And the Rat Laughed - By Nava Semel Page 0,63

began to speak to her in the language of the Jews, but she did not respond. He pulled a piece of candy out of his uniform. Her body froze, like on the day when I took her in. I buried my face in the dirt at her feet. I rubbed my nose against the candy, then licked it. Sweet dirt.

Hesitantly she fingered the candy, fluttering over it and withdrawing.

The Jewish officer was kneeling now, on the ground before her.

Whose child are you? What is your name? You can say now.

When he promised to look for her parents, she turned her back and ran inside.

I stood up, my robe forming a cloud. I told him: The Knights of the Holy Grail were forbidden to reveal their name or where they came from.

The officer said: The Zionists are going through the orphanages now. Go hand over the girl.

1 November 1944

All Saints’ Day

I lit all the candles in the church. The shadows are scampering in all directions, and the saints are fixing their doleful gazes on me. Perhaps I have infected them with my own despair. How many children of pits and of basements, children of cupboards, children of boxes and niches are coming out of their holes now?

Who will wait for them in a light that is no light?

I wish I were the last sinner.

I doubt it very much.

2 November 1944

All Souls’ Day

At night she begged me to baptize her. She swore to do anything to keep me from handing her over.

My Father, give me the strength to withstand the torment I am causing her. The tears I had hoped for so badly are streaming down now. She dropped at my feet, her tiny body convulsing. She hit me with her fists. A Holy Communion is what she craves, to partake of the bread and the wine. A tiny bride, draped in white, marching towards the altar. A nun she wants to be. I put my arm around her. If only I could swap places with her. Her warm tears wet me.

In the end she immersed herself in the baptismal font.

I told her: Baptism won’t do any good, because my faith does not force itself on anyone. A child is only baptized with both parents’ consent.

But they promised, she screamed.

She tore the rosary and pulled off the beads. They rolled over the church floor.

Apostasy – that is the term that Jews use for their spiritual annihilation, the officer told me, for reneging on one’s faith.

How can I explain to the child that if I cause her to renege on her people there will be no forgiveness.

The beads scatter. I crawl around and hurt myself.

I did not succeed in finding all of them.

3 November 1944

Stash!

You’re bad, Stash!

The worst, Stash!

Her cries cut through me. I will know no peace, day or night. The beast of memory will remain trapped in the lair of my body, sinking its teeth into me and biting. But I am grateful, because the bleeding wound will keep me from forgetting her.

Mother, Mother, why have you forsaken me!

Thus cry all of the nameless children.

6 December 1944

“Parents, do not mourn your children too much.” If the village elders knew of the rupture in my world they would try to comfort me with the banal saying and throw in the story about the daughter who was sentenced to carry buckets upon buckets of her mother’s tears in the world to come. And about another daughter who was said to return to earth just so she could beg her mother to stop crying, or else her grave would be flooded.

For the child’s sake I will keep silent.

My grave will remain dry. This is a promise I will keep.

25 December 1944

Christmas Day

I sit in the niche, facing the drawing of the Madonna with the rat. She has a Star of David around her neck, which I added using a twig that had been covered over with dirt. It seems as if I can feel laughter taking form in the darkness. The rat is not laughing out of joy or derision. The rat’s mouth is gaping at the horror of that which will be and that which has been. It is the laughter of those who accompany the dead, as they stare into the pit.

People around are hushing them. A disgrace. A desecration. But against their will they are rolling with laughter.

1 January 1945

I am sealing the diary because I cannot trust the memory of humans. It is not a part of Creation, because Adam