MORNING SERIAL
HE HEARD the matron say, in a tranquil, comfortable tone, sewing hooks and eyes on to a child’s frock, ‘She was a very dirty little girl. I tried, believe me, I tried. To take her under my wing. To show her the uses of soap and flannel. No good at all.’
‘No good,’ echoed Fraulein’s colleague. ‘Still, you tried.’
‘Of course,’ said Fraulein, ‘it was hopeless from the start. They could tell, you see, the girls, from the outset. Tell the difference.’
‘What difference was that, Mrs Meier?’ asked Michael. Looking into the common room for Isolde, he had found only the matrons having a thick gossip in Plattdeutsch. They looked mildly shocked at this incursion into their female zone. He tickled the old trout on her underbelly. And indeed her mottled hands reminded him signally of that fish. ‘I presume you mean that she is an unhealthy example of world Jewry?’
Beneath the mask of powder, a flush spread. She bent to her sewing, dabbing the needle through the cotton with a thimbled finger, while she negotiated the possibility of irony. Michael smiled at her quandary.
‘Was she indeed, Mr Quantz? That I didn’t know.’
‘Come, come, Mrs Meier. We are not so naive.’ He slid down his fingers again, steadily, into the soupy green of polluted water, reaching round for her belly. ‘A Jew can always be smelt,’ he whispered in Plattdeutsch. ‘Or even a half-Jew. A quarter-Jew. The bad blood overcomes the good. Aren’t I right?’
‘Certainly, this girl gave off a bad smell,’ she agreed, not quitting her cover. ‘The English are less than particular about these things – either that, or they pretend for good manners’ sake not to notice. A pity for all concerned.’ She put down the frock on her lap, needle between thumb and forefinger. ‘Cleanliness is everything, I think you will agree?’
She put this proposition to Michael with banal finality. Then stared, and they all stared, balefully, as if through a compound eye, hoping to drive him off.
> The Element of Water by Stevie Davies is published by Parthian in the Library of Wales series www.parthianbooks.com
CONTINUES TOMORROW