Touched by Fire (2 page)

Our little houses burned. It was a long way to the river, and the flames spread too fast for our men to quench them. They could not outrun the fires or the soldiers.

My friend Malka and I had been playing with our dolls by the stream, near a clump of trees at the edge of the village. We dropped everything, held hands, and ran. Malka wanted to go back for her doll; mine was in my pocket. I waited, calling out to her to hurry, but she fell down. I ran to her and told her to get up. Malka refused to move, so I stayed with her. We screamed until our fathers came and carried us away. Papa had blood on his face, where a whip
had slashed his cheek. Mama cried and pushed us under the bed, next to Yuri.

This is what I dream, over and over again: a nightmare of fires and breaking glass. I hear the shrieks of animals and children. Malka and I are there, screaming like them. Since then, I don’t play with my doll.

It is almost daylight. I get up and go into the kitchen, where Papa and Zayde are drinking their first glass of tea. I sit on Papa’s knee, and my grandfather pops a sugar cube into my mouth. Papa lets me take a sip from his glass. Mama bustles in to start making breakfast.

“Not dressed yet, Miriam? Hurry up, wake your brother. You will both be late for school.” She removes the bowl of sugar, putting it away on the top shelf of the cupboard.

“We are not living in the ‘Golden Land’ yet, Zayde,” Mama says, but she smiles at him as if they share a secret.

The “Golden Land” Mama is talking about is America!

M
alka lives near us. We walk to and from school every day, and we tell each other everything. One morning, she is not at our meeting place – the corner of our street – as usual. I wait a few minutes, and when there is no sign of her, I run and knock on the door of her house. Her mother goes out to work, but the woman who lives downstairs opens the door.

“What do you want?” she says.

“Please, is Malka here?”

“The family has moved away.” She shuts the door, and I hear her fasten the chain.

All day, I wonder and worry about what could have happened. Twice the teacher raps my knuckles for not paying attention. Malka’s desk is next to mine, and my eyes fill with tears, seeing it standing empty.

At the end of the day, I run all the way home. “Mama, Mama, Malka is gone! Do you know where she is?”

Mama hugs me. “I am sorry, Miriam. Malka and her family have left Kiev. Moved somewhere else. I don’t know where they’ve gone. Sit down, and we’ll drink a glass of tea together. Try not to be sad.” She pours us both some from the samovar, then reaches for the sugar bowl on the shelf and lets me help myself. Mama strokes my hair.

Where can this somewhere else be? Why didn’t Malka tell me she was going away, when her family came for supper last week? Didn’t she know?
When our fathers talked in low voices, I overheard the words “bribe” and “border,” so perhaps they are in another country.
Have they gone to America?

Everyone talks about going to America – the Golden Land, they call it. They say, there, that no one goes hungry, that they eat sugar and chicken every day. I listen to Mama chatting to the neighbors. Sometimes, one of them receives a letter from a relative who has crossed the ocean and shares the news.

“
‘Imagine,’
she writes,
‘I can walk anywhere – to the park, to market – and enter any shop I want, without fear. I speak Yiddish with my friends, even in the street. I go to the library to read a newspaper, free! I can hardly believe it – the American policeman who walks up and down our street smiles. He speaks to my little girl: “Isn’t it a fine day for a stroll?” he says.
’ ”

Pogroms happen in cities too, not just in small towns and villages. I hope the Cossacks forget about our street, if
they come to Kiev. Papa says that this has been a bad year for pogroms.

A few days later, Bubbe and I are alone in the kitchen. She is teaching me to bake bread. She and Mama have been keeping me busy, to stop me from feeling sad without Malka.

“I have something to tell you, Miriam,” Bubbe whispers. “It is about Malka and her parents. I know how much you miss your friend. Will you promise to keep it a secret?”

“I promise, Bubbe. I won’t tell anyone.”

“Zayde heard the news from a man he is making a new pair of boots for. I asked him how the man could afford new boots, made of Zayde’s finest leather. It seems the man was paid well for helping Malka and her parents to cross the border. He hid them under some potato sacks in his cart. Who knows? By now, they might be on a ship to join their son and daughter in America!”

I hardly remember Malka’s older sister and brother. They left Russia a long time ago. All I can think of is, my best friend has gone away too.
Will I ever again find another friend like Malka?

A few days later, Papa comes home from work earlier than usual. He looks happy.

“Tonight,” he says, “I shall make an announcement.”
Are we going to find out about Papa’s surprise at last?

After we have finished our supper of potatoes, salt herring, and freshly baked black bread, Mama brings in the samovar and pours tea. We sit waiting for Papa to speak. Bubbe has taken off her cooking apron, as though we are expecting company. Mama’s cheeks are flushed; her eyes sparkle. My mama is very pretty, with brown shiny hair and dark blue eyes – sometimes they almost look black. My hair is brown and shiny too. Mama says I have Papa’s eyes – eyes that can melt a stone. I don’t think that’s true. Yuri gets away with much more than I do!

We wait for the great moment. Papa does not like to be hurried, even when he has a big order of shirts to sew. He puts his hand inside his jacket, where I know he has stitched a secret pocket, and pulls out an envelope.

Is it full of rubles? Rubles enough so that Mama will not worry when the rent man comes? Rubles to buy cloth to make something new to wear for Pesach, the feast of Passover?
I would so much like to have a new dress. I can hardly wait.

Yuri fidgets – he wants to go outside and play before it gets dark.

“Come, Yuri, sit beside me,” Zayde says. He strokes his beard, which is streaked with gray. Papa’s beard is still black, like his hair. Yuri looks just like him. Papa opens the envelope and takes out three tickets, waving them in the air.

“Do you know what these are for?” He looks at us.

Yuri jumps up and down. “Tickets to go to the circus, Papa?”

“Tickets, you are correct, but they are not for the circus.”

Yuri sits down again, disappointed. He longs to see the horses, acrobats, and wild animals.

“Are they tickets for the train, Papa?” I ask him.

“Who is going on the train? Why are there only three tickets? We are six in our family,” Yuri shouts. The others turn and look at my brother, smiling, as though he has said something wonderful. I try not to be jealous of him getting all the attention.

“Quite right, my son,” Papa says. “The first three tickets are for you and Bubbe and Zayde. We are all going on the train, but you three are going first. Mama and Miriam and I will come very soon. We are going to live in Berlin, in Germany, which is the first step of our journey. Then, when we have saved enough money, we will continue on to the Golden Land, to America. One by one, two by two, like the animals in Noah’s Ark.”

“America, Papa? Why so far away?” Yuri asks.

“Tsar Nicholas is our ‘little father,’ but does a good father burn his children? No, and in America, they don’t let you burn. We will drink a toast to our journey and to a new and better life,” Papa says.

Mama takes four glasses from the cupboard. Zayde puts a bottle of vodka on the table and pours a little of the clear liquid into each glass.

“
L’Chayim
. To life,” the grown-ups say, clinking glasses. They smile. Papa and Zayde shake hands, and Mama and Bubbe embrace each other.

“I don’t want to go to America,” Yuri says. “I want to stay in Kiev, with my friends. I am a Russian boy, and I have decided, when I grow up, to be a soldier like my teacher’s son. I will ride a big black horse and carry a sword or a gun. I will stay here and protect the tsar from his enemies. I will not go to America.” He stands with legs apart, arms crossed, daring any of us to defy him.

Papa bangs his fist on the table – I have never seen him so angry. Mama and Bubbe look at each other, and Mama’s hands fly to her mouth.

“You have decided,” Papa says. “You have
decided
to be a soldier in the tsar’s army. You
will
not go?”

Yuri stamps his foot. “Yes, I have decided, Papa,” he says. “I will defend Russia from the tsar’s enemies.”

Mama tries to make peace. “Samuel, don’t be upset – he is a child. He does not know what he is saying!”

“Then it is time my little son grew up,” Papa says. “I want you to tell him, Sara.”

I know what Mama is going to say, because Bubbe told me the story a long time ago. Another secret we share.

“Come here, Yuri,” Mama says. She looks at him, putting her hand under his chin so that he cannot squirm away. “Once, I had a brother, an older brother. His name
was Yaakov, and you are named after him. When he was not quite twelve years old, he was taken from us by Tsar Alexander. His soldiers came and stole him away. It had been the law in Russia for many years to conscript Jewish boys and make them join the army for twenty-five years. They snatched little boys as young as ten, sometimes.…” Mama wipes her eyes and cannot go on.

“My son never came back to us, Yuri,” Bubbe continues. “Even though that law is abolished now, if someday the tsar wishes …” She does not finish her sentence, but in a moment goes on speaking. “It can happen again – today, tomorrow, next week. The laws against us, like pogroms, never end. Every day they make another, and who has enough rubles to bribe the police to look the other way?”

“If Papa says it is time to leave,” Mama says, “then we go. Tell him you are sorry, Yuri.” Her voice is firm.

My little brother hangs his head. He whispers, “I am sorry, Papa.”

Zayde says, “I will need a clever helper like you, Yuri, as an apprentice when we go to Germany. You have good hands, much too good to carry a sword or a gun. You will see, together, we will make the best shoes in the whole of Berlin.”

Mama sends us to bed. I take Yuri’s hand, and for once he does not pull away.

T
he train journey from Kiev to Berlin passes in a blur of sleep, musty air, rattles, and sudden stops and starts. We sit on hard wooden seats; the windows are sealed shut. Even when the train halts, we may not get out for a drink of fresh water. The garlic-smelling breath of the fat couple who share our compartment, the old man with his grandson – who never stops kicking the seats – and the crying, sickly baby, rocked to and fro by his tired mother, give me a headache. The excitement I felt as we began our journey has disappeared. I just want to get there. Mama insists I eat a little black bread and some cheese.

Papa pats my hand, smiling at me. He says, “Imagine the good meal that Bubbe will have ready for us.”
But does she know when we are coming?

I realize I need not have worried, as the train jolts to a halt. I see Zayde pacing back and forth on the platform, waiting for us, holding Yuri’s hand. It has been lonely without them all, these last three months. I am so glad Papa will stay with us for a while longer. I know most families cannot afford to leave for America all at the same time. Usually, the father goes first. Sometimes it is the older children, like the two sisters who used to live next door to us. They went alone and send money back home to their parents and five brothers and sisters. I would never dare to travel across the ocean without Mama.

We climb down onto the platform, and the guard shuts the doors behind us. We are here in Berlin, at last. The train departs in a hiss of steam, still packed with passengers on their way to the port of Hamburg.

Zayde greets us with joy. “The train is only four hours late. Welcome, my children.” Yuri jumps up and down with excitement and talks so fast that my head spins. Zayde has borrowed a horse and cart for us. He helps Papa load our belongings, and we are off to our new home in East Berlin.

“Many Jews have settled there,” Zayde tells us. “Wealthy Jews live in their fine houses overlooking the parks and grand streets. But most of us who have escaped the hardships of Poland and Russia and Lithuania live in the Scheunenviertel, the Barn Quarter. Some Jews are just
passing through, waiting for passage to England, Canada, or America. Others plan to stay forever.”

Yuri says, “Yes, stay forever, that is what I want to do.” Mama and Papa take no notice of his chatter. They are too busy listening to Zayde.

He says, “Everything you might want can be found on the main shopping street, this one, the Grenadierstrasse. The Barn Quarter is like a small town that people like us have made. We are tailors, butchers, bakers, and shoemakers. Some work out of their homes, others in shops. Some buy and sell from pushcarts. There are hotels and boarding-houses, restaurants offering dishes from many countries. People crowd together. It is a ghetto of our own making, and yet it is not. No walls shut us in or out. Many languages are spoken here – German and Yiddish and Polish and Russian. When the Gypsies come to the market to sell their wares, they speak a mixture of everything—”