The Painted Bird Part 5

When the Germans were approaching and it was too late to run for the woods, my master hid me in a skillfully camouflaged cellar beneath the barn. Its entrance was very narrow and it was at least ten feet deep. I had helped dig it myself, and no one else, other than the man and his wife, knew of its existence.

It had a well-stocked larder with large lumps of b.u.t.ter and cheese, smoked hams, strings of sausages, bottles of homemade liquor, and other delicacies. The bottom of the cellar was always cool. While the Germans rushed all over the house searching for food, chasing pigs in the fields, clumsily trying to catch chickens, I sat there absorbing the delicious fragrances. Often the soldiers stood on the board covering the entrance to the cellar. I used to hold my nose to avoid sneezing as I listened to their strange speech. As soon as the sound of the army trucks died into the distance the man would pull me up out of the cellar to resume my usual duties.

The mushroom season had begun. The hungry villagers welcomed it and went into the woods for their rich harvest. Every hand was needed and my master always took me along. Large parties of peasants from other villages roamed the woods in search of the small growths. My master realized that I looked like a Gypsy and, anxious not to be denounced to the Germans, he shaved my black hair. When going out I put on my head a large old cap that covered half of my face and made me less conspicuous. Still, I felt uneasy under the suspicious glances of the other peasants, so I tried always to stay close to my master. I felt that I was sufficiently useful to him to be kept for a while.

On the way to the mushroom gathering we crossed the railroad running through the forest. Several times a day great puffing locomotives pa.s.sed pulling long freight trains. Machine-guns thrust out of the roofs of the cars and rested on a platform in front of the steam engine. Helmeted soldiers scanned the sky and woods with binoculars.

Then a new kind of train appeared on the line. Living people were jammed in locked cattle cars. Some of the men who worked at the station brought news to the village. These trains carried Jews and Gypsies, who had been captured and sentenced to death. In each car there were two hundred of them stacked like cornstalks, arms raised to take up less s.p.a.ce. Old and young, men, women, and children, even babies. Often the peasants from the neighboring village were temporarily employed on the construction of a concentration camp and brought back strange tales. They told us that after leaving the train the Jews were sorted into different groups, then stripped naked and deprived of all their possessions. Their hair was cut off, apparently for use in mattresses. The Germans also looked at their teeth, and if there were any gold ones they were immediately pulled out. The gas chambers and ovens could not cope with the great supply of people; thousands of those killed by gas were not burned but simply buried in pits around the camp.

The peasants listened to these stories thoughtfully. They said the Lord's punishment had finally reached the Jews. They had deserved it long ago, ever since they crucified Christ. G.o.d never forgot. If He had overlooked the sins of the Jews so far, He had not forgiven them. Now the Lord was using the Germans as His instrument of justice. The Jews were to be denied the privilege of a natural death. They had to perish by fire, suffering the torments of h.e.l.l here on earth. They were being justly punished for the shameful crimes of their ancestors, for refuting the only True Faith, for mercilessly killing Christian babies and drinking their blood.

The villagers now gave me even darker looks. "You Gypsy-Jew," they yelled. "You'll burn yet, b.a.s.t.a.r.d, you will." I pretended that this did not concern me, even when some shepherds caught me and tried to drag me to a fire and toast my heels, as was G.o.d's will. I struggled, scratching and biting them. I had no intention of being burned in such an ordinary camp-fire when others were incinerated in special and elaborate furnaces built by the Germans and equipped with engines more powerful than those of the largest locomotives.

I stayed awake at night worrying whether G.o.d would punish me too. Was it possible that G.o.d's wrath was reserved only for people with black hair and eyes, who were called Gypsies? Why did my father, whom I still remembered well, have fair hair and blue eyes, while my mother was dark? What was the difference between a Gypsy and a Jew, since both were dusky and both were destined for the same end? Probably after the war only fair-haired, blue-eyed people would be left in the world. Then what would happen to children of blond people who might be born dark?

When the trains carrying Jews went by in the daytime or at dusk, the peasants lined up on both sides of the track and waved cheerfully to the engineer, the stoker, and the few guards. Through the small square windows at the top of the locked cars, one could sometimes glimpse a human face. These people must have climbed on the shoulders of others to see where they were going and to find out whose voices they heard outside. Seeing the friendly gestures of the peasants the people in the car must have thought that they themselves were being greeted. Then the Jewish faces would disappear and a ma.s.s of thin, pale arms would wave desperate signals.

The peasants watched the trains with curiosity, listening intently to the strange humming sound of the human throng, neither groan, cry, nor song. The train went by, and as it pulled away one could still see against the dark background of the forest disembodied human arms waving tirelessly from the windows.

Sometimes at night people traveling on the trains to the crematories would toss their small children through the windows in the hope of saving their lives. Now and then they managed to wrench up the floorboards and determined Jews might force their way through the hole, hitting the crushed stone track-bed, the rails, or the taut semaph.o.r.e wire. Slashed by the wheels, their mutilated trunks rolled down the embankment into the tall gra.s.s.

Peasants wandering along the tracks in daytime would find these remains and quickly strip them of clothes and shoes. Gingerly, lest they get soiled with the diseased blood of the unbaptized, they ripped the linings off the victims' clothes in search for valuables. There were many disputes and fights over the loot. Later the stripped bodies were left on the track, between the rails, where they were found by the German motorized patrol car which pa.s.sed once a day. The Germans either poured gasoline over the contaminated bodies and burned them on the spot or buried them nearby.

One day word came to the village that several trains with Jews had pa.s.sed at night, one after another. The peasants finished their mushroom gathering earlier than usual and then we all went to the railroad tracks. We walked along the line on both sides, in single file, peering into the bushes, looking for signs of blood on the signal pole wires and on the edge of the embankment. There was nothing for a few miles. Then one of the women spotted some crushed branches in a thicket of wild roses. Someone spread the th.o.r.n.y growth and we saw a small boy of about five sprawled on the ground. His shirt and pants were in shreds. His black hair was long and his dark eyebrows arched. He seemed to be asleep or dead. One of the men stepped on his leg. The boy jerked and opened his eyes. Seeing people leaning over him he tried to say something, but pink froth came from his mouth instead and dripped slowly over his chin and neck. Afraid of his black eyes, the peasants quickly moved aside and crossed themselves.

Hearing voices behind him, the boy tried to turn over. But his bones must have been broken, because he only moaned and a large b.l.o.o.d.y bubble appeared at his mouth. He fell back and closed his eyes. The peasants watched him suspiciously from a distance. One of the women crept forward, grabbed the worn shoes on his feet, and tore them off. The boy moved, groaned, and coughed up more blood. He opened his eyes and saw the peasants, who darted out of his field of vision, crossing themselves in panic. He closed his eyes again and remained motionless. Two men grabbed him by the legs and turned him over. He was dead. They took off his jacket, shirt, and shorts and carried him to the middle of the track. He was left there and the German patrol car could not miss him.

We turned to go home. I glanced back as we went. The boy was lying on the whitish stones of the track. Only the clump of his black hair remained in view.

I tried to think what he had thought before dying. When he was tossed out of the train his parents or his friends no doubt a.s.sured him that he would find human help which would save him from a horrible death in the great furnace. He probably felt cheated, deceived. He would have preferred to cling to the warm bodies of his father and mother in the packed car, to feel the pressure and smell the hot tart odors, the presence of other people, knowing that he was not alone, told by everyone that the journey was only a misunderstanding.

Although I regretted the boy's tragedy, at the bottom of my mind lurked a feeling of relief that he was dead. Keeping him in the village would do no one any good, I thought. He would threaten the lives of all of us. If the Germans heard about a Jewish foundling, they would converge on the village. They would search every house, they would find the boy, and they would also find me in my cellar. They would probably a.s.sume that I, too, had fallen off the train and would kill both of us together on the spot, punishing the whole village later.

I pulled the cloth cap over my face, dragging my feet at the end of the line. Wouldn't it be easier to change people's eyes and hair than to build big furnaces and then catch Jews and Gypsies to burn in them?

Mushroom gathering was now a daily ch.o.r.e. Baskets of them were drying everywhere, basketfuls were hidden in lofts and barns. More and more grew in the woods. Every morning people dispersed into the forest with empty baskets. Heavily laden bees, carrying nectar from dying flowers, droned lazily in the autumn sun through the windless peace of the thick undergrowth, guarded by the towers of tall trees.

Bending down to pick the mushrooms, people called to each other in cheerful voices each time they found a rich cl.u.s.ter. They were answered by the soft cacophony of birds calling from the thickets of hazel and juniper, from the branches of oaks and hornbeams. Sometimes the sinister cry of an owl was heard, but no one could see it in its deep, hidden hole in some tree trunk. A reddish fox might scurry away into the dense bushes after a feast of partridge eggs. Vipers would crawl nervously, hissing to give themselves courage. A fat hare would bound into the bush with huge leaps.

The symphony of the forest was broken only by the puffing of a locomotive, the rattle of cars, the grinding of the brakes. People stood still, looking toward the tracks. The birds grew silent, the owl drew deeper into its hole, draping its gray cloak about itself with dignity. The hare stood up, raising its long ears high, and then, rea.s.sured, resumed its leaps.

In the weeks that followed, until the mushroom season ended, we often walked along the railroad tracks. Occasionally we pa.s.sed small oblong heaps of black ashes and some charred bones, broken and trodden into the gravel. With pursed lips the men stopped and stared. Many people feared that even the burnt corpses of those jumping off the train might contaminate both men and animals, and they would hastily kick dirt over the ashes.

Once I pretended to pick up a mushroom which had dropped out of my basket and grasped a handful of this human dust. It stuck to my fingers and smelled of gasoline. I looked at it closely but could find no trace of a person. Yet this ash was not like the ash left in kitchen ovens where wood, dried peat, and moss were burned. I became frightened. It seemed to me, as I rubbed the handful of ash in my fingers, that the ghost of the burned person hovered over me, watching and remembering all of us. I knew that the ghost might never leave me, that it might follow me, haunt me at night, seep sickness into my veins and madness into my brain.

After each train had pa.s.sed I saw whole battalions of ghosts with ugly, vengeful faces coming into the world. The peasants said the smoke from the crematories went straight to heaven, laying a soft carpet at G.o.d's feet, without even soiling them. I wondered whether so many Jews were necessary to compensate G.o.d for the killing of His son. Perhaps the world would soon become one vast incinerator for burning people. Had not the priest said that all were doomed to perish, to go "from ashes to ashes"?

Along the embankment, between the rails, we found innumerable sc.r.a.ps of paper, notebooks, calendars, family photographs, printed personal doc.u.ments, old pa.s.sports, and diaries. The pictures were of course the most desirable to collect, since few in the village could read. In many of the pictures elderly people sat stiffly in peculiar clothes. In others, elegantly dressed parents stood with their arms on the shoulders of their children, all smiling and wearing clothing of a type that no one in the village had ever seen. Sometimes we found photographs of beautiful young girls, or handsome young men. There were pictures of old men, who looked like apostles, and old ladies with faded smiles. In some, one could see children playing in a park, babies crying, or newlyweds kissing. On the reverse of these were some farewells, oaths, or religious pa.s.sages scribbled in handwriting obviously shaken by fear or the motion of the train. The words were often washed off by the morning dew or bleached out by the sun.

The peasants eagerly collected these articles. The women giggled and whispered to one another about the pictures of the men, while the men muttered obscene jokes and comments about the pictures of the girls. People in the village collected these photographs, traded them, and hung them in their huts and barns. In some houses there was a picture of Our Lady on one wall, of Christ on another, a crucifix on the third, and pictures of numerous Jews on the fourth. Farmers would come upon their hired hands exchanging pictures of girls, staring excitedly at them, and playing indecently with each other. And it was said that one of the more attractive village girls fell so hopelessly in love with a handsome man in a photograph that she would not look at her fiance afterwards.

One day a boy brought back news from the mushroom fields of a Jewish girl found by the railroad tracks. She was alive, with only a sprained shoulder and some bruises. They surmised that she had dropped through a hole in the floor when the train slowed down on a curve, and thus escaped more serious injuries.

Everyone turned out to see this marvel. The girl staggered along, half carried by some men. Her thin face was very pale. She had thick eyebrows and very black eyes. Her long, glossy black hair was tied with a ribbon and fell down her back. Her dress was torn, and I could see bruises and scratches on her white body. With her good arm she tried to hold up the injured one.

The men took her to the house of the village head. A curious crowd a.s.sembled, looking her over carefully. She did not seem to understand anything. Whenever any of the men came near her she joined her hands as though in prayer and babbled in a language no one could understand. Terrified, she stared about her with eyes that had blue-white eyeb.a.l.l.s and jet-black pupils. The village headman conferred with some of the elders of the village, and also with the man nicknamed Rainbow who had found the Jewess. It was decided that, in accordance with official regulations, she would be sent to the German post the next day.

The peasants slowly dispersed to their homes. But some of the bolder ones stayed on, watching the girl and cracking jokes. Half-blind old women spat thrice in her direction and, muttering under their breath, warned their grandsons.

Then Rainbow took the girl by the arm and led her to his hut. Though some thought him odd, he was well liked in the village. He took special interest in heavenly signs, especially rainbows, hence his nickname. In the evenings when he entertained his neighbors he could talk for hours about rainbows. Listening to him from a dark corner, I learned that a rainbow is a long arched stalk, hollow as a straw. One end is immersed in a river or lake and draws the water off. It is then distributed fairly over the countryside. Fishes and other creatures are drawn up with the water, and that is why one finds the same kind of fish in widely separated lakes, ponds, and rivers.

Rainbow's hut adjoined my master's. His barn shared a wall with the barn in which I slept. His wife had died some time ago but Rainbow, still young, could not decide on another mate. His neighbors used to say that those who stared at rainbows too much could not see an a.s.s in front of their faces. An old woman cooked for Rainbow and looked after his children while he worked in the fields and got drunk once in a while for recreation.

The Jewess was to spend the night at Rainbow's home. That evening I was awakened by noises and cries from his barn. At first I was scared. But I found a knothole through which I could see what was happening. In the middle of the cleaned threshing floor the girl was lying on some sacks. Next to her an oil lamp was burning on an old chopping block. Rainbow sat close to her head. Neither moved. Then Rainbow, with a quick movement, pulled the dress off the girl's shoulders. The strap gave way. The girl tried to escape, but Rainbow kneeled on her long hair and held her face between his knees. He leaned closer. Then he tore the other strap off. The girl cried, but became motionless.

Rainbow crawled to her feet, wedging them between his legs, and with a deft jerk pulled off her dress. She tried to rise and hold on to the material with her good hand, but Rainbow pushed her back. She was now naked. The light of the oil lamp threw shadows on her flesh.

Rainbow sat at the girl's side and stroked her body with his big hands. His bulk hid her face from me, but I could hear her quiet sobbing broken occasionally by a cry. Slowly Rainbow took off his knee boots and breeches, leaving on only a rough shirt.

He straddled the prostrate girl and moved his hands gently over her shoulders, b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and belly. She moaned and whined, uttering strange words in her language when his touch grew rougher. Rainbow lifted himself on his elbows, slipped down a little, and with one brutal push opened her legs and fell on her with a thud.

The girl arched her body, screamed, and kept opening and closing her fingers as though trying to grasp something. Then something strange happened. Rainbow was on top of the girl, his legs between hers, but trying to break away. Every time he hoisted himself, she screamed with pain; he also groaned and cursed. He tried again to detach himself from her crotch, but seemed unable to do so. He was held fast by some strange force inside her, just as a hare or fox is caught in a snare.

He remained on top of the girl, trembling violently. After a while he renewed his efforts, but each time the girl writhed in pain. He also seemed to suffer. He wiped the perspiration off his face, swore, and spat. At his next try the girl wanted to help. She opened her legs wider, lifted her hips, and pushed with her good hand against his belly. It was all in vain. An invisible bond held them together.

I had often seen the same thing happen to dogs. Sometimes when they coupled violently, starved for release, they could not break loose again. They struggled with the painful tie, turning more and more away from each other, finally joined only at their rear ends. They seemed to be one body with two heads, and two tails growing in the same place. From man's friend they became nature's freak. They howled, yelped, and shook all over. Their bloodshot eyes, begging for help, gaped with unspeakable agony at the people hitting them with rakes and sticks. Rolling in the dust and bleeding under the blows, they redoubled their efforts to break apart. People laughed, kicked the dogs, threw screeching cats and rocks at them. The animals tried to run away, but each headed in the opposite direction. They ran in circles. In mad rage they tried to bite each other. Finally they gave up and waited for human help.

Then village boys would throw them into a river or pond. The dogs tried desperately to swim, but each kept pulling away from the other. They were helpless, and their heads only emerged from time to time, frothing at the mouth, too weak to bark. As the current carried them away an amused crowd followed along the riverbank, shouting with joy, throwing stones at their heads as they bobbed out of the water.

On other occasions, people who did not intend to lose their dogs in this manner brutally cut them apart, which meant mutilation or slow death from bleeding for the male. Sometimes the animals managed to separate after wandering around for days, falling into ditches, getting caught in fences and brush.

Rainbow renewed his efforts. He appealed loudly to the Virgin Mary for help. He panted and puffed. He made another big heave, trying to tear himself away from the girl. She screamed and started to hit the bewildered man's face with her fist, scratch him with her nails, bite his hands. Rainbow licked the blood off his lip, lifted himself on one arm, and dealt the girl a powerful blow with the other. Panic must have dimmed his brain, for he collapsed on top of her, biting her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, arms and neck. He hammered her thighs with his fists, then grabbed her flesh as if trying to tear it off. The girl screamed with a high-pitched steady cry that finally broke off when her throat dried up-and then it started again. Rainbow went on beating her until he was exhausted.

They lay, one on top of the other, motionless and silent. The flickering flame of the oil lamp was the only thing that moved.

Rainbow started crying for help. His shouts brought first a band of barking dogs, then some alarmed men with axes and knives. They opened the door of the barn and, uncomprehending, goggled at the couple on the floor. In a hoa.r.s.e voice, Rainbow quickly explained the situation. They closed the door and, not letting anyone else enter, sent for a witch-midwife who knew about such things.

The old woman came, kneeled by the locked couple, and did something to them with the help of others. I could see nothing; I only heard the girl's last piercing shriek. Then there was silence and Rainbow's barn grew dark. At dawn I ran to the knothole. Sunshine was coming in through the slots between the boards, lighting up sparkling beams of grain dust. On the threshing floor, close to the wall, a human shape lay stretched out flat, covered from head to foot with a horse blanket.

I had to take the cows to pasture while the village was still asleep. When I returned at dusk I heard the peasants discussing the previous night's events. Rainbow had taken the body back to the railroad track, where the patrol was due to pa.s.s in the morning.

For several weeks the village had a lively topic of conversation. Rainbow himself, when he had taken a few drinks, would tell people how the Jewess had sucked him in and wouldn't let go of him.

Strange dreams haunted me at night. I heard moans and cries in the barn, an icy hand touched me, black strands of lank hair smelling of gasoline stroked my face. At dawn when I took the cattle to pasture I looked fearfully at the mists floating over the fields. Sometimes the wind would push along a tiny shred of soot, clearly heading in my direction. I shivered and cold sweat poured down my back. The bit of soot circled over my head, looking me straight in the eye, and then drifted high into heaven.

10.

German detachments began to search for partisans in the surrounding forests and to enforce the compulsory deliveries. I knew that my stay in the village was reaching its end.

One night my farmer ordered me to flee at once to the forest. He had been informed of a coming raid. The Germans had learned that a Jew was hiding in one of the villages. He was said to have lived there since the outbreak of the war. The entire village knew him; his grandfather used to own a large tract of land and was greatly liked by the community. As they said, though a Jew, he was a decent enough fellow. I left late that evening. It was an overcast night, but the clouds began separating, stars sprang out, and the moon revealed itself in all its eminence. I hid in a bush.

When dawn came I moved toward the waving ears of grain, keeping far from the village. My toes were stinging from the thick sc.r.a.ping blades of grain, but I tried to reach the center of the field. I had to proceed carefully; I did not want to leave behind too many broken stalks that could betray my presence. Finally I found myself fairly deep in the grain. Shivering from the morning cold, I curled into a ball and tried to sleep.

I woke to hear rough voices coming from all directions. The Germans had surrounded the field. I clung to the earth. As the soldiers strode through the field, the crackling of broken stalks became loud.

They almost stepped on me. Startled, they aimed their rifles at me; when I rose, they readied them. There were two of them, young, in new green uniforms. The taller one grabbed me by the ear, and both laughed, exchanging remarks about me. I understood that they were asking whether I was a Gypsy or a Jew. I denied it. This amused them even more; they kept on joking. All three of us walked toward the village, I ahead and they, laughing, directly behind.

We entered the main road. Terrified peasants spied from behind the windows. When they recognized me they disappeared.

Two large brown trucks stood in the center of the village. Soldiers in unb.u.t.toned uniforms squatted around them drinking from canteens. More soldiers were returning from the fields, stacking their rifles and sitting down.

A few of the soldiers surrounded me. They pointed at me, laughed or grew serious. One of them walked up close to me, leaned over, and smiled straight in my face with a warm, loving smile. I was going to smile back when he suddenly punched me very hard in the stomach. I lost my breath and fell, gasping and groaning. The soldiers burst into laughter.

From a nearby hut an officer emerged, noticed me, and approached. The soldiers snapped to attention. I also stood up, alone in the circle. The officer scrutinized me coldly and issued a command. Two soldiers grabbed me by the arms, dragged me to the hut, opened the door, and shoved me inside.

In the center of the room, in semi-darkness, a man lay. He was small, emaciated, dark. His snarled hair hung over his forehead, a bayonet wound split his entire face. His hands were tied behind him, and a deep wound gaped through the cut jacket sleeve.

I crouched in a corner. The man fixed me with shining black eyes. They seemed to look out from under his thick, overhanging eyebrows and come straight at me. They terrified me. I averted my gaze.

Outside engines were being started; boots, weapons, and canteens rattled. Commands rang out and the trucks departed with a roar.

The door opened and peasants and soldiers entered the hut. They dragged the wounded man out by his hands and dumped him on a seat in a cart. His broken knuckles hung limp as on a swaying dummy. We were seated back to back; I faced the shoulders of the drivers; he the rear of the cart and the receding road. A soldier sat with the two peasants who drove the cart. From the peasants' conversation, I gathered that we were being taken to the police station in a nearby town.

For several hours we rode on a well-traveled road bearing the recent tracks of trucks. Later we left the road and drove through the forest, startling birds and hares. The wounded man sagged listlessly. I was not sure if he was alive; I could only feel his inert body lashed by rope to the cart and me.

We halted twice. The two peasants offered some of their meal to the German, who in return doled out a cigarette and a yellow candy to each of them. The peasants thanked him servilely. They took long draughts from the bottles hidden under the box seat and then urinated in the bushes.

We were ignored. I was hungry and weak. A warm resin-scented breeze drifted from the forest. The wounded man moaned. The horses restlessly tossed their heads, their long tails lashing out against the flies.

We moved on. The German on the cart was breathing heavily, as though in sleep. He closed his gaping mouth only when a fly threatened to swoop into it.

Before sunset we rode into a small, densely built-up town. Here and there the houses had brick walls and chimneys. The fences were painted white or blue. Sleeping doves huddled together on the gutterpipes.

As we pa.s.sed the first few buildings, children playing in the road noticed us. They surrounded our slow cart and stared at us. The soldier rubbed his eyes, stretched his arms, hitched up his trousers, jumped down, and walked alongside the cart, oblivious to his surroundings.

The troop of children increased; children jumped out of every house. Suddenly one of the older and taller boys struck the prisoner with a long birch twig. The wounded man shuddered and drew back. The children became excited and began pelting us with a barrage of rubbish and rocks. The wounded man drooped. I felt his shoulders, glued to mine, wet with sweat. A few stones. .h.i.t me also; but I was a more elusive target, sitting between the wounded man and the drivers. The children were making great sport of us. We were being pelted with dried lumps of cow dung, rotten tomatoes, reeking little cadavers of birds. One of the young brutes began to concentrate on me. He walked alongside the cart and with a stick methodically hit selected parts of my body. I tried vainly to ball-up enough saliva to spit into his derisive face.

Adults joined the crowd around the cart. They shrieked, "Beat the Jews, beat the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds," and egged the children on to further attacks. The drivers, unwilling to expose themselves to accidental blows, jumped off the box seat and walked along beside the horses. The wounded man and I now provided excellent targets. A new hail of stones struck us. My cheek was cut, a broken tooth was dangling, and my lower lip was split. I spat blood into the faces of those nearest to me, but they leapt back adroitly to aim other blows.

Some fiend tore whole bundles of ivy and ferns growing along the roadway out by the root and lashed the wounded man and me. The pain burned at my body, the stones were striking me with more precision, and I dropped my chin on my breast, dreading that some stone might strike my eyes.

Suddenly a small, stout priest leapt out of an unprepossessing house as we were pa.s.sing by. He wore a torn, faded ca.s.sock. Flushed with excitement, he burst into the crowd brandishing a cane, and he began to strike at them on the hands, faces, and heads. Panting, perspiring, trembling with exhaustion, he scattered the mob in all directions.

The priest now walked alongside the cart, slowly regaining his breath. With one hand he wiped his brow and with the other clasped mine. The wounded man had evidently fainted, for his shoulders grew cold as he swayed rhythmically like a puppet tied to a stick.

The cart entered the courtyard of the military police building. The priest had to remain outside. Two soldiers untied the rope, took the wounded man off the cart, and laid him down at the wall. I stood nearby.

Soon afterward a tall SS officer in a soot-black uniform sauntered into the courtyard. Never before had I seen such a striking uniform. At the proud peak of the cap glittered a death's-head and crossbones, while lightninglike signs embellished the collar. A red badge bearing the bold sign of the swastika cut across his sleeve.

The officer received a report from one of the soldiers. Then his heels drummed against the flat concrete surface of the courtyard as he strode to the wounded man. With a deft movement of the tip of his shining jackboot he flipped the man's face toward the light.

The man looked hideous-a mangled face with a rammed-in nose and a mouth hidden by torn skin. Shreds of ivy, lumps of earth, and cow dung were sticking to his eye socket. The officer squatted close to this amorphous head which was reflected in the smooth surface of his boot tops. He was questioning or saying something to the wounded man.

The b.l.o.o.d.y ma.s.s moved like a thousand-pound load. The thin, mutilated body pushed itself by its tied hands. The officer edged away. His face was in the sunshine now, and it had a sheer and compelling beauty, the skin almost waxlike, with flaxen hair as smooth as a baby's. Once before, in a church, I had seen such a delicate face. It was painted on a wall, bathed in organ music, and touched only by light from the stained-gla.s.s windows.

The wounded man continued rising until he was nearly sitting. Silence lay over the courtyard like a heavy cloak. The other soldiers stood stiffly, gazing at the spectacle. The wounded man breathed hard. Straining to open his mouth, he swayed like a scarecrow in a gust of wind. Sensing the nearness of the officer he listed in his direction.

The officer, disgusted, was about to rise from his squatting position when suddenly the wounded man moved his mouth again, grunted, and then, extremely loudly, uttered a short word that sounded like "pig" and fell back, striking his head on the concrete.

On hearing this the soldiers quivered and looked at each other stupefied. The squatting officer rose and barked a command. The soldiers clicked their heels, c.o.c.ked their rifles, approached the man, and pumped rapid shots into him. The shattered body shuddered and grew still. The soldiers reloaded and stood at attention.

Nonchalantly the officer approached me, beating a swagger stick against the seam of his freshly pressed breeches. The instant I saw him I could not tear my gaze from him. His entire person seemed to have something utterly superhuman about it. Against the background of bland colors he projected an unfadable blackness. In a world of men with harrowed faces, with smashed eyes, b.l.o.o.d.y, bruised and disfigured limbs, among the fetid, broken human bodies, he seemed an example of neat perfection that could not be sullied: the smooth, polished skin of his face, the bright golden hair showing under his peaked cap, his pure metal eyes. Every movement of his body seemed propelled by some tremendous internal force. The granite sound of his language was ideally suited to order the death of inferior, forlorn creatures. I was stung by a twinge of envy I had never experienced before, and I admired the glittering death's-head and crossbones that embellished his tall cap. I thought how good it would be to have such a gleaming and hairless skull instead of my Gypsy face which was feared and disliked by decent people.

The officer surveyed me sharply. I felt like a squashed caterpillar oozing in the dust, a creature that could not harm anyone yet aroused loathing and disgust. In the presence of his resplendent being, armed in all the symbols of might and majesty, I was genuinely ashamed of my appearance. I had nothing against his killing me. I gazed at the ornate clasp of his officer's belt that was exactly at the level of my eyes, and awaited his decision.

The courtyard was silent again. The soldiers stood about obediently waiting for what would happen next. I knew my fate was being decided in some manner, but it was a matter of indifference to me. I placed infinite confidence in the decision of the man facing me. I knew that he possessed powers unattainable by ordinary people.

Another quick command rang out. The officer strode off. A soldier shoved me roughly toward the gate. Regretting that the splendid spectacle was over, I walked slowly through the gate and fell straight into the plump arms of the priest, who was waiting outside. He looked even shabbier than before. His ca.s.sock was a miserable thing in comparison with the uniform adorned by the death's-head, crossbones, and lightning bolts.

11.

The priest took me away in a borrowed cart. He said that he would find someone in a nearby village to take care of me until the end of the war. Before reaching the village we stopped at the local church. The priest left me in the cart and went alone to the vicarage, where I saw him arguing with the vicar. They gesticulated and whispered agitatedly. Then they both came toward me. I jumped off the cart and bowed politely to the vicar, kissing his sleeve. He looked at me, gave me his blessing, and returned to the vicarage without saying another word.

The priest drove on and finally stopped at the far end of the village at a rather isolated farmhouse. He went in and stayed there so long that I began to wonder if something had happened to him. A huge wolfhound with a sullen, downcast expression guarded the farmyard.

The priest came out, accompanied by a short, thickset peasant. The dog tucked his tail under his hindquarters and stopped growling. The man looked at me and then stepped aside with the priest. I could hear only s.n.a.t.c.hes of their conversation. The farmer was obviously upset. Pointing to me he shouted that one look was enough to tell I was an unbaptized Gypsy b.a.s.t.a.r.d. The priest quietly protested, but the man would not listen. He argued that keeping me might expose him to great danger, since the Germans often visited the village, and if they found me it would be too late for any intervention.

The priest was gradually losing his patience. He suddenly took the man by the arm and whispered something into his ear. The peasant became subdued and, cursing, told me to follow him into the hut.

The priest came closer to me and looked into my eyes. We stared at each other in silence. I did not quite know what to do. Trying to kiss his hand I kissed my own sleeve and became confused. He laughed, made the sign of the cross over my head, and departed.

As soon as he was sure that the priest was gone, the man grabbed me by the ear, almost lifting me off the ground, and pulled me into the hut. When I yelled he jabbed me in the ribs with his finger so hard that I became breathless.

There were three of us in the household. The farmer Garbos, who had a dead, unsmiling face and half-open mouth; the dog, Judas, with sly glowering eyes; and myself. Garbos was a widower. Sometimes in the course of an argument neighbors would mention an orphaned Jewish girl whom Garbos took as a boarder from her escaping parents some time ago. Whenever one of Garbos's cows or pigs damaged some of the crops, the villagers would maliciously remind him of this girl. They would say that he used to beat her daily, rape her, and force her to commit depravities until she finally vanished. Meanwhile, Garbos renovated his farm with the money he received for her keep. Garbos listened angrily to such accusations. He would unleash Judas and threaten to set him against the slanderers. Each time the neighbors locked their doors and watched the evil beast through their windows.

No one ever visited Garbos. He always sat alone in his hut. My job was to look after two pigs, a cow, a dozen hens, and two turkeys.