Page 78 of The Watchmaker of Dachau

Then he noticed the lantern begin to glow its burnt orange in the shed window, alerting him to Isaac’s arrival. Although his mother roamed the hallways, tiger-like, he could easily dodge past her and get to the shed.

He placed the binoculars on the floor and crept out of the spare bedroom, noticing each squeak of the dusty floorboards as he walked.

Reaching the top of the stairs, he looked down and saw two men, both wearing mustard-coloured overalls, wrapping the grandfather clock in cloth, a large crate next to them on the floor. Another man entered through the front door, carrying a large box. He shook his head like a dog to rid himself of the rain and trailed wet footprints into the dining room.

Friedrich descended the stairs, spotting that the photographs and paintings that had hung on the walls had now disappeared, leaving clean rectangular spaces on the dirty white of the wallpaper.

They were leaving. Of course they were. But where?

Suddenly Friedrich was excited – of course, they were going home! Back to their townhouse in either Munich or Berlin. He wanted to race to the telephone to call Otto and tell him the news – they would be together again soon.

He did not care if his mother heard him now, and ran down the rest of the stairs, almost bumping into one of the mustard-coloured men as he tried to edge the clock closer to the box, ready to lay it in its tomb-like case.

‘Watch yourself!’ the mustard man scolded him. ‘You break this, and I’ll tell your mother.’

Friedrich ignored him, but then he saw a postmark on the lid of the case that would be hammered into place to hold the clock still.

It was a strange postmark – one he had not seen before – but he made out the smudged word: Argentina.

He knew the name of the country and tried to place it, straining to remember those long geography lessons where he and Otto, instead of listening to the teacher, had drawn silly pictures in the back of their books to make each other laugh.

He could see the outline of his mother in the dining room – she was with the wet man – and Friedrich scooted past quickly, into the kitchen and out to the garden, heading for the shed.

Isaac was not alone when Friedrich entered. Anna was sitting on the bucket – his bucket that he would sit on when he came to visit. Stupidly, he wanted to push her off it and tell her that it was his, but then he saw that her eyes were red and tired, and her face seemed to have deflated, leaving cheekbones that jutted out, making her eyes look too big for her face.

‘Friedrich.’ Anna stood. ‘Is everything all right?’

‘We’re leaving,’ he cried. ‘It’s really happening.’

He saw Anna look over his head towards the house, a crease in her brow.

‘When?’ Anna asked him.

‘There are men downstairs now, packing things, and I saw a postmark on a box, a label saying where to send the things – it said Argentina.’

‘I must go – she’ll be looking for me.’ Anna did not wait for a reply and scurried down the path towards his mother.

Friedrich closed the door after Anna.

‘Argentina,’ Isaac said.

Friedrich sat on the upturned bucket. ‘Where is it?’ he asked.

‘South America,’ Isaac answered. ‘It’s very far away. It’s very hot.’

Friedrich remembered now the comments about the heat from his father, how his mother had been upset by them – she did not want to go.

‘What if I don’t want to leave?’ Isaac was smiling, a faraway look on his face as if he were dreaming. ‘Isaac, what if I don’t want to go!’

‘It’s really happening,’ Isaac croaked, then began to cough, a hard cough that made him clutch his chest.

Friedrich stepped forward to support him. He wanted to run back to Anna, to get her to help.

‘It’s all right, I’ll be all right,’ Isaac said, as if reading his mind.

‘What will happen if we leave? Where will you go, back to the camp?’ Friedrich asked.

Isaac stared at him and did not speak.