The words melted together and Elvira wanted to
scream. In the big auditorium the air was charged with the recklessness and
impatience of youth, with the uncorked words of long simmering desires, with
unrestrained hope bubbling, but Elvira was close to a complete and uncontrolled
breakdown. This can not be, she thought to herself! I am in danger! Her mind
screamed silently and with increased intensity it twisted every nerve fiber she
had! Danger, danGER, DANGER!
The pictures came with frightening speed. Pictures
of yellow star on her coat at the age of six or seven, the destruction of her
father’s store as unknown people just kept on streaming through the door
smashing, breaking, then looting and carrying out things which were not yet
completely spoiled until there was nothing left just broken, twisted parts of
the menorah, spilled flour and grain mashed into the floor with crumbs of homen
tashen, oil and salt. All the result of hard work and self denial was gone,
along with all the pleasant memories! Gone was the smell of fresh baked bread
and rolls, gone was the memory of hide and seek among the boxes and bags. There
was nothing in the store just the broken rocking chair her mother used to hold
her after supper and the incredible mess on the floor. In the next moment she
saw the picture of chanting, torch carrying crowd as they attacked her uncle in
front of the store as he and her father were trying to clean up and put the
place back together again. The crowd was surging to and fro; as people tried to
find a better angle to snap a fist in uncle’s swollen face. She saw the jeers
and the hateful sneers as the crowd called them “dirty Jew”.
Elvira remembered the knock on the door at night as
the police wearing full-length black leather coats and Nazi armband took her
father away. She saw her frightened mother as they were told to pack and to
leave immediately in the middle of the night just three days later. They could
carry only one bag a piece. And they came for them always in the middle of
night awakening them from deep, deep sleep always breaking up her dreams.
They were told to go to the gathering place where
they will be reunited with her father then go by train to a camp. The camp of
no return - said the kind neighbor lady, the one who used to take care of her
sometimes and used to tell her stories about the bible, but now she just cried
all the time and she sighed and sighed. Elvira recalled the frantic effort to
hide from the daytime bombs and from the artillery shells which seemed to come
from not too far away but always landed too close, were too loud and too
dangerous when they exploded. She remembered huddling in the dank cellar with
many families and with armed nazi guards at the entrance. She remembered her
mother crying hysterically all night as some of the people were called and
taken away. She remembered the whispers of the neighbors pressing close as they
talked about the camp. She remembered the hunger from not eating and remembered
the fear that numbed the hunger pain and took away the appetite even when there
were some cold boiled potatoes and carrots which were brought down the steps in
big bowl and thrown on the floor like feed for pigs! The day when there was
nothing to eat she remembered. But most of all she remembered the first Russian
soldier as he appeared on top of the stairway.
*************************
Steve thought of his disheartened and unhappy
father, the wreck of a man he was when he died. He thought of the socialization
of their farm and how every farmer became landless worker overnight. They lost
the possessions and didn’t get compensated. Steve saw how the interest in the
work disappeared. He thought of the disinterest, the lack of concern, how
workers just followed the Communist program without question. There was no
choice. Cadres directed from offices far away, without knowledge without wisdom
and most importantly without common sense. He thought of the last photo of his
father with the colt he had hoped to raise. On the back of that photo the
inscription read -he was socialized and led away today.
Steve lost his smile as he remembered the hard work,
the long hours, the planning his father had done in hopes of getting ahead. He
thought of the genuine pleasure his father had grooming and handling that colt.
Silently he made a determined promise:
**************************
It's either him or a whole lot of other people!
It’s either him or me!
I will live, and with that decision looked down the
length of the barrel of his gun and saw the shape of the leather helmet in the
scope. He saw small flames around him as he tried to extricate his legs and his
boots through the opening. He was trying to dodge flames burning on the outside
but the smoke coming from inside the hull indicated that there was fire already
inside the tank.
He must be the commander. He came out of the turret
and he is trying to escape the danger inside that armored hull. He must be
afraid, but he must be mad and he wants to kill. He is about to loose his tank
and he wants to save his crew, but most of all he wants revenge! Revenge for
the destruction of his beautiful machine that was his first command. He wants
to kill the attackers for taking away his luck, for defacing him, for putting a
blemish on his spotless military record. There was no way to justify loosing his
tank to unarmed civilians in a friendly country, and he wants to kill the
attackers before they would get him. He wants his hands on that machine gun on
top and shoot everything that moves, everything that could hide a person. He
wants to annihilate everybody in this block and everybody all around. He came
in peace. He was ordered to come, but he was ordered not to shoot. Now his
beautiful tank was burning, his hands were blistering from the flames and from
the hot steel, he was coughing and his lungs ached from heavy smoke, from fuel
vapors and from the hot air. He knew his crew was struggling inside. He had to
save them and there was not a minute to waste. It was his responsibility. He
had to reach that gun!
Tom aimed and squeezed the trigger.