by Roxi Harms
A few minutes later they were all seated around the radio, eager to hear the day's news.
"The Führer this week approved two new laws. The Decree on the Confiscation of Jewish Property, which regulates the transfer of assets from Jews to non-Jewish Germans, shall be effective immediately. All Jews are required to report to their town hall to proceed with the transfer of assets. Any Jews not transferring their assets within one week will be arrested. The second new law was announced by the Reich Interior Ministry, revoking all German passports held by Jews. All Jews are required to surrender their passports, which will be replaced by new passports stamped with the letter ‘J'. Further, the Führer has announced his intention to pass a Decree on the Exclusion of Jews from German Economic Life. This Decree is expected to come into effect next month. All Jews operating a business which they own are advised to begin preparations for winding up the business and closing it within the month.
In international news. . . "
"They're getting pretty tough on the Jews," one of the men said, when the news was over.
"I wonder if the Wilde will shut down," one of the other men said. The Wilde was a big store in Elek run by a Jewish family, where Adam's mom bought wool and fabric and everything else she needed to make their clothes.
"Do you think they'll pass the same laws here? Can Hitler tell Hungary what to do?" someone wondered out loud.
Neither the people around the radio that evening, nor anyone around the world had any idea yet about the power Hitler would wield in the years to come.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It rained hard that night, a cold rain. Not cold enough to be snow, but it wouldn't be long. The next morning, the ground was muddy and the wet grass froze Adam's hands as he filled the sack with grass for the rabbits.
Franz was waiting on the road outside his house when Adam got there. Franz's family was pretty rich. They lived in a fancy house in town and they also had a big farm outside of town. Still, he was a good guy.
"Look at him." Adam pointed to a kid walking ahead of them. "That fancy white suit would look better with a little mud on it, don'tcha think?" The kid was in grade three like Adam. His house was even bigger and fancier than Franz's house, and it annoyed Adam how he strutted around at school like a peacock in his fancy clothes with that smug look on his face.
Franz grinned at Adam and raised his eyebrows.
"I'll run ahead and find a puddle he'd look good in," Adam said quietly out of the side of his mouth. "You talk to him and tell him a good story about something so he doesn't notice me."
Franz grinned wider. "Good plan!"
As Adam ducked behind the next house to make his way ahead of the boy, he looked back and saw Franz speed up as he called to the boy, "Heinz, wait up!"
When he'd found a mud puddle with a big tree next to it, Adam ducked down behind the tree and watched for them. He didn't have to wait long. Franz was striding along, waving his arms around telling a story and Heinz was listening intently. When they reached the edge of the mud puddle, Adam stuck his foot out from behind the tree.
"Ahhhh!" yelled Heinz as he landed in the mud.
"Nice brown suit!" yelled Adam over his shoulder as he and Franz darted away, hooting with laughter. Heinz didn't look so smug now.
"Does anyone know which river is longer, the Rhine or the Danube?" Mr. Tihanyi asked after the bell rang and everyone had quietened down. Geography was Adam's favourite subject.
When no one answered, Mr. Tihanyi continued. "The Danube is actually twice as long as the Rhine, starting in Bavaria and flowing all the way to the Black Sea. The Romans used the Danube very strategically, for transporting cargo on large ships during times of peace, and in wartime, the ancient Roman navy used very small rowboats for carrying special messages and other secret activities. These little spy boats were called ‘musculi,' which means ‘little mice.'"
Adam's mind wandered as Mr. Tihanyi went on to talk about other things. Imagine sailing a boat on the Danube, or on the Rhine, or rowing one of those little boats carrying secret messages. All the things you would see. . .
‘Smack!'
"Owwwww!" said Adam as Mr. Tihanyi glared down at him, tapping the wooden ruler that he had just smacked Adam across the head with against his palm.
"Maybe that will help you pay attention," he said as Adam rubbed his ear. Just then the door opened and the priest walked in. "Time for Catechism," said Mr. Tihanyi as he walked over to his desk to pick up his satchel before leaving the classroom.
Every week the priest came in and droned on for an hour about Jesus being dunked in the River Jordan, getting nailed to the cross, rising from the dead, and on and on. Jesus this and Jesus that. They'd heard it all before.
Adam's mind wandered back to what he'd heard on the radio the night before, as he rubbed his stinging ear. Suddenly a thought came to him.
"Father!" he interrupted, putting his hand high in the air.
The priest looked annoyed.
"Yes Adam?" he asked in a clipped tone.
"Wasn't Jesus a Jew?"
The priest's face turned stony as he stood up and slowly answered. "You are a smart mouthed boy and you need to learn some respect."
"But wasn't he descended from Judah so he's a Jew?" Adam remembered learning this in some of their earliest lessons at church.
At this, the priest turned and strode over to the can of bamboo sticks in the corner of the room, selected the biggest one, and then strode to Adam's desk. He towered over Adam in his black robe and glared down. "Fingertips!"
Seeing no way out of it, Adam slowly raised his hands, palms up and then bent his fingers so his fingertips were sticking up.
Whack! Whack! Whack!
Adam winced. Fingertip caning really hurt and the priest knew it, but Adam wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of crying out.
The priest strode back to the can and reinserted the bamboo rod as Adam looked down at his smarting fingertips. He looked back up as the priest marched back towards him.
"Owww!" Adam yelled in surprise, as the priest pulled him to his feet by the same ear that Mr. Tihanyi had hit with his ruler.
The priest led Adam roughly from the room and down the hall to the principal's office where they entered without knocking.
"This boy is unruly and needs to be severely punished!" he shouted at the principal.
Adam looked at the principal innocently and blinked.
"And what has he done this time, Father?" the principal asked calmly.
"He interrupted the catechism lesson and he called Jesus a dirty Jew!"
Looking first at Adam, whose head was tilted to the side by the priest's hold on his ear, then at the priest, the principal's face remained expressionless. The priest waited for the import of what he'd said to sink in.
"Adam, what do you have to say for yourself?" the principal finally asked.
"Well, I remember that Jesus was descended from Judah, and I thought that made him a Jew, so I asked."
The principal hesitated a moment. "I'm very sorry, Father, but that's the way I remember it too. I'm quite sure I was also taught that Jesus was a Jew."
Adam stumbled slightly as the priest released his ear with an exasperated little shove.
"Well, it's not what he said exactly, it's the way he said it! This boy is full of disrespect. He needs discipline!" And with that, the priest spun around and, robes flaring out around him, strode from the office.
Adam thought he saw a hint of a smile flit briefly across the principal's face before he spoke. "Adam, why do you insist on annoying your teacher and the good Father?"
Adam looked down at his feet and then back up at the principal.
"I wasn't trying to annoy him, I just remembered hearing on the radio about Jews last night and I wondered about Jesus."
The principal was quiet for a moment. "Go back to class, pay attention to your lessons, and behave yourself."
"Yes sir," Adam said. He was right about Jesus being a Jew, he thought
as he headed back to class, and the principal wasn't really angry with him.
At nine, Adam had begun to trust his own instincts, even in the face of contradictory information from those more learned than he. This trait, the same as that which marks the great world changers, would pay off time and time again throughout his life.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
One afternoon not long after, when he'd finished the rest of his chores, Adam opened the door of the cage where he kept the rabbits that were ready to eat. Pulling one out by its ears, he shut the door, and grabbed the stick from where it was tucked in between the end cage and the barn door. WHACK! The rabbit went limp. He had to hit quick and hard on the back of the head just below the base of the ears, so that it was fast and didn't hurt. He didn't like to think he was hurting them. When he'd finished skinning and cleaning the first one, he selected another one and started again. Just like his dad had taught him. Kill, bleed, hang from the wire in the barn doorway so he could slice the fur down the back legs and pull it off, then cut the skinned rabbit open and get rid of the guts and head, but always keep the heart and liver for his mom to use. They ate a lot of rabbit over the summer and fall while the pigs were growing, so it was pretty routine, and Adam's mind started to wander.
It was about a week since he'd seen the neighbour's rabbits. The goat had been pacing up and down along her little fence, bleating non-stop. ‘Take that goat over to old man Haas' billy-goat, Adam, she's ready to breed,' his dad had said.
When Adam followed Herr Haas through his barn a little later, leading the nanny goat, he couldn't help but stare at the rabbits in the stacks of cages just inside the door. They were something else! Especially the big buck in the first cage. He was a beautiful, soft grey colour and his ears were huge and floppy. His own rabbits were nowhere near that good looking. Or that big. He had a nice black from a trade with Franz, but this grey was way nicer. And those ears!
He'd been thinking about that buck all week. Everyone knew Herr Haas hated kids. He wouldn't be interested in trading for any of Adam's rabbits. How could he convince Haas to let him borrow the buck?
Mulling over what he would say to the old curmudgeon, Adam picked the two skinned rabbits up by their back legs and held them in one hand, their tiny organs in the other, and took them to where his mom and Theresa were working on the porch in the summer kitchen. Mom was chopping vegetables and Theresa was stoking the cooking fire. Little George was nowhere to be seen. Anni was sitting in the corner banging a dried corn cob on the floor and babbling away in baby talk. She smiled up at Adam and bobbed her curly blonde head at him.
"Ad-am, up?" she raised her little arms and smiled disarmingly.
"Here you go, Mom," he said, swinging the rabbits up onto the counter where she was working. He placed the hearts and livers beside the two carcasses.
"Thank you, Adam," she gave him a warm smile and continued chopping.
"Not right now, Anni. Bye, bye," he said, exaggerating a wave to her.
She rewarded him by waving back with her pudgy arm. "Bye, bye, bye."
Adam jumped from the porch, his bare feet making a little cloud of dust as he landed on the dry ground. Rinsing his hands quickly in the water trough, he ran out onto the street. He'd decided what he would say to Herr Haas, and if he hurried, maybe he could even borrow the buck and breed a couple of his females before supper!
Herr Haas and his wife lived two doors away, and as Adam came to their front gate, he stopped and stood up straight, then opened the gate and went through, careful to latch it behind him. Adam could hear the sound of sweeping coming from the back yard. Walking softly past the porch steps, he looked around the corner of the house. Sure enough, there was Herr Haas, scowling as he swept the early autumn leaves into a pile. His old dog was lying nearby in the shade. That dog never left the old man's side. Adam paused and took a deep breath to speak, just as Herr Haas noticed him standing there.
"What do you want?" barked the old man.
Adam almost turned on his heel, but then he'd never have rabbits like those. Looking straight at Haas, he opened his mouth and forced himself to start talking. "Herr Haas, your rabbits are very good looking, much better looking than mine, you must be good at taking care of them, they're bigger and a beautiful colour and their ears are so big and floppy, and I wonder if you would consider letting me borrow one of your males, that big grey one, for an hour or so to breed him with a couple of my females, I'll bring him right back and it won't take long, I promise." Adam's words spilled out, tumbling over each other in their rush to be said. There, it was done. He held his breath, clenching and unclenching his little fists nervously as the old man's expression changed from shock to anger.
"The nerve of you! Those are my rabbits! No respect! Get outta my yard, you rotten kid, before I make you sorry!" he sputtered as he started towards Adam, waving the broom menacingly.
Ducking, Adam turned and fumbled with the gate latch, then took off down the street. He stopped in front of his own gate and looked back. The street was empty. Grumpy old jerk! It wouldn't cost him anything, Adam fumed silently as he stomped into his yard.
For the next hour, Adam moped around the back yard, absentmindedly kicking at the splinters of wood around the chopping block and digging holes in the dirt with his toes. He'd asked so politely, much more politely than the old grump ever was to anyone! The more he thought about it, the madder he got. He wanted that big grey male, and it wasn't fair of Haas to keep it to himself!
Suddenly, he smiled. Herr Haas didn't even need to know about it.
The next morning dragged by. His dad had left for the vineyards long ago. Anni was at the table on the porch, pushing a bread crust around in her cup of milk with a pudgy finger, chattering happily. In the yard, Theresa was adding wood to the fire under the big copper pot, getting ready to wash clothes. He watched from the steps as his mom cut a piece from the block of soap she'd made a few days earlier, dropped it into the steaming water, and stirred it in with the long-handled laundry paddle. In the back yard, little George was wandering around, holding a stick between his short little legs, talking quietly to his "horse."
Adam reviewed his plan. The best time would be after the midday meal, when Dad had gone back to the vineyards for the afternoon. Hopefully Herr Haas wouldn't have any chores to do in his back yard in the afternoon. Adam headed back to muck out the pig pen while he waited.
An hour later, he leaned against the gatepost drawing in the dirt with a stick. Finally, his mom announced that the clothes had boiled long enough and began to pull them out to cool so that he and Theresa could wring the water out of them and hang them on the line.
His dad got home for lunch as they hung the last of the laundry, and while he washed up, Adam's mom ladled rabbit stew from the pot that had been bubbling away all morning. Everyone was moving so slowly today!
Sitting at the table, Adam swung his legs impatiently and swatted at mosquitoes, watching as his dad finally mopped up the last of his gravy with his last bite of bread, and stood up to go back to work.
Back in front of the rabbit cages, Adam moved rabbits around to empty out cages for the two females he'd selected. Everything needed to be ready so that he kept the buck for as short a time as possible. Next, he dashed inside to grab his sweater. He would need something to cover the buck with. In the kitchen, Theresa was setting up the sewing machine and his mom was measuring George's legs. Adam did his best to walk calmly out of the house and down the steps, then dashed through the back gate into the orchard. With any luck, things would be equally quiet in the Haas yard.
Herr Haas's barn came into view. The coast was clear. He quickly slid through the fence and dashed to the barn door. It was open a crack. Peering inside, Adam could just make out the rabbit cages. Everything was still, inside and out. Easing the door open a few more inches, he slipped inside and stopped for a moment to let his eyes adjust. The air in the barn was hot and stuffy. There he was! Adam reached out and opened the latch on the cage, then stuck
his arm in and got a good grip on the buck's ears. Slowly, he pulled the big rabbit out of the cage.
"Hello," he whispered, holding the rabbit up to eye level, before wrapping the sweater around him and tiptoeing back to the door. Heart pounding, Adam peeked out through the crack. Still no movement in the yard. Cradling his precious bundle, he dashed to the fence and crawled through, then looked back. He was pretty sure he hadn't been seen.
Putting his bundle on the ground in front of the rabbit cages, Adam unfolded the sweater and grabbed the buck's big floppy ears.
"In you go!" he whispered, opening the first cage and pushing the male in.
The male and female sniffed each other briefly, and then the male jumped on top! Yahoo! It was working! As soon as they stopped, Adam moved the buck into the second cage, glancing over his shoulder around the yard to make sure no one was around. The sniffing began again. But this time it went on longer and then nothing. Come on! They were just sitting there. Adam waited a few minutes and weighed the options. Maybe he should take the buck back. At least he knew he had one female bred. Or he could risk keeping him a bit longer and try for two. He had a much better chance of getting the look of those grey rabbits into his herd if he had two litters to work with.
"Adam!" His mom's face appeared around the corner of the porch, startling him. "There you are. The scrap bucket is full. Can you come and get it and take it out to the chickens please?"
"Okay," he said, looking up nervously at his mom. But she hadn't noticed anything.
Obediently, he headed into the house and brought out the bucket of scraps. As quickly as he could, he dumped it in the chicken pen and spread it around a bit, then put it on the porch and raced back to the rabbit cage. They were still just sitting there! Had they moved? He couldn't tell, but he couldn't risk waiting any longer.