Free Other People’s Houses by Lore Segal

I could get up out of my coat. “Come along,” the lady said. “Come and dance.” I said, “I don’t know how,” looking straight before me into the black of her dress where herfur coat flapped open. I thought, If she asks me a third time I will go. The lady said, “You can learn,” but still it seemed to me she had not asked me in such a way that I could get up and go, and I waited for her to ask me the right way. The lady turned and walked off. I sat all afternoon waiting for her to come back.
    In the evening there was an entertainment. We sat in rows. The camp leadergot up on the stage and taught us to sing songs in English: “Ten Green Bottles,” “Rule Britannia,” and “Boomps-a-Daisy.” Then he introduced a muscle man. The muscle man threw off his cape and he had nothing on underneath except a little pair of plum-colored satin trunks. He looked bare and pink standing all by himself on the stage, but he didn’t seem to feel the cold. He flexed his biceps for us.He could flap his diaphragm left side and right side separately, and wiggle each toe in turn. His head was small and perfectly round, like a walnut. Afterward, the camp leader went up to thank him. He said the muscle man was sorry that he could not speak German but that he had come all the way from London to entertain us. The muscle man stood smiling with great sweetness, but I knew he didn’t evenknow that I was there.
    At the end of the entertainment, the camp leader announced that we were to remain in hall after breakfast tomorrow to welcome the Mayor, who was coming to welcome us. The ceremony would be broadcast by the B.B.C. He asked for a show of hands from the children who spoke English. They were to be introduced to the Mayor. I raised my hand, stunned by the opportunity openingbefore me. I could tell the Mayor about the rose in the snow; I would ask him to be a sponsor for my parents. In bed that night, I asked the counselor how to say “growing” in English, but she didn’t know. She told us that a new transport of Jewish children from Germany was expected in camp. I understood from her that this was to be regarded as a calamity, because German Jews talked like Germans andthought they knew everything better than everybody else and would ruin the whole camp. I was surprised. At home I had learned that it was the Polish Jews who always thought they knew everything and were noisy and pushy in public and ruined everything for the real , the Austrian, Jews. I asked our counselor how to say “plucking,” as in “plucking flowers,” in English, but she said how should sheknow?
    That night I lay for hours in a waking nightmare. The more I worked on my speech for the Mayor, the fewer English words I seemed to know; the less I felt like speaking to him, the more I saw that I must speak or it would be my fault if my parents did not escape. I must have fallen asleep, for I woke in a thumping panic from a dream that a crowd of people had discovered my sausage. WhenI had calmed a little, I leaned out into the dark and felt under the bed. There was the paper bag. I brought it out and stealthily squeezed it well down into my rucksack, and I thought the crackling and rustling of the paper must be echoing from one end to the other of the sleeping camp.
    All the next morning we stood in rows waiting for the Mayor. He sent a message that he was going to be delayed.I had given up the preparation of my speech. I imagined that once I was face to face with the Mayor the words would roll from my tongue. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and yawned. I had a fantasy: I was saying my sentences about the rose to the Mayor. His look was full of wonder. He asked me my name. He invited me to come and live with him in his house.
    At some point, I happenedto look toward the stage, and there were some men standing with the camp leader. They were talking. I wondered if one of them might be the Mayor. Maybe it was the gray-haired man in the raincoat. He