Flesh-Coloured Dominoes by Zigmunds Skujins

Author:Zigmunds Skujins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arcadia Books

XVII

Grandfather hurried down the stairs, whistling and so energetic that it was hard to keep up. I’m saying that less in regard to myself and more for the Golden Pheasant who escorted us from the high director’s office to the door. At the main doors, Grandfather shouted something happily and waved his top hat. The guards holding machine guns to their chests exchanged quick glances with one another, and returned the farewell. Their wide-set boots snapped briskly together then they returned to attention.

‘Now to that Italian invention!’ Grandfather shouted once we were back in the carriage.

‘Where?’

‘The ghetto! It was Pope Paul IV’s idea. He created the first ghetto in 1550 in Rome. And do you know why? To protect the Jews.’

‘The popes have their hands in everything!’

‘It is what it is. Even financially speaking, the Vatican’s merits are indisputable. In 1179 the pope prohibited Christians from handling currency exchange or loans.’

It was a cool, sunny day. The wind plucked the final leaves from the lindens along the boulevard, scattering them across the asphalt and cobblestone pavement. Where groups of pigeons used to gather in front of the Opera was now empty. Rumour was, the German soldiers had eaten them. The trams looked strange – the windows had been painted over in thick layers with only a hand-wide stripe left clean across the middle. The honour guard no longer stood in front of the Freedom Monument. Even the red-white-and-red flags were gone.

We passed under the railway viaduct in front of the central station. Anti-aircraft guns sat on the grassy embankment, their slender muzzles angled towards the sky. A little way beyond the Church of Jesus Christ a tall barbed-wire fence blocked the road. I’m not entirely certain, but it seemed to me that the word Grandfather spat out at that moment was not one to be used in public. It was the first time I had heard him speak that way.

‘Nothing in the world is more stupid than a blocked-off road,’ he sputtered angrily.

Even today, at the age he was back then, I have to agree with him. Truly, when a road is blocked by a wall or barbed wire, it’s indicative of a loss of sensibility.

An absurd scene unfolded before us. Cement gateposts rose up in the centre of the rapidly erected, transparent hedge. Their massive size and texture reminded me of pictures of the tank traps of the Siegfried Line that I’d seen in magazines. Next to the gate was a small guardhouse and checkpoint, built from freshly cut boards. A long chimney, like the chimney of Stephenson’s locomotive, sat atop the roof. Maybe not exactly like it, but that’s the impression I gained from the spotlight affixed to it.

No death marches had been led out of the ghetto gate as of yet, and there were still various pretexts given for the rounding up of all the Jews in one place.

As far as I could tell, the neighbourhood on their side of the barbed wire in no way differed from the side we were on.

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