The Voyage: A Historical Novel set during the Holocaust, inspired by real events

by Roberta Kagan

  “Thank you for trying, anyway,” Anna finally managed. She was glad she had not told Alex about the conversation with Mrs. Garcia. She’d wanted to surprise him. Now at least she would not have to thwart his dreams.

  Benita Garcia laughed loudly. “Anna, my dear, I was just joking. I have the visas.”

  “Mrs. Garcia....” Anna took the old woman into her arms. “Tell me what you need. I will give you all the money that we have.”

  “Well, I had to grease a palm or two, but it’s done. And you needn’t pay me. I have plenty of money…”

  “God bless you, God bless you.” Anna was crying, and everyone in the salon had stopped working to watch the interaction between the most difficult client and the quiet girl who was always kind to everyone.

  “Enough, you’re ruining my reputation. We wouldn’t want them to think I did anything nice, now, would we?” Benita Garcia laughed again. Then she continued, “You and your husband report to the immigration office first thing tomorrow morning. Ask for Jorge Garcia; he is expecting you. You said that you have an uncle in the United States?”

  “Yes, my uncle Max.”

  “He will need to sponsor you and your husband by signing an affidavit that he will promise to support the two of you financially. America will only accept immigrants that they are sure will not become a burden on the already strained economy.”

  “I understand. I am sure my uncle will sign whatever is necessary. He has been trying to help us for a long time.”

  “Yes, well, usually it takes at least two to three years for your number to come up, even with help, but I’ve made these other arrangements, and that will speed the process. Do as I say and go tomorrow, ask for Jorge Garcia. He will direct you from there.”

  “I will do what you tell me to do.” Anna smiled through her tears.

  “Now hurry up and get my nails polished. You know how I hate to wait,” Benita said. Her voice was caustic and demanding, but her smile was warm and loving.

  Chapter 46

  After a year and a half in the tropics, Alex and Anna boarded a ship headed for New York. They held hands as their hearts beat with excitement. Soon, they would be in America, the land of opportunity.

  The ship they were able to afford passage on was nothing like the MS St. Louis. There were no bands or fancy food. In fact, they shared a bunk bed deep within the belly of the vessel, surrounded on all sides by other hopeful immigrants. Neither Anna nor Alex had experienced seasickness on the St. Louis, however here they were both nauseated for most of the voyage. Because a large group of people had been stuffed into a small, enclosed room, sometimes violent fights broke out, not to mention all of the illness that spread through the germ-infested air.

  But in spite of its cargo, the ship sailed up the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, passing the beautiful beaches of Miami and continuing toward the port of the city of New York, and the gateway to the land of plenty, Ellis Island.

  As the ship came into port, the passengers rushed up to the lower deck where they were able to see the Statue of Liberty, holding her torch high and welcoming them into the new world. Although there were over a hundred people, no one spoke. They were all in awe of the beauty of the copper statue, the symbol that meant they had arrived. Alex leaned over and kissed the top of Anna’s head.

  “I can’t believe we are actually here,” he said.

  “I know. We are in America... It’s like a dream,” she said, and looked up at him, her eyes glowing with excitement.

  When they left the ship, they were directed into a line which had formed on the bridge into the port. Alex carried the cardboard suitcase with all of their possessions as they went to the end of the line. It took hours to reach the front, where they were examined by doctors and dentists. They saw others walking around with markings on their bodies, such as H, or E. They had no idea what this meant, only that these people were to be detained and held in quarantine.

  “Look healthy, pinch your cheeks,” Alex heard a man say to his young daughter. The girl was pale and had been coughing for most of the trip.

  Alex squeezed Anna’s hand, and gave her a wink and a worried smile as they were separated to see the doctor individually.

  The exam was extensive. Not only were they checked for physical defects, but mental defects, as well.

  Several hours later, Alex waited outside the building until Anna finally joined him. They had passed the test. Then they boarded the ferry that took them to Manhattan. They were now in the United States of America.

  Uncle Max had wired them directions to the apartment he shared with Aunt Edith, and although Alex had done a fair job of learning to read English, the bus numbers and street names were still difficult for him to navigate. But they asked directions and made their way to the Jewish section of Manhattan. When they arrived, they climbed three flights of stairs in a red brick building to find the apartment. Anna knocked on the door. A plump woman with a bright smile and graying brown hair opened the door.

  “You made it…” she said. “I’m your aunt Edith.” The woman opened her flabby arms to take them both into a big bear hug. “Come in, come in… Don’t stand in the hallway.”

  Anna walked in first; then Alex followed her. She looked around at the small apartment, clean and modestly furnished.

  “Sit, sit, you must be tired, yes? You must be hungry, too. Well don’t you worry, I’m gonna make you something right away. In fact, I have a little chicken soup left from last night. I’ll make you both a bowl with a piece of Challah. How does that sound? Oy, Max was right; you are a pretty little thing. Am I rambling? I ramble sometimes. I’m sorry. It’s just that Max works for such long hours, and I am all alone, with no one to talk to. It will be good to have you here. There I go again; I am rambling. I’m sorry. Let me get that food. I’ll be right back.”

  When Aunt Edith went into the kitchen, Anna smiled at Alex.

  “She’s excited,” he said.

  “She’s funny,” Anna said.

  Anna sat down on the sofa and Alex sat beside her. Neither of them spoke, but their eyes caught, and they could see in each other’s expression that they were comfortable here at Anna’s uncle’s house, at least for now.

  The food was delicious, good, old-fashioned Jewish cooking, the way that it had been so long ago when they were just children in Germany. Anna’s attempts at preparing their old favorites had been good, but this was truly authentic.

  “It reminds me of my mother’s chicken soup,” Anna said.

  “Yes, it’s strange, but I felt the same thing. My mother used to make it just like this, too,” Alex said, sipping a spoonful of hot broth.

  Aunt Edith refilled their bowls twice, and they both finished every drop, and then thanked Aunt Edith a thousand times.

  “You two look tired. Let me show you the room where you will be staying.”

  It was a pleasant room with a red and yellow flowered bedspread and matching curtains, the dresser was light blond wood, and there was a small closet to hang things. Both Anna and Alex were too tired to unpack. They took turns going to the bathroom to clean up, and then went directly to bed, where they slept all the way through until the following morning. Even though they arose early, Uncle Max had already left for work. He was a butcher, Edith explained. The customers began to come early. He kept terrible hours.

  “We don’t have a lot, but Max does all right. People will always have need for a kosher butcher, thanks be to God,” Aunt Edith said. “And we always seem to have enough to eat...so for that I am thankful, too.”

  “Yes, wherever our people settle, be it here or anywhere else, they will always need a kosher butcher, so it is a very good profession to be in.” Alex smiled.

  “Max says that he will take you to work with him, Alex. He says he is going to teach you, apprentice you; I think that’s what he called it. Then you will have a trade. You will be a butcher, too.”

  Alex smiled at her, but inside he was cringing. He could do almost anything, almost anything b
ut this. The killing of animals sickened him; he couldn’t bear to see the blood. This was going to be a challenge, but he couldn’t let Anna down. He had to try.

  “I want to get a job, too,” Anna said. “I have experience working in a beauty shop. Do you think they would hire me here?”

  “I don’t know. You can try if you want to…”

  “Yes, I will do that today.”

  “Why don’t I go along with you to make sure that you are safe? Again, Anna, we are in a new place, we don’t know much about the neighborhoods,” Alex said.

  “All right. Come with me, then.”

  None of the beauty salons were interested, they already had their staff, and besides, Anna’s English was still limited.

  “I don’t know what I am going to do,” Anna said.

  “Well, perhaps I will do well enough as a butcher to support us, and you can go to school instead of working.”

  “I want to do both. I plan to go to school. But I want to bring some money into the house; I cannot just live with my aunt and uncle and not contribute.”

  “But my contribution will be for both of us.”

  “No, I feel that I need to do something as well. I need to be productive.”

  “Sweetheart, let me do this for you. If we find that it is necessary, you can get a job, but for now, can we just try it my way? You stay at home and learn how to make that special chicken soup, so that you can make it for our children when they are born, all right?”

  She nodded, but since they had landed in Cuba, Anna had grown from a child into a woman. She had earned her own money, and learned her own self-worth.

  Chapter 47

  Aunt Edith meant well, but she watched over Anna as if Anna were a child. She would not allow her any freedom. Anna, having lived in Cuba, alone with Alex, was not used to anyone hovering over her constantly, and she began to feel annoyed.

  “I would like to go to school and work on my English, so that I can get my citizenship and maybe a job,” Anna said as they were rolling out bread dough one morning.

  “You don’t need to go to school. Women don’t need an education. The only education you need is how to cook, clean and take care of babies.”

  “Yes, but I want to. I would like to maybe become a teacher.”

  “This is nonsense. That’s a job for an old maid. You have a husband to take care of you. What do you need to do all of this for?”

  Anna shrugged. “I had a job in Havana. I had friends too. I feel a little bit lost here.”

  “You have me. And you have all the young girls from the neighborhood who come to sit outside on the steps with us in the evening.”

  Anna nodded. She did have Aunt Edith, and every night the family sat outside on the steps and the sidewalks with all of the other families in the neighborhood. The children ran through the streets playing kickball, while the adults talked. Because of these nightly gatherings, Anna had become friendly with several of the other young woman who lived in the building. News traveled through the neighborhoods at these informal groupings. In fact, as the sun set one night, Anna and Alex sat on the stairs with Uncle Max and Aunt Edith when they overheard a conversation between two men who lived in the adjacent building.

  “Hitler has taken France and Belgium, they are now under Nazi rule, and he is bombing the hell out of England,” one of the men said.

  “Are you sure?” Alex interrupted the conversation.

  “Absolutely. It’s all over the newspapers.”

  Alex looked at Anna to see if she had heard what the man said, and by the expression of horror on her face, he knew that she had. Neither of them spoke the words aloud, but they both knew that Manny and Elke could be in any of those countries. Those were three of the countries that had accepted the passengers from the St. Louis.

  Anna and Alex also learned that America was not immune to anti-Semitism. Outside on the sidewalk they heard about the street demonstrations against Jews, and the American Nazi Party. Their Jewish neighbors tried to brush it off as nothing but insignificant rabble-rousers. But when Alex heard that America had a growing Nazi Party, he’d spoken up, and because Alex was usually so quiet and mild mannered, when he raised his voice, heatedly explaining that the Jews must pay careful attention, and they must do everything possible to ensure that the Nazis never came to power, the others listened. He told them that he had been in Dachau; then he explained how it all began, how the Nazis took over in Germany. “Open your eyes! You are in danger! Act now, while you still can! Once they are in control, you will have no rights at all! And they HATE you! They hate ALL Jews! They will do things to you and your families that you never dreamed human beings could be capable of doing to another human being!” Alex said, and he made them afraid.

  It was also on one of those evening that Anna had overheard one of the girls talking about job openings in the factories in the garment district. Anna wasn’t sure how far this was from her home, or which streetcar she would need to take to get there, but the idea of having a place to go and money in her pocket, money that she had earned, excited her. She planned to find out more information.

  But she hardly had the chance to look into working, because try as they might to prevent it, Anna had become pregnant. Although they had hoped to delay the beginning of their family until they were sure they could afford it, both Anna and Alex were excited. Max and Edith assured them both that they, too, would welcome a child.

  But secretly, Alex was not well. He’d become deeply troubled. He could not bear being a butcher, could not force himself to participate in the killing of animals. The slitting of their throats, the draining of the blood and the carving of their bodies haunted him. He could not sleep and gagged when he tried to eat meat of any kind. At night, he had dreams where he saw the slain animals turn into his family members. His mind twisted and turned as he slept, his body bathed in sweat. In his dream, Alex saw himself dressed in a perfectly pressed black SS uniform. He woke shivering, his mouth dry, his throat parched, his heart racing. Before the Nazi’s had taken power in Germany, Alex had been a man of words, a man of learning, a gentle man who could never see himself capable of killing anything. But he knew he had to continue to try, to try not to fail for Anna’s sake, especially now with the baby coming. He went to work every morning with Uncle Max. Alex stood beside Max, shuddering as he butchered the creatures, then secretly went behind the building and vomited. Alex saw the eyes of the young lambs and thought of his sister. Even after he left the butcher shop, he still heard the sounds of the animals. His hands began to shake, and as the weeks went by and he ate less and less. He grew thin and pale.

  Anna knew something was wrong with Alex, but and he refused to tell her what bothered him. She thought he must be concerned about earning enough money to care for a child. He’d only just begun his apprenticeship; he had a lot to learn before he could expect full pay as a butcher. If only she could find a way to reassure him. As her belly grew bigger, Alex got worse. He withdrew into himself and hardly spoke to her or the others. When the family went outside of the tenement at night to gather with the neighbors, he did not join them.

  In spite of Aunt Edith’s disapproval, Anna decided that she would get a job. One afternoon when Edith lay down for a nap, Anna dressed and left the apartment. She waited for the streetcar on the corner, and then asked directions to the garment district. Because of her broken English, she was ignored by most people walking by. She boarded the streetcar, hoping that she would find someone to help her. Anna took the streetcar until she saw what looked like factory buildings. She got off and walked around looking for any help-wanted signs, but did not see any. Instead, she saw lines of people in ragged clothes outside of Christian missions waiting for food. The streets were filled with people of all sorts, boys selling newspapers, men scurrying off to work, even prostitutes in tight skirts and low-cut blouses, selling their wares. Anna heard loud noises above her and she looked up to see workers laboring on dangerously tall buildings. They looked as if they might
fall to the ground any minute. Anna trembled and looked away. She began to feel as if Edith might have been right. Perhaps she should have just stayed at home. New York City loomed over her like a living, breathing giant, one she knew very little about. Anna turned to the left, then the right; nothing looked familiar, and now she couldn’t remember where she had gotten off the streetcar or even what number streetcar she’d taken. Automobiles honked their horns as the drivers hollered at each other. Anna felt her heart begin to pound. She tried to find a landmark, but all of the streets looked the same. A car right in front of her honked its horn. She jumped at the loud noise, just as a man came from around the corner. He rushed at her so quickly that she hardly knew what happened. With his left hand he punched her in the face, while with his right hand he grabbed her purse. Anna tried to run, but she tripped over the curb and fell hard against the concrete, her nose was gushing blood. She let out a scream, but the thief had disappeared into the crowd. Several people gathered around her. A tall, slender woman wearing high-heeled shoes and a stylish hat bent down to help her to sit up.

  Anna sat on the curb, the blood from her face flowing like a river onto her blouse.

  “Are you all right?” the woman asked.

  “I don’t know,” Anna said. “My stomach hurts. I have a lot of cramping.”

  The woman looked down; then she smiled a frozen smile back up at Anna, trying to hide her shock. Anna was bleeding from between her legs.

  “Officer, officer…this woman needs help. She needs an ambulance…”

  Anna passed out. The officer helped to load her in the back of an ambulance that screamed all the way to the nearest hospital.

  Chapter 48

  “You wouldn’t listen to me. Now, oy vey, I can’t believe this happened.” Aunt Edith pulled her hair.

  Anna opened her eyes to find Alex holding her hand.

  “Anna, my Anna…“ He kissed her hand. “I’ve been so worried,” Alex said, and she saw that his eyes were red and he’d been crying. “I was so afraid I would lose you...”