From the other side of the room, Max Fischer and Chawka watched the two whispering to each other. Max winked at Chawka. “I see trouble . . .”
*
A few days into Renia’s stay, the next group of eight arrived.
No Sarah.
The Jews all planned to head to the Hungarian border together, accompanied by a bribed policeman. Their cover story: the comrades were Hungarian nationals, and the policeman was taking them to the border to deport them. The convoy left, but Renia remained in Slovakia, along with Chajka, waiting for the next group—waiting for Sarah, waiting for Benito.
The following group arrived the next week. Still no Sarah.
This group was traumatized.
Back in Poland, there had been an incident at the Kobiletzes’。 Banasikova’s husband, Pavel, returned home on army leave and visited his in-laws’ home. Meir hadn’t expected him and ran into him outside the bunker. Pavel, intoxicated, called him over and disclosed that he’d heard about the hidden Jews from Mitek’s friends who had helped Jews escape the ghetto. “Don’t worry,” he insisted, “I won’t harm the Jews.”
Pavel was curious about how the bunker was made and opened its secret door. He was so drunk he could barely stand. The five people who remained in the bunker were shocked. Meir entered behind him, holding his homemade pistol. Pavel asked to hold it. Meir let him.
“The people who told us the story still don’t understand why Meir did that,” Renia wrote.
Pavel examined the pistol, looking at each part. Then, he pulled the trigger . . . and shot himself.
He was conscious when the comrades dragged him out of the bunker. But the family needed to report the incident to the police. Meir begged him not to disclose the bunker, and Pavel reassured them that he wouldn’t. He was, however, not in a good state. The police arrived, and he testified, showing them Meir’s homemade pistol, claiming he had stolen it from partisans during his military work, and that he’d been cleaning it when it accidentally went off. An ambulance arrived and took him to the hospital in Katowice. Two days later, he died.
The Kobiletzes still did not insist that the comrades leave, but they were too scared to stay, and, at first chance, escaped to Slovakia.
Then Renia got a message. She and Chajka were to leave immediately: they had received papers to immigrate to Palestine. Their photos had been sent to Hungary, and the girls needed to stop in Budapest to pick up all the documents.
Their dream.
Renia wrote to Sarah and Aliza, explaining that it was possible to make aliyah; that they needed to hurry to Slovakia with the children.
On the very day she was leaving for Hungary, the group received a letter from a smuggler. The snow in the mountains was now hip deep and the Poland-Slovakia border, impassable. They would not be doing any more crossings. That was it.
Everything went black. Renia knew that Sarah would not be coming. She sensed that she would never see her sister again. She was the last remaining Kukielka.
*
Early January 1944: Renia could not afford to miss a single connection.
She traveled with Chajka, Benito, and Moshe from The Young Guard, who spoke fluent Hungarian. They took the train to the final station in Slovakia. They were going to cross the border in the locomotive of a freight train.
It was late and dark. An engineer climbed down from the locomotive and gestured for them to follow him. Renia, Chajka, and Moshe climbed aboard. Benito, however, stayed behind to help more Jewish refugees. They crouched inside—a few other escapees were there. The engineers, paid per person, crammed them into hidden corners, and the train began to move, everyone united in praying that it would not be searched at the border. The heat from the boiler was unbearable, and Renia could not catch a full breath. Each time the train stopped, they all hunched down to the floor. Fortunately, the ride was quick. She did not let herself think about Aliza, the children, Sarah.