The Shield: a novel (28 page)

“
My God! Ephraim!” Sara gasped.

“
Yes, I know,” the officer said with a big smile “The resemblance is there. I am Ephraim Hirshson, but not your husband. We are related, though I am somewhat at a loss to pinpoint how.”

The room was silent for a while. Ephraim was ex
amining his family and they were too stunned to say anything as they stared at him.

Jacob was the first to recover
. “We are related? I don’t recall anybody from our family going to Palestine.”

Colonel Hirshson sighed. “I
’m not an expert in genetics, but it seems certain that I share some genes with you – otherwise why the resemblance?”

Sara smiled
. “I think I know where the resemblance to my Ephraim, may he rest in peace, came from. He told me that when the Great War started his first cousin decided to go to Palestine rather than enlist in the Russian army. He went the long way, through Turkey, and Ephraim never heard from him again. You must be his descendant.”

They were interrupted
. “Sir, we have an intrusion alert.”

“
Again? Who and where?”

“
Messerschmitt fighters, five of them approaching low over the water. About 250 kilometers and closing.”

“
Excuse me. This is the second time this week. The Germans are very persistent and don’t learn.” He left the room after giving a stunned Jacob a quick hug.

“
You have a funny look on your face.” Sheina was smiling at her brother. Being seventeen and adventurous had its advantages, among them a willingness to accept strange stories at face value. She recovered her composure before her elders did.

“
Yes. Very funny,” her brother responded. “He looks like family and I was a bit surprised.”

“
He looks exactly like your father,” Sara exclaimed.

“
Well, mama, not exactly. But the resemblance is there.” Jacob hesitated. “At least we will have family when we get to Palestine.”

By the time
colonel Hirshson returned, the family was mostly recovered and immediately started questioning him about Palestine and about his family there. They had a lot of questions, which the colonel tried to answer without lying or disclosing the truth – speaking to his young grandfather was confusing enough. After a while Hirshson asked to speak to Jacob privately in his office. “Zionist business, you know.”

“
OK, Jacob I know that you are a scout for the Revisionist group in Vilnius. They gave us a list of people to expect. There was supposed to be another one on yesterday’s train, but he didn’t come – ill, I understand?”

“
That was Arye. He came down with a bad case of food poisoning. Not surprising given the stuff the Nazis are feeding us. I decided to go by myself.”

“
I’m glad you did. We’ll let you and the other scouts from Vilnius examine this facility. Everything will be open to your group, except some of the military installations. Your group will be allowed, if you wish, to board and examine the ship that is waiting in port to pick up the next contingent going to Israel, er, Palestine.

“
I hope that you’ll be done with your inspections quickly. It’ll take us some time to show you some documents of the Nazis’ plans for the Jews of Europe; these are most convincing. Families of the other scouts are on their way here, and we’ll meet with them later in the day.  We would like you and the other scouts to return to Vilnius as soon as possible, but I have to be absolutely certain that you are convinced that the best thing for Jews now is to come to Palestine. It’ll be up to you to make our people come here. We have limited time before the Germans lose patience and revert to their original extermination plans. After that happens all hell will break loose.”

Jacob was thoughtful.
“I have to return, but my mother and sister do not. Will they go on to Palestine by themselves?”

The colonel smiled.
“That would be entirely up to you and them. If they want to wait for you here, we’ll provide them with a private apartment. Or they can leave on a ship sailing today and reunite with you in Palestine at my father’s house. The families of all scouts will have to decide where to wait.”

***

“So, your name is Boruch Katzenelson, from Lutsk?” the clerk asked. She was probably in her thirties, but he couldn’t tell for sure. He was too nervous.

“
Yes, this is my name.”

“
And you survived the Lutsk massacre?” she asked.

“
Yes. I ran into the fields and hid in the grain.”

She was making notes as he was speaking. He couldn’t see what she was seeing in the desk’s glossy surface and it worried him a little.

The woman smiled at him. “Don’t be so nervous, you are among friends now. Can you tell me how you got to the Vilnius ghetto?”

“
Yes. I was picked up by a Ukrainian guard patrol when I tried to look for my family. They transferred me to the Germans and the Germans put a bunch of us on a truck to Vilnius.”

“
Did you befriend anybody at the ghetto?”

“
Actually a good friend of mine, Jacob Hirshson was in the same car with me when we arrived here.” He hesitated. “His sister is really nice and I think likes me. I like her too.”

“
Very good, Boruch. Please take a seat in the next room. It won’t take long.”

Bohdan sat on a padded chair in a small room with no windows, brightly lit by invisible lights. There were a number of newspapers on the table in the corner, but they were all in either Hebrew or Yiddish – not knowing how to read either he couldn’t tell the difference. He was worried. The Germans told him that he w
ould encounter a bunch of Palestinian Jews or, maybe, a bunch of German allies. One of his assignments was to determine who was running this operation and report to his masters. Something was wrong. He couldn’t put his finger on what it was. Maybe the Palestinian soldiers didn’t behave the way he expected Jews to behave or maybe it was the fact that their rifles seemed to him more advanced than the weapons the Germans were carrying. He was ready to accept that these Palestinians were really something else. Maybe the allies the Germans mentioned. That seemed wrong too; they spoke Hebrew and Yiddish and treated the refugees like family.

After the door to the waiting room was securely shut, the clerk, otherwise known in the Israeli Internal Security Service as a Talker, picked up the phone
. “I think I have a live one here.”

“
I’ll be there in a moment.”

A few minutes later a short, skinny man
came into her office. He was in his forties and had many years of experience interrogating people disinclined to give out information. When they did talk, they mostly tried to deceive. He didn’t rely on his experience and instinct alone. An array of electronic stress measuring equipment was at his disposal.

“
Dahlia, I would like to see the recordings from your interview with this Boruch character.”

He looked at her computer monitor
. “The guy is stressed and lying. He has no clue what the Hebrew and Yiddish signs say, completely uninterested in the newspapers. I don’t think he knows how to read. What about his story?”

Dahlia pointed to the display: “The holocaust database has a Boruch Katzenelson, who died in the massacre in Lutsk. The dates match our guy’s story as does his description of his f
amily. The problem is that he was among the 300 that were murdered there several months ago. I think that he’s not who he says he is. Shall I check with Jacob Hirshson? Maybe they are good friends and something is wrong with our records?”

“
Don’t bother. I can see he’s lying. The Boruch Katzenelson of Lutsk went to a heder for several years and was on a Soviet list of religious Jews. What are the chances he didn’t know how to read Hebrew?”

The short man knocked on the door of the adjacent room and entered without waiting for a response
. “Come with me,” he ordered Boruch, who jumped up from his seat.

They exited the room through a different door, one that opened only after the short man pressed his thumb to a plate by the lock. After walking through several corridors, Bohdan found himself in front of a heavy steel door that opened when they approached. Inside, several guards, seemingly unarmed, looked him over after nodding to his companion. Then the two of them entered a room with only a table and two chairs. It had a mirror on one wall and was lit by a luminescent ceiling.

“Please sit. If you tell me the truth, you will be fine. If not…”

“
I didn’t do anything wrong. Why am I here?”

“
I haven’t accused you of anything.” The man switched from Yiddish to German. “But I need to have truthful answers to the questions the nice lady asked you. You see, I am not nice and I don’t like people wasting my time. So, what is your real name?”

“
I told her already, I am Boruch Katzenelson.”

“
Right. And you are from Lutsk.”

“
Yes.”

“
You must have known everybody there?”

“
Well, not everybody, but yes, I knew lots of people.” Bohdan was recovering a bit. These people seemed to be what they said they were: Jews. How dangerous could Jews be?

“
Do you remember the names of those who were with you in the heder?”

“
Some. It was many years ago, before the Soviets took over, in 1922, I think”

“
And how long did you study at the heder?”

“
Only three years. It was prohibited after 1924.”

“
Good. Very good. Now, please spell this word out for me.” The interrogator put a magazine on the table and pointed to its name.

Bohdan was sweating
. “I, I don’t know how to read Hebrew.”

The interrogator pulled a pen knife from his pocket and started cleaning his fingernails: “Do you know how many ways there are to pull out someone’s fingernails?” he inquired.

“No - I, I don’t know.” Bohdan stammered. “I am from Lutsk. I really am.”

“
I believe that you may actually be from Lutsk, but your name is not Boruch, So what is it?”

“
I am Boruch.”

“
If you insist, I can teach you, you know, about the fingernail business, and before you lie to me again and make the lesson inevitable: Boruch Katzenelson died in the Lutsk massacre in June. So again: what is your real name?”

Bohdan was thinking furiously. Apparently these Jews knew more than his German masters expected. It was also clear to him that this short, wiry man, who moved like a cat, had the power and the will to do to him anything he wanted. Bohdan’s only thought now was whether he should tell him the truth or continue pretending to being Jewish.

His thoughts were interrupted by the interrogator. “I know you are not Jewish and I know much more than that. So will it be the truth or a nice lesson?” The man was smiling, a very unpleasant smile that sent shivers along Bohdan’s spine. Still he hesitated. “Go ahead, I’m listening.”

Bohdan told about his childhood in the Jewish neighborhood, the many Jewish friends he spoke Yiddish with, how the Germans discovered his language skills and sent him on this mission
, threatening his family if he failed.

After Bohdan was done with his story the interrogator slapped him on the back: “You see it wasn’t so bad after all. Don’t you feel better now that you don’t have anything to hide?”

Bohdan was surprised that he was actually relived. He expected to be sent to a jail cell now that the interrogation was over. Instead, music started playing and the interrogator took a small box out of his pocket and placed it next to his ear, stopping the tune. “Yes,” the man said, “go ahead.”

“
We found your guy in the SS database. He was a sergeant with a Ukrainian guard unit. Fairly smart and not trigger happy it seems, at least there is no verified record of him killing anybody. I need more time to research him.”

“
Thank you” the interrogator said.

He was still smiling when he looked at Bohdan again: “I promised you a lesson if you lied to me. Well, I don’t know if not telling the whole truth can be considered lying. I think that it is the s
ame. What do you think, Sergeant Bohdan Kovalenko?”

“
Sir, please, I was afraid to tell you I was in the Ukrainian SS. I was afraid you would kill me if you knew. I will tell you everything and do anything you want.”

“
I am sure you will.”

The door to the room opened and a tall, heavily muscled man
came in: “I see that you are done,” he addressed the interrogator. “I guess it’s my turn.”

Bohdan expected the man to beat him up – that was what he would have done – but he was only asked more questions. The sergeant did not dare lie again. He wasn’t sure what these people knew or which questions were traps. He was sure that another lie would bring terrible suffering. He wasn’t that fond of his German masters anyway. But he was worried about the fate of his f
amily.