Survival

by M. Ben Yanay

  She owed her life to Gregory, who took care of her, fed her, and kept her hydrated until she regained her strength. Until that moment, about an hour into her guard duty on the locomotive, she had not considered his kindness. She was certain his actions stemmed from the fact that he was the one who had found her. Only now, did his generosity occur to her, and she felt a pleasant tingle down her back. She did not thank him even when he brought her a uniform kit in near mint condition, which was almost a perfect fit, complete with a woolen coat with pockets, a belt and a fur hat. He later gave her gloves and socks, too. When she wanted to give him his scarf back, he refused.

  “It’s yours already,” he said, leaning over, as though he was about to kiss her. But no, he did not kiss her. Since that day, she used to imagine the touch of his thick lips on her mouth, admitting to herself how much she wanted his kiss. Nevertheless, she never did anything to suggest to him she was keen, quite the opposite, in fact. She always treated him the same as everybody else, perhaps too equally. Her tingling got stronger. He must think I’ve betrayed him. Does he guess I fled? He must be worried about me more than anyone else. But it’s too late to change my mind now. I am not going back to the partisans.

  Gregory and the others lived their days from day to day, not thinking about tomorrow. They were prepared to die for Mother Russia. She, on the other hand, began dreaming about the days to come, after the war. I wish to live, she kept telling herself. She had embraced those words like a mantra at the Stalag. They proved their worth. She escaped and saved herself. Now, thoughts of the future merged with the thoughts about the changes in her life after the war. She tried to think of some purpose to set herself. It’s time to think hard about some worthy cause, some goal to give my life something to live for, in addition to my desire to live. And what if I don’t make it to America? Will I stay in Vienna? Will I continue my medical studies, work at a hospital and save people, or perhaps write a novel about the war? Defeat evil with words. She did not know which was better. Nevertheless, her heart smiled on the ideas.

  *

  Ten days had passed since her friends picked up the African American pilot. Everyone was curious about him. Ina was the only one who spoke English, so she became his interpreter. Their talks made it absolutely clear he would leave the group as soon as he was stronger, and could make it back to his friends on the front. He asked for her assistance as a guide, and she agreed.

  The idea to leave the forest bunch under such terms appealed to her. She shared her thoughts about this opportunity with no one, but the emerging goal seemed perfect. She must first get as far as possible from her homeland and then arrive in America with Bob’s assistance.

  And last night, Gregory caught another person, a Hungarian Jew. Another determined person with a purpose in mind, he longed to reunite with his family after three years in the Hungarian Army.

  I’m not like them, she thought. They are grounded, whereas I lost my foothold the moment I gave up on returning to Russia. But here I am, establishing a new footing, my own purpose. Empowered and strong, she decided there and then to elicit their help, share their strength, and help enable each other to achieve his or her goal.

  Ina glanced at the watch Bob gave her. She had half an hour left before her shift was over. The men snored peacefully behind her. The fire kept the coal searing in the engine. It was completely dark. Then, as she was about to rise from her seat and stretch, she saw lights.

  Scared, she woke both men up. “I see lights up ahead!”

  “What is it, what’s wrong?” Janos asked in a sleepy voice.

  Bob awoke and got up. “Yes. I can see. It’s a single light, coming straight ahead at us, quickly. It looks like the headlight of a locomotive.”

  Janos came to his senses and within a moment called, “Quickly, it’s getting closer, get off quickly; run to the forest! Hurry!”

  “And you, what about you?” asked Bob, holding the door.

  “I’ll signal them. I will light our own lights and join you immediately.”

  “Quickly, Ina.” Bob opened the door and waited for her to come down. When he saw her get off the last ledge, he jumped right after her and landed on the thin layer of snow by the tracks.

  “What now?” Ina asked, anxious.

  “I hope he will manage to divert the engine to the parallel tracks in time. If he doesn’t, there will be a collision. We knew this might happen. Let’s pray for a miracle.” They ran a few dozen feet into the forest and waited. In the meantime, Janos lit the powerful locomotive headlight along with the light inside the cabin. He pulled the horn and gave a long sound. The light up ahead drew closer and stronger. Janos landed outside the engine and joined his friends.

  “What do you say?” asked Ina, her gaze fixed on the approaching locomotive and her beating heart about to leap out of her chest.

  “I am willing to bet the train will run into our engine,” said Bob.

  “What have you got to bet on?” Ina asked, half-serious, half-joking.

  “Perhaps a kiss from you,” he answered in jest.

  “And if you lose, I bet there’s no collision, and then I’ll kick your American butt hard.”

  “Are you two nuts?” Janos berated them. “What’s so funny? This isn’t funny at all. We’ll know in under two minutes.”

  They watched the approaching locomotive and noticed the attached open cars. The locomotive gave a loud siren. The desperate sound merged with the smoke it blew. The distance between both engines got smaller. Janos held his breath. Ina covered her mouth. Bob held his head in both hands. The locomotive kept on, right before their astonished eyes. It rode quickly on the parallel tracks and flew right by theirs. The cars rode behind, their open doors flashing right before them. The eighth and last car blew by and the surreal sight came and went, as though it never was.

  “Russians or Germans?” Janos whispered.

  “It doesn’t matter now. It’s behind us.” Ina sighed. “I have an urgent debt to collect from Bob.”

  “You cannot be serious. I hope you’re joking.”

  “A bet is a bet. You lost, and now you need to pay!” she gloated.

  “A bet is a bet. I’m glad you won.” Bob laughed and turned his backside to her.

  They leaped happily back to the engine, each cherishing the miracle they just had. They felt the rush of adrenaline surging through them.

  “Go to sleep, I’ll take over,” Janos suggested to Ina.

  “But it’s my turn,” Bob protested.

  “I won’t be able to fall asleep now. I’m too restless.”

  “Neither will I,” Janos replied to Ina.

  “I suggest we resume our journey, how about you?” Bob asked, not waiting for a reply as he stoked the furnace with coal.

  “Let’s move, then. We’re taking our chances either way.”

  Ina stood by his side, feeling alert enough to watch the road. Janos started the engine. The locomotive’s beam of light shined afar. Janos reflected on the gigantic, water and coal-fed, metal comrade that was taking them along on this ride, like a good friend. The locomotive never complains and is far from spoiled. He pushed a lever, and the engine accelerated.

  9. Changing of the Guard

  “Perhaps you’d better join me,” Janos suggested to Bob. “I’ll teach you how to drive. I have no sole claim to the driver’s seat. What do you say?”

  Bob did not wait. Ina moved and let him stand next to Janos. “I think you’d better try to get some sleep,” Bob told her. “We don’t need you to observe with the headlight lighting our way.”

  “You haven’t slept a wink since we left the partisans. I’m concerned you might crash,” Janos added. “You’ll be of much greater help once you catch a few hours of shut-eye and grow stronger.”

  She did not argue and settled herself near the furnace. “Wake me up the moment something happens,” she told them. “I mean it!”

  “Certainly,” Bob promised.

  “Now, pay attention,” Janos explained.
“These are the brakes,” he said, pointing at two levers. “The red one is shorter and the black one is longer. The red is used for emergency brake. When you pull it all the way, you lock all the wheels at once. The black is used for gradual brake. It slows the wheels until they halt completely. Do you see this iron wheel? It controls the steam valve. Closing it slows the train down. When open, more steam flows, so the train increases its speed.”

  “I’ve seen you drive, so I get it. No need to demonstrate. Let me drive and watch everything I do.”

  Bob took Janos’s place. He felt completely sure of his every move. Janos stood next to him and looked at his black fingers. “I’m going over to fetch more coal. When I return, my fingers will be as black as yours.” Bob laughed. “Go, my friend. Get to it. I’m so hungry; you’d better keep away before I eat you.”

  It didn’t occur to Bob that he would have to cross hundreds of miles on the ground, and in foreign, battle-torn, enemy territory strewn with burnt tanks, remains of armored vehicles, and unburied soldiers. He did know these sights from his viewpoint in the cockpit. The elevation does make quite a difference, he thought. The hits look far less egregious and serious from the sky.

  *

  His squadron spent their first few months in England. He enjoyed the gracious and warm welcome he and his fellow African American pilots were shown. He felt no alienation from the locals, quite the opposite. A fair share of women showed an interest in him, some since he was a combat pilot and some because he was a tall, virile man who carried himself well. He had a sort of spontaneity about him, which was so different from the British cool reserve and aloof manners. Apart from the attention, which he found exciting, the courtesy he was shown marked a profound change from his treatment back home at Tuskegee, where he was “just another colored man.”

  Despite the backlash against racism and the fact that the northern states in the U.S. were less racist, the South was still mired in bigotry and violence. Segregation was very much a fact of life, with no end in sight. The restaurants were for whites only, public transport had seats assigned to either whites or people of color. The schools Bob had attended were strictly for African Americans, from the faculty down to the last student. When he graduated high school and wanted to continue to college, he had but one option: Tuskegee University, which was designated strictly for African Americans such as him. He did not even entertain the possibility of making an acquaintance with any white women. One wrong look at a white girl could have ended badly, resulting in either jail or lynching.

  Even before the U.S. joined the war, many African Americans volunteered to enlist. They were usually assigned to very lowly positions, mostly as service providers. Vital though they might have been, this attested to the low appreciation—or lack thereof—African Americans suffered from when it came to the top military echelons. This poor image had no basis, and it was rooted in neither fact nor figures. Lack of faith that African Americans could fight competently stemmed strictly from ignorance.

  All this led a group of African American students to organize and fight for their right to enlist in the U.S. armed forces in various roles, including combat missions. Their goal was to serve their country. “If only we could receive training as pilots, we would demonstrate that our abilities are equal to those of white pilots,” Bob used to tell the congressmen he met as one of the leaders of the students’ association. He realized that serving as a pilot would raise his status, along with that of his fellow African American pilots. This, in turn, would prove their abilities outside the battlefield, too. He and his friends did not flinch, even when they received explicit threats from the Ku Klux Klan.

  The relentless campaign took a long time, only at the end of which did the supreme command of U.S. forces agree to allow African American cadets to be trained at a specially established flight school near Tuskegee. The experimental program included grueling basic training. Many didn’t make the cut due to the physical or mental requirements. After that phase, the group began actual flight training. Alabama gamblers couldn’t wait to place their bets on the pilots’ chances or against them. At the end of the first flight course, many of the gamblers had to eat their hats. The African American pilots proved themselves above and beyond. For Bob, the war was some ray of light in an otherwise bleak reality. He was among the first class of graduates who went all the way from initiating the fight to completing it victorious.

  After their short stay in England, Bob and his comrades were sent to the Tuskegee Squadron in Sicily, where he took part in Allied air combat. He and his fellow pilots successfully participated in many air battles, taking few casualties and shooting down many enemy aircraft. Bob himself hit dozens of planes on the ground and shot down an entire dozen in air battles. He took great pride in himself and felt quite confident.

  I may have over done it, he told himself as he slowed the locomotive down. Perhaps I wasn’t alert enough, or too complacent. He kept berating himself angrily. It’s unforgivable, to get hit like that in broad daylight, with such little anti-aircraft fire from the ground. I have got to return to the squadron and make amends for this disgrace. Otherwise, I shall never forgive myself.

  “Why are you slowing down?” Janos asked him. “What’s going on?” Janos got up, still sleepy. He rubbed his eyes and looked on. “Did anything happen?”

  “The sun is up. We can turn the headlights off now,” Bob told him. “I wasn’t sure how to do that.”

  10. “Lexy” the Locomotive

  Both men leaned forward to the front windshield. The sky was gray. The sun was nowhere to be seen.

  Bob rose from his seat and turned it over to Janos. “No chance for a bright day,” he said. “I smell a storm.”

  “This is the switch,” Janos showed him as he turned the headlight off. “We’re safe as long as we’re moving,” he added. He liked the sound of the steam and the wheels.

  Bob turned back and threw additional chunks of coal into the furnace. He glanced at the pressure gauge.

  “Everything’s fine,” he tapped on Janos’s shoulder. “I’m going back to nap. Wake me up when you feel tired.”

  The forest was thick and heavy with snow on either side of the tracks. This was fresh snow, covering the trees like a cloak.

  *

  Janos thought about what Bob had said about “humanitarian duty,” rules,” an “unbreakable code” and so on. I never noticed such considerations among those ignorant Hungarian soldiers. Those I did meet displayed wickedness and malice every chance they got. Janos recalled how he barely contained himself when he saw three Hungarian soldiers jump off the truck he was driving, only to kill a dog. They took their time to shoot her and torture her puppy. The supply convoy was about to enter a small gypsy camp. The gypsy cars were still burning, the drying laundry was still hanging on the trees, blowing in the wind. Chickens and geese were still picking at the ground as they strutted on the muddy soil. A donkey with a missing leg wobbled toward a makeshift trough. The goats were bleating in their pound. A snowy dung heap glistened in the sun.

  The convoy moved on slowly and stopped at the center of the village in order to catch a few hours of shut-eye. None of the men in the convoy suffered from hunger; none were thirsty. They had warm clothes and good shoes.

  The soldiers got off the vehicles, stretched and went to relieve themselves among the trees. Most returned after that, but some went to the gypsy cars. Janos looked at them approaching and heard them. That was how he realized the camp was deserted. He assumed the gypsies simply fled the scene and might still be nearby. As much as he wanted to sleep soundly, he was alert. He already knew the soldiers in the convoy. They were used to doing harm without any reason or any provocation, except to satisfy their own desires. The first sign of the impending mayhem was a shot. Two soldiers jumped off his truck having heard the shot. Then he saw additional soldiers coming down. They all marched toward the cars. He heard additional shots in the background. The soldiers exchanged shouts he could not make out.


  Janos looked nervously, watching the camp and then the soldiers disappearing among the gypsy cars. He could not tell how long he was asleep for, but when he woke, he saw the cars were on fire.

  He knew war was inevitable, but something in him stirred against acts of sheer evil. “Bob is right,” he thought. Some codes are indeed unbreakable. But had some locomotive carrying a train full of German soldiers suddenly appear before them, he would not have cared if the Germans died in a collision. He felt pretty much the same way as he saw the heavy smoke rising from the innocent gypsies’ camp. He was filled with a deep sense of revenge, fueled by his desire to retain his sanity, to rid his thoughts of the knowledge that the people all around him could be so wicked and malicious. If only I could just punch those soldiers, that I hate so much, I would have. I wouldn’t stop hitting them. I would go on beating them and not stop even as they begged me to. After all, those who deserve to be punished should get their due in full!

  As he moved his hand across the dusty windshield to brush his thoughts aside, he saw the view was changing. The rows of trees were now filled with large gaps. The forest was sparser behind them. In the distance, far ahead, he saw moving vehicles.

  “Hey, there’s movement up ahead. I can see cars and people,” Janos said, excited.