Page 36 of The Watchmaker of Dachau

Isaac did not know how to reply. His fingers balled into his palms, his nails biting into the skin, the pain stopping his brain from understanding what Becher was really trying to say.

‘Now, I have another bag for you. These are a few watches – special pocket watches, in fact – that I was given on one of my trips to Munich. I’d like to gift them to some comrades, yet they need any engravings removed, a polish, a service, before they are ready.’

He handed Isaac the bag, the weight of the watches inside substantially heavier than before.

‘I must be going,’ Becher said, his eyes once more trailing Anna as she pegged the last sheet. ‘I’ve told the maid to bring you coffee and food each day – I cannot have you wasting away, can I?’ He laughed.

Isaac forced a smile, realising that Becher had no idea about Greta’s small gifts of food. Perhaps he could save some, take it back to the camp for Elijah?

‘Work your magic,’ Becher said, walking away, following Anna into the house.

Isaac watched him. He touched Anna’s shoulder just before she reached the kitchen door. She turned and Becher said something to her. She smiled, but Isaac could see from her body language that she was terrified.

Becher laughed, then pushed past Anna so that his arm brushed against her chest. When he had gone, Anna looked to her chest, then smoothed her brown dress in place and walked inside after him.

Isaac turned away and spilled the bag of watches onto the table – gold pocket watches, silver, and heavy men’s wristwatches, all of good quality. A few were engraved with messages from a wife to a husband, from children to their fathers, birthday wishes and all with love.

Isaac imagined Becher sitting in a smoky bar in Munich, his colleagues next to him, all of them bartering each other’s treasures whilst they drank and talked of women, of their rich lives, of the new world they were making for their own children.

‘What did Father give you?’ Isaac turned to see the boy at the door of the shed, holding something in his hands.

‘Watches. More watches.’ He turned away from Friedrich, from the meanness of the boy’s tongue that could whip him again.

‘I brought you these.’ Friedrich stepped forward and gave him what had been in his hands. Isaac sat down and looked at the gift – a pair of black woollen gloves, the fingertips cut away.

‘My hands are smaller than yours, so I thought if I cut the fingertips out then they would fit you and you could still mend things.’

‘Thank you,’ Isaac turned the gloves over and then held them out to the boy, ‘but I can’t take them.’

‘Please. It’s from me, to say I am sorry for what I said the other day. I wanted to bring them to you sooner, but Mother has been home, and Father. They’ve gone out now – he’s taking her to an opera, they won’t be back until late.’

‘If they see me with them, they will take them away. It’s pointless that I keep them.’

Friedrich sat on an upturned bucket. ‘Then hide them in here and just wear them when you’re working. They’ll keep you warm. If anyone finds them, I’ll say I put them in here when I was playing and forgot them.’

Isaac smiled at the boy and pulled the gloves on.

‘Are you magic?’ the boy asked, his elbows on his knees, his palms upturned to hold his chin.

‘Excuse me?’

‘I heard Father say that you had to work your magic. Are you then? Magic?’

‘I don’t know magic, no.’

‘That’s a shame. If I were a magician, I would make myself disappear from here.’

‘And where would you go?’

‘I’d go to see my friend Otto. His father lets him build treehouses. My father won’t let me.’

‘That sounds like a nice idea.’ Isaac picked up a wristwatch, its glass face smashed, the tiny clock face scratched and scarred. He doubted he could mend this one.

‘Where would you go?’ The boy stood and peered at the watches, and reached out his finger to trace the engravings of birds, ships and flowers etched into the pocket watch cases.

‘What do you mean?’

‘If you were magic, where would you make yourself go? Would you stay in the town with the others or would you leave?’