Touching the Wire by Rebecca Bryn

daughters but he failed, tricked by a greedy man and a
crafty wolf.’
    ‘It’s a sad story, Grandpa,’
Lucy said.
    Charlotte puckered her lips.
‘Serves him right.’
    He patted Charlotte’s hand.
He’d failed once to protect those he’d loved. He would die rather than fail
again. ‘I expect you’re right, sweetheart.’
    ***
    Walt unlocked the door to his workshop hoping
for five minutes peace. What did he know about school uniforms? Charlotte and
Lucy insisted skirt hems far above the knees were not only acceptable but
essential. Jane and Jennie had other ideas. He wouldn’t be the judge with the
casting vote.
    He unwrapped the diary he kept hidden beneath his workshop
bench. Its fifty pages bore witness to the courage and endurance of thousands
of camp internees. He opened it carefully, his copperplate English a
counterpoint to Miriam’s rounded, backward-leaning Hungarian. Tegnap Anya kénytelen
volt folytatni nehéz sziklák, hogy a domb
tetején. Meleg volt a
munka. Néhány elájult és verték.
      Ma
ő kénytelen volt folytatni a kövek le újra .   The words fell better from Miriam’s tongue. His grasp of
it, picked up from her and a pocket language-primer, suggested it read Yesterday, Mother had to carry many rocks from the bottom of the
hill to the top. It was hot work. Some were beaten because they fainted. Today
she was forced to carry them back again. 
    He turned a page to his own
handwriting. The Greek Sonderkommando refused to gas the Hungarians. They
staged a brave revolt. Another entry. August 2 nd 1944. They
have liquidated the gypsy camp. Bodies burn in pits
next to the crematorium .
    More of
Miriam’s words: his finger traced them gently, as if caressing her cheek. Was
he being disloyal to Jane? Láttuk atya át a kerítésen . Mi alig ismert rá. Nem vagyok biztos
benne, hogy tudta, hogy minket. Miriam had cried when she wrote this. We saw Father
through the fence. We barely recognised him. I'm not sure that he knew us. He closed the book and rewrapped it. Miriam had risked her life to trust in
him.
    He locked the workshop door
and walked back into the house. He sank into his chair, trying to block out the
horror of that day, and failing.
    An hour before dawn and they
were all exhausted; an outbreak of scarlet fever had kept them working most of
the night. His nurses were dead on their feet: patients lay dead on their
bunks. He wrinkled his nose: the night-soil buckets were full to overflowing
but the ‘pot girl’ was not permitted to go to the latrines to empty them until
morning.
    ‘Chuck, have we any charcoal
left? There are four more diarrhoea cases.’
    He tipped the contents of a
bag onto the table. ‘This is all… if only we had something else to treat them…
kaolin… If only we had more water…’ They dreaded rain for the quagmire that
dragged every last ounce of strength from exhausted limbs, yet prayed for it to
fill what bowls they could spare with precious drops.
    She wiped a hand across her
brow. He felt her forehead quickly and searched for evidence of a rash. ‘You
are hot. You have a sore throat?’
    ‘No… It’s warm in here
tonight. I don’t think I have a temperature.’
    ‘Tongue?’
    She stuck it out.
    ‘It’s not red.’ He let out
the breath he’d been holding. ‘It’s a miracle we avoid infection.’
    She managed a tired smile.
‘I worry about the boys, but I think we’re immune to everything, now.’
    Those patients who could
swallow were given a few sips of water, the last of the charcoal was dispensed,
and the moans gradually subsided as exhaustion pulled the sick into sleep or
death.
    ‘Miriam, rest while you can.
If we have more cases, today will be even harder.’ He passed the bunk Arturas
and Peti shared with three women and reached to feel their foreheads. Despite
his best efforts at scrimping extra food they were painfully thin. ‘They shouldn’t
be in here with all this sickness.’
    ‘Where else can they go? At
least here they