“A real success story, that one. You know the shtetl? It ’s not far from here. We gave them a few pistols once and a little training. Not much. Then not long ago the peasants started bragging about a pogrom. This was”—he thought for a moment—“last spring, I think.” They showed up at market saying they were coming back to wipe out the town.”
“The whole town?”
“That’s what they said. The next day they came down the main road in their carts. The Jews hid in the bushes on either side of the road and waited for them. They had maybe three pistols between them and not much ammunition. They started firing when the carts came into range. And as soon as they’d fire off a round, they’d toss it to the next man. He fired off a round and tossed it on. Soon it sounded like an army out there in the bushes. The muzhiki got so scared they ran off without a second thought. Some didn’t even bother to turn their carts around. They just left them and ran off into the woods.”
They drank some more while Yosele told them the story about hiding under the floorboards in Odessa during the pogrom. Morris told them about their group in Switzerland. When Pavel told his story everyone was impressed. He only exaggerated a little to give the story color. As the evening turned into night, they talked about their plans for the future: schools and a hospital, the establishment of kehiles and other self-governing bodies, Yiddish as the primary language, and an agenda of national-cultural autonomy. Pavel looked into their sweaty faces around the table and saw the same kind of fervor that he had seen on the faces in shul that morning. In shul the ardor had been for the love of God and His laws. Here, it was for social justice, empowerment, and dignity, but the feeling was the same, the intensity of purpose borne out of thousands of years wandering in the Diaspora.
And he felt it too. It may have been the whiskey, the talk, or the late hour, but whatever the reason, by the end of the evening he felt like a brother to these men. He had never felt this way before, not even to his own brothers. They were all comrades in the struggle. He would’ve done anything for them. So, when Zolman told them about their plan to break into a police warehouse to steal guns and asked for their help, Morris agreed without a moment’s hesitation. Pavel agreed too. Afterward he joined in when the flask was passed around even though he didn’t particularly like whiskey.
PAVEL FELT nothing but disgust for Morris when he came into his room on the morning of the break-in and found him lying in sweat-soaked sheets, his face flushed with a high fever, his hair plastered to his forehead, and a deep rumbling in his chest whenever he took a breath. “What’s wrong with you?” he asked, not bothering to hide his annoyance for the malingerer.
Morris opened his eyes and with some effort managed to focus them on his friend. “Pneumonia,” he whispered. He was propped up on pillows to make it easier to breathe. His room was a study in gloom. The heavy curtains were shut and the only light came from a small lamp on a table beside the bed. There was a white enamel inhaler beside the lamp emitting a lazy trail of steam out of its funnel that smelled of eucalyptus oil.
Pavel pursed his lips and shook his head. “For God’s sakes, Morris. I know what this is about. You don’t want to go tonight. All right, so we won’t go. You don’t have to put on this show.”
“I’m sick, Pavel. Ask my doctor. I’m running a high fever.”
He snorted. “Right.”
A coughing spasm caught him by surprise and when it was over he lay back on the pillows, panting for breath, wiping his hands on the sheets.
Pavel’s lip curled up in disgust. “Can’t you use a handkerchief ?”
“In case you haven’t noticed, it isn’t pleasant having pneumonia. I may have to go to hospital.”
Pavel looked pained. “Well, what about tonight then?”
“You’re going to have to go it alone.”
“I don’t want to go it alone. It’s goddamn freezing out there.”
“What choice do you have? They need a lookout.”
“They’ll just have to postpone it.”
“They can’t. The guns might be moved any day. You’ll only be a lookout.”
“Only…”
“Not much can happen to you. You’ll be standing out on a corner. The others will do the rest. You can’t back out now. I think even you can see that.”
“Even me?”
“You know what I mean.” Morris closed his eyes and lay back.
“Oh fine. You’re really a load of horseshit, Eiger, and I’m never forgiving you for this.”
“I know,” he said with a faint smile.
That night Pavel waited out on Potemkinskaya, down in the factory section, hoping that Zolman and the others wouldn’t show up. It was so cold that the snot froze in his nose and it hurt to breathe. He was standing in front of an old factory building across the street from the police warehouse. The factory was deserted, with missing windows like broken teeth and a front door secured with a flimsy padlock. It used to be a textile mill. He could see that by the likeness of a loom carved into the lintel over the doorway.
Although it was a snowy night with an icy wind blowing in off the river, there was some light coming from the Nicholas Sugar Refinery located at the eastern end of the street. It had one enormous smokestack that belched flames and burning cinders into the black sky, and the yard was lit because the refinery doors were open. As he stood on the corner trying to see the hands on his pocket watch, knowing that it was late and hoping that it was called off, an electric tram rumbled by, pulling cartloads of beetroots on the icy tracks in the middle of the road. He watched the tram pull into the refinery yard, where he could see men silhouetted against the light of the open doorway. When the tram had come to a stop, the men tilted the carts to spill the tubers out in the snow and started loading them onto a conveyor belt.
Looking down the other way, he saw Zolman and the others walking toward him out of the flurries. There were two other men with them that he didn’t recognize. One was expensively dressed and seemed out of place like Pavel. The other one was a laborer like the rest. With a pang of regret he walked down to meet them. There was a nod between them, no introductions or explanations, none of the joviality from that night in the tearoom. The new men were older and seemed to be in charge. The shorter of the two, the laborer, the one they called Scharfstein, took Pavel aside and told him where to stand so that he could have a good view of the street and the surrounding buildings. It was on the corner directly across from the police warehouse in front of the deserted factory. Pavel took his sentry post and watched the others cross the street and disappear around the back of the warehouse.
For a while Pavel saw nothing except the whirlwinds of snow and the men working the carts at the refinery. Then, after a short while, he saw the play of electric torch beams through the dark windows of the police warehouse and knew they were inside. He tried to keep his attention on the street. He knew that any trouble would come from down the street, not from the refinery or from the steep ravine behind it, but from the west, from the town, so he kept his eyes mostly in that direction. It was so icy out he began to shiver and curse Morris, blaming him for the cold and the fear that felt like something died in his stomach. After a strong gust of wind drove him back into the doorway of the deserted textile mill, he thought that if Morris survived the pneumonia he would kill him.
He began to take shelter in the doorway. He told himself he would only stay there for a little while. He reassured himself that it would be all right; besides, no one would be out on a night like this. He tried to limit the time he spent in there, but it was such a relief to be out of the wind. He could have stepped inside the building. It would have been easy to pry the padlock off the door. He probably would have done it if he hadn’t heard voices behind him.