But as they did, her heart sank, for though their group was safe for now, the island wasn’t large enough to hide a second contingent. Zus and the others hadn’t made it yet.
As night fell over the island and the exhausted travelers quickly ate some of their stored provisions, settled down, and fell into a deep sleep where they lay, Yona looked up to see Chaim and Rosalia just as alert as she was, despite their exhaustion. In the moonlight, she met their worried gazes, and she knew that they were wondering, as she was, if the others were all right.
It was midnight before Yona finally drifted off, and she slept soundly until she was awoken, just before dawn, by the piercing sound of a woman’s screams.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Yona sprang awake, already on her feet and clutching her knife before her eyes adjusted to the darkness. But Rosalia, who had been sleeping beside her, put a hand on her arm to still her.
“It’s Elizaveta Sokolowski,” she said. “Her baby is coming.”
And though this should have consoled Yona—the screams hadn’t been about the Germans approaching or a wild animal attacking in the night—it instead filled her with fear. “It’s too early,” she whispered to Rosalia, lowering her weapon. “She said her baby would not arrive for another two months.”
“Yes, well, the baby seems to have its own plans,” said Rosalia, her face white in the moonlight.
Together, they moved to Elizaveta’s side. Her husband, Shimon, knelt beside her, weeping, and Masha had taken their son to a spot several meters away, behind a bush, so he could not see or hear his mother’s distress.
“She must keep quiet,” Chaim hissed in the darkness. “It is so still out here.”
“I know,” Yona murmured. She put her hand on Shimon’s arm. “Shimon, you must help me now. You must help calm Elizaveta,” she said, and his eyes flashed with a dangerous blend of anger and fear.
“She will die out here!” There was panic in his voice. “Have I saved her only to let her perish in the wilderness?”
“No.” Yona was firm. “We will keep her safe. But you must help her stay quiet or we will all die. Think of her, and think of your baby. Think of your son, Nachum.”
He seemed to search Yona’s eyes, and then quickly he nodded and moved to murmur in his wife’s ear. She was writhing, her face red, her forehead beaded with sweat, her lips contorted in a pain Yona couldn’t imagine, but she seemed to understand what her husband was telling her.
“I didn’t intend for this to happen,” she said to Yona, the sentence beginning as a whisper and ending in a gasp of anguish as a contraction racked her body and she fought not to cry out. “I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to apologize for,” Yona said when the woman was still again. “What can I do to help you?”
Elizaveta was in no shape to be dispensing medical advice, but still, she whimpered, “Sterilize what you can, I think. That’s what the midwife did when I had Nachum.”
The words snapped Yona into action. She had read about childbirth, for Jerusza had insisted that her base of knowledge be broad and deep. She understood infection and the risks it would pose for both mother and child. But she couldn’t let Elizaveta or her child perish simply because they were stuck in the midst of a filthy swamp. There had to be something she could do.
“Who has alcohol?” Yona called out to the camp, which had now come awake with people watching, their eyes wide with fear. No one replied, and Yona tried again. Rudimentary distilled spirits, bimber, often wound up in the camp after food missions to nearby villages—most farmers kept many bottles—and though she had always discouraged drinking in the camp because it made the senses less sharp, she knew it was still widespread, a way both to cope and to ensure that liquid was purified. “I know you were not meant to bring it with you. But please tell me one of you disregarded my words. Please.”
It was Bina who finally spoke up. “In my pack,” she murmured. “I’m sorry. I—I have it for Oscher’s pain. This trek has been difficult.”
“Bina,” Oscher murmured, but there was no time to discern whether he meant to offer explanation or apology, for time was of the essence.
“I need it now,” Yona said, and in a few seconds, Bina had placed a bottle, half-full, in her hand. It was some sort of miracle that, after the trek through the forest and the swamp, the bottle was still intact, but Yona didn’t have time to thank God for that now. She poured some of the moonshine over her own hands to sterilize them as much as possible, and soaked a portion of the rope Moshe handed her with more. She edged between Elizaveta’s open legs and saw to her horror that the baby’s head was already there. Elizaveta would need to push or the baby might not be able to breathe.