The melodies have come back to Isidor, and he has resumed praying at night. His voice is pure and soft. Most of us do not understand the words of the prayer, but the melodies stir the heart and arouse our yearning for home.
Admittedly, the nighttime studies are sometimes filled with quarrel and strife. People argue over every word and every comma. Toughest of all are the communists, who insist that our involvement with the Bible and Hasidism is a retreat to the Dark Ages, and who find Isidor’s prayers distasteful. One of them said, “If Isidor takes off his cap while he prays, we’ll know he doesn’t plan to drug us with his enchantments.”
Many of us feel that Isidor is leading us to mysteries hidden within us. More than once, after an hour of prayers, someone bursts into tears. Or blurts out words of accusation.
Last night, after the prayers, Miriam fainted, and Salo took her to the clinic. For hours she didn’t utter a sound, but when she awoke, she began sputtering words at a rapid pace. Finally, she stopped her mumbling and sank into sleep.
After spending the day in the clinic, she went back to her work. Salo wanted to keep her another day, but Miriam refused. She’s always reserved and silent, but now her silence is more absolute. The people who bring clothes to be mended don’t dare open their mouths when they stand before her.
Only Tsila, our big sister, speaks to her. I once heard Tsila say to her, “My dear Miriam, don’t forget that many people rely on us. We mustn’t disappoint them.”
Miriam lifted her head and looked at her, as if to say, Nothing depends on me. I have no control over my body or my thoughts.
Tsila knows Miriam’s pain. It’s not easy to be a twig rescued from the fire. You keep burning but, defiantly, you are not consumed.
It’s easier for us fighters. We go to war almost every night. We return exhausted and sleep without dreams, but for Miriam, who launders and patches clothes, each garment leads her back home, to her father and mother, her husband and children.
By the way, Tsila is not afraid of Hermann Cohen; she serves the fighters full bowls of soup and thick slices of bread. When Hermann said she should be more frugal, she told him that a full ladle of soup and a thicker slice of bread won’t make that much of a difference. But for fighters, it’s like the air they breathe.
To Miriam she said, “My dear, don’t be afraid of him. We’re not able to do much; what little we can do, we’ll do wholeheartedly. Soup without a decent piece of bread is a mockery. After a night of walking with a heavy load on their backs, the fighters must be served a full bowl of thick soup; they are hungry and thirsty. With all due respect to Hermann Cohen, we must not skimp at the expense of the fighters. If he says something to me, I won’t stay silent.”
Miriam heard this and didn’t respond.
This, among other things, is how the days wear us down.
SALO NOTICED THAT from time to time I ask Tsila for a glass of vodka. He came over and asked me if I needed help. I said, “It’s a very personal issue, and I’m sure I’ll get over it soon. Thanks for your interest.”
“I just wanted to ask,” Salo apologized.
“Thank you.”
One night I happened to sit with Werner, who told me that the days in the ghetto were relatively good days for him. He read the French classics, book after book. It turned out that he had a solid basis in French from the gymnasium, and the constant reading later on in the ghetto had deepened his knowledge.
“It was odd,” he said. “I was buried within myself. I wasn’t part of the suffering that surrounded me. My parents and brother fought desperately for every loaf of bread, but I obsessively clung to my books.
“Later, when I went out to work, I would hide a book in my coat pocket and read during breaks. I was enchanted by Maupassant and Flaubert, and later on, when I got hold of the first volume of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, my happiness knew no bounds.
“My father and mother didn’t comment on this addiction of mine. Sometimes they looked at me with wonder. My big brother once said to me that at this fateful time it was wrong to escape into books. This remark did not prevent me from buying more and more books from people who were about to be sent to the camps. Because of this addiction, I didn’t see my father and mother and brother during our last days at home. Of course no one knew those were the last days. In my heart of hearts I deluded myself that it would soon be clear that the Germans’ cruelty to us was a mistake. They would apologize and recruit the Jews to the war effort.”
“And how did you spend your time in the ghetto?” Werner suddenly asked me.
“I was also addicted,” I said, without elaborating.
From then on, we’ve been chatting every once in a while.