“Thomas, forgive me for not coming to get you. I couldn’t leave your grandparents to their fate. At the railroad station there was a commotion, and it was mobbed. Your grandparents could barely stand up.”
“Mom, I forgive you with all my soul.”
“I left you alone,” her voice quivered.
“Fate sent Adam to me. He is my friend in heart and soul, and in the past months Mina brought us food.” Thomas wanted to ask about his father and grandparents, but he stopped himself. Like Adam, he felt they had to save Mina first.
After walking for two hours, trying to put a few drops of milk in Mina’s mouth, they reached the infirmary of the Red Army.
“Who are you?” asked the doctor, a tall, thin man. He wore glasses and looked like Brother Peter in their school.
Thomas’s mother answered: “We’re Jews, and we’re mothers. We were in camps, and our children hid in the forest. Our daughter is sick and she was beaten. The peasant who hid her abused her, hit her, and finally threw her out into the cold.”
“We’ll examine her immediately,” said the doctor.
Now they could see the blue bruises and red welts on her little body.
The doctor was shocked by the seriousness of her wounds and called out, “Good God, there’s no limit to cruelty,” and he instructed a nurse to wash her.
“Sit down. We’ll do everything we can to save this precious little girl.” He asked one of the medics to give them soup and a piece of bread.
For a long time not a sound was heard in the infirmary. The mothers wanted to know everything that had happened to Adam and Thomas during their long months in the forest, but fatigue and weakness overcame them, and they fell asleep.
At noon the doctor emerged from the infirmary and said, “The girl opened her eyes, and that’s a good sign. We’ll keep an eye on her for the time being. How old is the child?”
“She’s nine,” Thomas’s mother answered.
“Good God! Only a man without God in his soul is capable of such cruelty,” said the doctor.
“Will Mina recover from her illness?” Thomas’s mother asked in a trembling voice.
“With God’s help,” the doctor answered. He looked more and more like the school priest.
The cold outside was fierce, but it was warm in the tent. The doctor stood and looked at them with wonder. Adam felt like saying, “Again we met an angel, this time in the figure of a doctor,” but he didn’t say it.
The next day the doctor didn’t deny that there were some hard moments in bringing Mina back to life. In the end the good angels won out. The girl was out of danger.
“Thank God,” said Thomas’s mother.
“Thank the medical team that made an effort,” the doctor replied.
Adam’s mother was alarmed by the doctor’s correction and said, “Sorry.”
That night the doctor announced, “The girl, thank God, is showing good signs of recovery.”
“Is she talking?” Adam’s mother asked. “She’s talking a little.”
“Can you understand what she’s saying?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thank God,” said Adam’s mother in the doctor’s tone of voice.
All that day Adam and Thomas told about their life in the forest, about the raspberries and blueberries, about the brook, about the nest that protected them day and night, about Mina who had saved them from hunger, and about the old peasant who brought them bread and milk during the final hard days.
“I didn’t read, and I didn’t solve arithmetic exercises, but I kept a diary,” Thomas told his mother. “But it’s all broken up. We’ll only be able to tell about what happened to us in the forest for a few years.”
Thomas’s mother opened her eyes wide. Thomas’s words frightened her, and she said, “What do you mean by saying you won’t be able to tell about what happened to you in the forest for a few years?”
Thomas answered, “It’s hard to talk about fear and hunger. They are very concrete, but indescribable.”
When she heard his words, her eyes filled with tears.
Meanwhile the doctor came out and said, “Come in and see our pretty little girl. She’s not only pretty, she’s also a heroine.”
Mina was lying in bed, her head raised on two pillows. Her eyes were open. Her beauty glowed from within her.
“How are you, Mina?” Adam’s mother asked, trembling all over.
After a short silence she answered, “Well.”
Adam’s mother didn’t ask any more questions.
“The medical team has fallen in love with Mina,” said the doctor, and his face filled with light.
Chapter 30
They stayed in the infirmary tent for five days, constantly waiting in fear for the doctor’s announcements. The medic didn’t neglect them. He brought them soup, bread, and hard-boiled eggs. On the fifth day the doctor told them, “The girl is talking, asking questions and responding. She’s a girl from out of this world. You’ll have to keep bandaging her wounds. I’ll give you antiseptic and salve. The wounds are healing, but you mustn’t neglect treatment. The medical staff is impressed by Mina and wishes her a full recovery. You should know that she’s a miracle in every way. And you, where are you going?”
“We don’t know yet,” answered one of the mothers.
“We’ll give you some food to last for a few days.”
“Thank you, doctor. I can’t thank you enough.”
“We’re doing our duty as human beings. Tomorrow we’re moving from here. We’ve broken through the front. The German army is retreating in panic, but the way to victory is still long. I’ll give you a stretcher so you can carry Mina. She conquered all of our hearts.”
“How can we thank you, doctor?” Adam’s mother said, trying to restrain her tears.
“There’s no need to thank us. We’re here to do our duty.”
“You treated us with mercy. It’s been a long time since we saw mercy.”
“I’m just a doctor. You mustn’t attribute qualities to people that we attribute to God.”
“I’m sorry if I insulted you. I didn’t mean to,” she said, covering her face with both hands.
Thus they parted from the doctor who had saved them.
The sun came out from behind the clouds and lit up the snow. The snow absorbed the sun from above and glowed with thousands of points of light.
A military band played marches in the middle of the snowy forest. Thomas’s mother burst into tears, and Adam’s mother hugged her, saying, “Dear, thank God we found the boys. Now we have to take care of Mina. She needs a lot of attention.”
“Excuse me,” Thomas’s mother murmured and wiped her face.
The band continued to inspire joy.
Adam’s mother said, “Who watched over our children in this hard winter?”
“Our boys are smart. They took care of themselves,” said Thomas’s mother.
Adam wanted to ask how his father was, and how his grandparents were, but he blocked the words in his mouth. In his heart he knew it wasn’t the right time to ask. His mother sensed what was stirring in her son’s heart and said, “Let’s pray that Dad and your grandparents will return to us.”
Mina fell asleep on the stretcher, and the mothers wrapped her in the blanket.
About the Author
First championed in the English language by Irving Howe and Philip Roth, Aharon Appelfeld was born in a village near Czernowitz, Bukovina, in 1932. During World War II, he was deported to a concentration camp in Transnistria, but escaped. He was eight years old. For the next three years, he wandered the forests. In 1944, he was picked up by the Red Army, served in field kitchens in Ukraine, then made his way to Italy. He reached Palestine in 1946. Today, Appelfield is professor emeritus of Hebrew literature at Ben-Gurion University at Beersheva, a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, and commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He has won numerous prizes, including the Israel Prize, the MLA Commonwealth Award in Literature, the Prix Médicis étranger in France, the Premio Grinzane Cavour and Premio Boccaccio Internazionale, the Bertha von Suttner Award for Culture and Peace, and the 2012 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. In 2013, he was a finalist for the Man Booker International Prize.