just footsteps from the bridge, and a two-minute walk from a German checkpoint.

“No!” Eva screams. “Let me go!”

“Eva, you know the rules, and you know exactly where that bridge will take you,” I scold her, breathlessly, painfully, understanding the exact reason why she’s trying to run away.

“Because,” she says with a heavy groan. “The bridge goes to the bad place—the one that makes people disappear.” After a roll of her young, na?ve eyes, I tug her backward a few steps onto a patch of grass with sprouting weeds and dandelions.

“We need to go back to the orphanage. We can’t be out here.

Let’s go back so we can talk about what’s upsetting you.

” I lower to my knees to get a better grip on her, taking her small hands within mine.

“Come along—there’s no sense in calling attention to ourselves here.

We don’t want any trouble with those soldiers.

You know they’re always over here, looking for more Polish people to kick out of their homes. ”

“Well, I want to go back to my home,” she says, stomping her foot and crossing her arms over her chest. Her short blonde hair swishes along her pink cheeks.

She’s been at the orphanage a few years, brought here not long after her parents were killed, along with thousands of civilians in Warsaw during the invasion.

She was too young to understand what she survived, or the meaning of death. So now she carries hope that her parents are still at home waiting for her.

No matter how many times we explain that they’re gone, she doesn’t listen. She’s just a child, protected by her imagination.

We could all learn a thing or two from her.

“The church we live in is your home, Eva,” I remind her.

“You’re not Mama or Papa.”

“I know, but I still love you very much and want you to be safe.” I release one of her hands and poke the tip of her nose with my finger.

Her big hazelnut eyes widen as she stares back at me, and I’m not sure what has spooked her.

A low rumble of an engine simmers in the near distance, followed by the crunching of rocks beneath tires.

The squeal of brakes follows. With a cautious glance over my right shoulder, I spot an expensive black vehicle pulling over to the side of the road.

“Eva, look at me,” I say, squeezing her hands. “Go back now. Don’t stop running until you are back inside. Do you understand?”

With just one nod, she turns away from me and takes off, back in the right direction this time. Her ragged shoes slap heavily against the dirt as she becomes a blur between the trees. I should go after her, but I don’t like the look of this car, and I don’t want this person following us.

I drop my hands into the pockets of my skirt and stare across the road, waiting for the car to pass.

But it doesn’t. A door creaks open. My pulse thuds in my ears, so loud I can hear each beat.

A man steps out, his uniform crisp, the lightning-bolt runes sharp on his collar tab, and a red band tainted by a swastika.

He walks slowly, never taking his eyes off me. What could he want? I’m outside the “restricted zone” and I haven’t done anything.

He stops before me, his silence speaking for him as he rests his hand on his belt. “What are you doing this close to the checkpoint?” He stares down at me from beneath the rim of his peaked visor cap.

I take a breath and swallow the lump rising in my throat. We speak Polish, but when the German Reich stormed in, they demanded we speak their language. At first, I refused. I wouldn’t follow their bullish commands. Then I realized they were speaking German because they can’t speak Polish.

That’s when I realized that if I wanted to survive this war, I needed to know their language better than they knew mine. After three years of just me and a worn-out textbook, I’m nearly confident in my practice. Though I’ve never had to use it. Not like this.

For a moment, the foreign words stick to my tongue. “I—I’m taking care of a little girl. She wandered off. I was just bringing her back.”

He peers past me through the trees, and I follow his stare, finding no sight of Eva. I hope she made it back inside.

“You’re out here begging?”

“No, that—that’s…not true. I wasn’t begging.”

“You’re loitering like a street rat. Waiting for someone to toss you money or food, yes?” He steps in toward me, coming too close for comfort. “Unless, perhaps, you’re a simple thief?”

“No, never—” I curl my fingers into fists, pressing them into the sides of my legs. “I was helping the little girl. That’s all.”

The officer breathes heavily through his nose and recoils as if he’s gotten a whiff of something rancid. “You look like a Jew.”

A shiver runs down my spine, colliding with the droplets of sweat, now fearing this awful man more than before. I’m stronger than his fear tactics. I’m stronger than him.

“I’m not Jewish,” I say, my words shooting out of me like a protective shield. Anyone who isn’t Jewish has seen how the SS treat them, and we fear for them more than ourselves.

He tilts his head to the side as if inspecting me from a different angle. “Where are your papers?”

“Back at the house I work at. Like I said, I was trying to stop the little girl I care for from running off.”

He rolls back onto his heels and eyes me up and down, not in the way men sometimes do, but as if I’m being evaluated—like produce in a store.

“You take care of children?” he asks.

“Yes.” I think my last statement was enough of an answer to his question.

“The timing is stunning,” he says, scratching his manicured fingernails along his chin. “I promised my wife I’d find someone like you today: a young Pole, working-class age, able-bodied, and capable of speaking German. We need a caretaker for our children—the last one just…parted ways with us.”

“I already have a job,” I remind him for the third time. “And I should get back to work—make sure the little girl found her way back.”

The man shakes his head and snickers before all hints of emotion leave his angular face.

“I don’t have time to go searching for another caretaker today.

You understand this, yes?” He doesn’t let me respond before continuing.

“Good. Good. You have two choices…” He speaks casually, as if he hasn’t already begun to threaten me.

“You will come with me and serve in my home and tend to my children.”