by Bodie Thoene
“He did not say. But he left in that direction. Toward the souks. Not unusual. Maybe to go to market for his mother.” He tugged his earlobe in thought. “He seemed preoccupied, I will say that.” Then he smiled. “Like you!”
Shimon did not comment. He thanked him as he left, feeling foolish. Certainly the Protestant pastor of Christ Church could not have aroused any more curiosity than Shimon was managing to do right now.
Shimon walked quickly along the street of the Western Wall to where a narrow alleyway climbed up toward the Street of the Chain and the bazaars of the Old City.
***
Victoria’s eyes were shining happily into the mirror of the choir robing room at Christ Church. Leah’s beautiful burgundy dress and matching pumps fit Victoria perfectly. The rich color made her smooth olive skin glow with the excitement she felt.
She turned and embraced Leah, who seemed pale and wan compared to Victoria. “Oh Leah!” she cried. “It is perfect! And today is perfect!”
Leah stepped back to appraise her with a pleasantly critical eye. She tugged at the collar making it straight. And then with a broad smile she agreed with Victoria. “Perfect. Now all we need is the groom and the best man, yes?”
Victoria nodded nervously as she glanced up at the clock. It seemed that they had been waiting hours. Surely her brothers would have turned the city upside down looking for her. Would they think to come here as well? Would they take her away before Shimon came with Eli? The strain of these fears showed on her face.
“I have no regrets,” she whispered, as if to herself, “except that we did not do this sooner.” Then she gazed into Leah’s eyes. “I have always loved him. Since we were children, you see. He was always so big and strong, yet gentle. Not like the other boys. And yet I did not think it could ever be.”
She sighed and looked toward the ceiling. “But now our hearts meet here in truth before the one true God. And suddenly the things that kept us apart and fearful for so long do not matter anymore.”
She closed her eyes as if to drink in the truth of what she had just said. “I am not afraid, Leah. God is not a terrible God of vengeance and hatred to me anymore. I have found His nature in Jesus.” She turned to rummage in the pillowcase and pulled out a small Bible bound in mother-of-pearl. She held it gently in her hands for a moment and then held it out for Leah to see. “You see? The prettiest one!”
Leah frowned in thought. It was identical to the Bible she had given to the little beggar in the souk on their first day in Old City Jerusalem. “Yes. It is . . . did you . . . ” She hesitated to ask.
Victoria nodded happily. “I went back to find him after I left you. I paid him twice what you paid for it.” She held it to her heart. “And it is the greatest bargain, the greatest treasure of my life. I was ready, you see, before anyone told me! I was ready to meet the living Jesus! It was so easy for me to believe, Leah,” Victoria said. “I am going to find that little boy after all this is over, and I am going to return this to him and teach him to read.”
Radiant. That was the word for Victoria today. Leah was certain that Eli would be pleased with the beauty of his bride.
***
Etta watched it all from the upstairs window. The shouts and obscenities echoed throughout the Square like a howling, evil wind. She saw the upraised fists, watched the heavy brass crucifix high atop a staff as it waved over the mob, encouraging them forward to the steps of the synagogue.
The shouts of “Christ-killers!” became a chant that fell in rhythm with the crashing of an upraised bench against the doors of the synagogue.
She dashed down the stairs to pile chairs in front of the door. But the mob never came to her house. They vandalized the great Warsaw synagogue, but when they finished, they drifted off, laughing into the snow-covered side streets of the Square.
Silence overtook the Square. Snow began to fall again as men and women staggered out to help the injured in the street. The cold nearness of death stood beside her. She did not weep as she watched; it was all too much like a nightmare, unreal in its madness. Her children. Her husband. What had become of them? Fear for their safety drove everything else from her mind.
Baby Yacov slept peacefully in his cradle throughout the pogrom. She did not pick him up for fear even a small cry from his innocent lips would call the darkness of Evil here to devour him.
A group of women and children emerged from the building. They were surrounded by men with bloody faces who formed a circle of protection for them as they moved down the steps and then across the Square. They were coming here; somehow Etta knew even before they had directed their staggering legs toward the house. She put on her coat and hat and pulled mittens over her trembling hands as she ran down the hallway to pull away the heap of chairs from the door.
In her mind she replayed the faces and forms of the desperate human circle moving toward the house. Her children. Frau Rosen among the women. But Aaron was not among them. She had not seen the face of Aaron in the dark ring that glided soundlessly across the stark white snow.
Chairs were scattered everywhere in the foyer. She pulled back the bolts and threw open the door; then she heard their weeping—not just the voices of women and children, but the men as well! Their sobs ascended on the vapor of their breath. They were not individuals now, but one single unit of moving anguish—black coats torn, bright red blood clinging to beards and soaking white collars. The scarves on the heads of the women were untied. Buttons dangled; shoelaces trailed in the snow. Hands grasped fabric and flesh around them. No one let go, and the expression on every face was the same. The horror in each pair of eyes was identical. No one was untouched. No one separate in their grief.
Etta spread her arms as she stood on the top step. As she cried out to them, and urged them to hurry, she seemed to embrace them, to join the circle of anguish.
Rachel clung to her little brothers. “Mama!” she sobbed, and the boys joined her cry. “They took Papa! They took him away! Oh, why, Mama? They have taken Papa!”
Etta wiped her tears and wiped her mouth. Her legs would not carry her forward to them. They had to come to her. “My children! Rachel! Oh, my Rachel!”
Rachel broke off from the slowly circling group. Her arms out, fingers wide, she ran to Etta and embraced her. The boys followed, and a smaller circle was formed in the snow of Muranow Square.
“Where have they taken him?” Etta wept, as she called to the men. “Where did they take Aaron?”
“To the prison on Ginsea Street!” someone replied. “They called him a Communist! They beat him! They took him from the pulpit as he prayed. His blood marks the way!”
Across the square, Etta could see other small circles moving in their own orbits toward other houses and side streets. No one was alone. Not one.
“Who else? Who else did they arrest?”
“Only the rabbi! Only Rebbe Lubetkin!”
***
Etta shook the housekeeper by her shoulders as she sobbed uncontrollably in the parlor. “Listen!” Etta demanded. “Enough of this!” A slap across Frau Rosen’s cheek quieted her at last. “Listen to me! You must stay here. Lock the doors when I leave and do not open them until I return!”
“Yes . . . yes, Rebbitsin,” the woman sniffed. “It was so terrible!”
Etta would hear no more. “Stop it! Think of the children! Feed them now. Take care of the baby. I will be back.”
“But where are you going? Rebbitsin? You cannot go there!”
Etta’s look was stern. She picked up her handbag and demanded that Frau Rosen obey her. There was some sanity in obedience, at least.
Without a backward glance, Etta left the warmth and safety of the house and trudged off alone across the empty Square.
The snow crunched beneath her boots while fine flakes swirled about her head, stinging her cheeks and clinging to her eyelashes. She had no more tears to shed. She would find Aaron. She had learned the game of the Warsaw police. She knew well why Aaron had been arrested. No immigration papers if on
e has a police record. No country will admit a criminal . . . not a prostitute or a Communist!
Inside her handbag, Etta carried Eduard’s bank checks. If they were lucky today, she would speak to the right officer, someone corrupt and filled with greed. And then perhaps Aaron could come home again.
The shops on both sides of the street were closed. An artificial twilight hung over the Jewish district of Warsaw today. There was no sign of human life here except for Etta, bent against the snow and wind.
Two blocks farther, she reached Ginsea Street, where the great stone façade of the prison loomed over every other building. This was in Catholic Warsaw, and Etta could clearly see automobiles and red streetcars up ahead in the busy intersection. She had worn her camel-colored coat today, the one with the red fox collar. The Poles would not know she was Jewish by these clothes. She would be safe today. Until she opened her mouth in the police station, she would be safe!
Let them bring a crucifix before her—she would kneel and kiss it for the sake of Aaron. She would do what they asked. She would pay them. She would beg them!
She reached the corner of the street to Catholic Warsaw. They had flowed down this very street this morning—a vile flood of hatred. They had chanted the name of their Christ as they battered the doors of the synagogue. How Etta hated them! How she hated them all as they passed her now!
She looked up at the web of electric wires that crisscrossed above the street. Snow fell onto those wires and balanced there above the crushing chaos of the traffic below. Neat perfect lines of snowflakes clung to the wires while other flakes were trampled and soiled by the feet and tires of the Catholic Warsaw on this Sabbath day.
We are those snowflakes on the wire, Etta thought. How narrow is our world, how precarious our balance! And then she closed her eyes in a wordless prayer for help from the God who fashioned each snowflake. Let not my feet slip from Your way! Not even for the sake of Aaron. Let me kneel only to You, my living Lord!
To the left was the prison where Aaron had been taken. To the right was the spire of a magnificent cathedral—the very one whose priest had come to her help in the street when the Poles had taken her. That priest—also a very fine snowflake perched on the wire. Had he not risked his own safety to help Etta that day? And the Darkness had parted for him. At the sound of his voice the men had put her down and backed away.
Etta turned to the right. She walked through the thickening snow flurries toward the Catholic church. She smiled, confident that there was more inside that building than the cold metal image of a dead god. Inside the cathedral was a living man who somehow must have understood the compassion of the Eternal One and taken the Law into his heart! One righteous Gentile in all of Warsaw! Yes, Etta would ask for his help. Such a brave man would not refuse her.
She thanked the Eternal as she quickened her step, praying that the priest would be there. She didn’t even know his name, only that of his church. Somehow she knew that was enough.
38
Faith in the Shadow of Death
The Number Two bus from Mount Scopus and Hebrew University emptied its passengers outside the city walls near the pedestrian entrance of Jaffa Gate.
Eli was so busy looking for Victoria among the women passengers that he did not notice the glum face of his brother Moshe as he approached.
“Well, Eli,” Moshe said, his voice still bitter, “you have come to wait for me?” He slung a bag of books over his shoulder and stopped before the niche where Eli waited.
“I was just—” Eli could not offer him an explanation. He did not want Moshe to know his plans until everything was settled. Over with. “I will walk with you a ways. You are going home?” He fell in stride with Moshe, entering Omar Square to continue along the Street of the Chain.
“Home. Yes.” Moshe sounded regretful, almost apologetic. “For a few days, anyway.” He did not look at Eli.
“What are you saying?”
“My fellowship has come through. I am going to England. Oxford. I begin this coming semester.”
“I envy you,” Eli said as they pressed on through the narrowing street into the clamor of the marketplace.
“You? Envy? You have all this. What more do you want? So certain of your life, Eli. Serve your God in the Old City of Jerusalem. Carry on. I do not know what I believe anymore.” His words were not accusing, but still there was an unmistakable edge of bitterness.
“Mama will miss you,” Eli said.
“She will have her son, the rabbi.” Bitter amusement. Almost mocking.
Eli did not reply to that. He longed to tell Moshe the truth, but his brother would know soon enough. “We will all miss you, Moshe.”
The clanging of hammer against metal in an iron foundry drowned out Moshe’s response. Eli raised his head to look through the human current moving up the street ahead of them. He stopped, grasping Moshe’s arm.
“What?” Moshe looked up to follow Eli’s gaze. He frowned at the sight of Ibrahim Hassan and his brother Ismael pushing their way purposefully toward Eli. There was no mistaking that they wanted to speak with him. Their faces seemed hard and set with anger.
“Come on,” Moshe said. “We’ll go back.”
The clank of the hammer beat out a rhythm above the murmur of the crowds. Eli shook his head. “I have to speak with him sometime,” he replied, sensing there was no escape.
Angrily Ibrahim shouted out Eli’s name. His face was menacing. A few seconds and the two Arabs stood scowling before Eli and Moshe.
“Where is she?” shouted Ismael. He reached out to grasp Eli, but Ibrahim shoved his brother back.
“I will handle this!” Ibrahim roared, and the heads of strangers turned to look.
“Where is who?” Eli replied sharply.
“Victoria! What have you done with her?” panted Ismael, clenching and unclenching his fists.
“I do not know what you are talking about!” Eli shouted back over the roar of the foundry fire. The pounding of hammers behind them fell silent as the Arab ironmonger raised his head to see the confrontation between the Jews and his own countrymen.
“You son of a Jewish pig!” Ismael screamed. “Where is my sister, Victoria?”
Again Ibrahim shoved Ismael away. “I said I will—”
Eli responded in equal anger. “I do not know where she is!” He feigned unconcern. “And why should I? I am a Jew! I will remain a Jew! She is Muslim! I have no interest in—”
“You lie!” Ismael slammed forward against Ibrahim, who held him back.
The crowd of onlookers grew. Arab faces glared with sullen hostility at Moshe and Eli. Dark eyes considered them from beneath checkered keffiyehs. Hands drifted to the hilts of hidden daggers. And the murmur of conversations and haggling began to grow silent.
“I am going for help,” Moshe whispered hoarsely from behind Eli. Then he backed up one step and another, passing through the smoldering crowd until he emerged through the fringes to run wildly back toward the citadel to the British soldiers.
Eli felt the knot of fear in his stomach. A circle of Muslim faces ringed him as Christians and Jews alike scurried away from what looked like certain murder.
Long coats were pulled back at the waist and the hilts of daggers were in plain sight. Brown hands grasped the daggers, ready to unsheath the weapons at the right moment. Behind him, Eli felt the heat of the iron foundry. The fires hissed and made a dull roaring sound.
Eli spread his empty hands. “I have not seen her for a long time, Ibrahim, my friend! Not since I was with you. You remember?”
The blame shifted to Ibrahim. Ismael spat on the ground. “I have heard of the foolishness of Ibrahim. But now I will settle with you, Jew.”
Eli managed a weak smile. There were beads of perspiration on his brow. “Tell him there is nothing to settle, Ibrahim!” He gave a short, nervous laugh. “I have not seen her since we were all together. I have no interest.”
Ibrahim’s face tightened with indignation. “No interest! You are a
swine, indeed. To trifle so with us. To pretend.”
“Ibrahim!” Eli put a hand on his arm. “Brother! We are beyond these things, you and I!”
Ibrahim now spat and tore Eli’s hand away. His eyes were full of hate. He stepped forward. The ring of rough Arab men tightened. It was settled. There would be a killing today. Blood was hot. Hearts raced with the smell of imminent death.
Eli backed up into the shadows of the foundry. The smell of molten metal filled his nostrils. The blacksmith stepped aside as Ibrahim and Ismael unsheathed their knives.
“Where is she?” Ismael’s voice was low. “What have you done with her, Jew?”
“Nothing,” Eli stammered. “I . . . swear. I do not know where she is!” He looked to Ibrahim for help, for some sign of the friendship that once had seemed so strong. A cold smile was frozen on Ibrahim’s face.
“He is mine,” Ibrahim growled. The steel blade of Ibrahim’s dagger glinted with the orange reflection of the fire.
“Ibrahim!” Eli shouted, backing up until he tripped over a large piece of metal and fell to the ground.
Instantly a resounding roar erupted from the spectators as Ibrahim leapt forward, falling upon Eli. With a cry, Eli grasped the wrist of Ibrahim, pushing back against the downward thrust of the knife that hung inches above his neck.
The shouts of encouragement for a quick death of the Jew merged into a roar, hovering over the struggle taking place on the floor of the foundry.
Eli’s face was contorted with the effort. Ibrahim’s sweat dripped onto his cheeks. Ibrahim smiled above him, confident of his strength.
Eli jerked his knee hard into Ibrahim’s groin, sending him sprawling back in startled pain. The roar grew louder. This was not a simple slaughter; the Jew could fight, after all! It was more sport for the spectators, even though the end would be the same for the Jew!
Eli lunged toward Ibrahim, knocking the raised dagger from his hand. He slammed his fist against Ibrahim’s throat, and the Arab’s face filled with pain. He struck at Eli, a hard blow of his forearm across the bridge of Eli’s nose. Blood spurted out, spraying Ibrahim’s clothes with red.
