Mila 18 - Leon Uris

Alfred Funk had that queasy feeling in his stomach again. He tested his words carefully. “The world has a short memory.”

“I think this time they are not going to forget. Jews have a long memory. They weep for temples lost two thousand years and they repeat old wives’ stories of liberations and rituals from the dawn of time. Do you know what an old Jew rabbi told me once when I asked him about Jewish memory?”

“What?”

“The words ‘I believe’ mean ‘I remember.’ Even Nietzsche is puzzled over their ability to outlive everyone who has tried to destroy them. I believe ... I remember. So you see, Alfred, a thousand years from now old Jews will wail in remembrance of the Nazi pharaoh who held them in bondage in Warsaw.”

Terrifying thoughts ran through Alfred Funk’s mind. Damn Eichmann and his mania for rounding up Jews. Damn Globocnik! Damn Himmler! Damn Hitler! They had all gone too far with this Jewish business. But what could he say? What could he do? He looked at the map on the desk. In a few days his army would be assembled. Perhaps ... perhaps when he destroyed the last of the Jews he could enter into the higher form of life the Nazis promised. He restored his calm. To hell with Horst von Epp!

“Shall I tell you something, Alfred?” Horst said, bleary from a rapid emptying of the bottle. “You are a man who understands the mathematics of checks and balances. We Germans respect mathematics. The punishment always balances the crime. We have only eighty million Germans. It is not a sufficient number to bear our guilt. To balance the scale, we pass on our sentences to be served by a hundred unborn generations.”

Alfred Funk began to shake visibly. Words he dared not speak but thoughts he could not squelch were being hammered at him.

“Our names will be synonymous with the brotherhoods of evil. We shall be scorned and abused with no more and no less an intensity than the scorn and abuse we have heaped upon the Jews.”

Alfred Funk pushed away from his desk. He was perspiring badly. He had to take a bath.

Chapter Twelve

ANDREI SAT IN THE back row of the small church of a village on the northern fringe of the Lublin Uplands.

Gabriela Rak knelt before the altar, whispering prayers before a crudely hewn image of a bleeding Christ on the crucifix. She stood, lit a candle on the right side of the altar, knelt at the aisle, crossed herself, and retreated back to Andrei just as Father Kornelli entered.

“The children were exhausted,” Father Kornelli said. “The two girls fell right to sleep. The boy is waiting for you,” he said to Andrei.

“When will they leave?” Gabriela asked.

“In the morning Gajnow and his wife will come and fetch them. It is about ten miles into the forest to their home. Gajnow is a good man. The children will be safe with him. You must of course tell them that they have to learn Catholicism for their own protection.”

“I have told the girls,” Gabriela said. “They are bright children. They understand.”

“I’ll talk to the boy now,” Andrei said.

“You will find him in my room,” Father Kornelli said.

Andrei crossed a dirt courtyard filled with flitting geese and wallowing pigs. He entered the priest’s home. The door to the bedroom was ajar. He opened it a bit wider and looked at the two sleeping girls. One child had only a name they had invented for her. She did not know her name when they had found her. The other was a twelve-year-old daughter of one of the members of the Civil Authority. Deborah had been right. Children were children. This one deserved to have the second chance for life. Andrei shut the door and walked down the short hall to the sitting room and entered. A bed had been made on the couch, but his nephew Stephan was still dressed.

“It has been a long day, Stephan,” Andrei said. “You should get some sleep.”

Stephan looked at him with suspicion.

“Tomorrow you and the girls will be taken on the next stage of your journey.”

“What about you, Uncle Andrei?”

“I must be getting back to Warsaw with Gabriela.”

“You said I had a mission. What is it?”

“Yes ... I’ve come to give you your orders now. Your orders are to survive.”

“I don’t understand you, Uncle Andrei.”

“Stephan, you and the girls will be staying in the forest at the home of a very wonderful old couple.”

“Staying?”

“Yes, Stephan. I’ve come to say good-by.”

The boy’s eyes grew wide with astonishment. “You tricked me!”

“I told you to obey orders without question. That is not trickery.”

“You tricked me. You promised me you were taking me on a special mission.”

“You have a very special mission.”

“No. I won’t stay. I’ll run away if you don’t take me back to Warsaw!”

“This was a decision of your elders, Rabbi Solomon and Alex.”

Andrei walked to the boy slowly and put his hand on his shoulder. Stephan twisted away from him abruptly. “You lied to me, Uncle Andrei! I’ll get back to Warsaw myself!”

“I overestimated you, Stephan. I thought you were a good soldier. I guess you’re still a little boy.”

“I am a good soldier! I am as good as any runner in the ghetto!”

Andrei shrugged. “Not really. A good soldier knows how to obey orders even though they may not please him.”

“It is not a soldier’s assignment to hide in the woods like a coward.”

The boy was too clever to fool with games of words. Andrei had no alternative but to give him the hard facts in all their naked cruelty. Perhaps he should have done so earlier.

“Are you man enough to hear the truth? Can you take it, Stephan?”

“I can take it,” the boy answered firmly.

“Your momma is going to die. There is no way out for her.”

“No!”

“Truth, Stephan. Momma is going to die. She cannot leave those children and she cannot get them out. She is trapped and she is doomed.”

“Momma will live!”

“Only if you survive and preserve her memory.”

“I’ll go back and die with Momma!”

“I said are you man enough to hear the truth? I have not finished.”

Stephan’s eyes burned with an anger that told his uncle he had the courage to see it through. Andrei pointed for him to sit down on the sofa.

“Your sister and Wolf and I are in an impossible situation. The odds on reaching a star are better than the odds on any of us coming through. Do you think I lied to you when I told you I have a mission? It is the job of your mother and your sister and me to die for the honor of our family. It is your job to live for our honor. I say this with all my soul, Stephan. It is you who has the more difficult mission. You must go from this battle to fight your way into Palestine, and you will have to fight again for your freedom.”

Stephan looked up at his uncle, who was pleading for a sign of affection. The boy bit his lip hard to hold back the tears, but his eyes still showed anger.

“Stephan, one of us must get through this to show who we were and what we stood for. It is a big, big job, son! Only the best soldier can do it. You must live for ten thousand children killed in Treblinka and a thousand destroyed writers and rabbis and doctors. It’s a hell of a big mission.”

Stephan flung his arms around his uncle’s waist and buried his head on Andrei’s chest, and Andrei patted his head. “I’ll try,” Stephan wept.

Andrei comforted him and knelt beside him and held his tear-stained cheeks in his hands and winked. “You won’t let me down, Stephan ... I know it.”

Andrei removed the large gold ring which had been given to him as a member of the Polish Olympic team. “To seal the bargain,” he said.

Stephan looked at it in disbelief and tried to slip it on a finger. It was even too large for his thumb.