I stood alone in the cold and dark once more. It was as if I had imagined Ella. But the piece of bread and the pretzel were there in my pocket and the coin in my palm, reassuring me that she was real. I prayed she would have the chance to come again.

“Sadie!” a voice whispered urgently behind me in the darkness. It was Saul, who must have been out walking. Or maybe he had come looking for me. Normally I would have been happy to see him, but now I was startled. His eyes traveled up to the grate and then back to me. Had he seen Ella?

“Sadie, no!” He grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back into the shadows, his eyes deep with concern. “You can’t let anyone see you. I know you are lonely. But the Poles are not to be trusted,” he added forcefully.

“Surely not all Poles.”

“All of them.” His face grew stony and in the resoluteness of his voice I heard the horrors of stories he had lived but not shared with me.

“What about Pawel?” I asked. “He’s a Pole and he has helped us.”

He did not answer. “Promise me you won’t go again.” There was a note of tenderness in his voice.

“I promise.” I knew even as I said the words that they were a lie. I would go to the grate again to see Ella. There was something about her that told me I could trust her, even if Saul could not see it.

Saul took the water jug and we started back down the tunnel. As we neared the chamber, Bubbe stood, blocking our path. “What’s that?” she cried, pointing to my pocket where the edge of the pretzel peeked out. Our relationship with the Rosenbergs had become close during our weeks in the sewer, and despite the difficulty of living together in such close quarters, moments of acrimony between our two families were few. But elderly Bubbe seemed to grow more grouchy and irrational over time, as if the strain of living here was wearing on her.

“It’s mine,” I said, trying to step around her through the entranceway.

Bubbe shifted sideways in the same direction, unwilling to be deterred. “Thief!” she cried, seeming to think I had taken the pretzel from our food stores. I opened my mouth to tell her that such a thing was impossible. We didn’t even have obwarzanki here; it wasn’t a food that Pawel brought, so how could I have stolen it?

Before I could speak, my mother appeared behind her in the entranceway to the chamber. “How dare you?” she demanded of Bubbe, having heard the exchange in the tunnel. Mama had grown sullen and drawn these past few weeks, as her pregnancy and our time in the sewer dragged on. Now she seemed to find strength in defending me.

“She’s got extra food,” Bubbe accused, pointing her gnarled finger close to my face. “Either she’s stealing it or she’s going up to ground without our knowing.”