by Emuna Elon
Once she was given a witch marionette. A loud handclap made it jump on its broomstick and its face light up while its contorted body emitted a malevolent witch’s chuckle. He felt uneasy when Bat-Ami called him to come and see the grotesque show, and she, who of course had noticed his unease even though he smiled and said with forced amazement, What a present, what a present, had shrugged and taken her what-a-present, and that was the end of that. Until one summer night he got up from his desk very late when Bat-Ami was already asleep, and started, as was his wont every night, going from room to room and turning off the lights and locking the windows, and when he went into the room that was Bat-Ami’s clinic he saw on the white wall near the window a huge dark brown cockroach, and he hates cockroaches, especially the ones that come up from the sewers. He detests them so much that he usually calls Bat-Ami to perform their execution, but in this case Bat-Ami was already asleep. And the disgusting creature that transmits bacteria and illnesses was resting on the wall, its long legs symmetrically arranged on both sides of its shiny body and its long antennae waving in the air like two human hairs taken out of their context. Yoel had no choice but to be lionhearted, take off a shoe, raise it, and with it hit the wall with all his might—and the moment he saw the cockroach fleeing down the wall and disappearing under the chest of drawers, he heard a loud discordant laugh and looked up and saw the marionette witch jumping on its broomstick, its evil face flickering at him in ridicule.
39
Morning and night the child Yoel would invent his absent father, his wonderful father. If the other children asked him about his father he would invent replies that later evolved into his first stories. But even to himself, without an audience, he would incessantly re-create his father. And even when he was grown up and accepted the story his mother told him, he would still imagine his father alive, that only by mistake his father was considered dead while in truth he hadn’t been killed in that distant war but only wounded, or taken prisoner, and the mistake would soon be revealed and his father would return to the bosom of his beloved family.
* * *
You are hereby conscripted for forced labor under police supervision in Germany. You must present yourself for a personal and medical examination at the Westerbork transit camp.
You are to bring with you: 1 suitcase. 1 travel bag. 1 pair of work boots. 2 pairs of socks. 2 underpants. 2 shirts. 1 overall. 2 wool blankets. 2 sets of sheets. 1 bowl. 1 mug. 1 spoon. 1 coat. A towel and wash kit. Food for 3 days and all the ration coupons in your possession. Label the suitcase with your forename, surname, date of birth, and the word “Holland.” Illness does not exempt you from reporting. Enclosed is a travel warrant to your destination by tram or bus. In addition, bring: details of your bank account, including confirmation of the state of the account and of savings accounts at the bank and/or other investments. Declaration of capital. Insurance policy details. Details of property in Holland or abroad. Details of safe deposits (the safe key must also be brought). Report on inheritances. Report on collections. Jewels and precious stones. Items of gold and silver. Other valuables. Gifts. Details of business partnerships. An exact report of real estate and mortgages. You must tear up the travel warrant when you reach your destination.
* * *
Along the canals the leaves on the trees are drying up, browning and withering. Yoel is walking and as he walks dead leaves fall around him. They fall in front of him, at his sides, onto his head.
* * *
In the evening Sonia reads Eddy’s order and reads it again, and a third time, as if repeated reading will help her grasp what is written in it.
He has to report tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning.
The attached travel warrant does not exempt him from paying his fare but only permits him to take a tram or bus even though Jews are prohibited from using public transportation.
Leo is crawling happily on the living room floor; he grasps one of their three chairs and hoists himself up onto his little feet. Then he starts tottering here and there as he pushes the chair in front of him with the chair legs making loud scraping sounds that he accompanies with triumphant squeals.
Nettie, who has recently discovered the magic of reading, is curled up in a corner of the couch with a fairy-tale book borrowed from her teacher’s personal library. They had enrolled her for first grade in the Montessori school, but the school’s doors are now closed to Jews. One of the Jewish teachers opened a temporary classroom in her home, and Sonia takes Nettie there on her bicycle every morning.
Eddy inspects the wooden suitcase standing in front of him. On the lid Sonia has written his full name in large, round, black letters. And beneath his name his date of birth. And beneath his date of birth the name of their beloved country in which they now have no place.
I’m sure there’s no reason for concern, he says, perhaps to Sonia, possibly to himself. They’re taking me because I’m a doctor, and they need doctors. They won’t harm me.
* * *
Sonia cannot but worry lest something happen to Eddy’s rare and expensive glasses with their thick lenses, without which he sees nothing. Do they have opticians in the Westerbork transit camp? If need be, will there be anyone who can repair glasses like them somewhere in war-torn Germany? And what will happen if he breaks his glasses or loses them, and he’s unable to obtain new ones?
She leaves him with the open suitcase as he starts putting the required items into it with his ungainly movements. She takes Leo in her arms and hurries out, out and up the stairs to the floor above them.
* * *
Mrs. de Lange has been in a foul mood ever since Jews, even Jews like herself, were forbidden to continue employing non-Jews in their homes. The urgent knocking on her door troubles her, and the unexpected visit by the young tenant from the basement apartment does not exactly please her, even more so since this tall hyperactive girl appears to be distraught, and she is standing there with her blond infant, from whose diaper a nasty smell is wafting.
After apologizing for disturbing her and a brief exchange of courtesies, Sonia says, I’m looking for Mr. de Lange, I—
My husband isn’t at home, the older woman interrupts her impatiently. What was it you wanted from him?
And Sonia doesn’t understand why this is happening to her: why it’s happening to her at all, and why it’s happening to her with her landlady after all the time they’d been living here with not even a single meaningful conversation, but all her troubles and fears well up and then, her voice shaking and her tears flowing, she tells Mrs. de Lange, who is standing angry and impatient in her doorway, that her husband the doctor is being sent away from Amsterdam in the morning, and that she wanted to ask Mr. de Lange, that is to request—
Mrs. de Lange cuts her short again. I’m very sorry, she says, drawing out the first syllable of “sorry.” But imagine, Mrs. Blum, just imagine that every Jew about to be sent away from the city came and asked my husband to prevent him being taken!
All at once Sonia regains her composure.
So it’s true that your husband, that is, Mr. de Lange, can prevent Jews from being sent away?
My husband, declares Mrs. de Lange, cannot act on individual cases for the convenience and welfare of any specific Jew or family. While you, young lady, are worrying only about yourself, my husband is working tirelessly for the benefit of the entire Jewish community! That is the chief concern right now, that and nothing else!
And suddenly, as if she had heard her own words and was frightened by them, or realized that she’d revealed something she was supposed to keep secret, she angrily blurts out a few courtesies and slams the door.
Leo, who until this moment has been following the negotiation between his mother and their neighbor from his nest in his mother’s arms in uncharacteristic silence, starts to cry. He weeps insult, he weeps despair, he weeps as if he understands that with the slamming of this door his fate has been sealed too.
Night falls.
* * *
Nigh
t falls and Yoel collapses exhausted onto his bed in the hotel room. For the first time since his arrival here he connects the TV on the table to the socket and switches it on, and to his surprise the cumbersome old set is filled with vitality and on its screen appears a game show in which two teams of adults are competing to spell words in Dutch. The studio audience is divided into two sets of fans wearing the color of their favorite team, and the tension soars each time one of the contestants tries to spell the word given to him by the panel of judges. All of them—the contestants, the judges, the host, and the audience—continuously joke and continuously respond to each other’s jokes with loud laughter. Judging by the number of commercial breaks, Yoel understands that this is a program that enjoys high ratings. He too, even though he doesn’t understand a word or the laughter, is riveted for a long time on the exciting game that is deftly moderated by a laughing, bubbling blonde, behind whom are beautifully arranged beds of tulips and windmills, and on the floor in front of her a large map of Holland is spread out.
Another commercial break, and the tournament continues. And again the host laughs uproariously, the contestants and the fans laugh uproariously, and it seems that the TV set is dancing with joy.
* * *
Sonia continues with her rescue efforts through the night. She doesn’t leave Anouk alone. She doesn’t leave Martin alone. She doesn’t stop laying out her pleas before them, begging that they lay her pleas before the banker de Lange.
All Anouk says is: Tell Martin. Martin understands these things. All Martin says is: What can I do? I don’t know what to do.
Eddy, whose suitcase is locked and waiting by the door, asks her to stay calm. It will pass, he assures her and tries to smile, it will all pass quicker than we expect.
* * *
When the TV spelling game ends, Yoel leaves his room, almost stumbles on the steep stairs, and slips out of the hotel through the rear door. He thinks about going into the neighborhood brown café but feels he needs a time-out from Jacob Obrechtstraat and cuts through Muntplein and Rokin to Dam Square and his usual table by the balustrade on the upper level of the Irish pub. He stays there for a long time, vainly trying to drown himself in beer, and on his way back he passes the house. A streetlight illuminates the wall of small red bricks and the climbing plant running up it, its branches bare, and he slows and looks down to the long window at sidewalk level. A dim light is on in the small basement apartment, and by this light he sees the kitchen sink under the window, he sees the draining board, he sees the table and the three simple chairs and tries to see Sonia, to see Eddy, to see Sonia and Eddy…
* * *
Don’t go, she pleads all night long. And before daybreak, after Martin and Anouk had come downstairs and stayed awhile and climbed back up to their apartment, she makes one last effort. Don’t go, my love, don’t go, don’t report.
I’ve no choice, he repeats.
You can hide, she begs. She repeats, as she’s done a thousand times, the names of their friends who have already gone into hiding. Friends, who with the aid of one of the underground organizations active in the city, have already changed their identity and been granted protection by generous Christians, either for payment or gratis, so as not to be seen in public until the war is over.
All of them have ducked under the surface, she tells him. And it’s with good reason, my Eddy, it’s with good reason that people define hiding as ducking or diving underwater, because all you have to do in a situation like ours in Amsterdam is to lower your head and disappear for a while.
Eddy shakes his head.
She remembers with frustration how right at the beginning, when the city’s Jewish residents were told to go to one of the branches of the Jewish Council and register as Jews, she had begged him not to comply with this demand and simply not register, and he had refused her pleas.
It’s too dangerous, he tells her now too. They’re liable to capture me, me and you as well.…
We’ve got nothing to lose, my heart.…
And we have to remember, he goes on, that all those Jews who break the law to try to save themselves are endangering not only themselves but the entire community. If you and I, Sonia my love, break the law, the authorities will punish other Jews because of us. Especially Jews like your parents and brothers, who are already being held by the enemy, and we are the guarantee for their fate.…
Don’t report! she screams, leaping at the suitcase as if possessed, her hands tearing at the lock to open it and throw the contents of the case to the four winds.
Eddy jumps after her, trying to control her, and they struggle, hitting each other, scratching until they draw blood.
Finally they fall. Finally they fall to the floor locked in an embrace, their faces buried in each other’s chest. Beside them stands the brown wooden suitcase bearing the name Dr. Edouard Blum, and his date of birth, and the word “Holland.” And farther away lies a pair of glasses, Eddy’s thick-lensed, silver-framed glasses that had flown off his face as they struggled.
* * *
In the early morning the water in the canals shines bright. Throughout the day flickers of radiant light will flow in the canals, their colors and shapes changing with the strength of the sun’s rays and the position of the sun in the sky at any given hour.
Yoel reads Sonia’s story from the scenes before him. He reads it like the viceroy, searching for the lost princess in Rabbi Nachman of Breslov’s tale, reads the letter the princess wrote him, using her tears as ink, on a handkerchief she threw by the wayside.
* * *
I’ll be alright, my dear, Eddy says, you’ll see. He hugs her tightly, strokes her hair gently, don’t worry, don’t worry. I’ll be working there as a doctor, I’ll treat the people who need treatment, and I’ll come back to you. I’ll come back to you quickly, you’ll see how quickly.
Sonia remains silent. Don’t forget, she orders herself. The caressed head. The hugged body. Don’t forget this feeling, take it with you to wherever the days ahead might lead you.
40
It’s a beautiful day in Amsterdam, a beautiful day in the parks, a beautiful day in the streets and squares. On the canal banks the tree branches can be seen gleaming in a new light over the water, a light the likes of which has never been nor will ever be again.
Sonia tries not to worry too much about Eddy. In the early days Martin would update her on what he heard on his clandestine radio stations. Afterward he stopped updating her and she stopped asking.
In the afternoon she picks up Nettie from the temporary school and rides with both children on her bicycle: Nettie in the child’s seat behind her, and Leo in the wooden carrier on the handlebars. She rides through the street running alongside Vondelpark, pedaling slowly beside the dense wall of trees delineating the green expanses that are now covered with crocus and iris blooms of orange and purple.
Her heart sinks as she passes the Jacob Obrechtstraat entrance to the park, as if this is the first time she is seeing the wooden notice nailed to one of the gateposts, and on it, in brutal black letters, the words: “Jews Are Prohibited.”
She pedals southward along the border of the big park. Mama? her daughter’s thin voice pipes from behind her.
Yes, my sweet.
Mama, why haven’t we been to the park for such a long time?
Because it was winter, my treasure. It was too cold.
But it’s not cold now, Mama, when can we go to the park?
Very soon, Nettie, we’ll go very soon.
And only then Sonia realizes that the child has seen the notice, seen the notice and read the black letters. Since when has she known how to read those horrifying words? How many of those notices has she come across, my poor little gosling, at the various gates of the world she is only just getting to know?
* * *
After passing another entrance and another notice, Sonia puts a foot down onto the ground and stops. She stops by the bank of trees at a point where the branches are less dense. Between the un
sullied foliage she can see into the park, as far as the lake in its heart and the crocuses flowering between the lawns surrounding it. Closer, by the park’s central path, she sees the falling oak. It is a tree similar to lots of other trees in the park, but all the other trees have grown upward while this one has grown horizontally, actually lying on the ground. It seems that when it was a young sapling it was uprooted, then fell flat but continued living and growing after it had fallen: on its bottom side, its roots took hold in the soil and with them its branches, while on the upper side, the branches and roots grew skyward.
There’s our tree friend, she tells Nettie. Do you remember us all coming to see it together with Papa?