EVENTS FEBRUARY 3, 1943. ENTRY FEBRUARY 4, 1943. FROM RUTKA MAZUR. As soon as he was confronted with this choice, Mordecai went right to Rutka and talked it over with her. In ways, it would be easier for a man to choose between his wife and his own mother than to choose between his wife and his wife’s mother; for in the latter case, if he loves his wife, he suffers through her.
Mordecai, describing to Rutka his interview with Niemann, the German who is now in charge of the bricklayers’ labor battalion: —— He told me that I was lucky to have twenty-four hours in which to make up my mind. He said that I was lucky to have a choice at all, and he quoted the definition of families in the deportation orders from last July—that only wives and children are members of families. He said he was a loyal family man himself, and rather sentimental, and so he would give me a choice. He said I was lucky!
Rutka: —— Didn’t you tell him about Mother’s papers with the Judenrat?
Mordecai: —— Of course I did. I went and got them from your mother and showed them to him. He said he was sorry, he had to supervise the rooming arrangements of his battalion in his own way; that I appeared to be living in an illegal family unit; and that papers had nothing to do with the case. Besides, he said, your mother’s papers were dated September 7, and that showed she had only got the job in the Judenrat in order to avoid the “Kettle”; in which he was right, of course. Then I showed him the document signed by Engineer Grossmann himself, giving your mother permission to live with us, and he said that was a Jewish scrap of paper and absolutely invalid. [NOTE. N.L. Indeed, the Judenrat is impotent.] Then I reminded him of his own oral authorization for your mother to live with us: you remember I was careful to ask for that when he was first put over us; but he said he hadn’t thought the matter through at that time. What can you do in the face of such logic?
Rutka says she was utterly paralyzed by what Mordecai told her. Apparently Niemann, in combing through the records of all his Jewish charges, had come across the fact that Mordecai Apt had living with him two women: his wife and his wife’s mother. Niemann had now given Mordecai one day in which to decide which of these two women should go to the Umschlagplatz. And Rutka realized that the fact that Mordecai told her about this indicated that he had already decided that her mother would be the one to go. Rutka is honest: she says she knew she ought to have taken matters in her own hands and to have reported herself directly to Niemann; yet something prevented her from doing this. She was so used to the idea of bringing a child to life that she could not face throwing away her own life, and its, too. Yet how could she think of throwing her mother’s life away? Her mind began to go in circles.
—— Have you tried Noach Levinson?
—— He has quit the Judenrat.
—— What about Felix Mandeltort?
—— We can’t risk anything official. They’ll find out you’re pregnant.
Rutka says that she and Mordecai talked and talked of things to do—but did nothing. Mordecai had decided, and Rutka felt as if her head were squeezed by a wood-clamp.
EVENTS FEBRUARY 3, 1943, EVENING. ENTRY FEBRUARY 4, 1943. FROM RUTKA MAZUR. The three were alone in their small room.
Froi Mazur: —— What in the world is the matter with you this evening, Mordecai? I’ve never seen you so grouchy.
Mordecai: —— I’m all right. Just leave me alone.
Froi Mazur: —— Why don’t you and Rutka sing some songs? We need a little music.
Rutka: —— Let’s do Poverty Jumps.
The two young people tried the song, but it had no vigor, and soon they broke off.
Mordecai: —— I’m not in the mood.
Rutka: —— We need Dolek’s concertina.
Froi Mazur: —— All right, children. I’ll tell you some old stories. Do you remember the story, Rutka, about Rabbi Nachemia Ben Kuth and his three temptations?
Rutka: —— Tell it, Mother.
Froi Mazur settled back in her chair, with her hands folded, and began:
—— Rabbi Nachemia Ben Kuth was a devout man, and his beard fell nearly to his waist, and he used to sit in his garden praying to the Lord to keep him humble. He was afraid of becoming proud of his humbleness….
Rutka says that her mother’s voice was soothing. Rutka had heard the story many times; the telling of it took her back to the low grey sofa in the house in Lodz—Stefan and herself (Schlome was too young) leaning against their mother, one on each side of her, as she told them folk tales….Mordecai yawned. Rutka says that she herself felt a sweet, shameful sleepiness attacking her, and she fought it, thinking it callous. Her mother finished the story, and began another, in a different vein: about the schlemihl and the schlimazl trying to win fifty groszy by lifting the prize pig at the country fair, both struggling on their knees, the clumsy schlemihl rolling the huge sow over onto the hapless schlimazl’s stomach…the long conversation between them…at the end the schlimazl, pinned still to the ground by the animal, grunting, Oi woe! You give me all the work and expect fifty per cent of the profits? Dutifully, Mordecai and Rutka laughed at the familiar outcome. Froi Mazur asked if she should tell yet another story. Rutka said she thought it was bedtime.
Mordecai, in an almost ominous voice, as if he had something very important to say (Rutka says she thought he was going to tell her mother everything) :—— Mother Mazur!
—— Yes, Mordecai.
Mordecai hesitated. He stood up. He said, in an impatient tone that was incongruous with his words:
—— Thank you for the stories….Let’s go to bed.
At breakfast next morning, Mordecai was pale and irritable. At last he said:
—— Mother Mazur. Rutka. I must talk with you two.
Froi Mazur, quietly: —— I know, my boy. It is I who will go.
Mordecai: —— But…but Mother Mazur!
Froi Mazur: —— I know all about it, Mordecai. Yesterday, when you came to the Judenrat for my papers, I had a feeling that it was not for a housing permit. I finally got Secretary Mandeltort to find out from Niemann what was happening. I have decided for all of us, children. I am going.
Rutka: —— Mother, you can’t. I should volunteer to go. (Rutka says that in the moment of utterance, she knew that her statement was false and shallow. The mood—the should instead of shall—gave away what she calls her hypocrisy.)
Froi Mazur: —— I am the one to go, my Rutka. (Her voice was exactly as it had been when she had told the folk tales.) You two are young. We Jews can’t afford to hang onto the past. You are young. Soon you will have a baby. You will bring it up to love God, I am sure of that….
Mordecai: —— Mother Mazur! Do you mean to say that you knew this last night, when you were trying to get us to sing and when you told us the stories? Mother!
Froi Mazur: —— Besides (and she pronounced these words firmly, as positively her last argument), besides, your father needs me, Rutka.
Rutka, in protest but also, she confesses, in acquiescence: —— Mother! Mother!
Froi Mazur reported at about noon to Niemann’s office, and she was taken soon afterward to the Umschlagplatz. She carried with her nothing but a pair of slippers, symbolizing readiness for death, and a pair of candles, to make her prayers go straight to God.