Free The Kommandant's Girl by Pam Jenoff

late one night shortly after the occupation,” she continued. I realized she must have been talking about the night before his disappearance, when Jacob had not returned home for many hours. “He didn’t exactly tell me what was going on, but he asked me to keep an eye on you, in case anything should happen to him. I asked what else I could do, and we realized together that my home and my position might be useful somehow. He put me in contact with people…the specifics did not come until after he was gone.”
    “But this is terribly dangerous for you! Aren’t you at all afraid?”
    “Of course I am, darling.” The corners of her mouth pressed wryly upward. “Even an old widow with no children wishes to live. But this war…” Her expression turned serious. “This war is the shame of my people. Having you and the child live here with me is the least I can do.”
    “The Poles didn’t start this war,” I protested.
    “No, but…” Her thought was interrupted by a light scratching sound at the back door. “Wait here.”
    Krysia tiptoed downstairs. I heard whispers, some movement, then a tiny click as the door shut. Krysia came back up the stairs, her footsteps slower and heavier now. When she reached the landing, her arms overflowed with a large cloth bundle. I stood to help her and together we carried the sleeping child to the third floor.
    We set the child on the crib and Krysia unwrapped the blankets in which he had been swaddled. At the sight of the child’s face, I gasped loudly. It was the blond child whose mother had been shot in the alleyway.
    “What is it?” But before I could answer, the child, awakened by my gasp and Krysia’s voice, began to whimper. “Shh,” she soothed, rubbing the child’s back. He settled into sleep once more.
    Silently, we backed out of the room. “That child,” I whispered. “That’s…”
    “The descendant of Rabbi Izakowicz, the great rabbi of Lublin. His mother was shot…”
    “I know! I saw it happen from our apartment.”
    “Oh, you poor dear,” Krysia said, patting my shoulder.
    “You said he has no parents. What about his father?”
    “We don’t know. He was either shot in the woods near Chernichow or taken to a camp. Either way, it doesn’t look good.”
    I squeezed my eyes tight then, remembering the scene in the alleyway. Surely they wouldn’t kill the rabbi, I had said to my parents that night. “She was with child when she was killed,” I added, my eyes beginning to burn. “His mother, I mean.”
    Krysia nodded. “I had heard that. It makes what we are doing that much more important. The child is the last of a great rabbinic dynasty. He must be kept alive.”
    Krysia and I took turns sleeping that night in case the child should awaken and be confused or upset by the strange surroundings, but he slept through the night and did not stir. The next morning, I went to his crib and lifted him, still in his street clothes. He was damp with sweat, his blond curls darkened and pressed against his forehead. He blinked but did not make a sound as I placed him on my hip. Instead, he wrapped his hands around my neck and rested his head on my shoulder as though he had done this every day of his young life. Together we headed down the stairs to the kitchen, where Krysia was once again preparing breakfast. At the sight of us in the doorway, her eyes warmed and her face broke into a wide smile.
    A week later, Lukasz and I would walk into town for our debut appearance as gentiles at market. His eyes would light up at the sight of an ice-cream cart and I, unable to resist, would take a few pennies from our food money to buy him a vanilla cone. And this is how Lukasz, the son of the great rabbi of Lublin, and Emma, the daughter of a poor Kazimierz baker, came to live with the elegant Krysia Smok in a cottage that seemed like a palace in Chelmska.

CHAPTER 6
    “W e will be having a dinner party on Saturday,” Krysia announces as routinely as though she is