Читать книгу The Memories We Keep - Walter Zacharius - Страница 11

Effective immediately, the Levy family dwelling is transferred to Adolf Hitlerstrasse 21 within the Jewish Zone, in the area formerly known as the Baluty.

Papa read the letter from the Judenrat with a trembling voice, though his face showed no emotion.

In accordance with the regulations established by Regierungs President Matthias Ubelhoes, passed by the Council of Jews and signed into law by the Praesidium, you will be reimbursed on a par value for your house and possessions by a special fund of the Jewish Treasury designated for this purpose. Until you are established at your new address, the Jewish Treasury will maintain an escrow account for all monies receivable in your name, to be converted into legal deutsch marks.

As recent events have demonstrated, dawdlers and smugglers do grievous harm to the Jewish community. Those who fail to follow the orders contained herein are subject to full prosecution in the Jewish courts, with a maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment at hard labor, a fine of 10,000 zloty, or both.

All questions should be addressed to the Jewish Ministry of Housing, c/o Judenrat, Munsenstrasse 20 (formerly Sworske Street).

The letter was unsigned, but was stamped in bold letters C. RUMKOWSKI, ELDEST OF THE JEWS.

“Traitor,” Papa hissed while my mother sat in stunned silence and I mentally began cataloging our possessions. Jozef retreated to his room, the sound of a slamming door behind him the only sign of his fury.

Establishment of a Jewish Zone had been inevitable. And now it had come.

Perhaps, I thought, it might be for the best. Acts of violence against Jews had increased. SS troops developed a careful pattern of spot checks and shakedowns. Forced recruitment into the army or banishment to labor camps continued. Night attacks by bands of Aryan Poles were commonplace throughout Lodz. The German regime was behind this newly announced segregation, but maybe Jews would be subject to less harassment if we were banded together in one area. But I knew this was skewed reasoning. Nothing the government decided was ever for our benefit.

The order was issued in February, but not all acquiesced to it. Thousands filed exemption requests with the Judenrat. By early March, however, German soldiers gunned down more than two hundred Jews in the streets, underscoring the need for cooperation. The relocations, including our own, began in earnest.

The day before we left, we were visited by an apple-cheeked rabbi whom I immediately loathed.

“We’re saving you the best location we can,” the young man declared, helping himself to a slice of rationed bread Mama had offered him. “Of course, it might be possible to upgrade your status by speaking to the right people.”

When Papa ignored his awkward hint for a bribe, he looked with pity at my brother, as if to ask, how could you do this to him? “I assure you, Doctor, you’ll have sanitary facilities as befits your status, but your rooms will be small unless you can make other arrangements.”

“We’ll take what’s given us,” Papa said, ushering the rabbi out.

Papa stood motionless, staring at his ruined garden. I knew what he was thinking: last summer, when we had a chance, we should have gone to Kiev, somehow leaving a message for Jozef so he could follow. But all the foreign borders were closed now, and we would soon be sealed in with no access to news or non-Jews. Possession of even a radio was punishable by death, and the new law would prevent my father from ever researching or teaching in his chosen field, or even treating an Aryan patient again. The life we’d known had reached its end.

I couldn’t stand to watch the pain of Papa’s face and went to look in on Jozef. He was lying on his bed listening to Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony on his phonograph. I sat beside him but was far too restless to be silent.

“Don’t you understand what is happening?” I demanded. “How can you just lie here—we must do something. We could lose everything: the lovely glass solarium our grandfather designed, the house, the rugs, the furniture, the garden, the library. Everything. Our family has spent generations erecting this house and filling it with beauty.”

Jozef looked back at me and I could see the toll his injuries had taken on his spirit.

“Mia, you know I love you and Mother and Father, but I don’t have any hope. At the university I tried to pretend that I wasn’t Jewish, but the other students wouldn’t let me forget. All the things you mention can be replaced, but we must find a way to survive. Life is more important.”

“But, how could this have happened? Our ancestry is German. Our house has always been staunchly Germanic—more Viennese, actually, than Polish. Our father and his parents waved from the front steps of our house when Emperor Franz Jozef of Austria arrived in Lodz, insisting when he came to our neighborhood, on riding behind the Jewish Elders and their holy scrolls. Papa told us a thousand times how in temple Franz Jozef had kissed the Torah and called it the mother of his own religion.”

“It’s a different world—you can’t look back. We must now look to the future and find a way to survive. We are the hopes of our people.”

Jozef fell asleep. I ran my hand over his brow and kissed his hair. The strains of Beethoven wove in and out of the noises of the emigration outside. I left his room and joined my parents.

“Mia,” my father said, resolution in his bearing, “go out and get a cart and driver. We’ll need provisions, as much as we can get. We must move now, and we must move quickly.”

“But she can’t,” Mama gasped. “Ben, you don’t realize what it’s like out there, how dangerous. It’s bad enough that you send her in the daytime to get bread, but—”

My father glared at her. “A pretty young woman is far more likely to rent a cart and driver than I am. Half the time when I go out for food, I return empty-handed. And this is an emergency. We have to survive. If we’re to get to Warsaw, all of us must be strong. Remember, Warsaw is a big city and we have many non-Jewish friends there who can hide us until this craziness is over.”

Warsaw! I knew he had dreamed of moving there ever since the occupation had become stifling, but it seemed to me only a fantasy, like going to America. The trip would entail constant danger, constant suspense. It was approximately 130 kilometers away, yet because we were Jews there seemed little hope of making such a journey. We were, in effect, jailed. But evidently my parents had talked of it before. His announcement did not seem to shock my mother.

Instead, she was horrified. Papa disregarded the fury in her eyes. Jozef would be well soon, he explained, and then we could travel. Without food and warm clothing we’d freeze to death on the journey. “And meanwhile, we’re going to hold out in Adolf Hitlerstrasse until we can travel.”

“Then don’t send Mia. Go to the black market.”

My father walked past her toward the parlor. Stopping in the doorway, he pressed both hands against the molding with all his diminished might. But he was no Samson. The great house did not fall.

He turned back to my mother. “Don’t you understand?” he said. “They depend on us stalling. Paying for every second of freedom with our savings. Buying on the black market to ward off hunger, to stay warm. You heard that baby-faced rabbi. He recommended bribes for better housing, for security, for preferential treatment.”

“But that’s human nature,” my mother said. “What do you hope to prove by refusing us what everyone else is begging for, particularly since we can afford it?”

“It’s not human nature,” Papa roared. “And I hope not your nature or Mia’s or Jozef’s. We have no right to put ourselves above the others, at least not anymore.”

My mother’s voice was cold. “So you intend for us to starve before we even set out for Warsaw?”

“No. I intend to resist them. Every cent of bribery paid to the Judenrat ends up in the hand of the Nazis. It’s like digging our own graves and waiting politely to be thrown in. What they can’t get by confiscating, we’re delivering to them.”

“Then how long do you intend to hold out? Until Jozef dies? Or me? Or Mia?”

“Until I’m convinced there’s no other way.”

I could not understand him. He was willing to sacrifice us for some ideal! He was willing to let us die. For the first time in my life, I stood against him in league with my mother, and he knew it.

He gripped my arm. “Find a cart, Mia. Fill it with what you can find. Nora, it’s time to pack. I’ll be upstairs straightening out a few things for the new tenants. We wouldn’t want them to think us poor housekeepers, now would we?”

I ran out in a fury, not daring to speak to Papa for fear of what I might say. It was not like me to hold back. I always allowed my anger to explode, but today it seemed dangerous, capable of inflicting mortal wounds.

Trucks, pushcarts, and wagons rolled over the cobblestone streets, a parade of woebegone vehicles, most of them carrying the few possessions families could salvage.

“You see that house?” a Polish man remarked to his companion. “We’re moving in tomorrow night.”

“Very nice,” his friend said, whistling in awe. “How’d you manage to land something so grand?”

“My brother-in-law works for the SS.”

It was our house that he pointed to. An old woman, showing her toothless gums beneath a bleached babushka, passed by me. With all her strength, she pressed against the strap on her forehead, which supported the load of her belongings tied to her back in a cardboard carton.

I recognized her. She was one of the Jewish peasant women who used to paw through the pushcarts for scraps as the merchants shut down for the Sabbath. The ones who haggled with the dry goods merchants over a few groszy. Women like her would now be our neighbors. Papa was right. It would be intolerable.

I looked around at the stupefied expressions of the human packhorses pulling their carts laden with trunks and boxes and felt a wave of nausea. These were supposed to be my brothers and sisters in the land of Abraham. The people that Papa said were our fellow creatures were beasts of burden, hideous to behold, misshapen humanity.

No! I was not one of them. I belonged to Paris, to music, to opera houses and concert halls. To Jean-Phillipe. I leaned against a lamppost, feeling my stomach lurch in an attempt to give up a meal I had stood in line for three hours to get.

Nearby, I knew, was the Café Astoria, where Jozef and I had spent many evenings, sipping port and listening to Viennese waltzes on the Wurlitzer. Perhaps it was still open. I would go there now and order a grenadine and soda to calm my stomach. I could warm myself there against the fender of the coal stove as I used to do with Jozef and his friends.

I started down the street, veering through the oncoming traffic. “What have we got here?” a voice boomed in German. “Walking in the wrong direction. A thief? A gypsy saboteur?”

I spun around. An SS soldier stood at ease in front of me.

“Nein, mein Herr,” I said, my voice quavering. “I was going to the Café Astoria.”

His eyes wandered casually over me. “So you’re Jewish then?”

I struggled for air. “Yes, sir. My father sent me out to find a cart, to help us relocate to the Jewish quarter. But all the carts are already taken. I’m cold, so I thought at the Café—”

“Do you have any identification?”

“Just my school card.” I fumbled in my handbag and produced it. “I attend the lycée in Paris, so it’s in French. But here, you see, it says my age and name, Marisa Levy. I swear to you I was only going to get a cart. Honest. My brother’s home sick, recovering from—”

“Calm down,” he said, and I did. Perhaps the man would not put me in prison. He put his meaty fingers on my shoulder and I froze. Worse than prison!

The German soldier looked so big in his uniform at first I was frightened, but when I saw his soft blue eyes and he spoke, I relaxed. “You’re a pretty girl,” he said. “I’ve a daughter of my own. Annaliese.” He pulled a wallet from his pocket and showed me a picture. “She’s four years old, a charmer. That’s my wife next to her.” The picture was torn at the edges; a crack ran down its center. Evidently he had looked at it often. He shook his head. “This war. It drives us all crazy. Here I am, showing off my family to some Hebrew, as if she were my niece. Now listen, I’ll escort you to Wolnosci Plaza. This area is no place for you—it’s filled with scum. Times have changed at the Café Astoria. When you told me you were heading there, I thought…Well, the girls are…Understand?”

Heat flooded my face. I nodded.

“Good. So let me escort you out of this neighborhood. I’ll walk two paces behind you. Keeping company with a Jew—even a pretty one like you—is forbidden in the SS. Now, let’s find you a cart before it gets any darker.”

He pointed down a narrow alley, and I led the way. I could feel his eyes roaming over my back, my hips, my legs, and I almost bolted. Images of my humiliation at the train station plagued me, and this time there was no crowd to protect me, even as silent witnesses. I forced my legs forward in rapid, even steps, dreading his touch, the feel of his breath on my back.

We emerged into Wolnosci Plaza. He stepped past me and commandeered a cart drawn by two burly boys, tossing aside the protests of the family walking beside it. “Hurry up and take your things or I’ll give you a hard kick,” he growled. “Jewish swine.”

My heart grieved. My father would never have taken the cart that belonged to another family; he would have searched until he found one not in use. But the search might have been fruitless, I told myself. Everyone needed carts, everyone was moving. It was cold. We had little time. I still had to get as much food and coal as I could. It shames me to admit that after grief came relief, and that as the family unloaded their belongings, I willed them to be quick about it.

“Take this girl where she wants to go,” my benefactor snarled at the drivers. “If I find you’ve overcharged her family, I’ll have you sent to the labor camps.” He winked at me and handed me a bar of chocolate. “Auf Wiedersehen.”

“Auf Wiedersehen,” I murmured. “Danke schöen.”

The boys helped me onto the cart, and we set off to find provisions that I would take back to my family for our last night in our home.