The Grayling

by Cheryl Freier

  His friend sat straight with his feet firmly touching the polished wooden floor. “You must leave tonight”, he said in a most assured tone of voice. Joseph closed his eyes for a second and then nodded his head as if to say, “Okay, I will do it”. He stammered and cleared his voice and asked, “Can you help us to escape?” His friend, whom Joseph had known since boyhood and who for many years had invited Joseph for a family lunch, after he came home from Christian church services on Sundays. Joseph looked carefully into his friend’s eyes, and he knew to trust him, and said, “Okay, we will go”.

  Joseph ran up all 14 stairs in one minute, calling the names of his four sons and one daughter–-all in one breath. Anna, his wife, heard him, walked in from the garden and asked, “What is the commotion?” Joseph quipped with an air of determination, and said, “we’re leaving and that is all there is to it”.

  A few hours later, they all sat quietly at the kitchen table, and they waited, as the night got darker and darker. When it was pitch-black outside, they got up, and they knew that it was follow the leader and that the leader was Joseph. Standing tall with an undying faith and determination, they walked out quietly onto the road. They felt free. The winds from the night air wind blew onto their faces. They could not hear a sound, and the silence was golden. They smiled in relief. They could barely see their guide in front of them. My father led the way. He had taught himself to chirp like a bird so that he could signal us for danger. We were all on the alert for the sound of the bird call. The woods grew closer as the darkness from the trees created a blinking blindness of its own kind—the black grew darker and darker. I remember us stopping once. My father thought that he had heard a noise. My father whispered to us that we should start crawling into the woods from this point. We got down on our hands and feet and crawled. The ground was soggy and the soil glued our hands so we had to stop to stand up and brush off the dirt. The ground looked ugly; it looked like leaves had decayed, untouched, for all the ages. Our arched backs ached. Our eyes, which were bulging from the strain of seeing the heels of our shoe in front of us, ached and tingled. I remember crawling for miles. I remember oozing into the softness of the earth and feeling uncannily shielded by the black earth and trees. Our breathing got belabored and when my mother called out, with her hands shaking through her thick gray strands of hair, “oh, help, I cannot go any farther, we all collapsed and lay for hours on the damp and cold ground. As it was the month of August, the soil was somewhat softer and this made it easier for us to move along the winding roots in and around the large, black and sturdy tree trunks, which we used as our pathway. The trees had grown in this forest for hundreds and hundreds of years.

  The nighttime darkness was relentless. They walked slowly amongst the tall, thick, dependable statues of the trees, feeling their way, often touching the outside bark of the trees; the trees seemed everlasting and nourishing to the soul. The trees were a force of power that Martin admired. The trees had grown in this forest for hundreds and hundreds of years.

  Owls perched on the high branches, occasionally leaving out a hooting sound that reverberated through the airwaves of the wind and wisely warning the family, saying, “Whoever comes this way, beware”. Joseph became unnerved by the sound of the owl, and whispered in Martin’s ear, “maybe the owl knows something that we don’t know”. Martin focused his eyes more on the sides of the pathways.

  The sun’s light for the next day was beginning to appear, and the sun shined brightly through the small spaces in-between the green leaves. The waving, light green, yellow-speckled, iridescent, tall, pointed leaves were extensions of the branches at the apex arches of the trees. Soon the darkness from the night would disappear like puff into the air; the new day would bring light and hope for the oppressed.

  Their guide motioned with his uplifted left hand for them to stop. He held his hand steady; the family looking sleepy, but they all stopped quickly. The weight of their bodies made footprints in the soil, burrowing lasting, irrevocable imprint marks of the date and times in the forest floor. Their story of their quest to survive was recognized by the animals and the creatures in the forest and was recorded by time itself. Animals, grey wolves, pine martens watched them from behind the trees.

  The guide motioned with his left hand that they all squat behind the bushes, and he squatted down. Following his example, they dropped the small amount of baggage that they had and they squatted down as far as they could go. Joseph motioned to his son, Henry, the youngest understood; he knew at a young age of five that there was no time for crying. The muscles in their arms and legs ached. The muscles numbed. Their eyes stared out into space. Fleeting moments heard the rapid beats of hearts’ racing. Sweat appeared on all of their brows even though the weather had become much colder. The new month had just started but the moment in time was an eternity.

  The guide stood up and motioned with his right hand, pressing on his pursed lips. Everyone knew to be quiet. They knew to listen. Martin’s thoughts wandered to the Jewish people’s escape from Egypt. “The ruler of Germany had become like the pharaoh and his princes”, he said silently to himself He muttered to himself, “history is reliving itself, and we, the Jews in Czechoslovakia are the slaves of this generation”. He closed his eyes, and he said to himself, “may God deliver us from this evil”.

  The minutes went by as though time would never again move. Martin transfixed his thoughts on Moses leading his people, the journey through the dessert. He pictured Moses in his mind with a striped, multi-colored robe, which was made out of lamb’s wool. He asked himself the question, “Were not the forces of evil more prevalent in the desert?” and then he thought, “Oh, yes, they were”. Then he thought, “But then the people traveled behind the ark with the covenants”. He lifted his head and closed his eyes tightly until they ached and then he thought, “When God wishes to provide an ark for his chosen people, then he will”.

  Martin felt an inner spirit moving from within him to the outside. There was a thin yellow glow for a moment’s time that covered his body. He was not able to speak at that moment. He felt warmth returning to the inside of his body; it was almost as though he felt a sense of warmth after having eaten a satisfying meal on the Shabbat. He found himself looking up at the bright full moon in the sky. He had a smile on his face.

  His silent thoughts were interrupted as he thought he saw the guide getting up. He was mistaken. The guide was just shaking his leg. “Yes, Martin said to himself, “wherever the ark went, it destroyed the forces of evil and then the people could enter safely into the promised-land”.

  his eyes, and he said to himself, “may God deliver us from this evil”.

  The guide was getting up slowly, and it looked as if he was watching something!! No longer were there thoughts of the Sabbath–those thoughts were a distance of happiness away in time”, Martin thought. He recited, “Hear O’ Israel”, and he felt his breathing less labored, but he clasped both fists.

  Motions were spotted in the distance—shadows mingling with the trees. Sounds were heard: the hooting of the owls’ watchful eyes, the sound of the wind’s swooshing, and the crisp, crackling sound of the fallen leaves being stepped on by the on-comers. Footsteps could be heard, but not the usual rhythm of the Nazi boots, so Joseph breathed steadier, and his children did not cringe with fear.

  A second guide appeared suddenly about six yards away, as the condensation of new dew rising from the ground slowed their pace. The second guide was followed by a family, four people; they looked tired, bedraggled, and were dragging their feet. The couple’s sons looked like they were older, may 15 and 17. The family and the second guide stopped a few yards away from the bushes, which Joseph’s family was hiding in.

  They stood looking around……..They waited. They sat down on the forest floor, easily adjusting to the coldness of the ground and the bumps and crevices and unevenness of the surface of the ground, as the winds picked up a bit and swooshed
around them. It seemed like an hour had gone by, but it was hard to tell time. No one moved. Joseph’s guide did not give the signal for Joseph and his family to join the second guide.

  Then the second guide said “I do not like it. We were supposed to meet with two other groups. Let us take a chance and make a run for it”. They quickly followed the stance of the guide, and they began to run towards the way that would bring them to the train, but they knew that they were to travel south through the wooded areas to Bratislava and then they were to depart on a train in Austria for Switzerland.

  The family of four faded into shadows among the trees. Martin felt like reaching out to them and calling them back. Martin wanted to say to the boys, “I am coming too, and maybe we can study together someday, or join a team of soccer players?” He knew that he could not. Joseph was thinking, “I think I know this family”. He is a jeweler in another town”. Anna was thinking, “The woman looks like she is my age”. The winds whistled around Joseph and his family; and they, who tempted the swirls of the winds to go around them, Anna and Joseph, knew not to speak.

  Then suddenly, popping loudly, destroying the sweet sound of silence and the emergence of a new day; scooping up the waters of the dew with their boots, were tall soldiers. They looked like disfigured shadows, as they marched through the spaces between the trees; they were clad in woolen uniforms; and through the weary, tired eyes of the pursued, the soldiers looked like they were colored red; they were a virtual lineup of clones; they were all shouting in a frenzy, echoes of voices seemed to come from deep within the earth.

  The wicked sound of dogs pursuing their prey erupted into another frenzy of loud sounds, a halyard of barks to rig their victims. Bright lights, blinding lights, which were grasped tightly by the clones, shined their ominous rays of fate on the family of four and their guide. The guide tried to flee to the shelter of nearby trees, but the speed of one of the soldier’s piercing bullets stopped him in his tracks. He fell in a moment. More shots were heard. The rustling sound of falling leaves was heard afterwards. Then silence, as the trees in the forest noted what had happened and the branches shuddered.

  Terror struck through the pumping ventricles of Joseph Freier’s heart. He recited a prayer, “Hear oh, Israel”, silently and waited in the exact spot that he stood and he did not move a muscle. Joseph’s family followed suit by closing their eyes and waiting. Martin looked up to the heavens through a clearing of an extended arm of trees, and said to himself, “they have all gone to God and they are living in the land of Adam and Eve, with plenty all around them and no fears. He visualized one of the sons dancing with a fiddle in his hand and the other son dancing and ringing the bells of a tambourine. He visualized the mother and father holding hands, while they climbed the steps to heaven. They looked healthy and not bedraggled. Their bodies lay still, however. The watching trees refused to absorb the blood of innocent Jews into their root system.

  A voice boldly shouted, “Dead Jews, just leave them here to rot”, and the formation of vicious clones formed a line and vanished slowly into the air. They passed through the other side of the dark curtain of death, which descended into the earth a long way down. Joseph and his family stayed in the woods until Joseph’s guide stood up and raised his hand, pointing his hand in the direction of their town. With hopes diminished for escape, they trudged home, never muttering a word. Martin prayed silently for deliverance.

  CHAPTER 3:

  INFORMATION ON US AS A FAMILY

  Even though we were children, we understood that there was a dangerous war raging, but we did not have the maturity to go beyond those thoughts, and this sense of ‘denial’ was a blessing for us. My brother Sam was the oldest. Sam was only 14 in 1944, but the lines on his forehead and his red, ruddy complexion were a clear indication that he had seen cruel things that no man should see. He looked a lot older than he was for he was tall for his age and had a very stoic expression on his face. With blond hair and steel blue eyes, he looked like the Germans. He could speak German fluently and other languages too.

  Joseph, our dad, as a young boy had attended schools in Germany; he had lived in Germany with an aunt; he spoke the language fluently and he taught the boys the language. They caught onto the language very quickly.

  Myself, Martin, I was 3 years younger than Sam. I was big for my age, standing tall and lanky, while Sam was tall and broad. A question was always on the expression of my face; so I looked as though I might be 15; at 15 a lot was expected of a young man: to study; he had to choose a vocation, and to think about a bride–-a wife and family for his future. I realized that with the war the whole course of my life had completely changed. But I knew not to cry. I knew to act as though I was 11 years old, which if I survived, I would be soon anyway.

  My mother had come from an ‘aristocratic background’. Her father, I will always remember him–-he drove the carriage with the two horses in the front, calling out, “Hudya, hudya”, and I had to hold onto my hat and hold tight onto my seat or I would lose both. My grandpa Hellinger was a soda maker and the only one in the whole town. He manufactured the soda and delivered the soda to the people all over the ghetto and also outside of the ghetto. His business got bigger and bigger each year.

  In the beginning of the war, we could forget about the dangers and continue with the business. As the days passed, more and more restrictions were placed on us. But still, we were in denial and hoping that the war would end soon. We always hoped that our way of life would resume soon.

  We hoped that we could forget about impending bombs; we hoped that we could forget about the throes of hunger. My father was not happy that, “we should forget about the war for he knew that forgetting would undermine our chances for surviving. My father wanted us to be prepared. He asked us “Who amongst you would want to be the ‘watchman’ for planes”? We looked at my father with staring eyes; our mouths mumbling with fears at the thought of planes swooping over our rooftops and aiming bombs over our town and our people.

  “Okay, then I will choose,” and he chose my younger brother Henry. He told him, “I have chosen you, because you run so quickly, and no one, not even the German soldiers would think that someone your age would be the watchman. He said, “You Henry are like the tribe leader, Naphtali……you run faster and fleeter than the fastest deer. You will do a fine job”. He walked with Henry and explained, “You see that hill up there before the woods, well, each day I want you to climb up the hill and watch for the motorcycles and the planes”. He paused. “Your sister Edith will bring you food to eat and will stay with you for a little while”. He smiled and looked at Henry and asked politely, “Do you understand?” Henry nodded his head.

  One day went by. Two days passed by, and then a month, and then months; we were spared some of the initial strategic verve of conquering, because we lived near the Russian border and the Germans were not entrenched in the outskirts of our town yet. We waited for Henry to tell us that the Germans were coming every day. All of our neighbors for blocks and blocks were waiting to find out too. Henry felt he was doing something so important that he grew to be less frightened.

  The war continued to wage. It became common to see the lights of the cannons and the guns in the night time even though they were many miles away. People who had escaped from these towns had stories of terror to tell about the Germans. They talked of round-ups of people, they talked of deportation trains, and they talked of long marches.

  CHAPTER 4

  THEN THE GERMANS CAME

  Then one day Henry saw a lot of dust of clouds on the ground, moving like the wind and he knew. We were speared nearly one year. What Henry spotted was two motorcycles coming towards our town. He ran down the hill, one foot running forward and then the other running even faster–just like wheels with spokes—his feet turning and turning. His arms almost extended straight out from his sides–he for these moments was an airplane; his voice being without a natural ri
ng, but this time his voice had the ring, as he called out like a bell, “The Germans are coming, the Germans are coming. Doors slammed, women screamed, men shouted, windows banged down hard. This was the music of horror.

  We sat frozen in time. Visions of prisoners being marched before the triumphant Germans wearied our brows and the pits of our stomachs. In no time at all, echoes bounced from house to house, ceiling to ceiling. The word was out in whatever language you spoke that the Germans were coming! We heard the sound of the motorcycles coming. It was a coarse sound as if blazing against time and pushing the innocent angels away. They came closer and closer. The two descendants from the Amalachites, the German soldiers delivered the message, “We will be taking over the town”, they yelled this message as loud as they could in a course, guttural, hoarse sounding voice. It meant death to most, fear to most, thoughts of escape were on everyone’s mind. The message was clear and we knew that at the very least we would be part of a round-up. From there, we did not know. As they thumped on their gas pedals, we heard the engines roaring like wild panthers and they disappeared quickly into the blackness of the night. Only their sound could be heard in the distance and the memory of their passing through was indelible.

  We wondered what to do about the Sabbath, which was the next day, but our question was soon answered as we heard the rolling of the thick rubber tires pouncing on the small cobblestones beneath them. Shattering sounds to the ears–grinding, irking, pulling, prodding, pushing–sounding all at one time; something like the wild panther jumping for the kill of his prey––-we could hear others being taken into their chilling machine.