She beckoned to the golem, and without waiting for common sense to stop her, started down the hill.
She was as loud as she could be, kicking in leaves, snapping twigs until the mule jerked its head up and the woman shot to her feet. Judith slid to a halt at the edge of the clearing and stood there for a moment, awkwardly listening for the golem behind her. She didn’t hear a thing. It must have stopped when she had, but she didn’t want to look back and make this woman think she wasn’t alone. Instead she made a wide, friendly wave.
“Hello!” she cried, trying to keep the tremor out of her voice. “Good evening!”
“What do you want?” demanded the woman. She was holding a cast-iron skillet in one hand, letting it hang down against her knee. She was short and bulky, and Judith decided she’d used the skillet for more than just cooking, more than once.
“I’m so sorry to bother you,” said Judith, “but my friends and I are traveling to—” She gulped back the shtetl’s name, Leva, and waved vaguely toward the river. “To Cracow,” which was the nearest city. “We were robbed the other night. They took all our food — everything.” Which wasn’t so far from the truth. Her heart was pounding and she had to stop for breath. “Do you have a potato, or a piece of bread or something you can spare?”
The woman eyed the dark trees, and Judith strained to hear, but the golem was silent as the moon. The woman turned to the wagon. “Stephan,” she said. “Come out here.”
So she wasn’t alone. Judith took a step back as a tall man clambered out, thin dark hair falling into his eyes.
He frowned at Judith. “Yeah?”
“See if there isn’t a ham hock in there we can give this lady.”
Judith blinked. Pork. Was it a test? Or honest generosity? “No, please,” she said. “Nothing like that. Just bread. Or a potato.”
“Potatoes?” The man bent into the wagon again and jerked out a burlap sack. “You can have this bagful if you want. Some of ’em are a little soft.”
Judith’s knees almost buckled with relief as he gave her the bag. She clutched the heavy lumps to her chest. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”
“Well now, wait,” said the woman as Judith turned to flee.
Judith turned to see her raising the iron skillet and almost screamed.
The woman gave her a strange look. “You said they stole everything. Won’t you need something to cook in?”
Judith reached out with a trembling hand and took it. Turning down pork was one thing. Refusing a skillet because it wasn’t kosher would be harder. She would bake the potatoes in the fire and return the skillet in the morning. “Thank you,” she said again.
“Bless you,” said the woman, and Judith could feel their eyes on her as she scrambled through the leaves and low branches, into the concealing dark.
Nekomeh met her halfway back up the hill. “What on earth are you doing? Who are those people? What did they want?”
“They gave me food,” Judith panted, and pushed the skillet at her.
Nekomeh grabbed the heavy pan. “Food?” she echoed, as though it was a foreign concept.
“Where’s the golem?” whispered Judith. She turned unsteadily on the rough slope, squinting between trees. “It was right behind me.”
Nekomeh pointed to the campsite. “It’s up there.”
“No, it came with me.” Hadn’t it? Hadn’t she told it to?
“It hasn’t moved, Judith.” Nekomeh caught her arm. “Come on. Come on.”
At the top of the hill the golem squatted implacably by the fire. It had been up here the whole time. She hadn’t spoken to it, and it was a literal thing. Beckoning and expecting it to understand was too much for a brain of clay.
Judith pushed potatoes into the hot coals and dabbed at her forehead. She was sweating, panting, but she also felt wildly invigorated. She had done a thing that Motle would have forbidden her to do. It was dangerous. She had done it anyway. And, she realized, she could do it again.
Moireh sat up and scrubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands. “You went down there by yourself?” she mumbled, half awake. “How brave.”
On Friday they reached the hilltop overlooking the city of Cracow. Leva Trevla was just beyond, a grimy river village in the shadow of grand stone buildings. Church bells echoed against the hillside.
Moireh shaded her eyes in the bright afternoon. “We’ll be there by sundown,” she said with obvious relief, and turned to the golem, which was carrying the potato sack. “What are you going to do with it, Judith? You can’t take it into town.”
“How do you get rid of it?” asked Nekomeh.
Judith pushed the golem’s dark hair to one side and covered the aleph with her thumb, careful not to smudge the letter. Instead of Emet — truth—the word had changed to Met — death.
“All you do is erase?” said Moireh. “You take away the truth and you’re left with death. That’s all?”
“But what happens to it?” asked Nekomeh.
“It turns back into mud,” said Moireh. “Isn’t that right, Judith?”
Judith took her thumb away and felt her heart ball up with misery. She’d thought about naming the golem Reva, and telling the people in Leva that it was her daughter, but her cousins were there, too. Even once or twice removed, enough of them would know Reva had died years ago. She’d thought about swearing Nekomeh and Moireh to secrecy and coming up with some story about how they had found this simple, mute Jewish girl begging along the road, and taken her in as an act of charity, but even a story like that would evaporate the first time someone saw the inscription on its forehead. And then what? Questions? Accusations? They would destroy the golem and chase Judith out of town. They might banish Nekomeh and Moireh as well.
“You should get rid of it now,” said Moireh, “before anyone sees it.” She scuffed the ground with her shoes and wound her fingers in the sleeves of her long dress, eager to get to the safety of Leva.
Judith touched the creature’s shoulder, but the golem seemed not to be paying attention, holding the potato sack, concentrating on the peal of bells from the valley below. It would never notice, thought Judith, its own letter being erased. It would just stand there and fall to pieces, like a broken clay pot.
“I want to wait until we get to the river,” she said. “That’s where it came from.”
It was Good Friday. Dry hanks of palm from the Sunday before hung across Cracow’s ramparts. Colored eggs dangled from the half-budded trees lining the road between the city walls and the slope that led down to the river. Donkey carts, vendors, and soldiers all shoved along in a jostling crowd. Judith clung to the golem’s arm as Nekomeh and Moireh shuffled along behind. The cool spring air had thickened under the walls of the city, warmer, dense with close bodies and accusing looks. A military officer on horseback pushed in front of Judith and the golem, his uniform glittering in the sunlight. He flicked his riding crop in Judith’s face.
“Run home, Juden,” he said, and laughed. “Run home to Leva and lock up your daughter.” He leaned over to touch the golem’s dark hair, and Judith tried to yank the creature away. She bumped against someone too close behind her, turned and found Nekomeh, her face twisted into a furious mask.
“Goyim!” Nekomeh shoved past Judith and the golem until her face was level with the officer’s knee. “Bastard! Goyim bastard!” Judith reached for her but Nekomeh shook her off. “The very earth will rise against you!” She arched a finger at the impassive golem. “The mud will tear your city down, wall by wall, brick by brick.”