Free Puppet by Eva Wiseman Page B

duties?”
    “I was Sergeant Toth's housekeeper.”
    Warden Henter was tall and handsome, and I was soon to learn that he was known for his good humor. He would slap his thigh whenever he told one of his many jokes. He stood up and circled me, looking me over with calculating eyes as if I were a horse he planned to buy. I wanted to disappear, to have the earth swallow me up.
    “Well, you seem strong enough,” he said. “How old are you?”
    “Fourteen, sir.”
    “Teresa, the cook at the prison, needs a scullery maid to help her. You'll be paid the same as the girl before — and your room and board. You can sleep in one of the empty cells.”
    “Thank you, sir.”
    This was the best news. If I was careful, I could save enough for a train ticket to see Clara.
    “Listen carefully!” Warden Henter continued. “We keep the Jewish prisoners who were brought to us from Tisza-Eszlar separate from the rest of the inmates. You are not to go near them under any circumstances. If you help Teresa distribute their meals, you will give their food to their guards, who will pass it on to them. If you have any questions, you may ask Gendarme Bako, who was transferredhere. If you disobey my orders, you will be dismissed. Do I make myself clear?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “You may deliver the boy Morris Scharf, his meals, but you are never to speak to him. Understood?”
    I nodded.
    “You may go now,” he said, his handsome head already bent over some papers on his desk.
    As I went, his dog's angry bark followed me.
    Teresa was kneading dough to bake bread when I got to the kitchen.
    “You're late!” she snapped.
    “I'm a growing girl. I need my sleep,” I said cheekily.
    I knew that it was safe to joke with her. Over the last few weeks I had discovered that her bark was much worse than her bite.
    She dusted off her hands before answering me.
    “We're having visitors tomorrow. I heard that the Jews' lawyer is coming all the way from Budapest.” She slapped the dough cheerfully.
    “Yes, one of the guards told me about him.”
    “He'll be talking with his clients and with Morris too.”
    “I wonder what Morris will say to him. Do you think he was telling the truth?”
    “Well, did they beat him?”
    “They almost killed him.”
    “There's your answer. Mind you, you can't trust them Jews. Now take those two large pails of gruel to the prisoners.” She gave the dough a half-turn and pounded it with her fist. “And remember, you're not to go into their cells.”
    The Nyiregyhaza prison was overcrowded and the inmates were very different from sad old Mr. Meszaros sleeping off a night of drinking in the jail back home. The inhabitants of the Nyiregyhaza prison ranged from petty thieves to murderers. Most of them were filthy, violent, and vulgar. On my first day, I had delivered the inmates' breakfasts right into their common cell. It took all of my wits and a skillful use of my knees and elbows to evade their groping hands and worse. Now I knew better. I always handed the pails to the guards in front of the cell and asked them to give the prisoners their meals. I wasn't about to make the same mistake twice.
    “After you finish, sit down for a bite for yourself,” Teresa said with a toothless smile.
    I picked up the pails and I walked down the long narrow hallway leading to the cells. A guard met me at the end of the corridor and took the pails from me.
    Back in the kitchen I filled a small tin container with Morris's meal. I waited until Teresa's back was turned and I slipped two biscuits from the batch cooling on a plate into the pocket of my apron.
    I heard voices coming from Morris's cell. “Remember what I told you.” It took me a moment to recognize that it was Mr. Bary speaking.
    “It's not by chance, boy, that everybody hates Jews,” he said. “The whole race is nothing but liars and thieves. But you, Morris, are different from the rest of your brethren. You are doing the right thing and you won't go unrewarded. If