“You have a lot of space here, the outbuildings, the barn. Yes?”

“I tend several large fields. It takes a lot of equipment.”

“You could keep a second family here. Or hide a swarm of Jews—”

Róża feels as if her bowels might give way. Henryk doesn’t miss a beat.

“Oh, maybe just a pretty girl to have my way with in the night. Of course, I’d have to kill the rest of her family—”

The soldier laughs. His tone is friendlier now.

The conversation is muffled for a moment. Then Róża hears:

“We need your barn for storing supplies. I’ll give you four days to clear it out.”

So this is it.

“Of course,” Henryk says, sounding lighthearted. “I will clean out some space and, you know, get my girl out before the wife sees.”

The clomp of boots recedes. The barn door scrapes shut. For several moments, Róża holds herself frozen. What will become of them?

She waits a long while before moving Shira back to the loft. Once there she insists they remain buried beneath the hay. She weighs their options: The Gracja ghetto? The woods? The merchant’s house?

At nightfall, Krystyna steps inside with food.

“Róża.”

Róża attempts to disentangle herself from the hay, to stand, but her legs shake terribly. “I know.”

Krystyna’s pails hold twice as much as usual—barley soup and radish salad. She speaks in the most formal Polish, coded to keep the conversation above Shira’s comprehension. Arrangements for Shira are nearly set: false papers, a transport plan, her placement in a convent orphanage.

“Where?” Róża asks.

“In Celestyn.”

“How far is that from here?”

“Others refused, Róża. This one said yes.”

“But how far?”

“Nearly three hundred kilometers, due south.”

Three hundred kilometers! Róża slides back to sitting and gathers Shira close.

What better alternative does she have?

She can’t know what safety she can secure for Shira, with her or apart. She tightens her clasp around her girl, her lips moving in a loop of prayer. With every sound from outside the barn—the ricochet of voices, the creak of wagon wheels, the slow clop of horses’ hooves—she seizes up with fear.

The streets are quiet now—the Germans have gone from the village, no ruckus even from the tavern—yet her mother won’t let Shira out of her grasp. Shira shifts to evade her mother’s scent, breath like turned milk, and peers through a wall crack. Her mother strokes Shira’s cheek, over and over, presses her face to her neck. When Shira asks what’s wrong, her mother looks away, mumbling.