Wings of the Morning (7 page)

They remained frozen in this tableau as Sol’s smile embraced the younger men. Then the moment was broken by the sound of swish over carpet as the front door from the street was opened. Two
men had entered and now stood together without a word, their eyes fixed on Sol. The larger, who was black and very large indeed, looked to be West Indian. His companion was white, slim, smartly
dressed with highly polished black brogues and holding a small umbrella. It was he who took the lead. David took them to be customers or colleagues in the business, arrived for a pre-planned
meeting, and he sensed this was his moment to leave. He turned to say his farewell to Sol, but was shocked to find that he had become another person. The great shambling bulk had been instantly
diminished and reduced in every way. The shoulders hunched, the beard wobbled on his chest, his hands washed at each other but could not disguise their tremble. When he spoke, his voice emerged
cracked and reedy, so different from the booming tones of earlier.

‘Mr Riley and Mervyn’ he squeaked, ‘You’re a little early today gentlemen. No doubt it’s Christmas arrangements, but I can accommodate you. Of course I can. Please
follow me.’

And with that he led the way up the spiral staircase which was located at the extreme end of the building, leading up to a reasonably sized meeting room which completely occupied the mezzanine
area. Martin had showed it briefly to David and explained that they seldom used it except for client visits, so David assumed that these two represented some important business. It was certainly a
performance to get up there, with Sol and the huge Mervyn struggling to negotiate the stairs.

David continued perplexed by the dramatic change in Sol, the more so because Martin was now definitely moving him towards the front door and himself acting in an anxious manner. As they stood
together in the open doorway, Martin spoke.

‘Thanks for coming, David. It’s been good to see you and we must make another plan. I can tell that Sol is definitely doing some scheming.’ There was a forced joviality as he
gesticulated with some wild movements before going on, ‘what about New Year’s Eve if you’re around that day? We’ll be back at work, so come up for some lunch and maybe
we’ll all have something more to celebrate in the evening’.

Even as Martin was speaking, they could hear clearly the sound of raised voices from the upstairs room, Sol in agitation and an aggressive note from the white man, Riley. Immediately afterwards,
there was a crash against the inside wall followed by two or three thumping noises, unmistakeable to David as the sound of blows to the body. He grabbed Martin by the arm and spoke urgently.

‘Who are these guys, Martin, and what are they doing to Sol? More to the point, what are we going to do about it?

‘Please, David, just leave now. I’ll be able to handle it OK.’

He held the street door wide in invitation. His voice was tremulous but his message was clear, so David walked out and set off down Westbourne Grove, leaving Martin to duck back into the
building. David stood on the pavement for a minute or so in uncomfortable indecision before he started to move away. But he had gone only a few strides before heard the door of the Kirchoff
building slam shut again, and turning, he saw the unwelcome visitors. They were coming towards him. Riley was in the lead, Mervyn in close attendance with a small bag in his ham like fist. They
were unhurried as they approached. It seemed to David that they would simply walk on by, but Riley stopped short and fixed him with a gimlet eye. Without warning, he jabbed a short, hard blow from
his gloved left fist deep into David’s stomach. He dropped to one knee on the pavement fighting for breath. Riley bent a little from the waist and hissed into his ear,

‘Not your business. Keep it that way.’

Then he was walking on, steel capped shoes ringing in the cold evening air.

David gave himself some recovery time. It was as much the shock as the pain. Then he walked straight back into the office. Martin must have heard the door and came clattering down the spiral
stairs. Sol remained out of sight, up in the meeting room.

‘Sorry,’ said David with a wan smile, ‘but they thumped me too on the way past. So now I think I should know a bit more.’

Martin looked dishevelled and agitated.

‘Christ,’ he said, ‘let me just see to Sol.’

Whirling round, he disappeared upstairs and David sat on a typist’s chair and listened to the muted tones of conversation above him. Martin came back, looking no less disturbed. He slumped
into the chair at his desk and loosened his tie. His hands were shaking.

‘Sol needs his medication. It’s his heart you see. I’m going to get him home to Naomi who will handle it. Give me half an hour and I’ll be back. I agree that you should
know more and Sol insists on it. Can you manage here on your own?’

‘Of course I can.’

David sat and watched without comment as Martin carefully manoeuvred his father down the awkward stairs and through the main office into the street outside. Sol was ashen and trembling all over.
A taxi or hire car had pulled up outside; Martin must have summoned it. David heard the doors slam and the vehicle pull away. He got up then, closed and locked the front door and wandered around
the office while he waited. He felt numb and confused. What the hell was going on here?

He got his answer during the remainder of that evening. Martin was good to his time estimate and returned in another cab. He proposed they walk to a restaurant where he sometimes had lunch. It
was still early for evening traffic in the bistro and they had the place almost to themselves. They sat at a table in the window, ordered pasta and a bottle of Chianti.

By this point, Martin had recovered himself and was more composed. David could see that he was less nervous, but still agitated and that stemmed from embarrassment. He confirmed this in his
opening comments as they waited for their food to arrive.

‘Riley and Co. They’ve been onto us for about six months now. It’s a protection racket and they’ve targeted a good few businesses around here, including this restaurant,
I think. It’s unpleasant, but we can afford it if we have to. And we must. Sol gets really badly affected as you’ve seen and if truth be told, I’m not much better myself. Taken
together, we are really a thug’s dream.’

Martin paused there and gave a sheepish grin. Then he continued.

‘Actually, David, I suppose I’m grateful for that incident happening today — while you were with us I mean. You see, I’m keen for you to join us. I’m sure you and I
would work well together and Sol agrees but he just wants a bit more time to think the thing through. That’s fair enough and I predicted his reaction. I was also sure that before there could
be a commitment, you’d need to know more about our history and where we come from in every sense. I wanted to take my time about that. I tend to keep the past buried and when I tell you about
our background, you’ll understand why. But Riley’s visit means that I can’t delay. I’ve got to lay it out now. All I ask of you, David, is that you keep what I’m about
to say to yourself — even if it puts you off any further association with Sol and me. Is that agreed?’

David was relieved to notice that Martin’s confidence became stronger with every word of this introduction.

‘You have my word’, he said with a brief nod.

Martin started with the family history, speaking of Sol’s parents and their simple life in a small village community located midway between Lodz and the Baltic port of Gdansk in Poland.
How Sol had been a bright pupil who married Deborah, his childhood sweetheart and greatest friend. How the young couple moved to Warsaw for Sol to take up the offer he had won from High School to
enrol for a degree in Economics. Some years of living close to the breadline finally rewarded with an outstanding result which gave Sol the chance to move again, and this time a much greater step.
To Germany and to an appointment with a Government ministry in Berlin. The year was 1935. They prospered, working hard, becoming fluent in the language, living frugally, managing to send home a
little money for their families and to build up some reserves for themselves. Deborah was able to work, but then found herself pregnant and their daughter Natasa was born in November 1937.

At this point, David could anticipate the tragedy about to unfold. He could imagine a devout, hard working couple, content to be self effacing as they built their lives, enhanced their security
and determined to ignore all that was going on around them.

Martin did not dwell on the detail of what happened next, but his biting summary was all the more effective. Deborah and Natasa were removed by the police for ‘resettlement’ during
the early weeks of 1941 but Sol was retained at his job in the Ministry for a further year. It was explained to him that his work was valued and in recognition of his contribution to Nazi Germany,
his wife and child were being kept safe and well. Precisely what became of Deborah and Natasa is a story which can never be told. They simply disappeared, and Sol saw neither again after his final
glimpse of their faces at the window of the bus which took them away.

It was almost a relief when the end came for him. He was picked up when it was judged that the value of his work was worth less than the burden of employing a Jew. He was jammed into a train
holding thousands and transported to Dachau.

Martin ordered coffee and they smoked in silence. Then David asked,

‘How did Sol survive the Camp?’

‘By becoming as close to indispensable as it was possible to be. He managed to get work in the Camp commandant’s office, work that was relevant to his skills and qualifications. All
the concentration camps had to submit up to Himmler’s level what I guess we would call today a business plan, with details of how they were performing against target. The work was meat and
drink to Sol. He knew far more than the Germans at Dachau what was required and he was bloody good at it. But of course, the “product” — what else to call it? He was dealing with
a profit and loss account which depended on his fellow prisoners who were being harvested. What items of value did each leave behind, right down to teeth and hair; how to turn possessions into
marketable assets; how to dispose of the unwanted remains. Sol has erected strong barriers, but deep inside him, there’s a despair which won’t die before he does.’

‘Yes.’ David was absolutely at a loss for words.

‘And there’s more,’ Martin continued, ‘in his job, Sol had help from other inmates — prisoners who were assigned to him for work in typing, filing, that sort of
thing. None lasted very long, but there was one woman who was especially competent. Ironically, she wasn’t a Jew, but a Romanian gypsy. Anyway, she worked well and became a good friend. She
had a daughter with her and I guess that touched a strong chord in Sol. The child was eleven or twelve and she came to help Sol whilst her mother was too sick to work one day. The girl was pretty
enough to attract the attention of one of the soldier guards and he made a grab for her. He held her down across Sol’s desk, bawling at him to get on with his figures whilst the child was
being violated in front of his eyes. Sol broke the habit of a lifetime just that once. He got out of his chair to fight back. It wasn’t much of a fight: a fit young soldier against a broken
down Jew. Sol got knocked senseless and the soldier completed his rape. He called in his mate who did her as well. Then they slit her throat. And then they woke Sol up and started in on him. They
took turns to knock him about a bit more before they castrated him with a pair of office scissors. Then they made him get rid of the body of the girl and get back to work himself.’

The nausea which this horror produced in David made him miss the further significance of the story but it came to him in a rush as he saw Martin staring at him. Martin spoke without waiting for
the question.

‘No, of course I’m not his son and it’s just a coincidence that we have our similarities. But he is the one and only father figure in my life. I respect him and I love him plus
I owe him a great deal. You see David, I have no idea who my natural father was and neither has my mother, Naomi. She was in Dachau too, and being young and quite pretty, she was much in demand.
How else was she to survive?’

He looked appealingly at David as if to seek approval for behaviour under circumstances which are unimaginable except to those who were forced to endure them. David stretched across the table
and put his hand briefly on Martin’s shoulder. It was an instinctive gesture made both to acknowledge the anguish and to thank him for sharing it. Then he said,

‘It’s a desperate, tragic story, but thank you for trusting to tell me. I guess you don’t often speak of it.’

‘You’re right. Only once a year. On our Day of Atonement, my mother Naomi, Sol and I, we stay home alone and just sit with each other, sometimes saying nothing for hours on end,
sometimes talking trivia. We find there is no catharsis to be gained from sharing memories of that time, it’s just enough to be still together.’

David was moved by this and said so. Then he added ‘Please tell me what happened next. How did you get from there to here?’

‘Well, to keep it brief. Sol and Naomi survived Dachau until the camp was liberated by the Americans in 1945. They’d become very close and it made things much easier to pretend that
they were man and wife with me as their son. Also, Naomi is Austrian, so we went to Vienna until Sol applied successfully to bring us here. We arrived in London late in 1947 and we’ve been
here ever since.’

David had plenty more to ask about, to burrow deeper into the relationships and understand more about the business, but he decided that he would hold his peace for now.

‘You get back to them, Martin. I’ll settle up here. I’ll probably have a last drink and then head for home, but I’m looking forward to being back on New Year’s
Eve.’

The two shook hands and Martin left David in the bistro.

A while later, he was walking back to Bayswater tube station, his mind a maelstrom of thoughts and emotions.