The Family Moskat (91 page)

The front of the house had collapsed; a ceiling lay sloping above a pile of bricks, plaster, and glass. They made out the interiors of rooms, with their beds, tables, and pictures. Asa Heshel was reminded of modernist theater settings. The road was blocked and they had to clamber over heaps of rubble. On Iron Street a factory was burning; flames danced behind the barred windows, and acrid smoke belched forth. In the half-darkness firemen stood about and directed streams of water into the flames. A little man came up, demanded something, and flew into a rage.

Barbara hardly recognized her own house. She pulled the bell several times, but no one answered. They began to hammer on the door with their fists. Finally they heard footsteps; the little peephole was uncovered, and a pair of piercing eyes looked out. It was not the old janitor, who knew Barbara, but a new one. The key turned and the door opened a crack.

"Whom do you want to see?"

"We live here."

"Where?"'

Barbara gave the number of her room.

"You're not allowed to go wandering around at night."

"We've just come back from Zakopane."

"What? How? Well--" The janitor scratched his head in bewilderment and admitted them. They went up the stairs to Barbara's room. The door was open. Had there been a robbery?

She wanted to put on the light, but remembered that it was forbidden. She felt about in the darkness, opened the clothes closet. Her dresses and her winter coat were still there. She went over to the writing-desk and tried the drawers; they were closed.

Was it possible that she herself had forgotten to lock the door in -600-the haste of her

departure? She remembered clearly that she had made the bed before leaving, but now the blanket was half on the floor, and the bedclothes were in disorder. Someone had been here; someone had slept here. She went over to the telephone and lifted the receiver; the dial tone sounded; the world still existed. She took her keys out of her bag and opened the linen closet; in the darkness she drew out a sheet, a pillow slip, a towel. The people who had broken in had stolen nothing. Asa Heshel stood at the window. The courtyard was steeped in darkness. Black windows looked down on it, like the windows of ruins. A heavy-laden silence filled the unlighted spaces. The thought came to him: "All civilization has been extinguished. Only the skeletons of the earth's human habitation lie scattered about like gravestones."

"We're going to sleep in a bed tonight," Barbara said.

Accustomed now to the darkness, Asa Heshel walked over to the faucet and turned it on. The pipe gasped and gurgled. Tepid water began running out of it. Asa Heshel put his hands under it first, then his head, and while he was washing himself he drank. He began to undress. Little stones rolled out of his trouser cuffs. His shoes were tattered and filled with sand. His shirt clung to his skin. He laid his clothes on a chair, sat down on the sofa, and rubbed his feet. God, what distances they had covered since last Friday! He had never imagined that he could do so much walking. He felt his ribs, his belly, his chest. He stretched himself out and closed his eyes. Only now did it occur to him that he had eaten nothing since early morning. There was a rumbling in his intestines. His pulse beat was slow and intermittent. "Is there anything to eat?" he asked Barbara.

"Wait a moment."

She found quite a supply of food in her cupboard: a bag of flour, a paper container of rice, a box of sardines, a dried-up roll. Asa Heshel struck a match and she lit the gas stove. She put the rice on to boil, then broke the roll in two halves and gave one to him. He chewed it and took sips of water. He was not altogether awake.

It flashed through his mind that Hadassah and Dacha were probably in Warsaw, at Nyunie's. He suddenly remembered that he had a son, David, in Palestine. There were countries where there was still peace. In America people were going to the theater, eating in restaurants, dancing, listening to music. He heard the wailing of cats outside; the animal world -601-did not know there was a Hitler; in this way human beings, too, fail to perceive other realities.

Asa Heshel fell asleep. Barbara awoke him. He opened his eyes, but he could remember nothing. He did not know where he was or what had happened to him. He heard a voice: "Asa Heshel, the rice is ready." Who eats rice in the middle of the night, he asked himself wonderingly. Barbara handed him a spoon. He carried the half-boiled mess to his lips. She sat down next to him and ate from the same pot, her cheek close to his. "Aren't you hungry?

Or what is it?"

"I must sleep."

He got up from the sofa, but he could not see the bed. He stumbled against a table, a chair, the edge of the stove. Then he stood still and waited. He fell into a doze, like an animal. He came to with a start.

"What are you doing? Why don't you lie down?"

He wanted to answer, but the words would not form on his lips.

A grain of rice was stuck to his tongue. He clung to the wall, like a child learning to walk. Barbara put her arms about him. "What is it? You're frightening me."

She guided him to the bed. The sheets were cool. His head sank into the pillow.

2

In the morning Asa Heshel was awakened by the roaring of planes and the clatter of machine guns. The room was flooded with sunlight. Barbara was already up and about, in slippers and a dressing-gown. A childish joy took hold of Asa Heshel. The sun was shining! People were alive! He was home! He sprang out of bed and put his clothes on. The roar of the planes stopped, and with it the clatter of the machine guns. The windows were open again; radios blared, children shouted, the courtyard below was filled with people talking, gesticulating, pointing to the sky. A festive gaiety seemed to animate everyone. Asa Heshel had awakened hungry, thirsty, weak-kneed, but eager to start moving, to see his relatives. The dull awareness of the Nazis that had haunted him the last few days had dis-solved. Barbara turned on the radio. The announcer told of nothing but victories: our heroic troops were repulsing the enemy on every front, at Sheradz, at Piotrkow, at Tchechanov, -602-at Modlin. On

the Hel peninsula our gallant soldiers were putting up a magnificent resistance. The enemy was being flung back from the island of Westerplatte, near Danzig. French and English planes were bombarding German factories in the Ruhr.

Tremendous protest rallies were being held in America. President Roosevelt had called an emergency meeting of his cabinet.

The news bulletins were interspersed with music and instructions to the civilian population: what to do during bombardments, how to take care of the wounded. Then again reports, orders, warnings, promises full of good cheer. Asa Heshel telephoned Nyunie, but there was no answer. He looked up Pinnie's number and called him.

Pinnie answered; his voice was hoarse and quavery. "Who is that?"

"This is Asa Heshel, Hadassah's husband."

Pinnie was silent. Asa Heshel continued: "I telephoned my father-in-law, but no one answered."

At last Pinnie said: "Your father-in-law has moved in with us."

"Can he come to the telephone?"

"He's just gone out."

"Can you perhaps tell me where Hadassah is?"

Pinnie began to stammer something, broke off, coughed, and then said, reproachfully: "We thought you were going to stay out there."

"I got back last night."

"How did you manage it? But it doesn't matter. Hadassah is dead."

There was a long silence at both ends of the line. Finally Asa Heshel asked: "When did it happen? How?"

"In Otwotsk. The first bomb."

Again a long silence. "Where is Dacha?"

"Here, with us. Do you want to speak to her?"

"No. I'm coming right over."

While Asa Heshel had been talking, Barbara had been looking through the closet. She had lost her best clothes on the road. She took out dresses, shoes, underwear. She had apparently paid no attention to the conversation, for she asked: "Well, how are your people?"

"Barbaral I must go!" he answered in a hollow voice. "Hadassah's dead!"

She looked at him and turned pale.

-

603-"Ill come back in the evening," he said. "If the house is still standing!"

They stared at each other for a while, then Barbara started out of her trance. "Wait a moment. I'm coming with you. We might lose each other."

He sat on the sofa while she dressed, then they went out together. The street was crowded--Asa Heshel could not remember ever having seen such mobs on Iron Street. People jostled each other on the sidewalk and in the middle of the road. They carried valises, packages, bundles, rucksacks. One tall man held a floor lamp in one hand and a basket in the other. In an open place on which timber lay scattered a crowd of Jews and gentiles were digging a wide trench. The Chassidim threw up the earth with quick, eager strokes and wiped the sweat from their brows.

Somewhere in the vicinity a bakery was open; Asa Heshel saw women carrying fresh loaves. Many of the passers-by were in semi-military clothes: girls had soldiers' capotes on; men in civilian clothes wore helmets. Nurses, stretcher-bearers, and scouts wove their way through the throng. Here and there civilians carried gas masks slung over their shoulders. In the midst of the confusion two tall nuns stood arguing. Barbara clung to Asa Heshel's arm, afraid of losing him. She had changed her dress, but he still wore the rumpled suit, the filthy shirt, and the tattered shoes of their journey. As they passed a large shop window Asa Heshel caught a glimpse of himself and was staggered. He could not go like this to Pinnie's. He turned off the street in the direction of his room on the Novolipki.

The Jewish section, too, was densely crowded. Long lines stood before the bakeries. Some of the shops were shuttered; others were still open. Shopkeepers stood on guard. Here and there barricades had been thrown up; planks, tables, chairs, and boxes lay about, and in one place a cart had been turned upside down, wheels in the air. Children clambered on the heaps of sand, bricks, and stones. A bomb had exploded in the vicinity--no one yet knew exactly where. Small groups stood reading Yiddish newspapers printed on one side in gigantic letters. In the dusty air there was a wild confusion that reminded Asa Heshel of fires, of an eclipse of the sun, of Messianic expectation. They passed a barber shop. He asked Barbara for some change. She went in with him. The attendant began to soap Asa Heshel the moment he sat down, without bothering to wrap a towel -604-around his neck. Barbara waited, staring meanwhile at the mirrors. She had a few hundred zlotys in the State Savings Bank, but she had heard that the banks were all closed. Her total possessions consisted now of thirty-eight zlotys and a diamond ring.

Asa Heshel's room on Novolipki Street had been taken over by a sister of the landlord, newly arrived from the country. His clothes, however, had not been touched. He changed in the kitchen, throwing his dirty shirt out of the window. In the drawer of his desk lay an old version of "
The Laboratory of Happiness
,"

written in Switzerland. Asa Heshel unscrewed the door of the stove and thrust it inside. Then he went downstairs. Barbara was in conversation with a young Jewish soldier. Seeing Asa Heshel, she made as if to introduce him, but changed her mind, said good-by to the soldier, and rushed up to Asa Heshel. "We must run!

While the bridge is still standing."

"Run where?"

"Toward Russia."

"My daughter is here."

"Asa Heshel, we haven't a minute to lose."

"I'm staying here."

For a moment she stood undecided. Then she took his arm and accompanied him to Twarda Street, to his Uncle Pinnie's. She waited outside, for a long time. German planes, flying low, passed overhead. She heard the rattling of the anti-aircraft guns, the crash of bombs. She saw bursts of yellow smoke rising above the roofs and chimneys. Flocks of birds circled above, screeching. People ran about in panic. Someone warned her to take shelter, but she was afraid of losing Asa Heshel. She looked up at the sky, which was filled with sulphur-yellow fumes, and yawned. Now she understood what Asa Heshel had meant when he said that the war bored him.

Asa Heshel came down again. He had seen the whole family: his father-in-law, his father-in-law's wife, Dacha, Reb Aaron, Leah, Dosha, Lottie. Others had been there too, strangers to him. The rooms were jammed, everything was in disorder. The bedding had been tied in bundles; valises, trunks, and packages lay about.

Leah, wearing a crepe-covered hat, stood apart, examining her American passport. The rabbi was in conversation with a young man. Pinnie ran around babbling unintelligibly. It appeared that a bomb had exploded close by. Patches of plaster had fallen from the ceiling and walls, uncovering the gas pipes. A yel--605-low dust lay over everything. In the kitchen Asa Heshel found Lottie seated on a footstool, reading an English book. No one paid any attention to him. Dacha was eating bread and sausage. She had grown much taller since he had last seen her; her face had a city pallor. She ate with the slow earnestness of an orphan who had become a charge on her relatives. She told her father all the details: Mother had gone to Otwotsk to ask about a train. Vanya's older daughter had gone with her. Suddenly there was an alarm; the two women ran into a school building. That was where the bomb had struck. Mother had died the same evening in Dr.

Barabander's sanatorium. The girl had lost an arm. Mother was buried in Kartchev.

Dacha began to choke; she laid her head on her father's shoulder and wept in the shrill, hoarse voice of a grown-up.

3

From Pinnie's Asa Heshel and Barbara set out for Franciskaner Street, where his sister lived. On the way they were overtaken by an air raid and took shelter under an arch. Again the planes roared low overhead, machine guns rattled, bombs exploded.

When the sirens sounded the all-clear, they continued past burning houses and ruins. The streets rapidly filled again. An order had been issued over the radio that all men of military age were to leave the city. Immense crowds were fleeing through the streets leading to the Praga bridges. Some went on foot, others in every variety of vehicle: platforms on wheels, carts, droshkies, motorcycles, buses, and taxis. A limousine was tangled in the traffic. Passers-by caught a glimpse of well-dressed ladies and lapdogs behind the gleaming windows.