They called him Moishe the Beadle, as if his entire
life he had never had a surname. He was the jack-ofall-trades
in a Hasidic house of prayer, a shtibl. The Jews
of Sighet—the little town in Transylvania where I spent my childhood–were fond of him. He was poor and lived in utter penury.
As a rule, our townspeople, while they did help the needy, did
not particularly like them. Moishe the Beadle was the exception.
He stayed out of people's way. His presence bothered no
one. He had mastered the art of rendering himself insignificant,
invisible.
Physically, he was as awkward as a clown. His waiflike shyness
made people smile. As for me, I liked his wide, dreamy eyes, gazing
off into the distance. He spoke little. He sang, or rather he
chanted, and the few snatches I caught here and there spoke of
divine suffering, of the Shekhinah in Exile, where, according to
Kabbalah, it awaits its redemption linked to that of man.
I met him in 1941. I was almost thirteen and deeply observant.
By day I studied Talmud and by night I would run to the synagogue
to weep over the destruction of the Temple.
One day I asked my father to find me a master who could
guide me in my studies of Kabbalah. "You are too young for that.
Maimonides tells us that one must be thirty before venturing into
the world of mysticism, a world fraught with peril. First you must
study the basic subjects, those you are able to comprehend."
My father was a cultured man, rather unsentimental. He rarely
displayed his feelings, not even within his family, and was more
involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kin.
The Jewish community of Sighet held him in highest esteem; his
advice on public and even private matters was frequently sought.
There were four of us children. Hilda, the eldest; then Bea; I was
the third and the only son; Tzipora was the youngest.
My parents ran a store. Hilda and Bea helped with the work.
As for me, my place was in the house of study, or so they said.
"There are no Kabbalists in Sighet," my father would often
tell me.
He wanted to drive the idea of studying Kabbalah from my
mind. In vain. I succeeded on my own in finding a master for myself
in the person of Moishe the Beadle.
He had watched me one day as I prayed at dusk.
"Why do you cry when you pray?" he asked, as though he
knew me well.
"I don't know," I answered, troubled.
I had never asked myself that question. I cried because
because something inside me felt the need to cry. That was all
I knew.
"Why do you pray?" he asked after a moment.
Why did I pray? Strange question. Why did I live? Why did
I breathe?
"I don't know," I told him, even more troubled and ill at ease.
"I don't know."
From that day on, I saw him often. He explained to me, with
great emphasis, that every question possessed a power that was
lost in the answer…
Man comes closer to God through the questions he asks Him,
he liked to say. Therein lies true dialogue. Man asks and God
replies. But we don't understand His replies. We cannot understand
them. Because they dwell in the depths of our souls and remain
there until we die. The real answers, Eliezer, you will find
only within yourself.
"And why do you pray, Moishe?" I asked him.
"I pray to the God within me for the strength to ask Him the
real questions."
We spoke that way almost every evening, remaining in the
synagogue long after all the faithful had gone, sitting in the semidarkness
where only a few half-burnt candles provided a flickering
light.
One evening, I told him how unhappy I was not to be able to
find in Sighet a master to teach me the Zohar, the Kabbalistic
works, the secrets of Jewish mysticism. He smiled indulgently.
After a long silence, he said, "There are a thousand and one gates
allowing entry into the orchard of mystical truth. Every human
being has his own gate. He must not err and wish to enter the orchard
through a gate other than his own. That would present a
danger not only for the one entering but also for those who are
already inside."
And Moishe the Beadle, the poorest of the poor of Sighet,
spoke to me for hours on end about the Kabbalah's revelations and
its mysteries. Thus began my initiation. Together we would read,
over and over again, the same page of the Zohar. Not to learn it by
heart but to discover within the very essence of divinity.
And in the course of those evenings I became convinced that
Moishe the Beadle would help me enter eternity, into that time
when question and answer would become ONE.
and then, one day all foreign Jews were expelled from Sighet.
And Moishe the Beadle was a foreigner.
Crammed into cattle cars by the Hungarian police, they cried
silently. Standing on the station platform, we too were crying.
The train disappeared over the horizon; all that was left was thick,
dirty smoke.
Behind me, someone said, sighing, "What do you expect?
That's war… "
The deportees were quickly forgotten. A few days after they
left, it was rumored that they were in Galicia, working, and even
that they were content with their fate.
Days went by. Then weeks and months. Life was normal
again. A calm, reassuring wind blew through our homes. The
shopkeepers were doing good business, the students lived among
their books, and the children played in the streets.
One day, as I was about to enter the synagogue, I saw Moishe
the Beadle sitting on a bench near the entrance.
He told me what had happened to him and his companions.
The train with the deportees had crossed the Hungarian border
and, once in Polish territory, had been taken over by the Gestapo.
The train had stopped. The Jews were ordered to get off and onto
waiting trucks. The trucks headed toward a forest. There everybody
was ordered to get out. They were forced to dig huge
trenches. When they had finished their work, the men from the
Gestapo began theirs. Without passion or haste, they shot their prisoners,
who were forced to approach the trench one by one and offer
their necks. Infants were tossed into the air and used as targets for
the machine guns. This took place in the Galician forest, near Kolomay.
How had he, Moishe the Beadle, been able to escape? By a
miracle. He was wounded in the leg and left for dead…
Day after day, night after night, he went from one Jewish
house to the next, telling his story and that of Malka, the young
girl who lay dying for three days, and that of Tobie, the tailor who
begged to die before his sons were killed.
Moishe was not the same. The joy in his eyes was gone. He no
longer sang. He no longer mentioned either God or Kabbalah. He
spoke only of what he had seen. But people not only refused to
believe his tales, they refused to listen. Some even insinuated
that he only wanted their pity, that he was imagining things. Others
flatly said that he had gone mad.
As for Moishe, he wept and pleaded:
"Jews, listen to me! That's all I ask of you. No money. No pity.
Just listen to me!" he kept shouting in synagogue, between the
prayer at dusk and the evening prayer.
Even I did not believe him. I often sat with him, after services,
and listened to his tales, trying to understand his grief. But
all I felt was pity.
"They think I'm mad," he whispered, and tears, like drops of
wax, flowed from his eyes.
Once, I asked him the question: "Why do you want people to
believe you so much? In your place I would not care whether they
believed me or not… "
He closed his eyes, as if to escape time.
"You don't understand," he said in despair. "You cannot understand.
I was saved miraculously. I succeeded in coming back. Where
did I get my strength? I wanted to return to Sighet to describe to
you my death so that you might ready yourselves while there is still
time. Life? I no longer care to live. I am alone. But I wanted to
come back to warn you. Only no one is listening to me …"
This was toward the end of 1942.
Thereafter, life seemed normal once again. London radio,
which we listened to every evening, announced encouraging
news: the daily bombings of Germany and Stalingrad, the preparation
of the Second Front. And so we, the Jews of Sighet, waited
for better days that surely were soon to come.
I continued to devote myself to my studies, Talmud during
the day and Kabbalah at night. My father took care of his business
and the community. My grandfather came to spend Rosh Hashanah
with us so as to attend the services of the celebrated
Rebbe of Borsche. My mother was beginning to think it was high
time to find an appropriate match for Hilda.
Thus passed the year 1943.
SPRING 1944 . Splendid news from the Russian Front. There
could no longer be any doubt: Germany would be defeated. It
was only a matter of time, months or weeks, perhaps.
The trees were in bloom. It was a year like so many others,
with its spring, its engagements, its weddings, and its births.
The people were saying, "The Red Army is advancing with
giant strides…Hitle r will not be able to harm us, even if he
wants to… "
Yes, we even doubted his resolve to exterminate us.
Annihilate an entire people? Wipe out a population dispersed
throughout so many nations? So many millions of people! By
what means? In the middle of the twentieth century!
And thus my elders concerned themselves with all manner of
things—strategy, diplomacy, politics, and Zionism—but not with
their own fate.
Even Moishe the Beadle had fallen silent. He was weary of
talking. He would drift through synagogue or through the streets,
hunched over, eyes cast down, avoiding people's gaze.
In those days it was still possible to buy emigration certificates
to Palestine. I had asked my father to sell everything, to liquidate
everything, and to leave.
"I am too old, my son," he answered. "Too old to start a new
life. Too old to start from scratch in some distant l a n d … "
Budapest radio announced that the Fascist party had seized
power. The regent Miklós Horthy was forced to ask a leader of
the pro-Nazi Nyilas party to form a new government.
Yet we still were not worried. Of course we had heard of the
Fascists, but it was all in the abstract. It meant nothing more to us
than a change of ministry.
The next day brought really disquieting news: German troops
had penetrated Hungarian territory with the government's approval.
Finally, people began to worry in earnest. One of my friends,
Moishe Chaim Berkowitz, returned from the capital for Passover
and told us, "The Jews of Budapest live in an atmosphere of fear
and terror. Anti-Semitic acts take place every day, in the streets,
on the trains. The Fascists attack Jewish stores, synagogues. The
situation is becoming very s e r i o u s …"
The news spread through Sighet like wildfire. Soon that was
all people talked about. But not for long. Optimism soon revived:
The Germans will not come this far. They will stay in Budapest.
For strategic reasons, for political reasons …
In less than three days, German Army vehicles made their
appearance on our streets.
ANGUISH. German soldiers—with their steel helmets and their
death's-head emblem. Still, our first impressions of the Germans
were rather reassuring. The officers were billeted in private
homes, even in Jewish homes. Their attitude toward their hosts
was distant but polite. They never demanded the impossible,
made no offensive remarks, and sometimes even smiled at the
lady of the house. A German officer lodged in the Kahns' house
across the street from us. We were told he was a charming man,
calm, likable, and polite. Three days after he moved in, he
brought Mrs. Kahn a box of chocolates. The optimists were jubilant:
"Well? What did we tell you? You wouldn't believe us. There
they are, your Germans. What do you say now? Where is their famous
cruelty?"
The Germans were already in our town, the Fascists were already
in power, the verdict was already out—and the Jews of
Sighet were still smiling.
THE EIGHT DAYS of Passover.
The weather was sublime. My mother was busy in the
kitchen. The synagogues were no longer open. People gathered
in private homes: no need to provoke the Germans.
Almost every rabbi's home became a house of prayer.
We drank, we ate, we sang. The Bible commands us to rejoice
during the eight days of celebration, but our hearts were not in it.
We wished the holiday would end so as not to have to pretend.
On the seventh day of Passover, the curtain finally rose: the
Germans arrested the leaders of the Jewish community.
From that moment on, everything happened very quickly.
The race toward death had begun.
First edict: Jews were prohibited from leaving their residences
for three days, under penalty of death.
Moishe the Beadle came running to our house.
"I warned you," he shouted. And left without waiting for a
response.
The same day, the Hungarian police burst into every Jewish
home in town: a Jew was henceforth forbidden to own gold, jewelry,
or any valuables. Everything had to be handed over to the
authorities, under penalty of death. My father went down to the
cellar and buried our savings.
As for my mother, she went on tending to the many chores in
the house. Sometimes she would stop and gaze at us in silence.
Three days later, a new decree: every Jew had to wear the yellow
star.
Some prominent members of the community came to consult
with my father, who had connections at the upper levels of the
Hungarian police; they wanted to know what he thought of the
situation. My father's view was that it was not all bleak, or perhaps
he just did not want to discourage the others, to throw salt
on their wounds:
"The yellow star? So what? It's not l e t h a l …"
(Poor Father! Of what then did you die?)
But new edicts were already being issued. We no longer had
the right to frequent restaurants or cafes, to travel by rail, to attend
synagogue, to be on the streets after six o'clock in the evening.
Then came the ghettos.
TWO GHETTOS were created in Sighet. A large one in the center of
town occupied four streets, and another smaller one extended
over several alleyways on the outskirts of town. The street we
lived on, Serpent Street, was in the first ghetto. We therefore
could remain in our house. But, as it occupied a corner, the windows
facing the street outside the ghetto had to be sealed. We
gave some of our rooms to relatives who had been driven out of
their homes.
Little by little life returned to "normal." The barbed wire that
encircled us like a wall did not fill us with real fear. In fact, we felt
this was not a bad thing; we were entirely among ourselves. A
small Jewish republic…A Jewish Council was appointed, as well
as a Jewish police force, a welfare agency, a labor committee, a
health agency—a whole governmental apparatus.
People thought this was a good thing. We would no longer
have to look at all those hostile faces, endure those hate-filled
stares. No more fear. No more anguish. We would live among
Jews, among brothers…
Of course, there still were unpleasant moments. Every day,
the Germans came looking for men to load coal into the military
trains. Volunteers for this kind of work were few. But apart from
that, the atmosphere was oddly peaceful and reassuring.
Most people thought that we would remain in the ghetto until
the end of the war, until the arrival of the Red Army. Afterward
everything would be as before. The ghetto was ruled by neither
German nor Jew; it was ruled by delusion.
SOME TWO WEEKS before Shavuot. A sunny spring day, people
strolled seemingly carefree through the crowded streets. They
exchanged cheerful greetings. Children played games, rolling
hazelnuts on the sidewalks. Some schoolmates and I were in Ezra
Malik's garden studying a Talmudic treatise.
Night fell. Some twenty people had gathered in our courtyard.
My father was sharing some anecdotes and holding forth on his
opinion of the situation. He was a good storyteller.
Suddenly, the gate opened, and Stern, a former shopkeeper
who now was a policeman, entered and took my father aside. Despite
the growing darkness, I could see my father turn pale.
"What's wrong?" we asked.
"I don't know. I have been summoned to a special meeting
of the Council. Something must have happened."
The story he had interrupted would remain unfinished.
"I'm going right now," he said. "I'll return as soon as possible.
I'll tell you everything. Wait for me."
We were ready to wait as long as necessary. The courtyard
turned into something like an antechamber to an operating room.
We stood, waiting for the door to open. Neighbors, hearing the rumors,
had joined us. We stared at our watches. Time had slowed
down. What was the meaning of such a long session?
"I have a bad feeling," said my mother. "This afternoon I saw
new faces in the ghetto. Two German officers, I believe they were
Gestapo. Since we've been here, we have not seen a single officer…"
It was close to midnight. Nobody felt like going to sleep,
though some people briefly went to check on their homes. Others
left but asked to be called as soon as my father returned.
At last, the door opened and he appeared. His face was
drained of color. He was quickly surrounded.
"Tell us. Tell us what's happening! Say something…"
At that moment, we were so anxious to hear something encouraging,
a few words telling us that there was nothing to worry
about, that the meeting had been routine, just a review of welfare
and health p r o b l e m s … B u t one glance at my father's face left
no doubt.
"The news is terrible," he said at last. And then one word:
"Transports."
The ghetto was to be liquidated entirely. Departures were to
take place street by street, starting the next day.
We wanted to know everything, every detail. We were
stunned, yet we wanted to fully absorb the bitter news.
"Where will they take us?"
That was a secret. A secret for all, except one: the president of
the Jewish Council. But he would not tell, or could not tell. The
Gestapo had threatened to shoot him if he talked.
"There are rumors," my father said, his voice breaking, "that
we are being taken somewhere in Hungary to work in the brick
factories. It seems that here, we are too close to the front…"
After a moment's silence, he added:
"Each of us will be allowed to bring his personal belongings.
A backpack, some food, a few items of clothing. Nothing
else."
Again, heavy silence.
"Go and wake the neighbors," said my father. "They must get
ready…"
The shadows around me roused themselves as if from a deep
sleep and left silently in every direction.
FOR A MOMENT, we remained alone. Suddenly Batia Reich, a relative
who lived with us, entered the room: "Someone is knocking
at the sealed window, the one that faces outside!"
It was only after the war that I found out who had knocked
that night. It was an inspector of the Hungarian police, a friend of
my father's. Before we entered the ghetto, he had told us, "Don't
worry. I'll warn you if there is danger." Had he been able to speak
to us that night, we might still have been able to flee…But by
the time we succeeded in opening the window, it was too late.
There was nobody outside.
THE GHETTO was awake. One after the other, the lights were going
on behind the windows.
I went into the house of one of my father's friends. I woke the
head of the household, a man with a gray beard and the gaze of a
dreamer. His back was hunched over from untold nights spent
studying.
"Get up, sir, get up! You must ready yourself for the journey.
Tomorrow you will be expelled, you and your family, you and all
the other Jews. Where to? Please don't ask me, sir, don't ask questions.
God alone could answer you. For heaven's sake, get u p … "
He had no idea what I was talking about. He probably thought
I had lost my mind.
"What are you saying? Get ready for the journey? What journey?
Why? What is happening? Have you gone mad?"
Half asleep, he was staring at me, his eyes filled with terror, as
though he expected me to burst out laughing and tell him to go
back to bed. To sleep. To dream. That nothing had happened. It
was all in jest…
My throat was dry and the words were choking me, paralyzing
my lips. There was nothing else to say.
At last he understood. He got out of bed and began to dress,
automatically. Then he went over to the bed where his wife lay
sleeping and with infinite tenderness touched her forehead. She
opened her eyes and it seemed to me that a smile crossed her lips.
Then he went to wake his two children. They woke with a start,
torn from their dreams. I fled.
Time went by quickly. It was already four o'clock in the morning.
My father was running right and left, exhausted, consoling
friends, checking with the Jewish Council just in case the order
had been rescinded. To the last moment, people clung to hope.
The women were boiling eggs, roasting meat, preparing cakes,
sewing backpacks. The children were wandering about aimlessly,
not knowing what to do with themselves to stay out of the way of
the grown-ups.
Our backyard looked like a marketplace. Valuable objects,
precious rugs, silver candlesticks, Bibles and other ritual objects
were strewn over the dusty grounds—pitiful relics that seemed
never to have had a home. All this under a magnificent blue sky.
By eight o'clock in the morning, weariness had settled into our
veins, our limbs, our brains, like molten lead. I was in the midst of
prayer when suddenly there was shouting in the streets. I quickly
unwound my phylacteries and ran to the window. Hungarian police
had entered the ghetto and were yelling in the street nearby.
"All Jews, outside! Hurry!"
They were followed by Jewish police, who, their voices breaking,
told us:
"The time has c o m e … y o u must leave all t h i s … "
The Hungarian police used their rifle butts, their clubs to indiscriminately
strike old men and women, children and cripples.
One by one, the houses emptied and the streets filled with people
carrying bundles. By ten o'clock, everyone was outside. The
police were taking roll calls, once, twice, twenty times. The heat
was oppressive. Sweat streamed from people's faces and bodies.
Children were crying for water.
Water! There was water close by inside the houses, the backyards,
but it was forbidden to break rank.
"Water, Mother, I am thirsty!"
Some of the Jewish police surreptitiously went to fill a few
jugs. My sisters and I were still allowed to move about, as we
were destined for the last convoy, and so we helped as best we
could.
AT LAST, at one o'clock in the afternoon came the signal to leave.
There was joy, yes, joy. People must have thought there could
be no greater torment in God's hell than that of being stranded
here, on the sidewalk, among the bundles, in the middle of the
street under a blazing sun. Anything seemed preferable to that.
They began to walk without another glance at the abandoned
streets, the dead, empty houses, the gardens, the tombstones…
On everyone's back, there was a sack. In everyone's eyes, tears
and distress. Slowly, heavily, the procession advanced toward the
gate of the ghetto.
And there I was, on the sidewalk, watching them file past, unable
to move. Here came the Chief Rabbi, hunched over, his face
strange looking without a beard, a bundle on his back. His very
presence in the procession was enough to make the scene seem
surreal. It was like a page torn from a book, a historical novel, perhaps,
dealing with the captivity in Babylon or the Spanish Inquisition.
They passed me by, one after the other, my teachers, my
friends, the others, some of whom I had once feared, some of
whom I had found ridiculous, all those whose lives I had shared
for years. There they went, defeated, their bundles, their lives in
tow, having left behind their homes, their childhood.
They passed me by, like beaten dogs, with never a glance in
my direction. They must have envied me.
The procession disappeared around the corner. A few steps
more and they were beyond the ghetto walls.
The street resembled fairgrounds deserted in haste. There
was a little of everything: suitcases, briefcases, bags, knives,
dishes, banknotes, papers, faded portraits. All the things one
planned to take along and finally left behind. They had ceased to
matter.
Open rooms everywhere. Gaping doors and windows looked
out into the void. It all belonged to everyone since it no longer
belonged to anyone. It was there for the taking. An open tomb.
A summer sun.
WE HAD SPENT the day without food. But we were not really hungry.
We were exhausted.
My father had accompanied the deportees as far as the
ghetto's gate. They first had been herded through the main synagogue,
where they were thoroughly searched to make sure they
were not carrying away gold, silver, or any other valuables. There
had been incidents of hysteria and harsh blows.
"When will it be our turn?" I asked my father.
"The day after tomorrow. Unless…things work out. A miracle,
perhaps…"
Where were the people being taken? Did anyone know yet?
No, the secret was well kept.
Night had fallen. That evening, we went to bed early. My father
said:
"Sleep peacefully, children. Nothing will happen until the day
after tomorrow, Tuesday."
Monday went by like a small summer cloud, like a dream in
the first hours of dawn.
Intent on preparing our backpacks, on baking breads and
cakes, we no longer thought about anything. The verdict had
been delivered.
That evening, our mother made us go to bed early. To conserve
our strength, she said.
It was to be the last night spent in our house.
I was up at dawn. I wanted to have time to pray before
leaving.
My father had risen before all of us, to seek information in
town. He returned around eight o'clock. Good news: we were not
leaving town today; we were only moving to the small ghetto.
That is where we were to wait for the last transport. We would be
the last to leave.
At nine o'clock, the previous Sunday's scenes were repeated.
Policemen wielding clubs were shouting:
"All Jews outside!"
We were ready. I went out first. I did not want to look at my
parents' faces. I did not want to break into tears. We remained sitting
in the middle of the street, like the others two days earlier.
The same hellish sun. The same thirst. Only there was no one
left to bring us water.
I looked at my house in which I had spent years seeking my
God, fasting to hasten the coming of the Messiah, imagining what
my life would be like later. Yet I felt little sadness. My mind was
empty.
"Get up! Roll call!"
We stood. We were counted. We sat down. We got up again.
Over and over. We waited impatiently to be taken away. What
were they waiting for? Finally, the order came:
"Forward! March!"
My father was crying. It was the first time I saw him cry. I had
never thought it possible. As for my mother, she was walking, her
face a mask, without a word, deep in thought. I looked at my little
sister, Tzipora, her blond hair neatly combed, her red coat over
her arm: a little girl of seven. On her back a bag too heavy for her.
She was clenching her teeth; she already knew it was useless to
complain. Here and there, the police were lashing out with their
clubs: "Faster!" I had no strength left. The journey had just begun
and I already felt so weak…
"Faster! Faster! Move, you lazy good-for-nothings!" the Hungarian
police were screaming.
That was when I began to hate them, and my hatred remains
our only link today. They were our first oppressors. They were
the first faces of hell and death.
They ordered us to run. We began to run. Who would have
thought that we were so strong? From behind their windows,
from behind their shutters, our fellow citizens watched as we
passed.
We finally arrived at our destination. Throwing down our bundles,
we dropped to the ground:
"Oh God, Master of the Universe, in your infinite compassion,
have mercy on u s … "
THE SMALL GHETTO. Only three days ago, people were living
here. People who owned the things we were using now. They had
been expelled. And we had already forgotten all about them.
The chaos was even greater here than in the large ghetto. Its
inhabitants evidently had been caught by surprise. I visited the
rooms that had been occupied by my Uncle Mendel's family. On
the table, a half-finished bowl of soup. A platter of dough waiting
to be baked. Everywhere on the floor there were books. Had my
uncle meant to take them along?
We settled in. (What a word!) I went looking for wood, my sisters
lit a fire. Despite her fatigue, my mother began to prepare a meal.
We cannot give up, we cannot give up, she kept repeating.
People's morale was not so bad: we were beginning to get used
to the situation. There were those who even voiced optimism. The
Germans were running out of time to expel us, they argued …
Tragically for those who had already been deported, it would be
too late. As for us, chances were that we would be allowed to go on
with our miserable little lives until the end of the war.
The ghetto was not guarded. One could enter and leave as one
pleased. Maria, our former maid, came to see us. Sobbing, she
begged us to come with her to her village where she had prepared
a safe shelter.
My father wouldn't hear of it. He told me and my big
sisters, "If you wish, go there. I shall stay here with your mother
and the little one…
Naturally, we refused to be separated.
NIGHT. No one was praying for the night to pass quickly. The
stars were but sparks of the immense conflagration that was consuming
us. Were this conflagration to be extinguished one day,
nothing would be left in the sky but extinct stars and unseeing
eyes.
There was nothing else to do but to go to bed, in the beds of
those who had moved on. We needed to rest, to gather our
strength.
At daybreak, the gloom had lifted. The mood was more confident.
There were those who said:
"Who knows, they may be sending us away for our own good.
The front is getting closer, we shall soon hear the guns. And then
surely the civilian population will be evacuated…"
"They worry lest we join the partisans…"
"As far as I'm concerned, this whole business of deportation is
nothing but a big farce. Don't laugh. They just want to steal our
valuables and jewelry. They know that it has all been buried and
that they will have to dig to find it; so much easier to do when the
owners are on vacation…"
On vacation!
This kind of talk that nobody believed helped pass the time.
The few days we spent here went by pleasantly enough, in relative
calm. People rather got along. There no longer was any distinction
between rich and poor, notables and the others; we were
all people condemned to the same fate—still unknown.
SATURDAY, the day of rest, was the day chosen for our expulsion.
The night before, we had sat down to the traditional Friday
night meal. We had said the customary blessings over the bread
and the wine and swallowed the food in silence. We sensed that
we were gathered around the familial table for the last time. I
spent that night going over memories and ideas and was unable to
fall asleep.
At dawn, we were in the street, ready to leave. This time,
there were no Hungarian police. It had been agreed that the Jewish
Council would handle everything by itself.
Our convoy headed toward the main synagogue. The town
seemed deserted. But behind the shutters, our friends of yesterday
were probably waiting for the moment when they could loot
our homes.
The synagogue resembled a large railroad station: baggage and
tears. The altar was shattered, the wall coverings shredded, the
walls themselves bare. There were so many of us, we could hardly
breathe. The twenty-four hours we spent there were horrendous.
The men were downstairs, the women upstairs. It was Saturday—
the Sabbath—and it was as though we were there to attend services.
Forbidden to go outside, people relieved themselves in a
corner.
The next morning, we walked toward the station, where a
convoy of cattle cars was waiting. The Hungarian police made us
climb into the cars, eighty persons in each one. They handed us
some bread, a few pails of water. They checked the bars on the
windows to make sure they would not come loose. The cars were
sealed. One person was placed in charge of every car: if someone
managed to escape, that person would be shot.
Two Gestapo officers strolled down the length of the platform.
They were all smiles; all things considered, it had gone very
smoothly.
A prolonged whistle pierced the air. The wheels began to
grind. We were on our way.