To the edge of sorrow, p.10
To the Edge of Sorrow, page 10
Kamil again warns us not to become addicted to far-reaching hopes but to prepare for immediate challenges. If the Red Army comes and liberates us, we will shout our thanks, but until then, drills and more drills, text study and more text study: what comes from within is doubly strong.
Organized study at night has halted for the time being. Fatigue and the dampness have subdued us. But Kamil won’t give up. Before supper, he reads out a few verses from the weekly Torah portion or a chapter from the Book of Psalms. Before we set out on an operation, he reads the psalm that begins “The Lord is my shepherd.”
“What’s the point of reading verses we don’t understand?” ask those who don’t agree with him.
“Because our ancestors depended on these verses day and night.”
“This isn’t rational, it’s hocus-pocus,” someone says.
Every statement by Kamil that touches on tribal faith remains provocative. At times he seems unable to respond. Because of the many objections, his thoughts aren’t as well phrased as they should be. More than once, the words have been stuck in his mouth, and one time, as he tried to overcome these obstacles, he began to stammer. But when Kamil goes out at night, his orders are clear-cut, and he marches like a young man. And on top of that, when one of us becomes short of breath, Kamil props him up and doesn’t leave him until he gets his wind back.
* * *
—
THE PERSON WHO has brought a new spirit to the base is Isidor, one of the three young men who recently joined us. Isidor has a pleasant voice, and he knows prayers and Hasidic melodies. When he was a child, his grandfather took him to a Hasidic synagogue, and there he heard the Sabbath, festival, and daily prayers.
His parents were not pleased that he went to synagogue, but Isidor loved his grandfather and the prayers. When he was small, his grandfather would wrap him in his prayer shawl and show him the words in the prayer book. When he was older, he would stand beside his grandfather and pray with him.
At night we are greatly fatigued, but when Isidor sings some prayers, his clear, pure voice enchants us and we follow it, like a magic flute.
“Do you observe the commandments?” Danzig asked him.
“No, but when I pray, I see vivid images, and my heart yearns for my parents and grandfather.”
“Do you pray every day?”
“No.”
“Did your father pray?”
“No.”
Everyone was surprised by these blunt questions, which forced Isidor to bare his soul. Danzig—who takes care not to hurt those under his authority, in particular Milio, whom he protects like a parent—he of all people was carried away by curiosity.
One evening Isidor announced, “Tonight I will not sing.”
“Why?” everyone wondered.
“The melodies ran away from me.”
“They’ll surely come back.”
“I hope so.”
Isidor looked surprised, as if he were speaking not of himself but of someone else who was confused or troubled.
I have learned: everyone here carries an inner secret, or a bitter disappointment that’s hard to speak about. It’s no wonder that our conversation is mostly restrained. Isidor, too, who had appeared to pray so fluently, turns out to have restraints of his own.
This odd reticence makes us very uneasy. Kamil senses that Isidor’s problem is no trivial matter. The few nights when he prayed had filled us with longing for parents and grandparents, and suddenly that melody was extinguished.
Ever since Isidor stopped praying, he is unable to rest. He works at odd jobs at the base and is always asking, “When will we go out on a mission?”
Grandma Tsirl tells him, “Itche Meir, you have nothing to worry about: Prayer will come back to you. Your grandfather, who lives inside of you, will open your mouth.”
“And what should I do until then?” Isidor asks cautiously.
“Nothing, it will happen by itself, when you least expect it.”
There is a calm in Grandma Tsirl’s voice that immediately relaxes him. “Did you know my grandfather personally?” he inquires.
“I knew him well; we were neighbors. And I remember you, too, little bird. On the Sabbath and on holidays you would go with your grandfather to the synagogue, always nicely dressed.”
“Why were my parents displeased that I went to synagogue?”
“Every generation goes its own way; they also meant well. Your parents bought a record player and liked to listen to classical music. They would sit for hours on the glassed-in porch and listen. While they listened to music, you sat with your grandfather in the little synagogue of the Vizhnitz Hasidim. The praying of the Vizhnitz Hasidim is very sweet. You tasted more than a little of it and it lodged inside of you.”
* * *
—
AT NIGHT SOME of the fighters get gloves from Reb Hanoch. Reb Hanoch dresses them in stocking caps, gloves, and vests, and although we don’t talk about him much, his presence is felt and seen. Not a day passes without his gifts. He knits day and night, and every item he makes is nice and warm. It’s too bad we don’t know how to thank him as we should.
30
Kamil has hatched a new idea: learning Hebrew. “Every day we’ll learn a word and use it as a password,” he says. Fortunately, one of the books we brought from that abandoned house was a German-Hebrew dictionary. “It’s impossible to be a Jew without the original Hebrew language, where all the ancient spiritual treasures are hidden. Every day we’ll learn a word, and it will revive us.”
The communists and Bundists object. If we study, they say, we should study Yiddish, not Hebrew. Yiddish is the language of the people, and it should be cherished. Hebrew is the language of the religious rituals that clouded the minds of the masses. Hebrew belongs to prehistory and not to history. We must study Yiddish, the language of the tormented people who were deported to the camps. Hebrew will lead us far away from ourselves, into the primeval darkness.
There are many more strong objections. Kamil makes the decision. “Whoever wants to learn Hebrew will learn it, and whoever wants to learn Yiddish, that’s fine, too. Both are holy languages. The first Hebrew word we will learn is avodah. Avodah means work but also avodat kodesh, holy work. This describes our situation here. Let’s repeat: avodah.”
This gesture of goodwill is also met with objections. Fortunately, Tsila has prepared a dessert of compote from dried fruit that the fighters have brought. The compote bridged the differences of opinion and improved the mood.
* * *
—
ISIDOR AND HIS TWO COMPANIONS have completed their personal training and in two days will begin to drill with a squad. For their first mission, Kamil added them to Felix’s expanded squad, which went to catch fish in the lake, not far from the base.
The three have gotten stronger and no longer walk like raw recruits. In a short time they have learned the various ways of walking and are pleased with their first assignment.
We spread out the net and waited for about an hour. When we lifted it, we found, to our surprise, five big fish and about ten small ones. We would have tried again, but a sudden rain came down and drenched us. We put the catch in sacks and returned to the base.
Kamil saw the fish and called out, “Marvelous! What a wonderful meal Tsila will make us.” Kamil gets excited about things that make everyone happy. His excitement brings out the boy in him. The fighters hurried to help Tsila and Miriam prepare the fish and cook them on the coals.
It was a meal fit for a king. We sang Russian marches till late at night.
Kamil had a few drinks and announced: “Today we rescued from oblivion the Hebrew word avodah. The word avodah, unlike its cousin melakhah, which means labor, also has the connotation of holiness. The opposite of avodat kodesh is avodah zarah, idolatry, and there is also avodah shebalev, work of the heart—prayer. Every Hebrew word we acquire is a gift. It holds within it so much of our spiritual property. Do not forget, we are the last guardians of these treasures.”
Kamil was not drunk, but his spirits were high and he was clearly connected to worlds beyond our reach. Tears eventually came to his eyes. He tried to stop them, but he was overcome with weeping and slipped away into the darkness.
31
We conserve our batteries and listen to the radio only at night. Ever since we’ve had a radio, our lives have changed. At exactly seven in the evening, if there’s no alarm or sudden alert, we huddle around the receiver and eagerly listen to the news. In Kamil’s opinion we are overly wedded to expectations from elsewhere. Training our hearts is more important.
When Kamil speaks, we have the feeling he is not speaking to our handful, but to the many people who are on their way to us.
For now, only three have arrived, and we held a party to mark the conclusion of their training. Tsila and Miriam baked cookies filled with plum jam. A few days ago Hermann Cohen, with the help of two fighters, set up a field oven, which has now proved its ability.
We all respect Kamil, but it’s hard to accept his insistence that holing up in the mountains is a journey into ourselves and to the God of our fathers. There is a strong light in this mysterious man that pulls us toward him but is scary and intimidating at the same time.
His deputy Felix is closer to us in all respects. Felix may be a silent man who will rarely utter a complete sentence, but his broad, steady body inspires peace and quiet. Raids with him are not wrapped in weighty thoughts, like raids with Kamil. His whole being says, Act and don’t talk and don’t interpret. Whoever wants to talk and debate should do so at night by the campfire. Too many thoughts undermine concentration. One has to focus on the mission. The mission is the main thing, and the rest is unimportant. It’s best to sleep after the mission and not end the nights with arguments. A person who talks depletes his spirit for nothing. Sleep makes us ready for difficult struggles; it not only refreshes our energies but also cleans out the debris within us. So says Felix, without uttering a word.
I sometimes think we harm Kamil, and ourselves, when we argue. But what can you do, the arguments arise spontaneously. It’s good that on recent nights Isidor has been telling us about the last days in the ghetto. There’s a melody to his words. He chooses them carefully so that each word and phrase paints a picture.
In the final days before the last deportation, Isidor told us, the people stood at the high fences and pleaded with the Ruthenian women, “Take one child; we’ll pay you for every day.” The farm women waved their hands in refusal. More maddening still were their gestures toward the heavens, as if to say, it’s God’s doing, not ours.
Isidor’s two friends are still in a state of shock. The three train all day, they saw wooden beams, and they help in the kitchen. They’ve gone out on small raids, but the two of them don’t talk. When they train and work, they resemble us, but when they sit, eating or gazing, they seem stupefied. What happened to us?, their eyes say. How did we get here; was it all by chance?
Even in the midst of a fireside conversation, their puzzled look remains the same. I sometimes think it’s not bewilderment but dread about what the future holds for us.
* * *
—
SINCE THE ARRIVAL of the three young men, I again see Anastasia’s face clearly. When the war broke out, I was certain that the dangers would only strengthen our relationship.
Once, on our way home, smitten and saturated with love, Anastasia asked, “Why do people hate the Jews?”
“It’s prejudice; Jews are no different from other people.”
“I know,” she said, her lips pursed in an alluring smile. She had the grace and beauty of a girl who grew up outside the city, with fresh air and a big garden, and a stable and cowshed beside the house.
Within the gymnasium her manner was reserved and she spoke little. She was a good student yet didn’t excel in any subject. She did her homework, paid attention in class but didn’t ask questions. She always looked wary, as if she didn’t belong. But outside of school her movements were free, her speech unrestrained, and by the river and at the park she would laugh loudly. Every little thing would make her laugh. Once, when I told her I wanted to learn to ride horses, she let out a rather scornful chuckle. When I asked why, she said, “I was already riding when I was seven.”
In those besotted days I didn’t look at the details but at the whole, and the whole was Anastasia—a kind of living miracle who keeps amazing you: the magnificent neck, the head bobbing like a young bird’s, and the body sculpted like a statue. I was sure she’d be with me forever and we would always be young.
When I was with Anastasia, talk seemed superfluous. To hug, to kiss, and to laugh seemed the right things to do. To write, do homework, excel, take part in a debate—they seemed to me unnecessary, artificial, and pointless.
Not surprisingly, my schoolwork deteriorated. Classmates were jealous of me, and I was once kicked by a bully who yelled, “Stick to your own kind and don’t bother our girls.” I hit him back twice as hard. In truth, I wasn’t looking for confrontation at that time. I was overflowing with happiness.
My parents’ world darkened as my studies suffered. At first they said nothing and sat sullenly at the table. But after they were called to the school for a meeting, they cried out in pain, “What’s happened to you, Edmund?” They looked at me as if I’d been struck by a hidden illness.
“Nothing; soon it’ll all be back to normal,” I said, knowing I was keeping the truth from them.
Disaster followed disaster. First I was expelled from school along with my Jewish friends, and right after my expulsion, my mother’s illness got worse.
I would occasionally bring Anastasia home, to show off her beauty. My mother didn’t say a word. My father would joke with her. Her beauty apparently impressed him, too.
We were still allowed to walk on certain streets. But then walls were erected around the Jewish area. Money ran out and food was lacking. People stood alongside their homes and sold clothes and household goods. But I ignored the turmoil around me. Even my mother’s illness. She would sometimes turn to me and ask, “What has happened?” She didn’t realize I’d been swept into a whirlwind.
The meetings with Anastasia had become dangerous, and she hinted that we should keep them to a minimum. I wasn’t afraid. I was smitten with Anastasia and I said, “We’ll always be together. Fate will not separate us, cannot separate us.” Anastasia responded with a thin smile that I took as agreement. In those days I saw only what I wanted to see.
And then came that fateful Tuesday. We had made a date to meet at seven o’clock at Lilac Lane. I waited a full hour and Anastasia didn’t appear.
I was about to go to her house but held back. Her father with his peasant’s face didn’t much like me, and one time he’d said to me, “We don’t stay long at parties. An honest person goes to bed early.” I knew this was a warning, and I avoided going to her house.
That same week we were banished to the ghetto. I was sure that in the evening I would see Anastasia at the fence. I looked for her among the farm women who came to sell bread and vegetables, and I gave one of them, a woman who used to work at our house, a short letter and asked her to give it to Anastasia. “I’ll wait for you by the fence at five o’clock,” I wrote to her. “Love always, Edmund.”
That entire time I was certain her father had locked her up at home, and this was why she didn’t come. I imagined her sitting by a barred window, her eyes filled with yearning.
I planned to slip out of the ghetto, come to her house, and rescue her. But all my attempts to mix in with the workers going out to their jobs nearly ended in disaster. I was stubborn. Day after day I went back to the fence, surveying the people strolling on the sidewalk, looking intently for Anastasia.
As I stood waiting by the fence, I saw from afar a young girl coming out of Lilac Lane, a tennis racquet in her hand: Anastasia. She was headed for the tennis club. I couldn’t believe what I saw and became very emotional: my eyes filled with tears.
Only the next day did I realize: Anastasia’s daily schedule had not changed. Tuesday afternoons she goes to the tennis club. The next morning, I saw her walking to the gymnasium, schoolbag on her back, surrounded by our classmates, joking and jostling. I couldn’t hear her voice from far away, but all her movements said: What was, was. Life goes on and let’s enjoy it.
For months we were imprisoned in the ghetto; every day we saw the face of death. A man was shot because he went too close to the fence, and people were removed from their homes and sent by truck to unknown places. Someone who tried to escape was punished by being hung in the square.
Dangers lurked everywhere, and eventually we also began to starve. But for some reason I was sure that in another day or two Anastasia would appear and show me a breach in the fence through which I would squeeze my way out to her.
32
On our way back to the base from one of the raids we returned to the same abandoned house where we had found the books. We took whatever we could; every book on those shelves was valuable. Again we saw in our mind’s eye the remarkable people who had lived in this house, far from any Jewish community, in the heart of a tranquil, wide-open landscape. Every time we come here, their images appear before us. Dear Jews, Kamil calls them, who left us this great treasure. Were it not for them, this green wilderness would be the end of us.
I am reading Heinrich Graetz’s magnificent History of the Jews. It’s still hard for me to see the whole picture, but I am eagerly reliving the conquest of the Land by the Tribes of Israel, their first exile, and their wondrous return to the homeland. And then their second, terrible expulsion and their dispersion among the nations. As I read, I can share Kamil’s sense of awe.
