Clara's War (18 page)

If Beck had been married to another woman, we would have been dead a long time ago. Julia was a saint. Our saint. The Patron Saint of the Long-Suffering Jews and drunken and unfaithful husbands. Since I was a child, I'd been told the stories about the 36 righteous for whose sake God didn't destroy the universe. I liked to think that Mr and Mrs Beck were two of them. God knows they didn't look like the long-bearded wise rabbis I thought these
tzadekim
looked like in the picture books. But as much as I believed we wouldn't live through the war, and that my mother was right to insist I write a record of our time in the bunker so people after us would know what happened to the Jews of Zolkiew, on nights like this I was convinced that we would survive.

Lola understood what I meant, but when I tried to explain
this to my mother she said I was as crazy as the Becks. I knew Mania would understand, and I realized that as much as I wrote at my mother's insistence, I was now also writing my diary for Mania. She would have given anything to be alive to see the Becks fight about the beautiful Zolkiew fur coat with the bullet holes. She would have loved to put her fingers in the holes.

September 1943

Z
osia was asleep with her head on my lap and although I wanted to write, I didn't want to wake her up. It was still very early, but the heat was already oppressive in the bunker. The faces and arms of the others were coated with sweat, even the children's. Yom Kippur was in three days and it was to be our first
Kol Nidre
without Mania. Zygush and Zosia now slept either side of me. We told them Mania went to hide some place else and, though I could see Zygush didn't believe us, he didn't say anything. I was afraid of Mama's reaction during the memorial
service that is part of Yom Kippur even more than I was afraid of my own reaction. The tension was building but none of us dared mention it. This holy day had taken on a special meaning because all of us had lost so many people that I couldn't even write all the names in my diary. There had to be hundreds and hundreds. We were asking God to forgive us for our sins and asking God for help to forgive those who had sinned against us, but how could we possibly be asking God to forgive the SS? How could this be? How could I say such prayers with sincerity and how could I pray for them without being the worst liar in the world? How could God ask us to do this? How could this not be a mockery of everything we thought holy?

I could hear and feel something moving against the sticky shift I slept in. We hadn't had much of a mouse or rat problem down here because we fought them for every crumb and scrap of food and we always won. Even the potato peels went into the soup and were devoured. In the millions of years of their existence, I'm sure the vermin had never seen people so crazy for food. I couldn't possibly imagine what might be crawling behind me.

I turned around and couldn't believe what I saw. A frog had jumped on to Zosia's chest and was resting there. The frog must have come in through the air vent we opened at night. Zosia opened her eyes to discover the frog staring at her. I would have expected Zosia to jump through the roof, but she just stared at the frog, fascinated. Neither Zosia nor I moved. Zygush opened his eyes, saw the frog and smiled. As I put a finger to his lips, the frog jumped on to my chest. The frog rose and fell with each breath. I couldn't imagine what the frog was thinking, but I knew what Zygush was thinking. If I told him not to catch the frog, it would be the first thing he would try to do. I could see his little boy devil of a mind at work. He had already made up his mind that this new pet of his was the best thing that had
happened to him since he came to the bunker. In his head, he was building the little cage and teaching it frog tricks and giving it a name that would be an insult to somebody down here, most likely Klarunia, whom he tormented every chance he got. When reprimanded, he'd pretend he didn't know what anyone was talking about. Looking at him, I knew he couldn't resist the temptation a second longer, no matter what I said or did. He went for the frog, which leapt away and scrambled across the bunker, from body to body, waking everyone. Zygush followed the frog deep into the bunker where it disappeared.

I picked up my diary and started to write. Sometimes I wrote to shut out the world; sometimes to escape the boredom or to ignore an argument; or as a way of reminding myself what the Becks were doing for us. But that day I wanted to write because something wonderful was happening. We had a frog. But soon enough my blue pencil fell from my hand as I joined the others in watching the comedy of Zygush and the Frog, even as they tried to hold on to their dignity while he crawled all over them. At least, today, for a few minutes, there would be something to smile about. When Zygush emerged from the bowels of the bunker, he was covered in dirt. Only his teeth were white.

The frog made me think that the coming of this little boy into the bunker was as much a miracle for us as for him. Any time that we could forget, even for a moment, where we were and why we were here nourished us more than food, and it was Zygush more than anyone else in the bunker who gave all of us this relief. Even when sitting still as a stone, his eyes were still alive with mischief. As the days passed one into another, he turned from a boy who couldn't read a word into a boy who devoured books. He would have started school last year and learned to read. Compared to the death of his mother and everything else that had happened in his short life, educational deprivation might
seem insignificant. But we had to take our triumphs in small places and this was one of them, especially for me because I had the joy of teaching him. Even here, at my father's urging, learning happened. If Zygush's outer world was circumscribed by dirt walls, his inner world was expanding into the past; into faraway lands; into adventures that even he couldn't imagine. Hearts of stone could be softened watching Zygush and the others as we taught them. Time and boredom were our enemies too and Zygush more than anyone else in the bunker was our champion. Time and time again, he would rescue one or another of us from our torment. Mrs Melman was next.

As every morning, the first thing Mrs Melman did was examine her precious water pitcher. She turned it over. It was bone dry. She was satisfied that at long last she had the irrefutable proof that someone was stealing her water in the night. She held the pitcher up for all to see.

‘See, I told you. There's a thief in here! We're dying of thirst and someone's stealing my water.' Zygush, fresh from his frog hunt, sat next to Mrs Melman. He looked at the ground where the pitcher was sitting. He noticed something and felt the dirt. It was damp. He put his nose to the dirt and, like a little terrier dog, sniffed. Mrs Melman watched in silence as he took the vessel from her hand. He turned it over and looked at the bottom very carefully.

He pointed at the ground. ‘Mrs Melman…Mrs Melman. Look, the dirt is wet right where the pitcher is! There's a crack. No one's stealing your water. Look at the crack. It goes all the way through!' He held up the pitcher for everyone to see as Patrontasch turned on the light. Zygush had just uncovered one of the mysteries of our universe and solved the alleged crime, which, if it didn't drive us apart, was driving us crazy. Nobody wanted to believe there was a thief of water in our midst and, as
annoying as Mrs Melman was, the theft of water was a serious accusation.

Mr Melman looked at the pitcher and saw that in the bottom there was a faint crack. Mrs Melman felt the wet ground and looked away. She couldn't face anybody and I could see in her eyes that she wanted to smash the pitcher. Instead, she took it and put it on one of the shelves. My mother leaned close to me and whispered, ‘Looks like she needs another pitcher. Maybe she'll get the next one from a museum.' I know my mother. If I had said such a thing, I would want to take it back. But I knew my mother's only regret would be her cowardice at not saying it louder.

I looked around and could see how relieved we all were about the outcome of the mystery of the pitcher. There were unwritten commandments in the bunker. No bad tempers. No yelling. No arguments. We were not three families used to keeping things in. At least now we wouldn't have to listen to Mrs Melman's daily carping any more. More importantly, poor Mrs Melman wouldn't have to be suspicious that we, her friends and family for more years than anyone could remember, were stealing her water. She had been eating her guts out over it. Now she was merely embarrassed and she would surely get over that quickly enough. But most relieved had to be Mr Melman as he wouldn't have to ask forgiveness for his wife any longer. He never apologized with words. Just his eyes. Mrs Melman never thanked Zygush for removing this burden from her soul.

The next morning it was as if the thought of anyone stealing water from her never occurred to Mrs Melman. The mood in the bunker became solemn and holy as we started our preparations for Yom Kippur, now only two days away. The air was thick with emotion and unspoken grief; the bunker became crowded with the ghosts of our lost loved ones, their faces hidden in the darkest corners and their voices whispering to us
the sweetest things they ever said, which countered every small and petty moment that transpired between us; their souls filled us up with love. It was life's final irony that death is the flint and spark that ignites the eternal flame of a loved one's spirit, which lives forever within the breast. And it was not lost on us that in this year's Day of Atonement we would be praying to be inscribed in the book of life as we had never prayed before. I cannot say that these prayers in past years were without meaning or without the deepest sincerity, but I can say they were offered up to the Almighty in the knowledge that the chances were we supplicants would be around to say the same prayers next year. Now we knew that chances were this might be our last Yom Kippur. And our last chance to pray for atonement in this lifetime.

The women were cleaning the bunker as best they could. The men were dividing up the service. My father was going to be both rabbi and cantor. There was some discussion about bringing the Torah that had been in the Schwarz family for 250 years down from its hiding place in the attic. To read from this Torah would give us, we all knew, a deep connection to all that was holy. Each letter in each word of the Five Books of Moses was written in kosher ink made from the crushed outer bark of a wasp's nest; written with a quill made from a turkey or goose feather; and written on parchment made from a calf killed for food as scribes had done for thousands of years. Our Torah took a year to complete, as does every Torah. Not even one mistake is permitted and each Torah is read again and again after completion. The men were worried that the moisture and mould in our bunker might harm the Torah, so they decided to leave it in the attic where it was safe and dry. We would read the Torah passage from the
Humash
, which was the Torah in book form.

I had eaten a few more of the apples Julia brought back from Lvov and was now facing the consequences. I knew there were
other people who needed it but I was squatting over the bucket and couldn't move. My mother came over to see if I was all right. ‘You know you can only eat potatoes, Clarutchka.' Believe me,
this
I already knew. She went back to cleaning and from where I was sitting I could see the men huddled around the map and a German newspaper Beck had slipped down into the bunker. There were lines and dates marking the Russian advance. Preparations for the holy day were momentarily suspended and the mood broken by Mr Melman announcing, ‘We've stalled outside Zhitomir.' We weren't quite dead yet, and as long as we had breath we would argue. I could sense a heated discussion coming on.

Mr Patrontasch, who acted as if he and Melman were in charge of the Russian troops, voiced his frustration. ‘Back and forth, back and forth, we've taken and lost Zhitomir half a dozen times. The whole war is being fought at Zhitomir! We'll never get out of here.'

Melman: ‘We could always just hang ourselves, but we couldn't do that to the Becks.'

My father gave Melman a look I've only seen once or twice in my life. ‘I don't want to hear talk like that! Especially around the children.'

Melman was the kind of man who would sacrifice anyone and anything for the sake of a joke. He had a good sense of timing and so waited until he had everyone's attention to deliver his punch line. ‘I mean, how would they get rid of the bodies?'

Mrs Melman was shaking a potato peeler at no one in particular and didn't even look up from her work. ‘This is the sense of humour I've had to live with. I thank God for one thing. Now you all know what I've had to put up with all these years.' This kind of remark was the last thing you would expect from Mrs Melman. I laughed and groaned at the same time.

Later, Julia came to collect the money to go shopping for our
meal to break the Yom Kippur fast. I was weak from the diarrhoea and from where I was lying on my pallet writing about my episode on the pail, I could see Julia's legs behind her husband, who was standing half in the bunker and half out. Professor Steckel was squatting uncomfortably in front of Mr Beck, handing him some bills.

Steckel was giving orders as usual. ‘I want a nice chicken.'

I could hear Julia's patient voice: ‘I'll do the best I can.' I knew she was wearing her usual placid expression.

Steckel was about to say something, but Mr Beck looked him straight in the eye. I felt Mr Beck was ready to explode. So did Professor Steckel.

‘We all know how much the professor loves his
pupik
, obviously for its medicinal qualities. We all know that a chicken's ass is a delicacy.'

Everyone was laughing to themselves except Zygush, who turned to me. ‘Will we have chicken?' My father overheard and kissed Zygush on the head. ‘Some other time.'

Zygush knew enough not to argue or beg or complain. The resignation was almost as hard to bear as the fear and the grief. I prayed we'd get out of here before the boy's spirit was broken. He was small for his age, just as Uchka had been small, and he had a little man's face that seemed to age every day. My mother whispered to my father: ‘Have we asked them for one thing in half a year? You'd think the holiest day of the year they could spare a few zloty for the children.'

My father whispered back: ‘They don't have children, they don't understand.'

‘They don't understand because they don't have a heart.'

This was what I loved about my mother.

 

The holiest night of the year. It was a hot, hot September night. The men, still dressed in their underwear, carefully unwrapped their tallith from their tallith bags and tins, and kissing them, middle, left and right, put them on. By now, I was used to the sight of the men and their skinny legs and black socks. They had been living in their underwear for months and so there was no longer any discussion whether it would be appropriate to pray in underwear. Still, I wondered how I would feel about it. Before the war, the idea of men in underwear on the high holy days would have sent me and Mania into shrieks of laughter. It wasn't that I was used to the sight of skinny legs that made it seem normal for me. It was the sense that this Yom Kippur had enormous significance. Would it be my and our last? We would be praying for Mania. My emotions were at a fever pitch. I felt like I was going to pray, really pray, at Yom Kippur for the first time. There was so much I wanted to ask God.