Free The Train to Warsaw by Gwen Edelman Page A

my cheek. Shave off my beard? he said. And then who would I be? God wouldn’t recognize me without my beard. And my eyes? What shall I do with my eyes? Grandfather, I said sharply, for God’s sake be practical. He looked at me sadly. Practical, my darling? Is that how we will survive?
    I went to the man who sold old Hebrew books out of a broken down baby carriage on Nalewki Street. He always had plenty of browsers. Whether they bought or not I don’t know. People stole the books and ran off down the street. He was an old man and couldn’t pursue them. So he hired a young boy, he couldn’t have been more than six, to run after the thieves. I remember that boy. He had black eyes like olives and had lost all his teeth. But he could run, and panting, he would bring back a volume and the bookseller would give him a coin. How could the man make a profit? He was paying more to get back what was stolen.
    The bookseller would give me a small list of volumes he thought would interest my grandfather. I would get money from my mother on some pretext or other and buy them for him. My grandfather kept them stacked up beside his mattress, old black books with Hebrew lettering in fading gilt.
    Shall I teach you Hebrew? my grandfather asked me when he saw me looking. I shook my head. I wouldn’t have the patience. If you dip into these works, he told me, you forget the outer world. I can’t, Grandfather, I said. It’s the only way, he said. Otherwise how can one live?
    Sometimes we sat side by side and a strange calm was transmitted to me. He stroked his beard slowly and sometimes he recited a psalm. His skin was like parchment, his long fingers were bony and white. His red rimmed eyes were always calm. He’s somewhere else, my mother would say irritably. He’s not of this world. Why must you treat him this way? I would ask her. He’s father’s father. Luckily your father was nothing like him, she said. Why didn’t he stay in Lodz? she asked. Why must he complicate everything?
    I went into our secret hiding places and showed Grandfather our packets of sugar, sausage, even tea. He looked at me in surprise. It’s her smuggler, said my mother. A low type. In these times, even that is permitted, said Grandfather. Is that what it says in your books? asked my mother. What she was up to, said Jascha, made smuggling look like a fairy story. All right, all right, replied Lilka. Let’s not get into all that.
    He drove my mother crazy. Dear God in Heaven, she said. Can one look more Jewish? That he arrived from Lodz is a miracle equal to the parting of the Red Sea. She was speaking like my father!
    With Grandfather there the atmosphere in the apartment grew calmer. Neighbors came to see him. He makes me feel calmer, they said. A real tsaddik . Even my mother was softening toward him. I sometimes thought of my father, his son, who bought his suits in Paris, ordered his shoes from the finest boot maker in London. Who traveled to the capitals of Europe and never observed the Sabbath. Not long before my father was born, they had allowed the Jews to leave their shtetls. How quickly things had changed in one generation. The gates opened at last, said Jascha, and everyone rushed out. A few decades later they closed again. Your father was of the generation that could finally become European. Or so everyone thought. Gates open and close, he said. This time they closed forever.
    There are no free miracles in this world, he observed. Not even from the Almighty. He turned in the soft bedding and reached for a cigarette. This miracle was paid for in hard cash. What do you mean? asked Lilka. The Accountant arranged it, said Jascha. He brought him in with another shipment from Lodz. We can squeeze one more in, he said. And this one, he added, is as small as a bird. What do you mean? How did he know about Grandfather? Jascha shrugged. I told him. And you? How did you know? You told me you had a