No one said anything as we moved about the kitchen. Though my heart was in my throat, the rebbe seemed calm enough. Indeed, his face appeared radiant. At last, he’d gotten his wish: he was a saboteur, and there was nothing the enemy could do about that. The Germans, in any case, hardly seemed to figure into his calculations. They were, at most, a minor detail in the larger conversation he was holding with the Holy One. True, they were fierce — I’d seen one place a pistol to the head of a child and pull the trigger and go about his day as though he’d done nothing more than kick a dog — but when it came to goodness and mercy, the rebbe was equally as fierce.
Our wagon driver failed to arrive at the appointed time, and it was decided we should set out on foot, hoping he’d find us along the way. There must have been ten of us, descending the stairs as quietly as we could, moving along with a sort of rustling hum. The janitor was asleep, and we were forced to rouse him, as he possessed the only key to the front gate.
“And what possible reason could Jews have for needing to be out at this godforsaken hour?” he complained, squinty with sleep.
What would we tell him? Even if he weren’t groggy, I’m certain it would have been impossible to explain that we were off to the baths in order to bring the German army to defeat. He wasn’t a bad fellow, simply a man with whom there was little point in discussing the niceties of Hasidic theology.
Instead we offered him a tip, and he unlocked the gate.
The distance between the rebbe’s house and the mikve was not inconsiderable, and we walked silently in pairs. Periodically, we’d hear footsteps from someone other than ourselves, and these moments were terrifying. The night trolley clattered down its tracks, and we ran to board it, but it was an Aryans-only trolley, and the driver turned us away. A car approached, its headlights blinding us. However, it passed without stopping, and we all breathed a sigh of relief. At this hour, the gates of the houses were all locked, and there would have been nowhere to hide.
A SHADOWY FIGURE met us in the courtyard next door to the mikve. Without a word, he waved his hand and bid us to follow him. We entered a cellar that was so dark we’d been instructed beforehand where to walk, for how many steps, where to turn left, where right. At last, we reached a hole in the wall, and I climbed through it after the man in front of me, tearing the skin on my shins against its roughened edges. On the other side of the hole, though the darkness was equally thick, I could sense we were standing on a platform made of boards. “Jump!” someone whispered, and I jumped, landing with such force that my teeth knocked together with a resounding clop.
Someone lit a match, and I saw that we were now standing in a tiled changing room outside the mikve. Slowly the morning light began to shine through the windows near the ceiling. Others had already immersed themselves by the time we’d arrived, their emaciated bodies in various states of nakedness. For all our secrecy, word must have gotten out and they’d somehow beaten us here.
“Cousin, pay attention to where your thoughts go beneath the water,” the rebbe told me before he immersed himself. I peered at him through the dark curtain of water. Without my glasses, he was an indistinct watery blur, floating weightlessly, his beard rising before his face.
I drew in a lungful of air and plunged down, hewing through the cold water. As I did, I found myself thinking about my own shipwrecked life. Why had I even come to Warsaw in the first place? Did anyone even know I was still here? The Zamenhofs had all disappeared. It’d been years since I’d had word from any of my own siblings, years since I’d received the news that Sore Dvore and her husband, Zelig Mintz, had perished from malaria in the Promised Land. I had only the vaguest notion where any of the others had been when the war began. My parents were dead, of course, and Aunt Fania had died, leaving Uncle Moritz to face the German invasion alone.
I had no idea where Loë was. Even Ita seemed to have forgotten all about me.
How’s that for eternal love?
Floating to the bottom of the tiled pool, I doubted that even God could find me here. Despite His fabled omniscience, I knew He’d look for me in the only place I ever looked for myself, which was inside my father’s gazebo, reading my forbidden books while the pink cherry blossoms shimmered in the cool Galician breeze.
I IMAGINE MY powers of spiritual discernment were not as sophisticated nor as subtle as the rebbe’s, and yet, as far as I could see, his piety had moved Heaven not at all. In the days after we’d emerged from the mikve, the world, or at least our small portion of it, only seemed greyer. People were hungry, if not hungrier, and the streets were filled with even more corpses than before.
Even the rebbe seemed to have lost heart. “But none of this makes any sense,” he insisted to me. “It’s one thing for the Holy One to rebuke us with suffering, quite another for these rebukes to destroy everything in the world that’s holy.”
It was a Sunday morning, and though it wasn’t the thick of winter, the day was frozen solid. A heavy snow had fallen during the night, the temperatures had plummeted. We’d finished our work earlier than usual, and the rebbe saw me to the door. As we stepped out onto the landing, our breaths steaming forth in great cottony puffs, we were confronted by a terrible sight. All along the street, at various points, either huddled together or alone, were children, some barefoot, most bare-kneed, many of them lacking a winter coat, this one cradling a book in his hands; that one, a doll.
When I looked closer, I realized that none of them was moving. My first thought was that they must be playing at some game, at statues, perhaps, but then of course I realized they’d frozen in the night.
A cry erupted from the rebbe’s throat.
Plastered to the sides of buildings were posters designed by the Judenrat, celebrating the Month of the Child. Each bore the legend A CHILD IS THE HOLIEST THING.
“Dr. Sammelsohn, help me!” the rebbe said, and before I knew it, he’d ripped one of the posters down and was using it to cover the child nearest him. For some reason, I couldn’t move. I felt as though I were frozen to the ground as well. Instead, I watched as Reb Kalonymos ran from one wall to the next, pulling down poster after poster, covering each child with the tatters.
“Forgive me, children,” he told them. “It’s all that I have.”
“Master of the Universe!” he screamed. “This far? this far?”
Then: “Dr. Sammelsohn! Help me!”
Then: “Children, forgive me!”
Then: “Master of the Universe, this far?”
I remember roaring when I was next conscious of myself. I knew what I looked like, but a madman shouting indecipherable names as he sank to his knees in the middle of a city square wouldn’t, in those days, have attracted any special attention, and no one seemed to bother about me. I continued to call, until my voice grew hoarse and the two stood before me, in his woolen overcoat, in his leather one.
“What kind of angels are you, anyway?” I demanded of them.
“Doctor, please! You pierce us to the quick!” said.
“What does he mean, what kind of angels are we? We’re angel angels,” said, pounding his fist with his truncheon. “And whatever we are, I can assure you we don’t have time for these sorts of theological speculations with a man who owes his continuing existence to — ”
“Brother!” silenced him.
“When the Romans were martyring Rabbi Akiva,” I jeered, “what did your forefathers do?”
spat. “You see, that shows you how little he understands!”
“He doesn’t literally mean our forefathers,” told him, attempting, it seemed, to keep the conversation on a politer keel.
“ ‘This far, Master? This far?’ That’s what your ancestors said, that’s what the angels of that era had the nerve to say, and to the Holy One Himself!”
“Yes, and you heard what the Holy One said back to them. If they didn’t stop complaining, he’d return the universe to chaos and desolation! Is that what you want, Dr. Sammelsohn? Chaos and desolation?”
Giv
en the chaos and desolation in which we lived our daily hours, the question couldn’t have seemed more irrelevant. All three of us realized this, I think. sighed. Flicking his glasses onto his forehead, he rubbed his eyes. let his truncheon drop and stared at his gleaming boots. I looked down at the mud and at the snow dampening my trousers. My bare hands were raw and freezing. At that moment, rain began to fall in dense, windy sheets. “Oh, wonderful! That’s just wonderful!” I said, crossing one leg beneath the other and sitting in the mud.
“Horrible,” muttered under his breath. “Just …”
“Dr. Sammelsohn.” kneeled near me. “You have to understand.”
“No, he doesn’t! This is none of his business!”
“Things are not as they should be, nor as they used to be.”
“Why don’t you just draw him a map?” said. “Why don’t you just take him up into the Heavens and show him exactly what you mean!”
“And would that be so wrong?” challenged him.
“Would that be wrong?” laughed darkly. “Brother, think!”
“Why not?”
“Why not? Must I tell you why not? Because I won’t permit it, that’s why not?”
“Oh, you won’t permit it?”
“Yes, I won’t permit it!”
“And what if I started to say, but before he could finish his sentence, had grabbed him by his tie, his shirt front, and the lapels of his coat. Pushing his fist into chest, he knocked him against the trunk of a tree. glasses flew from his forehead, his hat tumbled to the ground. his chest heaving, raised his truncheon over him.
“Oh, don’t be so fucking tedious!” said, forcing hand from his lapels.
gave out a strangled cry. Wielding his truncheon, he repeatedly struck it against the iron railing of a park bench until it shattered and all he was holding was its nib. “You think I’m happy with the situation?” he roared. “I am not! I am not happy with the situation. But I do my best. I do what’s asked of me, which doesn’t mean I agree with every policy from on high. But still, what are our choices, brother?”
“Well,” I said, getting up and moving away. There’d be no help from this quarter, I could see. I left them arguing behind me. But, brother, what if this, and No, brother, we can’t that, back and forth, back and forth, until cried, “Dr. Sammelsohn!” and ran after me. Wanting nothing more to do with them, however, I kept walking, blowing into my hands, trying to warm them.
“Will you come with us, then?” he said, catching up with me.
“Come with you?” His words seemed to have no meaning. “Where?”
“It’s never been done before, you know that, don’t you?” said, catching up with us as well.
“I know. I know that,” said.
“Maybe once or twice before but that’s it.”
WE ALL STOOD in the middle of Tłomackie Place Square facing in the same direction.
“Perhaps you should stand between us, Dr. Sammelsohn.”
I had no idea what they were up to, but it seemed useless to resist. It’s difficult to describe what next occurred. The two of them began reciting or rather chanting in a kind of susurrous rasp — the words are impossible for me to reproduce — and the sky, slowly at first, but then more quickly, began to roil. The dark rain-filled clouds began to form into whirling coils, as the wind picked up. My hat blew off, and grabbed my arm when, by instinct, I began to dash after it. “Forget it!” barked into the gales, grappling me to his side. “Let it go, Dr. Sammelsohn. Let it go!”
With his chin pointed high, searched the skies. “Can you see it, brother?”
“Not yet.”
“There? Is it there?”
peered through the lashing storm. “I don’t think so.”
“What is it you’re looking for?”
“There! Isn’t that it?” said.
“I believe so,” said. “Finally.” He pointed with his truncheon. “Do you see it, Dr. Sammelsohn, that little black rectangle among those purplish clouds way up there?”
I squinted, looking through the storm, expecting to see — what? I don’t know. The longer I stood in Tłomackie Place Square, the more ridiculous the enterprise seemed. However, despite my cynicism, I couldn’t deny that in the quadrant of the sky where was pointing, there seemed to be a black doorway.
“Do you mean that little black doorway?” I said.
“Precisely,” said.
“Now, watch this,” said.
As I did, the firmament, as though it were a blanket, seemed to rumple. Behind the fabric, so to speak, it seemed as though a staircase was being lowered, the cloth conforming to the shape of the stairs. Step after step, it descended towards us, each step appearing larger as it grew nearer, until it stopped with a clunk at our feet.
“Careful, Doctor,” said, as, in step with both of them, I placed my foot cautiously upon the lowest stair. Each angel held me by an arm. “The rain will have made it slippery.”
“One mustn’t fall.”
“Especially from the upper reaches.”
“And Heaven forbid someone should push you off!” said. Holding me by the shoulder with one arm, he made me shake with the other.
“Brother, stop it!” said. “You’re scaring him.”
gave out a barking laugh.
AS FOR ME, I never felt more certain that these angels were, as Dr. Freud had once endeavored to convince me, figments of my imagination, hallucinations brought on by fatigue, stress, and a consequential derangement of my senses. Thanks to starvation, the freezing temperatures, and the grinding conditions of our life, I assumed I was simply dying in the middle of Tłomackie Place Square. Or perhaps I was already dead, having been unable to endure one more moment of my captivity.
As we climbed the numinous stairway, I felt certain that if I turned my head and looked behind me, I would see my body, a lifeless, forlorn figure, lying in the snow. Surely, the experience of ascending a staircase into the firmament was the last gasp of the neurons in my brain, a vision the dying mind throws up, like a dream, to seal one more firmly inside this new and eternal sleep. Each time I thought to peer below me in order to verify this impression, however, prevented me from looking back, either with remonstrations or by slyly distracting my attention.
“I wouldn’t do that, Dr. Sammelsohn, oh no!” one of them might say, or: “Hey, hey, watch your step there! It’s slippery.”
I had no idea how long our mad ascent was taking. Indeed, I’d lost all sense of time. The air had begun to thin, and soon we were above the rain line, and the sky-embossed steps beneath our feet became not only less slippery but brighter and warmer in color. With the rains receding, it seemed safe enough to stop and tie my shoes. As I did, said, “You see, Dr. Sammelsohn, if this were an hallucination, I very much doubt your mind would have included as mundane a detail as the need to tie a shoe.”
Only when we’d attained the threshold of the black door did my guides permit me to look down. I could see Warsaw far below us, its cars moving along its streets like toys, the cemetery with its tiny white monuments to the east, the train tracks to the north, the trolleys rumbling down Chłodna. I searched for a glimpse of my corpse, lying in Tłomackie Place Square, where I was sure I’d find it, but at this height, it was impossible to see such a small detail.
“This way, Dr. Sammelsohn, this way.” pulled me in by the arms. I ducked my head beneath the lintel of the black doorway, and we entered what appeared to be the upside-down bowl of the Heavens.
“Look up, Dr. Sammelsohn,” commanded me.
I did. The planets seemed to be wheeling directly above our heads. The stars were so near I could feel their heat upon my face. I was reminded of the Planetarium in the Deutsches Museum, which I had visited in Munich once with Loë. There, the planets traveled on rails, powered by electric motors, and the stars were projected onto the wall by electric bulbs, while here, the friction of their breezing against the stratosphere created the most beautiful music I’d ever heard. It sounded like harps, flutes, an
d the voices of women and children.
“But this is the real thing, Dr. Sammelsohn,” said, “and not some German planetarium. Do you have any idea how long it took to build all this?”
“No, how long?”
“One day.” He roared with laughter.
“Oh, yes, well,” I said, somewhat chagrined. “Perhaps I did have some idea.”
“This way.” took my arm. “There’s still so much to see.”
Together, the brothers went searching for a doorway hidden in the back wall of the cosmos. Searching blindly with their hands — the atmosphere here was particularly dark and cold — they at last found the knob. “Ah, yes. Here it is!” They pulled the door open, and the light from the stairwell flooded the room. I followed them, slightly unnerved by the whiff of urine that greeted us in the stairwell. After we’d opened a door marked with a large numeral 2, the scent was replaced by the smell of baking bread. A pang pierced my heart. Here, exactly as I had been taught as a child, was the Heavenly Bakery, where angelic bakers were busy preparing the manna that will be enjoyed by the righteous at the end of time. Their magnificent ovens were working at full blast. Apprentices in smocks and caps were running with floury wheelbarrows. Master bakers were shouting their orders, opening their oven doors, inspecting their loaves, while their assistants slathered the long work tables with oil and pounded down mountains of dough with giant rolling pins. The scent of coffee filled the air. The music I’d heard below, produced by the circuits of the planets, now blared out of the radios each baker listened to at his station.
“Is there someplace we could sit and order a little something?” I said, suddenly feeling quite famished.
shook his head.
“Look at them working,” said, thrusting his hands into his pockets. “They have no idea what’s in store, do they?”
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