The Hidden Child

Chapter 44

They were picked up from the concentration camp in Neuengamme. It was rumoured that the white buses had first had to remove a lot of other prisoners, including Poles, from the camp before they could make room for the Nordic prisoners. It was also rumoured that this had cost a number of people their lives. The prisoners of other nationalities had been in much worse shape than the Scandinavians, who had received food parcels by various means and so had managed to survive the camps in relatively better condition. It was said that many failed to survive the journey, while others had endured terrible suffering during their transport from the camp. But even if the rumours were true, nobody dared think about that now. Not when freedom was suddenly within reach. Bernadotte had negotiated with the Germans and secured permission to bring home the Nordic prisoners, and now they were finally on their way.

His legs wobbling, Axel climbed on board the white bus. This would be his second journey in a matter of months, and the horrors of the last one – from Sachsenhausen to Neuengamme – still kept him awake at night. He would lie in his bunk reliving the hell of being locked in a freight car, listening to the bombs falling all around them, sometimes exploding so close that they could hear debris raining down on the roof above them. But miraculously none of the bombs had scored a direct hit. For some reason, Axel had survived even that. And now, just as he had almost lost all will to live, word had come that they were finally going home.

He was one of the few prisoners still capable of making his way unaided. Some were in such bad shape that they had to be carried on board. Carefully he settled down on the floor, drawing up his legs and listlessly resting his head on his knees. He couldn’t comprehend it. He was going home. To his mother and father. And to Erik. To Fjällbacka. In his mind’s eye he pictured everything so clearly. All the things he hadn’t allowed himself to think about for such a long time. But finally, now that he knew it was all within reach, he allowed the thoughts and memories to pour over him. At the same time, he knew that life would never be the same. He would never be the same. He had seen things, experienced things, that had changed him for ever.

He hated how he had changed. Hated what he had been forced to do and what he had been forced to witness. And it wasn’t over yet, just because he had climbed into this bus. Their journey was a long one, and along the way they saw towns reduced to smouldering rubble and a country in ruins. Two prisoners died, one of them Axel’s neighbour whose shoulder he had leaned against for the brief periods when he was able to sleep. One morning Axel shifted his position on waking and the man toppled, his body stiff and cold as if he’d been dead for some time. Axel had simply pushed the body away and called to one of the people in charge of the transport. Then he had hunkered down in his place again. It was just another death. He had seen so many.

He found himself constantly raising his hand to touch his ear. Sometimes he heard a roaring sound, but most often it was filled with an empty, rushing silence. So many times he had pictured that scene in his mind. Of course he had endured things that were much worse since then, but there was something about the sight of the guard’s rifle butt coming towards him that represented the ultimate betrayal. In spite of the fact that they stood on opposite sides in the war, they had established a human contact that had given him a sense of respect and security. But when he saw the boy raise the butt of his rifle and felt the pain as it struck him above the ear, all his illusions about the innate goodness of human beings had been shattered.

As he sat there in the bus, surrounded by others who had suffered as he had, many of them so sick and traumatized that they would not survive, he made a sacred vow to himself: he would never rest until he had brought to justice those responsible. He would make it his mission to see to it that the guilty did not escape punishment.

Axel put his hand up to his ear again and tried to picture the home he had left. Soon, very soon, he would be there.