Authors: Cynthia Freeman
Chavala even found herself thinking less and less about the golden shores of America. What still ate at her was that her father and sisters could not share their lives with them. She envied the closeness of the Aaronsons. Well, next week her family would go to Jerusalem. She took out the letter her father had written her, telling how proud he was and that he lived for the moment he could hold his grandson in front of the great Wall.
When they entered the Old City of Jerusalem, Chavala’s heart beat quickly in anticipation. She could hardly wait.
She rushed up the stairs, but when she came in Raizel’s embrace was not with joy but tears. She looked at Sheine, whose eyes were red and swollen from crying. Breathing unevenly, Chavala asked uneasily, “Where’s papa?”
A long silence, then Sheine answered. “He died … the day before yesterday …”
It was a bad dream, had to be … no mention had been made in the letter that he was ill. “It can’t be true—”
“It’s true, it’s true,” Sheine repeated.
“What happened?”
“He went to the
shul
in the morning and when they brought him home he was already gone.”
Dearest papa, I wasn’t even here at the end
… “But why didn’t you let me know he was sick?”
“He wasn’t, just old … it was his time.”
Chavala looked down at her child of three weeks. God took away and God gave. If only she’d at least been there to see him put in the ground. Her thoughts went to a cemetery in Russia, to mama, who should have been side-by-side with him, reunited in death…
“Dovid, I want to go to my father’s graveside.”
He nodded, and the family filed out and walked toward the Mount of Olives….
During the mourning period little was discussed, but now the time was over. “Tomorrow we’ll all go back to Zichron.”
Sheine looked first at Dovid, then at Chavala. Instead of her love for Dovid becoming less, it now bordered on unreality. Her fantasies were so heightened that at night she thought only of what it would be like to have Dovid’s child. In her worst delirium she saw Chavala dead and Dovid, of course, turning to her for comfort. She would punish herself for such evil thoughts, pray that nothing would happen to her sister, but she was obsessed. Finally she decided that only by cutting herself off from the family would she be able to keep her sanity. “I’m staying here in Jerusalem.”
“Since papa’s gone there’s no need for it any longer, Sheine.”
“There’s a need for
me.
I’m not going to live in a village. What would I do there? Work in the fields like one of your barefoot
chalutzim?
Become someone’s
chavera?
”
“It’s not that way in Zichron—”
“Maybe not But I’m not going to live on charity any longer.”
“You wouldn’t be living on charity, Sheine, we’d all be sharing. And Zichron isn’t like the Old City of Jerusalem. It’s lovely. I want you to see it, and our little house, and there’s a little garden. Please, Sheine, come with us.”
Sheine stared at Chavala, who blathered on as though she hadn’t heard a word. “You amaze me, Chavala, what happened to that pioneer spirit? Your determination to go to America? You remember when you told me that when papa died nothing could stop you? Not even Dovid … you said he loved you so much that he’d do anything, even give up—”
“Things change, it doesn’t seem so important now—”
“Doesn’t it? That’s shocking, coming from you. You, who more than any of us despise poverty, but I know what’s happened. You’ve let yourself be Dovid’s peasant wife … what you really want is a stove and a hut and a little plot to plant your vegetables. Yes, you’re a peasant, that’s what you’ll always be. Well, I’ve waited a long time to get out of here and be rid of all your beliefs, yours
and
Dovid’s.
I don’t need you
,” and she ran from the room, hysterical.
As the rest of the family sat in stunned silence, Dovid got up and went to the girl. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he tried to take her hand but she pulled away and turned her face toward the wall. Softly he said, “Sheine, what’s happened to you? Please talk to me.”
You’re right
, Sheine thought,
my love for you is so painful, to be this close is agony.
“Tell me, Sheine, say whatever you feel, I’ll understand.”
She turned slowly and looked at Dovid, and then finally said it… “I love you, Dovid—”
“And I love you too, Sheine, and want to help you. That’s why I want you to come to Zichron—”
“You didn’t
hear
what I said, Dovid.
I love you
.”
The impact of her true meaning hit him like a thunderbolt. “Sheine, you mustn’t say that. It’s not true … I’m married to your sister—”
“How well I know
that.
But you asked, and now, even if I have no pride, at least now I feel free. Dovid, I’m not shameless … I love Chavala too, but I can’t help my feelings … at least now you know why I can never live with the family.”
Dovid held his face in his hands. How could he help Sheine, she would never believe that this was only the infatuation of a young girl and that one day she would look back on this as just a childish phase … ? “You can’t live alone, Sheine, have you thought of that?”
“Yes, but I don’t intend to live alone. I’m going to be a nurse.”
At least now that he knew, he could understand her behavior. He would have liked to take her in his arms and hold her and tell her that he understood, but under the circumstances that would only be cruel. After a long silence he said, “Come, Sheine, we’re leaving soon. See Chavala. I don’t want to leave without the two of you coming together again as sisters.”
She got off the bed, looked once more at Dovid, then without a word went to Chavala. They sat awkwardly together, then Sheine said, “Please forgive me, Chavala, if you can.”
“There’s nothing to forgive, Sheine. I know how hard life has been for you with papa. You’ve had nothing except the worry and responsibility … but won’t you please try, at least give it a chance and come home with us?”
She took Chavala’s hands in hers. “Thank you for wanting me, but I’m sorry. I’ve other ideas … I’m going to be a nurse—”
“When did you decide that?”
“I’ve been thinking about it for a long time now.”
Chavala looked at her sister’s hand in hers. “It’s been so
long
since we’ve been a family. Will you at least come with us for a little while?”
“No, Chavala, I’ve already been accepted as a student nurse.”
Nothing could change Sheine’s mind. “You’ll write?” Chavala asked with tears in her eyes. “We’ll worry about you—”
“Of course I’ll write, and please don’t worry about me. I know for the first time in my life what I want to do with it. And … I love you all.” And at this special moment she truly meant it.
S
HEINE, TO KEEP HERSELF
sane, had planned, plotted her life with great care. Whenever she had the chance to escape from the Old City, she would wander up the hills to the German hospital and sit on a bench against the wall. She would watch the nurses dressed in their white crisp uniforms that rustled as they went meticulously about their duties. At the end of the long corridor a small group of handsome young doctors stood like disciples, listening to Herr Professor explain the findings of the cases they had seen that morning. This was a special world, a white, immaculate world she longed to be part of. But how? She became aware of her Jewishness. For the first time her Jewishness became an obstacle, something to wish away. This was her first venture into the world of non-Jews, and the feeling of difference, of being separate, came as a shock. They were fair-skinned, blue-eyed and blond. Names she had not heard before sounded melodically in her ear … Christine, Helga, Greta, Gretchen … And the German she listened to was softly spoken, not guttural. And speaking Yiddish, she could understand much of what she heard. Compared to it, Yiddish sounded … well, uncouth, smacked of the ghetto. She got up unhappily and left this place she felt she could never enter.
Back at her home, she felt so bleak, defeated, she even thought about ending her life that seemed hopeless. But then she thought of all she’d managed to live through so far and told herself to stop the self-pity and
solve
her life, not destroy it. So what if she’d been born Sheine Rabinsky? That could be changed. But what about her raven hair and deep brown eyes, and the olive tint of her skin? Papa had allowed no graven images or mirrors in his house, but she’d hidden a small, broken piece of mirror under her thin mattress. Looking at herself, she thought there was some beauty in her face… from her mother she had inherited the delicate features and unblemished, smooth skin. Why, she could pass for some of those French women she’d seen in Odessa who had married Russian men of nobility. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine herself dressed in finery, and the image became alive. If she changed her name, perhaps … she suddenly remembered the large bronze plaque that hung in the entry of the hospital inscribed with those who had founded the institution, and the name “Professor Beck” lingered. Why? Who knew? But in that moment Sheine Rabinsky became “Elsa Beck.” But what about her coloring? Her mother was French and her father German. Where was she born, something that could easily be checked up on. She’d figure that out later … she’d come a long way in her transformation already. She’d need to absorb it, try to adjust herself to it…
She took from the small alms her father had gotten and hid the money away until she had enough to buy a German primer. She slowly accumulated more secondhand books, books on anatomy, Latin and the techniques of nursing.
By the time she applied as a student nurse she not only had become Elsa Beck, born in French Equatorial Africa, but she spoke fluent German and her knowledge of nursing was equal to a graduate’s. In two years she had taught herself anatomy and even knew most of the generic names in Latin. She was as obsessed with the task she’d dedicated herself to as she had been with Dovid. Not a moment was wasted. Scrubbing, cooking, her head was filled with the lessons she was mastering. A dialogue went on constantly … she asked the questions, and she answered them. Sheine knew that one deception created another, but at least, she felt, Chavala had to be told.
So after one especially grueling day, she wrote to Zichron.
Chavala sat for a very long time trying to make some
sense
out of it. There were no answers to why Sheine had done this unbelievable thing. Papa had once said there was a dybbuk in Sheine, but who knew what really had made her go to such extreme lengths? All Chavala was sure of was that she had failed. She looked at the letter again … “So I ask you, Chavala, to explain to the others that if and when you write it will be addressed to
Elsa Beck.
Please try, if you can, to understand and not to judge me. We all in our own ways must find our own solutions and salvations …”
Chavala could just not accept it, not now. Sheine was lost to them, as lost as if she had died. Which in a way she had.
Life for Elsa Beck started at five in the morning. The disciplines were rigid, exacting. If a corner of the bed had one small wrinkle, Head Nurse Holstein ripped it off and the student was chastised without mercy and a privilege was taken away. In Elsa Beck’s case, no such penalties were handed out. Elsa was, in fact, the most precise, careful and prompt student Nurse Holstein had ever encountered, and for this she gained the admiration of not only Nurse Holstein but the entire staff. Her discipline and devotion did not, however, exactly endear her to her sister nurses. But that didn’t bother Elsa Beck. She had become a nurse for the sake of her own survival. She did not fraternize with anyone, and was, not surprisingly, considered a recluse.
When graduation came she held highest honors, and now was ready to become a full-fledged member of the elite. Indeed, the first time Nurse Beck walked into the operating room dressed in her surgical garb, she knew the title of Head Surgical Nurse would soon be hers.
Long live Elsa Beck.
Get thee behind me, Sheine Rabinsky.
I
T WAS NOW
1908.
“Nothing really changed, Moishe,” Dovid said, “it only appeared that way. How well off were the serfs when they were freed, did they achieve freedom and equality? No. When slavery in America was abolished did the Negroes really become free? Where were the opportunities for them? And this new rebellion of the Turks …Do you really think they will give
us
liberty and equality? A revolution won’t change hatred felt for the Jews. It’s persisted for over two thousand years.”
“But the Yishuv seems to have great hopes that these young Turks will be more sympathetic to our condition—”
“I hope they’re right, but Chaim Weizmann isn’t so optimistic.”
“That’s because he’s pro-British—”
“Which he has reason to be. Britain is the only nation that has listened to him.”
“What about the Germans? The greatest scientists and doctors in the world are German Jews. When the Kaiser came to Palestine he spoke to Herzl and said he was in favor of a Jewish homeland—”
“I know, but you noticed that we still don’t have one, and besides, Germany has a treaty with the Turks. No. I believe the way Jabotinsky does, that this so-called rebellion of young Turks was only a political maneuver to gain power and not to create any great changes in Palestine for the Jews. Aaron thinks like Weizmann, but he’s in no position to speak out. For years he has worked so closely with the Turks, hoping that eventually the sultan would give Palestine a charter. He may be a dreamer, but he still hopes.”
For Chavala, politics was what men constantly, boringly talked about. If a rebellion had occurred, it hadn’t touched her life here in Zichron. For her there was one small sacred place that seemed unpenetrable … her home, and her family.
Chia had now grown into a chubby three-year-old girl with pink cheeks, blue eyes and fair hair. She was cheerful, precocious, always asking questions. Her devotion to and curiosity about the baby Reuven was apparent as she sat wide-eyed watching Chavala nurse him. In her mind she naturally looked on Reuven as her brother, much more than she did Moishe, and Chavala was the mother she had never known.