In wartime, Gisi was a Jewish community leader, insisting on joining the Judenrat leadership （the rare woman to do so） in order to help her people; she maintained contact with numerous international leaders, telling them what was going on. Slovakia had promised to send its people to German work camps, but the Slovak government struck a deal with the Nazis, asking them to deport their Jews instead. Slovakia was the only European country that formally requested that the Nazis take their Jewish citizens.
At first, the Nazis wanted to take only twenty thousand Jews to help build Auschwitz, but Slovakia pleaded with them to take more. In fact, the Slovak government paid the Nazis 500 marks for each additional Jew—yet another way the Nazis made money off their Final Solution. Hoping that money could sway the Nazis further, Gisi really got to work, negotiating with Germans and the Slovak government, eventually collecting funds and offering bribes to the Nazis to reduce the number of Jewish deportees. She set up work camps for Jews in Slovakia to save them from being taken to Poland. When several of her interventions seemed to work—though it’s possible the reduced deportations occurred for other political reasons—she promoted the Europa Plan, an attempt to bribe the Germans to curb Jewish transportations and murders all across Europe.
Always active, Gisi sent medication and money to Polish Jews via paid emissaries. She was also instrumental in collecting international funds to help smuggle in Jews, known as “hikers,” on an underground railroad from Poland—like the one Renia had taken.
*
In this new country, Renia and her hiker comrades descended the mountain into a valley. In the distance, a bonfire. Goods traffickers on a break. The comrades stopped at the spot where they were supposed to meet their local guides and started their own fire.
Now they felt the cold.
Their feet were wet and in danger of freezing. They dried off their shoes and socks in the blaze. Then they heard heavy footsteps in the snow. But it was only the Slovak smugglers, bringing liquor to warm up everyone. The comrades rested for an hour, and their original guides parted from them caringly, returning to Bielsko to bring over more groups. The guides too, Renia wrote later, were paid a large sum of money per person. Mountain people were poor, and this was how they made a living.
The comrades could barely put on their shrunken shoes, but they had to continue.
They walked with the Slovaks, trying to make conversation. Passing mountains, hills, valleys, and forests, they approached a sleepy village. A dog’s bark welcomed them. They were led into a stable with horses, cows, pigs, and chickens. The only light came from a small oil lamp, and the stench of manure was unbearable, but they couldn’t enter the house, for fear the neighbors would see.
Despite the cold, it was hot inside. Fatigue set in. Everyone dropped onto bales of hay. Renia’s legs were so weak, she was unable to straighten them. She curled up and fell into a deep sleep.
*
At noon, the landlady, dressed in traditional mountain garb—a kerchief and colorful dress with felt shoes connected to a garter by white laces—woke the comrades with lunch. It was Sunday. She told them to stay put, as the villagers were all on their way to church. They needed to be careful. These days, everyone was spying on their neighbors; everyone was suspect. Of course, for them, nothing new.
After eating, Renia slept some more, lying next to her comrades on the hay like packed sardines. Rays of sun entered through a small window. The Jews started talking and—for the first time—recounting the events of the past months and years. On the threshold of safety, they began to fully realize all that they had lost.
Their happiness at having crossed the border was muted by fear of the future. Their trek was not over; neither was the war. At night, a sleigh arrived. The comrades hopped on and rode to the next village via small side roads and empty fields, away from police. A few hours later, they reached a town and were placed in a single room in a peasant’s home and told not to leave until their car arrived. There was plenty of food here, as long as one had the money to buy it, and, fortunately, the comrades each had a bit of cash. The household head—an honest, compassionate person, Renia felt, who spoke of the Germans with great hatred—went out to buy them provisions. It turned out that the first group had been there a few days earlier. After feasting, the comrades slept some more.