by Bram Presser
‘You must leave.’ She recognises the man’s voice, is surprised he is still here. For months he had sat in the corner, watched over them. She had not considered that he would have nowhere to go. ‘It is worse than I feared,’ another voice says, a fellow worker. ‘The Russians. They are telling us to take what we want. Follow their example.’ She points at the rags. ‘Nothing is too much, too weak.’
The plague of consumption had swept the garment factory in the spring, striking them down where they slept. Those who stayed strong kept vigil, watched the rash expand outwards on their bunkmates, waited for the cramps, the vomit, the hacking cough. She checked Irena every morning, was relieved to find no marks. She paid little attention to the fatigue, the weight loss—everyday symptoms of factory life. Then a cough, not like the others, with blood. The girl clutched at her chest with every shudder. Each day Daša went out to the station, unloaded the sacks, waited for his visit. A kind-faced station orderly, the villager who asked only for cigarettes. When she returned, her clothes stuffed with parcels, food wedged between the burlap, she would check on the girl and feel the feverish skin shrink from her touch.
She knows what she must do. She puts Irena on her shoulders and walks to the stairs. Down, past the looms, another floor, the same. Then the bottom, where the soldiers once camped, and out the door. On the western road she finds a house, its door open, food still on the table. She lays her sister on the bed, props her up with pillows. She pulls a couch across the door so it cannot be opened. She opens the window, climbs out onto the grass and closes the window behind her. They are everywhere, shouting down the streets, knocking on doors. She doesn’t understand what they are saying but picks up the word for freedom; it is close to her own: osvobozhdenny. One of the men approaches her, grasps her wrist and talks as if she might speak his language. He strokes her hair and tries to pull her towards him. She wrenches herself free, slaps his face. He stumbles back then falls to his knees in peals of laughter. His bottle spills over and he grabs it and takes another swig. She stands her ground, doesn’t flee: no more running. The soldier stands, composes himself and grabs her again, this time with both hands. His breath is warm against her face. He kisses her on the cheek, a chaste gesture, and lets go. The last she sees, he is laughing again.
She hurries on, unsure of what she is after. Only when she sees it does she know. A wheelbarrow, left upturned in the front yard of a cottage. She runs her finger along its wheel, checking for punctures. It holds firm to her touch. She turns it over like it is a precious chariot. The handles are worn, digging into her hands. She wheels it back towards the house careful to avoid any looters who might want to use it for their load. At last she arrives. The door does not budge; the window is still closed. Her sister is safe. She lays the barrow on its side and pushes up the windowpane. A jump. Another. On the third she catches the ledge and heaves herself onto the sill. From the bed, a familiar soft wheeze. She pulls the couch away from the door and brings her sister to the porch.
The barrow is gone. She expected it. She runs to the corner and looks down the street. It is being pushed by an older woman she knows from the factory. It is already full with food, blankets, silverware. From the surrounding houses she hears laughter and grunts, the shattering of glass. She runs towards the woman, sees that she can hardly stand up. The barrow is her crutch. In the distance, the grumble of approaching engines. She grabs the woman’s shoulders, shoves her to the side. The woman falls to the ground and looks up at her with hollow eyes. There is no time. She empties the barrow beside the road and runs back to the house. Scooping up the pile of rags, she barely registers the weight of her sister. She begins to walk west.
‘Come on, Irča,’ she says. ‘Let’s go home.’
Františka Roubíčková unfolded Daša’s letter again. The paper had already begun to age. The war was over. But where were her girls? In March she had answered a knock on her door and been met with a face she had never seen. His name, he said, was Josef. He had been in Birkenau with Ludvík. For several months they had shared a bunk. He had come, he said, to fulfil a promise to his friend. They had survived together until January, when the camp was evacuated. For days they marched in step, clutching at each other’s shoulders for support. They huddled against one another at night in barns and open fields. They were, Josef said, like brothers. Ludvík had spoken of Františka and his girls. He spoke of love, of sacrifice. The rest of his life, Josef said, he had committed to making amends. On the fifth day, for no particular reason, he was shot in the head by one of their escorts. His body was dragged to the side of the road and the group marched on. ‘I’m sorry,’ Josef said, ‘but I’ve no idea where it was.’ Josef offered his hand in consolation; Františka was too stunned to take it. He tipped his hat and left. Františka returned to her chair and looked up at the last remaining picture of her husband.
That word: widow. She could grow into it no more than she had the others: wife, divorcée. But what do you call a mother who has lost her children? No. She wouldn’t accept it. She made enquiries. She owed it to Marcela, to Hana. They still harboured hope. Every day she went to the authorities to ask if there was any word about Daša and Irena Roubíčková. Always ‘and’, never ‘or’. She could not leave one behind. The men who received her were sympathetic and counselled patience. Be comforted by the lack of news, they said. Most news, they said, was bad. And so she would return to 13 Biskupcova Street and take the letters from the Baťa shoebox and read them beneath Ludvík’s watchful gaze. For those few moments they were together again. Her family.
A knock. Františka jerked, her thumb crumpling the page’s edge. She cursed and tried to straighten the tissue paper. Time was already stealing her daughters’ words away. Again, a knock. Františka turned the page over to protect the faint pencil marks from the light and stood up. Outside the window she noticed the unlikely shape of a wheelbarrow. She shrugged. War drags all kinds of flotsam in its wake. Františka bustled down the hallway and opened the door.
‘Ahoj, Frantishku.’ It was Radka Fialová from apartment four. ‘I…I bring news.’ Radka was the quietest of the neighbours. A kindly woman with no children, she had lost her husband in the first war and mourned him ever since. Františka would often make a point of speaking to her on the stairwell or in the street. ‘It’s the girls,’ Radka continued. Františka felt a thump in her chest. She steadied herself against the doorframe. Perhaps it was the younger ones that Radka meant. Maybe they had got themselves into mischief. They were of that age now. But then…Oh God. Most news that comes is bad. Radka didn’t wait for a reply. ‘They are with me. Daša and Irena. They came just now. It…they wanted to warn you. They look… it is possible you won’t recognise them. They asked I come first.’ Františka Roubíčková could not move, could not breathe. Her knees grew weak. A single tear fell from her eye. Radka fumbled in her apron pocket, muttering to herself. She was not good at these things. She knew only how to be consoled, not to console. Her hand stopped suddenly and she pulled it out in a fist. ‘Here,’ she said. ‘They said to give you this.’
And her fingers unfurled to reveal a simple gold ring.
The infinite rounding of life.
14
A man comes to a door in an ordinary apartment block, at 13 Biskupcova Street, in the city that is once again his home. He has come almost every day for over a month. In his hand, as always, is a gift: bigger, more precious every time he comes. The door is ajar; he hopes to recognise voices in the apartment.
He has come here, this man from the country, directly from the Old Town Square, where he stood before an idol, his idol—its fur coat, its large, pointed nose, and its long, thin, black beard resplendent in the sun—and prayed for those he has lost. His suit does not fit; it is too big. It was given to him when he returned to the city. He is sure there are fleas under the lining. Sometimes he talks to them, asks them for the courage that seems always to elude him. He tugs at his cuffs to make sure they cover his wretched mark. A-1821. All his ex
periences over these long years gather themselves in his head to one point: he must keep his word. He must see her. This time he will not run away. He goes back onto the street and double-checks the names on the list of residents, his gaze resting on the one he wants: Roubíček.
Jakub R walks inside, approaches the door and knocks.
Epilogue
I too have returned.
I sit at the table in the kitchen of 13 Biskupcova Street, where I smoked my first cigarette, where I picked at undercooked chicken, where I tore the wrapping paper from around a handcrafted marionette. Ludvík sits opposite me, beneath the portrait of his grandfather that has hung in place for over seventy years. Old Ludvík did not return and yet, from this story, only he remains. Here, where once they all gathered. Where we all have gathered.
‘Do you still look?’ Ludvík asks me.
‘No,’ I say.
‘There are stories,’ he says. ‘More stories. Is time Babička…’
‘It’s enough,’ I say. He nods and runs his hand along the table, sweeping crumbs onto the floor. I watch him bring his foot down, crushing them. He looks up. ‘You hungry?’
I take in the room for the last time. I will be flying home tomorrow. I will try to make sense of all this, begin to write it down. Within a few generations almost all of us will have been forgotten.
I follow Ludvík into the sun. As I step onto the pavement, I breathe in a gust of spring. Out of the corner of my eye I catch a glint on the concrete and look down.
To know them as more than just names on brass stones/
that is enough.
Františka Roubíčková and the author, 1984.
A GUIDE TO CZECH PRONUNCIATION
Czech spelling and grammar are used throughout The Book of Dirt.
A, Á‘ah’ as in art.
E,‘e’ as in bed.
É‘eh’ elongated ‘e’ as in there.
Ě‘yeh’ as in yesterday.
I‘i’ as in hip.
Í‘ee’ elongated ‘i’ as in marine.
O‘oh’ short ‘aw’ as in water.
Óelongated ‘aw’ as in poor.
U‘u’ as in put.
Ú, Ů‘oo’ as in root.
Y‘ih’ as in syntax.
Pl‘pul’ as in pulse.
B‘bir’ as in birthday.
C‘ts’ as in cats.
Č‘ch’ as in church.
Ch‘Kh’, guttural Germanic sound as in Bach.
Ň‘ny’, palatalised as in the Italian Bolognese.
Rrolled R sound, as in Italian.
Ř‘rzh’ where the sounds are pronounced almost simultaneously, the R rolling into a sound like the S in measure. Sometimes, such as with the composer Dvořák, there is more of a space between the syllables (dvor-zhak).
Š‘sh’ as in ship.
T’‘ch’ as in tube.
Ž‘zh’ as in the S in measure.
Consecutive vowels in a word are pronounced separately.
The stress on almost every word falls on the first syllable. Accents might change pronunciation of the letters themselves but do not imply a change in the stress of the word as a whole.
Czech has three grammatical genders: masculine, feminine and neuter. In The Book of Dirt, female characters are named using their feminine forms (-ová, -á).
GLOSSARY
Ahoj—(Czech) Hello
Babička—(Czech) Grandmother.
Bar mitzvah—(Hebrew) Thirteen, the age at which a Jewish boy is considered a man.
Bat mitzvah—(Hebrew) Twelve, the age at which a Jewish girl is considered a woman.
Beit—(Hebrew) The second letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Has the consonant sound ‘B’.
Beth Din—(Hebrew) Jewish religious court.
Bonkes—(Yiddish) Fanciful rumours.
Bris—(Hebrew) Colloquial for circumcision.
Cheder—(Hebrew) Religious study class.
Chevra Kadisha—(Hebrew) The Jewish Burial Society.
Dikduk—(Hebrew) Grammar.
Dybbuk—(Hebrew) ‘The clinging of an evil spirit.’ A ghost that possesses the body of a living person.
Elul—(Hebrew) The last month of the Jewish calendar, a time of repentence.
Genizah—(Hebrew) A room set aside for the storage of torn or damaged religious books and items.
Golem—(Hebrew) ‘Shapeless man.’ Humanoid created from dirt and animated through the mystical power of Hebrew letters.
Irgun—(Hebrew) Jewish paramilitary group in Palestine during the British Mandate.
Kambal—Camp slang for a nook in which inmates made private living spaces.
Kippah—(Hebrew) Head covering worn by Jewish men. Also known as a yarmulke.
Lamed—(Hebrew) The twelfth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Has the consonant sound ‘L’.
Lashon hara—(Hebrew) Malicious gossip against which there is a Jewish religious prohibition.
Mazal—(Hebrew) Luck.
Mazal tov—(Hebrew) ‘Good luck’ but used as a congratulatory cheer.
Mem—(Hebrew) The thirteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Has the consonant sound ‘M’.
Mezuzah—(Hebrew) A small parchment scroll containing religious verses that is affixed, usually in a protective case, to the door of a Jewish home.
Mikveh—(Hebrew) Ritual bath used for purification.
Mitzvah—(Hebrew) A good deed.
Neshamah—(Hebrew) Soul.
Pan—(Czech) Mr.
Paní—(Czech) Mrs. Also used to address an older single or divorced woman.
Payes—(Yiddish) Sidelocks. It is custom not to cut the hair that grows from near the temple.
Purim—(Hebrew) A joyous Jewish festival that commemorates the salvation of the Jewish people in Persia from a plot by the king’s adviser to kill them all. Purim is celebrated by dressing in colourful costume, drinking and feasting.
Rebbetzin—(Hebrew) The wife of a rabbi.
Rosh Hashanah—Jewish New Year.
Sefer Yetzirah—(Hebrew) The Book of Formations, a classic Jewish mystical text.
Shacharit—(Hebrew) The Morning Prayer Service.
Shalom Zacher—(Hebrew) Celebratory gathering to welcome a baby boy. Usually held on the first Sabbath evening following the birth.
Shammas—(Hebrew) Synagogue beadle.
Sheds and Mazziks—(Hebrew) Types of demons in Jewish mythology.
Shema—(Hebrew) One of the holiest Jewish prayers: ‘Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one.’ It is often said when anticipating death.
Shikse—(Yiddish) Derogatory term for a non-Jewish woman.
Shiva—(Hebrew) Seven days of mourning following a death.
Shloshim—(Hebrew) The service to mark the thirtieth day since a person’s death.
Shtibl—(Yiddish) ‘Little room.’ A small Hasidic synagogue.
Siddur—(Hebrew) Prayer book.
SOKOL—(Czech) Youth movement dedicated to a ‘strong mind in a strong body’. Much of the youth resistance during the occupation was centred around and coordinated through SOKOL clubs.
Stracheldraht—(German) ‘Barbed wire.’ The dried vegetable leaves that did not soften when thrown into the watery soup.
Svíčková—(Czech) Beef stewed in cream sauce.
Taf—(Hebrew) The last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Has the consonant sound ‘T’.
Tallis—(Hebrew) A traditional prayer shawl.
Tashlich—(Hebrew) Service after Jewish New Year where ‘sins’ are cast into flowing water.
Techelet Lauan—(Hebrew) ‘Blue white.’ Czech Zionist youth group.
Tefillin—(Hebrew) Leather phylacteries worn on the head and arm during morning prayer.
Tishrei—(Hebrew) The first month of the Jewish calendar.
Torah—(Hebrew) The Old Testament, Five Books of Moses.
Tzitzis—(Hebrew) Tassles that hang from a prayer shawl.
V Boj—(Czech) The Struggle. The main newspaper of the Czech underground during the oc
cupation.
Yom Kippur—(Hebrew) Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the Jewish year.
Zeli—(Czech) Sauerkraut.
A NOTE ON HISTORICAL SOURCES
Although The Book of Dirt is a novel, it makes use of a number of original historical images and documents. The family photographs, photographs taken at significant locations, and scans of official documents speak for themselves. In the interests of transparency and historical fidelity, however, I should comment on the newspaper article and various letters and emails that appear in the book.
The article ‘Dr Jacob Randa and the Books of the Extinct Race’ is a greatly condensed rewrite of ‘A Strange Scholarship’ by Sam (Shmuel) Bennett that appeared in the Australian Jewish News on Friday, 19 March 1999 (although in the novel I have made it 2005). Bennett’s article was a reworking of a chapter in his book of collected journalism, Chronicles of a Life, which was itself an expansion of a piece he had written in Yiddish for Di Oystralische Yidishe Nayes (the Yiddish supplement of the Australian Jewish News) in 1987 that was syndicated in Yiddish newspapers around the world. I have tried my best not to alter the substance of the article. There was, however, one exception: I changed the third museum worker from Rabbi Šimon Adler to Otto Muneles in order to contain the book to the characters already introduced. As both Adler and Muneles were members of the Talmudkommando I felt comfortable taking that liberty.
The extracts of correspondence between Jan Randa and Beit Terezín and Yad Vashem in Part Two appear in the novel exactly as they were written but for one word. In his initial letters, my grandfather referred to the Talmudkommando as ‘Talmudhundertschaft’. This accords with the German grammatical naming structure of many work groups in Theresienstadt. For the sake of consistency (and given that I refer to it by its two other official names), I thought it best to just use Talmudkommando, the term by which it is most commonly known.
The ‘Merzdorf Letters’ in Part Three (including the letter around which Chapter 11 of Numbers is structured) were written by Daša and Irena in pencil on brittle, grainy paper. That they survived is thanks only to Hana Košťálová (née Roubíčková) who hid them in a shoebox at the back of a cupboard for sixty years. The translated extracts in the book are transcribed almost verbatim. I did make a couple of minor edits, removing the names of several people whom the girls asked after in Prague. There were also a couple of references to people from the neighbourhood who had been in the various camps with Daša and Irena. For example, the line I wrote as We were where all transports from T go… reads, in the original letter, ‘We were where Hugo is (all transports from T go there)…’ In making these slight edits, I have endeavoured not to change the meaning in any substantial way.
