Two Princes and a Queen

by Shmuel David

  “Yes, but you can be both Jewish and liberal. You don’t need to observe all the taryag mitzvoth, the 613 religious commandments of the Torah,” I answered.

  “Enough, Hanne. Stop philosophizing and come closer. Can’t you see I’m freezing?”

  I drew closer to her, until our bodies rubbed against each other through the layers of coats separating them.

  “That’s better,” she said. “Now give me your hand.”

  I offered her a hesitant hand, and she held it in her own ungloved hand.

  “Well, that’s so much better,” she said and rubbed her hand against mine.

  “I didn’t mean to philosophize.” I felt the need to apologize. “We may not be so close to God or observe the laws of the religion, but I think God isn’t about the spirit, or divine spirit, or the existence of God as a spiritual entity, but a matter of the heart, between one person and another. That is what they taught us in Akiba.”

  “What’s Akiba?” she asked.

  “Akiba is a Zionist youth movement, but they follow the principles of Judaism in a much more liberal way,” I tried to explain.

  “What about us? Does that mean we aren’t liberal?” she asked, offended.

  “No. We have a Shabbat meal on Friday evening, for example, but we don’t need to actually observe the Shabbat.”

  “That’s odd. It’s the first time I’ve ever heard of anything like it. My mother always says that you can’t be half-pregnant.”

  “What does that have to do with it?”

  “You’ll see…”

  “Why can’t we observe some of the commandments and ignore those that aren’t suitable to our day and age?”

  “But that’s the whole point. Either you’re a believer or you’re not. We are believers.”

  “Well, we also have the Hashomer Hatzair here. What do you think about them?”

  “They’re even worse…”

  “I prefer the way things are done in Akiba. It seems much better to me.”

  “Just you wait. I’ll teach you things about Judaism you never knew or even imagined. For example, what is this week’s parashat hashavua?”10

  “How should I know?”

  “See? ‘Vayeira. And the LORD appeared unto him…’ I’ll be happy to help you become really Jewish.”

  “Don’t worry. I already feel very Jewish or I wouldn’t be here. We had a great life on Dedinje Hill. We had a car, a swimming pool, a tennis court…”

  “So what happened?”

  “It has to do with the Serbs. They don’t like people who served in the Hungarian army. My father served as an officer in the Hungarian army during the war, and that’s why they have a score to settle with him.”

  “So that’s the reason you’re here?”

  “That’s why they boycotted him, denied him citizenship, and stopped giving him work.”

  “You have no idea what’s going on in Germany. This isn’t about work anymore. This is about life and death.”

  “My Mother heard everything. She has parents and a brother in Vienna. She’s the one who finally pressured father to emigrate. But let’s forget about all that. It’s not why I asked you up here. Look up. What a beautiful starry night! You can’t see anything like this in the city.”

  We looked up at the night sky with its myriad glittering stars.

  “Can you see the Big Dipper? There, see? Isn’t it beautiful? No, not there. Over there.” I turned her in the direction of the north. “There’s the North Star, right at the end of its shaft, see?” I felt the warmth of her breath on my cheek.

  “I never knew their names. I’ve heard about the North Star, but never knew you could actually see it.”

  “There you are. You might learn a thing or two from me as well…”

  “Do you see? You and I look at the sky in different ways… You give the stars names and recognize them, while I learned to look at them and say, ‘When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained.’”

  I felt so close to her at that moment. The warmth of her body seemed to flow into mine through all the layers of our clothes. We were both looking up at the star-strewn sky, when suddenly, she quoted in a voice full of yearning:

  “All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times; but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, till they take root in our personal experience.”

  “Goethe…” I answered and immediately realized she also knew something of the great poets. “But what does that have to do with what we were talking about?”

  “Can’t you see? I’m trying to tell you about the greatness of God, and you’re trying to tell me about the greatness of God in a different way, through the stars in heaven. Wise thoughts that we simply try to think about for ourselves.”

  She looked at her watch. “It’s getting late. I need to go. Just tell me how your mother is doing. Is she better now?”

  “Since the last crisis, she’s been fine. But she was really miserable. She told Father that perhaps we should leave the boat, but he convinced her that everything would turn out all right.”

  “Your mother is a very special woman. I really feel close to her. She reminds me a bit of my own mother. I’m sorry, but I need to go back now. I have a long day tomorrow.”

  We parted with a handshake, and she hurried off the bridge.

  The longed-for telegram did not arrive in the next few days, and we continued to dock at Prahovo until the last day of December, when the officials of the state river shipping line instructed the captains of the boats to return to the winter bay at the Kladovo fishing village, not far from the Djerdap Gorge, opposite the Romanian town of Drobeta-Turnu Severin.

  * * *

  5The Mizrahi religious Zionist organization in Germany included three main movements: the Mizrahi Youth, established in 1926, supported the values of agriculture and the Torah and founded the religious kibbutz.

  6The Blau-Weiss (Blue and White) youth movement was established in 1912 and was very influential among the Jewish community in Germany.

  7Netzah, Zionist Pioneer Youth, was a youth movement established in 1930 and closely associated with Hashomer Hatzair.

  8Moshe Averbach, called Agami, a prominent member of the Mossad L’Aliyah Bet, was in charge of foreign affairs, first in Italy and later in Romania.

  9The Iron Gates (in Serbo-Croatian, Đerdap Gorge, the last part known as Đerdapska klisura) are two mighty cliffs that form a narrow gorge on the Danube River, which is part of the boundary between Serbia and Romania and hampers the passage of ships along the river.

  10The weekly portion of the Torah read in Jewish synagogues. Vayeira, for example, is the fourth weekly parashah, or Torah portion.

  The Ice Harbor, January–March 1940

  For the past two weeks, the boats have been stranded in the icy Kladovo harbor, waiting for the ice to thaw. Other boats, apart from our three, are docked in the harbor, but most of them are empty. On our boats, the crowded conditions as well as the cold and tension are unbearable; a terrible uncertainty hovers over us all, and rumors are rife.

  Everyone here hates the rumormongers, but we are all preoccupied with rumors; when will we sail on, why are we stuck here in the first place? There’s so much confusion. Some people don’t believe the ice is the real reason for our stop.

  Today, Father was angry with me again for eavesdropping like a spy.

  “When will you stop this annoying habit?” he grumbled. “It’s not an attractive quality in a young man. Find something better to do with your time.”

  Actually, there were better things to do on the boat, like getting water, for example. We needed water for drinking, cooking, and washing. I took turns drawing water with a few other boys my age on the boat, including Efraim
and Jacob.

  Jacob, who suffered from the cold temperatures on the boat more than anyone, was the son of a wealthy family from Berlin. His parents had wanted to send their children away from Germany at all costs, but their daughter, Eva, and their youngest son, David, were too young to travel on their own, and Jacob was the only one who could join the cruise. His parents took comfort in the fact that at least one of their children was already safe.

  Water duty consisted of drawing water from the well or the river and carrying it in containers to the boat. We took turns going to the well behind the post office, lowering the bucket to the bottom, and raising it back up with a handle. Once that task was completed, we had to be careful not to slip with the bucket on the frozen ice on our way back to the boat. The easier water duty was pulling up cold river water in a bucket from the wooden bridge next to the boat. We used the river water for washing.

  One morning, after drawing water from the river, I saw Efraim running toward me from the direction of the well, looking very upset and confused.

  “It’s because of the damned frost. The rope was so slippery that the bucket slid from my hands into the well.”

  The rope tied to the bucket was covered in a thin layer of frost, and Efraim could hardly pull it up with the full bucket. He was afraid the bucket would slip and fall. When the bucket was already close, he tried to pull it to him, but the rope, almost fully stretched, suddenly slid from his hands and fell back into the well along with the bucket. Efraim got scared, left everything, and ran back to the harbor.

  “Don’t tell anyone,” he urgently pleaded with me. “I feel bad for dropping the bucket.”

  “But you could have tried to bring it up again,” I told him reproachfully.

  “I was afraid it would just happen again and everyone would find out. Promise you won’t tell anyone.”

  Of course I promised, and no one ever discovered the incident. Only now, while writing my memoirs, am I allowing myself to reveal it. Who knows if anyone will ever read them?

  Jacob frequently asked me to replace him on water duty. He suffered greatly from the cold. His feet were frozen, and some days he could barely walk. One day, I accompanied him to the grocery store, not far from the harbor. He bought a bottle of slivovitz, which he said would warm him more than all the blankets they’d given us. He tried to convince me to drink with him and said many of the adults, and even some of the younger people on the boat, drank alcohol to keep warm. He pleaded with me to try and promised it would help me bear the chilling temperatures during the nights.

  One evening, when I came to visit him on board the Kraljica Marija, I found him sprawled on a wooden bench, an almost empty slivovitz bottle next to him, and Inge leaning over him and bandaging his leg. Shlomit, his girlfriend, placed rags soaked with hot water on his other ankle.

  Jacob urged me to drink with him. I took a large sip, just like Father does, then another one, and felt a fireball descending from my gullet all the way down to my stomach, spreading warmth and a pleasant stirring sensation throughout my body.

  At this time, our stay in the officers’ dining room came to an end, and we had to go back up on deck and huddle with everyone else. When Officer Ivanović returned from his vacation, he politely asked Father to clear the small room. He was a very strict officer who showed no favoritism, even though he really liked Father and invited him to drink and play cards with him in the small room. It was Mr. Reiss and Sylvie, his large, loud-mouthed wife, who were offended by the evacuation. Father had invited them to share the officers’ dining room with us so he wouldn’t be seen to be self-centered. Even though Father had always socialized with people of his status, he didn’t want to appear over privileged here.

  Mr. Reiss was on the verge of hysteria when he found out we had to clear out of our little “royal suite.”

  “What do you mean, ‘clear the room’?” he cried out. “Please tell them we have two small daughters. One of them is only four years old.”

  “No. We’re not leaving, Emil,” his wife was even angrier.

  Father had to make it clear to them that we didn’t have much of a choice.

  We went back to sleeping next to the chimney. Father on the floor, almost touching the chimney, Mother on a wide bench with a backrest next to him, and Pauli and me on the floor next to the bench. The next day, I heard them whispering before going to sleep.

  “You reap what you sow. I told you not to invite them. They seemed like a pair of ingrates to me right from the start. I know their kind well.”

  “They have a lot of nerve. They make it sound as if I signed an agreement with them,” said Father angrily.

  “You probably invited them thinking you’d have someone to play cards with. I know you.”

  “Loui, I already explained to you it wouldn’t have looked good if we were the only family in that room.”

  “At least you get along with him. I can’t stand his wife,” said Mother, lowering her voice. “She talks as if she were the only one suffering here. As if I’m here on a pleasure cruise…”

  “Oh, Loui, let’s just forget this episode. It will pass. After all, a week or two from now we’ll be in Israel and can forget about the whole thing.”

  “You know what I think now, Emil? Maybe the doctor was right. Maybe this trip just doesn’t do my nerves any good.”

  “But why, Loui? You know everything will turn out all right in the end. We just need a little patience.”

  “Look at what’s going on all around us. It looks like utter chaos. No one really knows what’s going on.”

  “So what do you suggest? That we get off now?”

  “No. Of course not. I’m just thinking aloud, just between the two of us.”

  “Are you having second thoughts?”

  “Not yet. I won’t be the one to ruin our chances. You know me. When I decide to do something, I stick it out to the end.”

  “True. Even when you agreed to come with me to Yugoslavia, ‘that backward country’ as your mother called it, you made a brave decision and acted upon it.”

  “That’s right, darling. Because I knew I had someone I could trust and I was right. Mother even apologized. Now come closer and hug me. Tell me that everything will be all right this time as well.”

  “Trust me. I’m only concerned about the fact our furniture might get to Haifa before we do.”

  “Never mind. The furniture can wait. Let it suffer a little too.” I finally heard the sound of her laughter.

  I fell asleep, waking in the middle of the night to the sound of Mother’s sighs.

  Father woke up as well, went to the toilet, and came back. I still can’t get used to this nightmare they call toilets here. I was afraid to go there last night, the obstacles in the form of sleeping men, women, and children on the way. But my stomach was pounding and aching for the third night in a row, and I simply couldn’t go on like this.

  The way to the toilets seems like a never-ending nightmare, and once there, I realize I’m not the only one. The stench and filth are disgusting, and I have to force myself to enter the overflowing toilet cabin instead of getting off the boat to disappear among the buildings in the harbor under cover of darkness.

  ***

  “What’s wrong, Hanne?” asked Mother after she saw me running to the toilet during the night and that morning.

  I told her I wouldn’t be coming for breakfast because I had no appetite, and then I curled up and lay on the bench. I felt all the strength drain from my body.

  “You look very pale. I think I’ll call Dr. Bezalel.”

  Dr. Bezalel felt my stomach with skillful fingers, pressed here, released there, and determined, “Dysentery. Four other children on the lower level have caught it.”

  “What do we do?” asked Mother with concern.

  “Maintain hygiene so you won’t get it as well. Take care to wash your hands bef
ore eating and after visiting the toilet cabin. Wash them with soap! I’ll ask for more soap to be brought from the storage room and see that it’s placed on all the sinks. And drink water. Lots of water!” Dr. Bezalel finished his instructions.

  “This is bad. Hanne is so skinny as it is,” Mother voiced her concern.

  “Normally, I’d isolate him, but we haven’t got an isolation room on the boat as yet. You’ll need to take care of him by yourselves for now,” he said and turned to go.

  Mother immediately began to follow Dr. Bezalel’s instructions.

  “Come, Pauli. Let’s go to the kitchen and ask for a pitcher of drinking water.”

  Mimi, the wife of Fredl, the composer, was on duty in the kitchen and would only agree to give them two cups.

  “I’m sorry, but I was instructed not to give anyone more than two cups. There’s a shortage of drinking water.”

  Mother silently took the two cups. I couldn’t bring myself to drink more than one anyway. I tried forcing myself to drink more, but simply couldn’t.

  Mother and Father urged me to follow the doctor’s instructions.

  “Are you sure that’s what they told you? A shortage of drinking water?” Father sounded angry.

  “Yes,” said Mother. “It was Mimi, Fredl’s wife, who was on kitchen duty. It’s not her fault.” Mother tried to defend Mimi, a thin and fragile-looking young woman who arrived pregnant for the journey.

  “She’s lucky to have Fredl. He takes care of her really well.”

  Mr. Fredl, whom everyone said was an excellent composer, was constantly busy with his sheet music and his trumpet, which he guarded like diamond treasure.

  Mother had immediately noticed that Mimi needed help.

  “Setting out on such a journey while pregnant is very irresponsible,” she said.

  Mother had forgotten she herself had objected to the doctor’s advice to leave the boat in her condition. But her health had improved since then. Now she works in the storage room, sorting out clothes, blankets, and food rations for the kitchen. Inge had taught her how to mend socks and woolen hats. At first, Inge worked in the storage room and suggested that Mother help there, that it would help pass the time and she could forget her troubles. But then Dr. Bezalel had taken Inge to help him care for the sick.