“The car was audible now, its sounds clear. My hand reached out and one finger impudently tapped his neck. Ahasuerus woke without even giving me a glance. He got out and stopped the car. The soldiers in the car were eager to help. They rescued us. A short soldier reached under the engine hood and did something in there that fixed the problem. In the meantime, they danced around the general, star-struck, offering him their food. They saluted him and asked if they could do anything. Confused, they saluted again. They shot glances at me but did not dare ask what the general was doing with a Jew in a pink shirt. But their looks were curious. Ahasuerus dismissed them and I thought we would set off on our voyage again, determined. The breakdown had cost us precious time. My body was slowly thawing, its heat eager to get to work, to find Feiga’s camp. But Ahasuerus was in no hurry. The moment the car was fixed, he began to plan the day ahead. From his coat pocket he gave me a hunk of bread. He had put it aside from what they had given him. Then, to my surprise, he went off to do his business.
“Even crouching behind a shrub, he still looked regal. Straight as an eagle. I allowed him some privacy, turning my face. But the odor of his bowel movement spread through the fresh air. The smell was unpleasant but I persisted in inhaling it, sensing his health — for months, begging your pardon, everything with me had been sick and watery. After a while he reemerged and walked toward me in his neat uniform. He rubbed his hands on the leaves of a bush and was spotlessly clean. He proceeded, not to his side of the vehicle, but straight to me, motioning with his head at the bush. I grew frightened. Was I to die there? But my fear was unfounded as I soon understood. There was a long way ahead of us, most likely, and I too, begging your pardon, had to relieve myself. My heart wished to lead me to a different bush, far from the one he had used. But my legs positioned me behind the very same bush. Nu. I pulled my pants down and looked aside. There were two of them, laying like babes in a cradle on the leafy grass, solid and identically sized. I hoped I would not emit the soft stream again, not the usual output, not in front of those two. But my bowels quickly erupted in a dirty, unpleasant flow. Flies had already appeared. I could barely stand up and tuck my pink shirt into my pants. Disgusted and miserable, I sat down beside him in the car. I recalled the sentence he had said to me and, for some reason in that moment my heart believed that the journey had somehow brought us closer, that perhaps we would talk. But the general’s concern was only for his car. He drove the marble angel back onto the road to his lover, to my Feiga.
“At midday we visited a camp. Again I sat imprisoned in the car while Ahasuerus met with the camp personnel. This time I saw women. Female prisoners and policewomen. Was the journey to Feiga over? Suddenly there was a knock on the window. A prisoner, an actual prisoner, was knocking urgently. His face looked like the skeleton I had seen the day before. That one had just stood and looked at me, a nameless figure with crazed eyes, but this one was more daring. I opened the window a crack and asked hurriedly, ‘Feiga, née Blau, is she here?’
“‘Bread?’ the prisoner asked. ‘Anything?’
“His skeletal face was crazed with fear. My reaction was too slow for him and he skipped away and disappeared among the huts without waiting for my answer. A moment later two SS men passed by and stared lengthily at the car. In my heart I knew that Feiga was not there. When I reached her camp I would know, I would not need conversations.
“I waited for Ahasuerus and did not trouble my mind with thoughts of the prisoner, that skeletal face of his, the likes of which I had never seen in the ghetto. I did not bother with thoughts of the type of life that engenders such terror. My heart was directed elsewhere, to an uncomfortable flutter, a dense sort of desperation. As if my heart was a true prophet, when Ahasuerus came out his steps seemed weak, his expression strange. I looked at him and suddenly all was clear: the voyage was over, no more. Ahasuerus had given up on his journey. Why the confidence? Why the certainty? It was his face. I could tell without a doubt that he was no longer determined, that he had lost his purpose. He got into the car without even glancing at me, and started to drive. The previous night had broken something in him, something greater than mere time lost. I could see this with certainty. Though in fact he appeared more at ease, as if something in him had found calmness, or had been lost, disappeared. But my heart was not available to study the inner workings of a Nazi general. It was Feiga that I was thinking of. Was my voyage still going ahead as planned? Ahasuerus, after all, knew nothing of the journey’s purpose. Only the Little Lover was in his head, and now, no Little Lover, and no more need for the ‘short Jew’ he had wanted to bring her as a gift. What would he do with me?
“The roadsides began to be dotted with villages. The villages grew denser and denser. We were driving through the outskirts of a town. German army guard posts, roadblocks, inspections, examinations. Everyone let Ahasuerus go on his way, retreating with a salute. We sailed deeper in. I slowly began to read names on the road-signs, and realized we had reached the city of Lodz. Why Lodz, I did not know. Had Feiga been taken there? Why was Ahasuerus bringing me to Lodz? What was he scheming? Was he planning to get rid of me now that I was unnecessary? And why not simply put a bullet through my head right there?
“From the fear, not only my heart shrunk. Begging your pardon, my bladder did too. To this day I remember the endless, painful pressure. My life was on the line, but it was my bladder that preoccupied me. If only Ahasuerus would stop for a moment, I could jump out and urinate. He might think I was escaping. He might shoot me. But my thoughts could not tolerate the caution that might delay urination. Still suffering, my bladder so full that it was almost erupting, we reached the gates of a low wall, and beyond it, I knew immediately, was a ghetto. Far larger than the Bochnia ghetto, unfamiliar and crowded, but there was no mistaking it. A ghetto is immediately recognizable. An entire town of hungry, ill Jews. The Lodz ghetto.
“To this day I wonder why Ahasuerus brought me to the Lodz ghetto. Was it so I would be killed in the Aktion that was planned for the next few days? He must have known about it (perhaps even ordered it). Or maybe it was just the opposite — it was life that he ordered for me. He knew what everyone knows today, that after the next Aktion this ghetto would be allowed to survive, the last of the ghettos. So his was an act of grace. Or maybe it was neither. Here was simply a place where he could leave me among the hundreds of thousands of people crowded into the ghetto, who walked its streets daily, characters coming and going with the wind. Here no questions would be asked. But why would a Gestapo general need to be so cautious? In the Bochnia ghetto they shot hundreds like me, lined up against the walls, so why would a general inconvenience himself for one miserable Jew? He could have shot me, no questions asked, on the side of the road.
“Back then, much like today, I was full of questions. But Ahasuerus was indifferent. We were destined to meet again several days later, and as I have said, Ahasuerus would address me one more time. But on that day he left me by the entrance to a building. He gave me some sort of Certifikat and a little bag which contained, I discovered, Polish and German currency. Dispensing with niceties, he left me and disappeared. As if the neglected regions of the world had never been traversed together by these two: a Nazi general and a short Jew. At that moment I still did not know how much future we were yet to have together.
“I soon realized that I had been left outside the German police headquarters. I was promptly led to the office of the Jewish police by two German officers who treated me with inexplicable respect. The Jewish clerks I was delivered to also treated me with caution, even deference. They interviewed me, asked questions. They explained to me about the difficulties, the rationing. They promised to help with housing, although the situation was practically hopeless, and in any case it was warm on these summer nights and the street was a good option for now. Better the street than the houses, where typhus and boils were raging. The streets were cleaner. They dared to ask, in hushed voices, if I had any particular desires, if I required assistance in my mission, any requests?