Upon the Head of the Goat (22 page)

“So they are bringing them in, too. It must be all over out there. The Germans have no need of them any more.” She spoke in the loudest tone of voice I had heard her use since we had come to the ghetto. Mrs. Gerber came in to see what we were talking about.

“They must have finished cleaning out the city,” Mother concluded as she told Mrs. Gerber what had happened.

“Or the trains are finally coming,” Mrs. Gerber countered.

“It is all the same.” Mother turned to the little ones and then, turning back to me, asked, “Where is Iboya working today?”

“In the kitchen.”

“Go see if she knows anything, and don't let anyone hear you talk.”

As I walked toward the kitchen, I spotted another group of men being led in. When they came closer, I recognized Mr. Schwartz from the fish store; I called, “
Szervusz,
” and Mr. Schwartz tried to break away from the group, but the two ghetto police made him go back.

“I'll see you later,” I called.

“How is your mother? Give her my greeting,” he called back, waving his one arm.

People now gathered at the shed entrance and stared at the new arrivals, their faces mirroring their fear as their eyes questioned the significance of the presence of these leaders in the ghetto. I heard one old man say to a woman next to him, “If they are bringing in the specially privileged, it must be the beginning of the end.”

As I neared the kitchen, I saw Iboya standing at the entrance talking to a young man. I realized, with great surprise, that it was Shafar, Iboya's friend from the Zionist meetings.

“You remember Shafar?” Iboya asked as I walked up to them.

“Yes, he wrote you all those letters from Budapest.” Their serious faces relaxed and they both laughed.

“You just arrived with the others?” I asked him.

“Yes,” he answered briefly, offering no explanations.

I turned to Iboya. “Mother sent me to ask you what is happening, why all these men are suddenly being brought into the ghetto. She is very worried about this new development.”

“I can't talk now,” Iboya answered. “I have to go back into the kitchen.”

Shafar bent over and kissed her forehead, and she left us standing there. “I'll go and talk to your mother,” he said, putting an arm around my shoulder, “but first I have to stop back at the infirmary.” He dropped his arm, and we started to walk. I wanted to ask him why he was in the Beregszász ghetto, but was afraid he would think me forward.

When we arrived, Mr. Weiss and the group of men were still standing by the doctor's partition and talking. Even though they were whispering, their faces were animated. As we approached them, they looked up at Shafar and then questioningly at me.

“Wait for me at the entrance,” Shafar said. “I'll be with you in a few minutes.”

I went back to the door of the barracks and stood near it, watching the patients. Young ghetto women, Iboya's age and older, wearing the Red Cross arm bands, wove in and out among the cots, trying to make their occupants more comfortable. Again I wished I were old enough to perform a service. Then Shafar joined me, and we walked toward our shed. At the rear entrance we found Judi sitting on the ground, her back against the shed, reading one of her thick books. She jumped up when she saw us and greeted me, never taking her eyes off Shafar.

“This is my best friend, Judi, and this is Joska, Shafar, Iboya's friend,” I said. “Shafar has come with me to speak to Mother,” I explained to Judi, and all three of us entered the shed.

We walked into the tent. Mother and Mrs. Gerber, sitting and talking as usual, looked up, startled by Shafar's presence.

“You remember Shafar,” I said to Mother.

He bowed politely and kissed each woman's hand in turn. Inside the tent, this customary gesture of good manners seemed exaggerated and out of place.

“I hoped not to see you in this place,” Mother said to him. “I thought that because of your job you would be spared.”

“I am afraid no one will be spared. They are rounding up those who have only one Jewish parent, even those who have been baptized, and God only knows where they will stop.”

Mother asked if by any chance Shafar might have heard from Etu before leaving Budapest. He replied that he had heard nothing for the last month or so, but he added that this could be a good sign. The last time he had seen Etu, she was confident about obtaining Christian papers through some of her school friends. “That might very well be the reason she stopped coming around to see me,” Shafar concluded.

“Let's hope so,” Mother said wistfully.

Mrs. Gerber began to question Shafar about conditions in Budapest: “Were the Jews there also being rounded up? What was their reaction to what was happening to the Jews in other parts of Hungary? Are conditions better in Budapest than in Beregszász?”

Shafar replied to the questions patiently, but his answers all had a similar sound. Conditions for the Jews were the same everywhere, and the rest of the people took no interest because of their own fears and their own problems of survival.

Judi and I walked away and out of the shed, leaving Shafar and our mothers to their discussions. I told Judi that I had seen Gari's father talking with the other men in the infirmary. “They looked upset over the new developments.”

“You mean about the arrival of these men.”

“Yes, but I think there is something more. They seemed secretive. They did not want me to hear when they spoke to Shafar. Henri knows whatever it is.”

“Did you see Gari there?”

“No. But when I went to the infirmary before with Henri, he said to tell you that Gari was occupied and would see you when he could.”

“What about this friend of Iboya's? Who is he and does he know anything?”

“He must, because he talked with the men.”

I then went on to tell Judi that Iboya had met Shafar at the Zionist Club, that he had gone to Budapest to work in a munitions factory because he could not serve in the army, and that he and Iboya had corresponded. “I don't know why he is here,” I concluded.

Then Shafar emerged from the shed. Judi and I fell into step with him as he started walking in the direction of the infirmary.

“What is going on?” Judi demanded before I could ask Shafar why he was in this ghetto instead of in one with Budapest Jews. “Are we finally going to leave this lovely place?” asked Judi sarcastically, waving her arm in the direction of the sheds and the latrine.

“We don't know for sure,” Shafar answered her, “but the arrival of the trains seems imminent, in a day or two.” He looked into the shed entrances as we passed by and shook his head in sympathy.

“You think it will be worse than this?” Judi asked in a quavering voice.

“It will be Germany. That is bad enough.” We had reached the infirmary, and Shafar bowed slightly to us, then went inside, leaving us to wonder what was going on among the men inside.

“He is very handsome,” said Judi. “The only man here in his twenties, I think,” she continued. I nodded absently in agreement, thinking Judi's comment, in the light of our present situation, somewhat strange. Still, I had to admit to myself it was true. And I was still annoyed with myself for not having asked Shafar why he was in the Beregszász ghetto.

After supper, Mr. Hirsch came to see us. Mother was not overly friendly at first.

“So they got you in here too,” she said.

“We never doubted for a moment that they would put us here eventually,” he answered her. “All we gained was two weeks of time for our cooperation in helping them organize things. And in those two weeks we were able to send in a lot of supplies.”

“You watch the children,” said Mother. “I am going to walk a ways with Mr. Hirsch.”

Judi looked at her watch, frowned, and left the tent. Knowing that she was expecting Gari and Henri to appear, I followed her after Mother returned, but stopped when I saw Mr. Schwartz, carrying a paper bag, walking toward our shed. He seemed older and slower-moving. I ran to greet him, and as he stretched his one arm over my shoulders in a hug, I noticed that he no longer smelled of fish. In fact, he almost did not even look like the same Mr. Schwartz. His clothes hung loosely around him, making him look shabby. He handed me the bag as we walked toward our place in the shed.

“Here, Piri, you share these with the family. Your mother and the children are feeling well, I hope?”

“Yes, Mr. Schwartz, we are all well,” I answered. Coming to our tent, I held up a corner of the bedspread to usher a surprised Mr. Schwartz inside. Mother was just as surprised and happy to see him. She jumped up and hugged him. Then she stepped back. “You look worn out,” she said. “Sit down.” And she pointed to one of the bundles. He seated himself slowly and she sat down beside him. “Have you been sick?” she asked.

“I'm not sick,” he answered, “just idle. After they closed my store, I tried to be of help at the Juden Bureau, but since I don't speak German, there was little I could do. It is hard to do nothing with so much going on.”

“I understand,” she said. “We've been sitting here, too, for almost two weeks now.”

Mr. Schwartz looked about. “Why did you make this tent arrangement?” he asked.

“Just for some privacy.”

I handed Mother the paper bag.

“Did you bring us a fish?” she asked, and they both chuckled with melancholy.

“They let us use the remainder of our bread coupons before they took us, and this was all that was left in the bakery.”

Sandor and Joli came from their corner to look as Mother opened the bag. She pulled out a sweet roll, split it in half with her fingers, and let the children eat from her hands, since theirs were covered with the dirt they were playing in. Mr. Schwartz watched Sandor and Joli devour their halves.

“Not a common treat,” Mother explained. “We'll save the rest for tomorrow's breakfast to celebrate Iboya's birthday.”

Sandor and Joli walked over to Mr. Schwartz and kissed his prickly cheek to express their gratitude. With his one arm he encircled them both and bent forward to kiss them. They giggled and ran back to their play. Mr. Schwartz stood up and said that he had to leave. Mother walked him to the end of the shed. Standing outside the tent, I watched them and the many curious eyes that followed Mother and the one-armed man.

Mother came back, and Mrs. Gerber joined her inside the tent.

“So many visitors in one day,” Mother said.

“Did they tell you anything?” Mrs. Gerber asked.

“Mr. Schwartz said that Beregszász is like a ghost town. People don't leave their houses unless they have to.”

At that moment, Judi, who had been pacing in and out of the shed for the last hour, came into the tent and whispered to me that she had just seen Henri and Gari crossing the road from the infirmary. They appeared a few minutes later and greeted our mothers, but they seemed preoccupied and upset.

The four of us left the tent, and as soon as we were outside the shed, Gari, noticing the hurt look on Judi's face, apologized for being so late.

“Please,” she said to Gari in an urgent voice, her hands reaching for his shoulders, “please tell us what is going on in the infirmary.”

Gari looked at Henri. Henri nodded and whispered, “Yes, we can tell them, but not here. We might be overheard.”

“Let's go to your house,” suggested Judi to Gari.

As we neared the house, we saw Mr. Weiss standing on the porch, looking off into the distance. He was deep in thought, and our arrival startled him. He greeted us with restraint, pulled out his pocket watch to look at the time, and walked into the house.

Then Gari began to speak in a soft voice. “We had formed an underground group and were considering an uprising. Now that the men have come they want to join us. They have no better idea than we did of what plan might work, but most of them feel that we should take some kind of action. They have helped us to smuggle in some guns and ammunition, and they know better than we do how the Germans have organized the city. So far, we have been exchanging ideas.”

Judi and I listened in shocked but fascinated silence as Gari continued, “They worked with the Germans. They realize that the Germans can't be trusted, and we don't believe anything they say about the better conditions in the labor camps. The men are determined to do something, even if it only shows them that we are not a pack of cowards. We know as well as they do that we can't keep them from eventually going through with their plans, but we feel the need to act.”

“Who are some of the youth workers in the underground?” I asked, knowing that both of them, Henri and Gari, were certainly a part of it.

“Most of the ghetto workers,” Gari replied.

“How long have these discussions been going on?” Judi asked.

“We have been talking about forming some kind of a resistance since they rounded us up. But we did not have anything to fight with,” Henri said, his face and tone stern.

“And now what do you have?” I asked.

“A few Hungarian rifles, several rounds of ammunition, and some dynamite.”

“How did you get it?”

“Some of the guns we managed to buy from the Hungarian peasants on the outside, and they were smuggled in. The buying is not as difficult as getting them in here and hidden away. The German searches are very thorough, because they are looking precisely for such things as guns. Your sister's friend, Shafar, is the one who did most of the work in getting the guns,” confessed Gari. “I just took in the last ‘shipment' about two hours ago.”

“In broad daylight!” exclaimed Judi, alarmed.

“There is no other way to do it,” Gari laughed, pleased at her concern.

“My God,” said Judi, “you are going to get yourself killed.”

Just then the whistle sounded the beginning of curfew, and we all automatically stood up. Mr. Weiss appeared at the door. “Take the girls back to their shed and come right back here. You have done enough for one day,” he said to Gari.