Esfir Is Alive

by Andrea Simon

  The bombing wasn’t a mistake after all. Germany had declared war on Poland.

  This made no sense, especially since Drora said we were supposed to go to the Soviets. But Drora said that this just confirmed the suspicions. Hitler would agree to anything to get our land. She also suspected that the Russians were duped; they were innocent pawns in Hitler’s devious dealings.

  Rivke made a squeaky noise and mumbled to no one in particular, “Some people will believe whatever they want.”

  For those who had been hurt or lost homes, there was no time for such discussions. Medical and relief agencies took immediate action. For those like us, who saw destruction but remained safe, we had the luxury of worrying about the future.

  Again, my mother left the house and this time spoke directly to Drora. “I know you are itching to see your friends, or should I say comrades, and find out what is going on. But as my daughter, I’m asking you to squelch your desires to get into the action for a little while. Please, stay here with your sisters. I have to see what is going on for myself. I can’t afford to rely on rumors.”

  I had never seen my mother so focused, so tough. And Drora saw it, too. She nodded and gave my mother a tight hug, whispering, “Don’t worry about us.”

  My mother returned in the early afternoon. She reported that at noon, flyers began to appear around the streets, plastered on kiosks, walls, doors . . . slipped under doors, askingfor men to enlist in the army. She saw groups of refugees from the west, as far as Warsaw, passing through town. There were Jews, gentiles, civil servants, all escaping the Germans. They clutched bundles or sacks—whatever they could carry at the last moment. Many had been killed on the road.

  The night was quiet. No one slept. On the radio, the announcer said that the Polish army was pushing the Germans back. He said, “Yes, we will win this war.”

  Twenty-Five

  WE LIVED IN a state of fear. It has a taste and feel of its own—metallic and parched mouth, stinging eyes, erect hair on your arms, fist in your throat. The startled response, the adrenaline flooding through the veins in your breasts, when every ounce of your body is on tiptoe and every instinct is to flatten yourself to invisibility.

  From the first day of invasion, September 1, the Germans had struck Polish airfields. They bombed bridges, disrupted railroads and other lines of communication, and confiscated private vehicles.

  Cut off from the rest of the world, we were like rats in a cage, totally dependent on someone else to dictate our fate. I think it was this helplessness, this not knowing that was driving me crazy. Drora was pacing continuously, no longer careful about looking out the window, even rushing to neighbors when my mother wasn’t home. Rivke, when she wasn’t crying, said little and resorted to her childhood habit of sucking her thumb.

  Two days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany, thereby supporting Poland. They were joined by other countries, including New Zealand, Australia, and Canada. The Polish army concentrated its efforts on the frontiers, and devised delaying tactics waiting for their allies to mobilize.

  Our spirits rose. Surely with all these allegiances, the Polish troops would have the backing necessary to defeat Germany. When this looked unlikely, official Polish Jewish leadership fled for the Soviet Union or abroad. There was no government. Jewish men volunteered to patrol the town square, but anything could happen with the Germans.

  Drora said friends in her youth movement had seen this coming. “The Nazis planned their attack to be overwhelming and quick so that our allies wouldn’t have time to mobilize.”

  She explained that earlier in the year, Hitler had ranted again about international financial Jewry being responsible for instigating another war. This was his pattern: spread hate and inflame the people, providing the rationale for his upcoming moves. So we were not only helpless, but condemned.

  In the meantime, we had to do something. Otherwise, we were sitting ducks. Everyone had a directive. We should fill our trunks with our best clothes, linens, silverware, and jewelry; take a horse and wagon and find somewhere to bury our valuables. We should build bomb shelters. We should guard against theft.

  It was difficult to have any kind of life. During those early days of German occupation, my best memory is a visit from Gittel. Although the Blooms’s house was destroyed, Gittel, who lived on our other side, was lucky like us. It’s strange how the bombs struck; it didn’t seem like a planned attack. It was the definition of hit-or-miss. On my street, out of six houses, three were totally destroyed and one was badly damaged. I once read about a tornado in America that took an inexplicable path, demolishing trees and leveling homes. Something as insignificant as a toolshed was saved while a beautiful mansion was destroyed. You couldn’t explain it.

  Gittel and I didn’t do much. Mostly, we spoke quietly, almost in whispers, about the people we knew who had suffered tragedies, some of them rumors and some of them confirmed. We also worried about whether we would go back to school. Maybe it was easier to focus on who was going to sit next to you in class than which student had lost his family.

  I had enough experience with Gittel to expect her to be frightened to the point of total immobility, but she surprised me with a plan of action that was more detailed than Drora’s. “If something worse happens, Esfir,” she said, “and if God forbid I can’t go home for whatever reason, I am going to my aunt’s house in Gorodets. I know the way. I can walk the thirteen miles there. I already have my bag packed, with the essentials.” You never know how someone will react in an emergency.

  As the days went by, we grew more desperate with worry. We were hungry too, as we couldn’t go out to buy food and had to rely on our garden and whatever my mother had stored in the cellar. She meted out portions, not knowing how long they’d have to last.

  No longer accessible to “real” news from the radio or newspaper, we had to depend on word spread from those who had access to underground radios, the Polish military, and the secretive Yiddish press. The Zionist organizations had their own sources of information, relayed to us regularly by Drora. We could no longer deny that she held an important position in the Left Poale Zion’s youth offshoot, Freiheit, German for freedom, sympathetic to communism and Yiddish as the national language of the Jews. This group fit into Drora’s beliefs and she fit into theirs.

  The “war” news was not good. My mother was frantic about Perl. We heard that on September 8, there was heavy bombing in the heart of Brest. Half the city was in flames; hundreds were killed, thousands injured. Many fled eastward. I couldn’t allow myself to wonder about my beloved aunt, about the boardinghouse and all who lived there. No, not there. Not them.

  One of the biggest threats to Germany came when the Polish army attempted to break through to Warsaw. For several days after September 9, German armies swung their divisions to meet the Polish attack. The Poles fought bravely but did not succeed. Their weapons and aircraft were outdated.

  IN KOBRIN, THOUGH, there was a temporary lull. We didn’t fool ourselves into thinking we were safe. But as human nature goes, we latched onto any hope. We were becoming a little bolder.

  One morning, we heard a timid knock on the door. Any knock was cause for alarm, and Drora and I stood to the side of the door, trying to peek out the window. We could only see black material of what appeared to be a man’s jacket. The soft knocking reassured us; we had heard the Germans when they came to someone’s house and you couldn’t even call it knocking. But we were so paranoid by then that any sound could be a prelude to something sinister.

  Drora and I were pointing to each other to do something when we heard a familiar voice saying, “For God’s sake, open the door.”

  “That’s Grandpa,” Drora said.

  I could feel my insides ease and I opened the door a crack just to be sure. My grandfather pushed it open and Drora and I fell into his arms.

  Normally not one to be sentimental or affectionate, my grandfather stroked both our heads and murmured, “Oy, mayne sheyne kinderlekh.”


  Drora and I each put an arm through my grandfather’s and led him into the kitchen where my mother and Rivke were scrubbing the floor.

  “Papa!” my mother cried. “How I longed to see you. Is Mama okay? And how are Khane and the children?”

  “Everyone is well, don’t worry,” he said. “We are too smart to let the German fascists get us.” He winked at me and my fear melted like ice in boiling water. Now with my father dead and Velvel in Palestine, my grandfather was the closest male in our family. Not to say we didn’t have our other grandfather, Morris, and our uncles, but we lived closer to Grandpa Yankel and saw him often. He was my favorite, I admit. And not just mine. Grandpa Yankel held the highest esteem in our house. It wasn’t because he was pious or educated. It was the way he spoke and carried himself, like he was proud but not haughty.

  After a few minutes, my grandfather told us a joke and we were laughing as if the Germans had never come. Drora and Rivke went upstairs to gather the dirty clothes for laundering that afternoon, and Grandpa took my mother aside. He shooed me away with his hand; and, though I tried unsuccessfully to make out what they were saying, it didn’t seem too bad by their facial expressions.

  “Esfir,” my mother said, beckoning me, “your grandfather and I think you can have a special privilege.”

  My heart fluttered as if I had swallowed a beehive, and I almost swooned at the fantasy that all was well and my grandfather was again taking me to visit Ida in Volchin. Of course that wasn’t the case, but they agreed that the streets were quiet, at least the three blocks from Khane’s house to ours.

  “Are we all going?” I asked, springing like a marionette.

  “No, just you,” my mother said. “We don’t want to cause any attention, so we’ll go one at a time. Tomorrow, it will be Drora, then Rivke, and then me. Next week, maybe we’ll all go together.”

  I sensed that my mother wasn’t a hundred percent okay with this plan. She was usually very cautious and stubborn. This time she had yielded to her father for what I imagined were two important reasons: She realized that I was again withdrawing into myself, afraid of even going to the outhouse; and she trusted her father, who was, to her, the epitome of good sense.

  “Come, my little shiksa,” he said, opening the door. Because of my blond looks, and his wry humor, it was one of his terms of affection.

  I was scared but my grandfather’s presence soothed me. So even with sweaty hands, I held my grandfather’s, and we walked down the street as if it was just an ordinary day in September. There were only a few people on our street and the next. When we turned to Khane’s block, there was a small group of neighbors surrounded by German soldiers. We crossed the street to the other side, to avoid them. One of the soldiers motioned for us to come to them; he was immediately joined by two others in helmets, rifles strapped to their shoulders.

  “It’s okay, Esfir, they won’t hurt us,” my grandfather said, undoubtedly feeling my trembling.

  We recognized the local grocer, Chaim Lifshitz, being plucked from the Jews. A soldier handed him a large pair of scissors. Mr. Lifshitz was a short, balding, and beardless man. It was a hot day and my grandfather was wearing a tight-fitting black cap instead of his usual fedora. I can’t remember all the words, most were in German, but it was clear that the Nazis ordered Mr. Lifshitz to cut off my grandfather’s beautiful long white beard.

  Mrs. Lifshitz, whom I hadn’t noticed before, immediately appeared by my side and gently eased me away. No, no, go away. I must explain to the Nazis that there’s a mistake, that here is my kind and brilliant grandfather. Surely they’d see that they have the wrong man. I don’t remember; it’s possible, I did say something because Mrs. Lifshitz squashed my mouth with her hand and pulled me even further from my grandfather—though it was only a matter of a foot or two—and I do remember squirming like a crazy person from her clutches, without success.

  The Nazis continued shouting at Mr. Lifshitz, who shook his head and refused. I guess, I was lucky if you can call it that. The Nazis didn’t pay attention to me. They had other things on their minds.

  Then a Nazi grabbed the scissors and held it to Mr. Lifshiz’s neck, plunging in the blade enough to produce blood droplets. His wife screamed.

  Mr. Lifshitz took the scissors and gingerly gathered the tips of my grandfather’s straggly beard in one hand, and, with the other, tried to cut off the bottom as a unit. He succeeded but the Germans weren’t happy. Several shouted and shoved Mr. Lifshitz. This was not what they had ordered. With tentative motions, Mr. Lifshitz hacked the remaining beard and scraped at my grandfather’s face until all that was left were uneven patches of pinkish white, the color from blood. The severed beard clumps lay on the ground like a run-over squirrel.

  A loud noise came from afar and the Germans must have decided that they were bored and would investigate this new commotion. Mr. Lifshitz dropped the scissors and ran down the street, his wife scampering after him. My grandfather took my quaking hand and led me back toward my house, even though we were closer to Khane’s. I don’t know if he was disoriented or felt safer retracing our steps.

  When my grandfather and I walked in the door, my mother tried not to show her distress but her face blanched and I heard a sucked-in gasp. She disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a wet rag and a bar of soap. She ushered Rivke to bring the “medicine,” something reddish brown mixed with alcohol. She doused the rag with it and dabbed at my grandfather’s chin. He winced and let out a thin but shrill cry.

  I stood on the side watching, still gripping my grandfather’s hand. I had a vague sense of someone speaking to me; it was sound, but no meaning penetrated through my ears. I felt pressure and my fingers were disentangled from my grandfather’s.

  Slowly, without asking, my mother removed his shirt. He no longer believed in the orthodox view that men and women shouldn’t touch (except for close relatives, which we were anyway), but he was still a very modest man about most personal matters. Drora rubbed the blood from his shirt, rinsed and ironed it.

  My mother held a glass of shnaps to his lips, forcing in the liquid, despite my grandfather’s protestations that his insides were already on fire. By midday, he was ready to go home. My mother begged him to stay, that it wasn’t safe for him to go outside again. He said he had to because my grandmother would be sick with worry. There were so many things to worry about, you needed a stepladder to put them in the proper order.

  Now that I think about it, I can’t remember spending so much time with my grandfather when he didn’t utter one of his Yiddish sayings. In all my years since, and after everything I witnessed, that sight of my grandfather trying to smile as my mother worked on him will always stand out as my first unbearable heartbreak.

  Khane related later that indeed her mother was almost a crazy woman by the time my grandfather arrived at her house. When my grandmother saw his face, she inhaled deeply and wailed an inhuman noise in a steady stream of broken air. She pulled him toward her and then quickly ran into the other room as if she were afraid that her touch would cause him more pain. She returned with Khane’s dead husband’s razor that she took from the cabinet, rusty from nine years of disuse, lathered my grandfather’s face, and shaved the remaining patches of hair. Her breathing became more even and she gently kissed his forehead. Then she said, “I always had a soft spot for a clean-shaven man.”

  Twenty-Six

  THE UNDERGROUND NETWORK related war news—persecution, destruction, and death in so many cities, towns, and villages. In short doses, we heard about Brest. On September 13, the day before Rosh Hashanah, bombs fell in Brest’s Jewish quarters. About two hundred died in this bombardment and thousands were left homeless. On September 17, after a fierce three-day battle with Polish forces, the Germans captured the Brest Fortress.

  My sisters and I had never been religious. But every night during the German occupation, we had prayed to God for help.

  Help came in the form of Russians. In Brest, meeting little resistance,
Soviet forces overtook the Fortress from the German army and reached the city on the 18th when the two invading armies met. On September 19, the Polish army surrendered. The war was practically over.

  The Russians were nearing Kobrin. Drora was unable to contain her euphoria. She practiced her Russian every available minute and helped formulate a myriad of secret plans with her “comrades,” some, I learned by listening to Drora and a girlfriend’s pressed-head talks, involved moving to Russia. I only prayed that these were merely pipe dreams because if my mother ever suspected that her oldest daughter would be immigrating to Russia, while her son was living in Palestine, I couldn’t imagine what she would do.

  On the morning of September 20, the Red Army entered and took control of Kobrin. No longer terrified of going outside, we all rushed to the main street and saw streams of Russian tanks and soldiers chugging along. The crowd was ecstatic. People kissed soldiers’ dusty boots. Many were skinny and wearing torn or frayed uniforms. To me, they looked more like tired and dejected men than jubilant conquerors.

  Within minutes, Kobrin was flying red flags that the local Communists made by tearing the white stripe from red-and-white Polish flags. Gangs scattered leaflets denouncing the fascist Polish regime. Jews greeted each other with, “Mazel tov.”

  Drora had been right all along about the “secret” partition pact between the Soviets and Germans. I didn’t always get my facts right, but this I wrote down in my journal: Out of the deal, the Soviets received some 77,000 square miles of new territory, with the Bug River as part of the demarcation line; and they inherited more than thirteen million people, including an estimated 3,500,000 Poles and 1,300,000 Jews. All-in-all, with at least half of Poland’s area and one-third of its population, the Russians got a very large piece of the pie. We were no longer part of Poland.