The Brothers of Auschwitz Read online

  The Brothers of Auschwitz

  MALKA ADLER

  One More Chapter

  a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  Originally published in Israel as ‘Itcho and Bernard’ by Yedioth Ahronoth, 2004

  First published in the USA as ‘Together Out of the Nazi Inferno’ by eBookPro Publishing, 2019

  First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2019

  Copyright © Malka Adler 2004

  Translation copyright © Noel Canin 2019

  Cover design by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

  Cover images © Shutterstock.com

  Malka Adler asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

  This is a biographical novel based on personal memories. Every reasonable attempt to verify the facts against available documentation has been made.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008386122

  Ebook Edition © November 2019 ISBN: 9780008386115

  Version: 2019-10-31

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  About This Book

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  About the Publisher

  About This Book

  This ebook meets all accessibility requirements and standards.

  Please be advised this book features the following content warnings and proceed at your own discretion: graphic depictions of violence, child abuse, anti-Semitism and genocide.

  This book is dedicated to

  Israel, Leora and Avi

  Ravit, Yonit and Hadar

  In the darkest part of the sky

  The light breaks through.

  Prologue

  Israel, 2001

  7:30 in the morning and it’s frrrreezing.

  I’m huddled in a heavy black coat on the Beit Yehoshua railway platform. I have a meeting with Dov and Yitzhak in Nahariya. There was a time when Yitzhak was known as Icho and Dov as Bernard. Yitzhak is seventy-five and can still lift a whole calf. Still strong. Dov at seventy-six is bigger than Yitzhak and loves cocoa cookies, television and peace and quiet. They have wives. Yitzhak has Hanna, a goodhearted woman. Dov has Shosh, who is also goodhearted.

  The rain stops falling like a scratch. Like pain. At first it falls hard, abundantly, then trickles down. Branches drop to the ground indifferently. Shhhh. The tops of the eucalyptus trees travel from side to side in the wind and already I need to pee again. The loudspeaker announces the next train. The lamp flickers. In two hours’ time I’ll meet with Yitzhak and Dov. Yitzhak no longer pushes forward. And Dov never pushes, not even before. Dov will bring good coffee and cookies with cocoa and raisins.

  Pew. Pew. Pew.

  A man in a long coat fires at the approaching train. Pew. Pew. Pew. Wearing a beret pulled to one side, he holds a black umbrella and fires. His face is divided in dark lines, forehead, cheeks, chin, even his nose. His face is taut as if someone had slipped underwear elastic under his skin and pulled and pulled, almost tearing it, but no. He takes short hurried steps, flapping his arms hither and thither as if brushing away a swarm of flies or insects, or stinging thoughts, and firing. Raising his umbrella high in the air. Aiming at the eucalyptus trees or the train and shouting, pew-pew. Pew-pew. Pew.

  I look the man straight in the eye as he shouts, pew. Pew. Pew. Pew. Pew.

  I’m beside him now and he says stop. Stop. Aims and fires, pew-pew. Pew. Pew. Pew, all dead, he says and wipes his hand on old pants. I cough and he frowns, thrusting out his chin and biting his lips as if to say, I told you, didn’t I tell you? You had it coming, sickos. And then he breathes three times on the end of the umbrella, phoo, phoo, phoo, brushes imaginary crumbs from his coat, straightens the beret and returns to the middle of the platform. To and fro. Back and forth and back again, his hands in fighting mode all the time.

  The soldiers have grown used to Friday shootings, the great rage that explodes on the platform from seven in the morning.

  Everyone knows he comes from Even Yehuda on his bicycle. Winter, summer, he comes on a Friday. A constant presence. The trains pull out and he remains until noon. Firing without resting for a moment. In summer he uses a cane. People say, eat, drink, rest, why tire yourself, go home, too bad, but he’s in his own world. Seven in the morning, Friday, he must be seventy, maybe less, shooting on the platform in dirty clothes with wild, white hair. Every Friday he leaves on his bicycle at twelve-thirty on the dot. The cashier tells everything about him. Eager cashier. Fat cashier with blond bangs and black hair. The man has no watch. There’s a clock on the station wall. But he stands with his back to it. It isn’t important to him to see the time. He knows. He prepares the Sabbath for his dead.

  Ah. The Beit Yehoshua platform is the closest thing to the platforms at Auschwitz. This is what the cashier tells us and we fall silent. At Auschwitz he touched his family for the last time. That’s what Yitzhak would say, and he’d raise his hat and shout, why should Jews stand on platforms at all? Are there no buses? Sometimes you have to stand on a bus, well, a taxi then. Taxis are expensive. So what, he refuses to stand on the platforms. Dov would cough if he heard Yitzhak getting mad about something. Then Dov would be silent. I’d pay no attention. I’d look first at Yitzhak, then at Dov and turn on the tape. Yitzhak would say loudly, why do yo
u stand on the platforms, why don’t you take a taxi, too. Yes.

  Now the eucalyptus trees are still. And the cashier is telling someone about Yajec. She has to talk fast before the new person shouts at Yajec. Every Friday the cashier protects him. Every Friday there are people who don’t know about him, haven’t heard him despair. The cashier has heard him and tells the older people so they won’t bother him. Leave him alone to kill with his umbrella, pew. Pew. Pew. Pew-pew. Once she told some new people, leave him alone, leave him be. Yajec was a little boy when he grabbed his mother’s dress, crying, yes. He wept incessantly, screamed, don’t leave me, but poor woman, she pushed him towards the group of men, and he ran to her, Mama, take me, but poor woman, she didn’t. Looking at her child, her face white, she screamed in his ear, Yajec you aren’t staying with me, go over there, you hear? And she slapped him and pushed him fiercely. You heard me. Yes. She went with the women and he stayed with strangers who didn’t see him because he was seven or eight, yes.

  The train entered the station and stopped. Quiet. Three minutes of quiet. Even the cashier doesn’t speak when the train stops. She doesn’t want people to get confused. Whoever has to, boards the train, whoever has to get off – gets off. The train leaves, and the cashier said that Yajec’s father disappeared too. And his grandfather, grandmother, four sisters, and Aunt Serena and Uncle Abraham.

  The face of an Ethiopian woman tugs at my belly. A gentle, fragile face, her mouth stretched outward as if she was about to weep, her eyes dark with sadness, a sadness from another place, distant, a sadness arranged in layers according to height, on her forehead a fresh, upper layer, her face strong. If Yitzhak and Dov were here, that face would probably make them weep. But Yitzhak never visits anyone and no one visits him. If Dov came, he’d probably give her a cookie and juice, tell her to sit down, sit down on a bench and rest a while.

  Another train pulls in. The platform empties, only the man in the long coat and the beret are left. The Ethiopian woman boards the train. She knows there’ll be pushing but she gets on. The cashier said she was also a regular on the train. She was going to get a telling-off from the head teacher of the boarding school. That daughter of hers has behavior issues morning and night. She makes the teachers mad; wants to go back to Ethiopia; wants to live among her people; runs off to town on a Friday night, fools around at a Reggae Club. All she wants is to rap. She goes off in a long skirt and a long-sleeved blouse. In her bag she hides a small pair of shorts and a short, colorful blouse that shows her belly. She doesn’t want to be in boarding school, doesn’t want to! Her mother shouts, you are not coming back with me, you’re staying, understand?

  Yitzhak would say, she’ll get used to it, in the end she’ll get used to it, and why does her mother get on the train every Friday, once every two or three months is enough, and she can go by taxi, didn’t they tell her? Dov would say, why insist with kids, it never works, best take her home, that’s all, right?

  A white sun pushes through a narrow crack. It peeps out from behind the backs of the eucalyptus trees, creating a huge, shining kaleidoscope. The loudspeaker announces: attention, attention. The sun disappears. The train leaves the station.

  I’m on my way to Nahariya.

  Yitzhak won’t receive me. He might. On the telephone, Yitzhak said – we’ll see. Yitzhak has no patience.

  Dov will sit with me. Dov keeps his word. Yitzhak too. But Yitzhak makes no promises. Yitzhak says – call on Thursday and we’ll see.

  I call every Thursday, and he says, we’ll see. Finally, he says, yes, you can come.

  Dov waits at the station with the car. Dov takes me to Yitzhak.

  I’m not certain of anything. Will they agree to talk to me? Come again once or twice and we’ll see. That’s how they talk on the phone.

  No “we’ll see”. They must.

  Right.

  Will you let me tell your story?

  We will. We will.

  We’ll take it slowly, slowly.

  Maybe quickly, in case we regret it, ha. Ha. Ha.

  Separately or together?

  However it works out, but I have a cow farm to deal with.

  So more often with Dov.

  Sure. I’m willing to talk to you whenever you want.

  Only on rainy days, come when it rains.

  Okay, Yitzhak.

  I can’t leave the cow farm in the middle of the day.

  No need.

  I have to feed all the calves, and I also go away sometimes.

  I’ll come when it rains.

  That would be best, I’m only home when it rains.

  So when it rains.

  All right.

  But call first, and we’ll see.

  Chapter 1

  I am Yitzhak: The State of Israel gave me the name Yitzhak.

  The Nazis gave me the number 55484.

  The goyim gave me the name Ichco.

  My Jewish people gave me the name Icho.

  In Yitzhak’s Living Room

  The hardest thing of all was being evicted from our home.

  We woke as usual. I got up first and wanted to go with father to the market.

  I forgot it was a holiday. Father came back from the synagogue. He was black-haired, medium height. Even with his coat on, he looked thin. Father sat down on a chair. Called us. Leah, come here. Sarah. Avrum. Dov, call Icho as well. We gathered around father.

  Father’s face was the color of tin in the sun. Sickly. Our eyes looked for mother.

  Father said, we have to pack. We’re leaving the village. We jumped, what? Where are we going, where, don’t know, the Hungarians are sending us away from here. Where, father, where. They didn’t say, we have to be quick, pack some clothes and blankets, he coughed. Leah, a glass of water please, take some cutlery, a few plates, socks, don’t forget socks, father, where are they sending us, where, asked Avrum.

  To die! said Dov. Enough, Dov, enough, they’re sending all the Jews in the village somewhere else, to the east, to work in the east. Why are they only sending Jews, asked Sarah. So we’ll die and they’ll finally be rid of us, get us out of their lives once and for all, don’t you understand?

  Father covered his face with thick, dark, strong fingers.

  I heard the sound of choked weeping. We looked for mother. Mother was tiny with brown hair and a gentle face, like a flower wary of the sun. Mother was chewing on the fingers of both hands. I told her, tell father to explain to us, I don’t understand, tell him, tell him. Mother sat down on a chair. At a distance from father. She was silent. Father rubbed his face as if wanting to peel off his skin and ordered: Enough! And then he got up, stretched, held onto the chair, his fingers white, almost bloodless. He looked at mother, saying hoarsely: Hungarian soldiers came to the synagogue with rifles. They told us to prepare for eviction from the house. They said within the hour. They said only to pack a suitcase with what we need. They said to go to the synagogue. To wait. Orders will come.

  We shouted in unison, but father, the war is over, we can hear the Russian cannons in the distance, tell them the war is over. Father said faintly: They know. Avrum shouted, so why are they taking us, father, what do they want to do to us, what?

  They want to burn Jews. I heard it on the radio. We’ll all die, said Sarah, almost crying.

  That’s exactly what Hitler planned, said Dov, putting an apple in his pocket.

  Father stamped his foot, enough. Go to your room, go on, go, we have an hour to pack. Mother said, but we don’t have any suitcases or bags, how can we pack?

  Father said, put everything in sheets, or even tablecloths, we’ll make bundles and tie them with rope, Avrum, run and fetch ropes from the storeroom, help the children tie the ropes, Leah, you’re in our room, I’m in the kitchen. Mother fell silent. Motionless, she folded her arms very tightly.

  Sarah wept.

  She said, I have to wash the dishes left from Passover night, I have to put them away in the cupboard, father shouted, never mind the dishes, they’re not importa
nt now.

  Mother rose from her chair, stood at the sink, opened the tap full force, grabbed a dirty plate and quickly began to soap it. Father beat his hands against the sides of his pants, as if drawing strength, stood next to mother, turned off the tap. Mother turned round, threw the plate on the floor, drying her hands on her apron, straightened up and said, we’ll go and pack. Sarah bent down and picked the pieces off the floor, crying harder, but the plates will smell by the time we return, they’ll have to be thrown out. Dov said, don’t worry, they’ll make us all smell. Mother lifted Sarah, hugged her, brushing her hair away from her forehead, stroking her head and said, we’re going. Mother and Sarah went into the rooms. Avrum returned with rope. Followed mother. Dov stood at the window. Father collected cutlery in the kitchen.

  I put on a woolen hat and went to the door. I grabbed the handle. My legs felt weak.

  Father called, Icho, where are you off to?

  The cowshed, I have to feed the cows, I’ll get them ready to leave.

  Father was alarmed, no, no, that’s impossible, we’re going without the cows, just clothing and blankets, put your clothes in a bundle. Father stood opposite me.

  I asked, what about the cows? Who will take care of the cows?

  Father gave me a long hard look, said, don’t argue.

  I couldn’t leave our cows. The cows lived in our yard.

  The cowshed was behind the house. I enjoyed milking cows. We’d talk sometimes, as if we spoke the same language. The calves were born into my hands. I looked at Dov. The curls on his head seemed small. He looked as if he’d just had a shower.

  Dov signaled me, drop it, drop it. I said to father, and who will milk our cows, the cows will die without food. Father didn’t know anything, believed the neighbors would take care of them, maybe one of the soldiers with a rifle, he wasn’t sure of anything.

  I remembered my cat. I wanted to know what to do with my cat that had caught cold on Passover night. I had a large cat with black and white fur. I went back to father. He stood with his back to me, opening cupboards and he looked like a grandfather. I begged, at least the cat.

  I’ll take my cat, it won’t bother us, all right?