‘It is getting late,’ Livi says, hopefully.
‘Thank you,’ says Vlad to the farmer. ‘We would be grateful. I promise we’ll be gone before you wake up in the morning.’
‘I doubt that.’ The farmer grins. ‘You ever run a farm?’ He winks.
With a flick of the reins, the horse continues down a narrow track to a small farmhouse, beside which looms a large barn.
‘Make yourselves at home in there,’ he tells them. ‘There are still a few pigs inside, but they shouldn’t bother you. And my wife will bring you some food in a bit.’ He offers a wave and strides off to the farmhouse.
‘Thank you,’ they chorus.
While they are making beds from the abundant piles of straw, the farmer’s wife enters the barn. ‘Will someone give me a hand?’ she calls.
Vlad and Magda help her with the mugs of tea and a huge plate of steaming potatoes and roast pork. There are six forks.
‘This is so generous of you,’ Vlad says.
‘Leave the dishes by the door when you’re finished, I’ll collect them later.’ The farmer’s wife pauses in the doorway before she leaves. ‘We’ve helped other groups, you know, just like you, and we’ll do what we can for those that come after you.’ With that, she is gone.
Still unused to the random kindness of others, Livi feels a lump in her throat.
‘Livi, don’t look so surprised,’ Vlad tells her. ‘Not everyone hates Jews!’ The boys and Magda burst out laughing. ‘Let’s eat.’
They gather around the plate of food. ‘Maybe she doesn’t know that Jews don’t eat pork,’ says one of the boys.
‘He did warn us he had pigs,’ sighs Magda. ‘But, Livi, do you remember the house with the Russians?’
Livi nods. ‘When we have no other food, we eat pork.’
The boys are still laughing when they all pick up their forks and dive in.
*
The next morning, the farmer wakes them with tea and fresh bread. He offers to take them to Trebisov.
‘Day two of fourteen,’ Vlad announces.
In Trebisov they buy food and head for the border. They are in Hungary. That night, they sleep in the woods. Livi would rather sleep in the open now, as far away from people as possible. While she has the skills to survive in the wilds of the countryside, her nerve for any confrontation with an enemy will fail her, she is sure. She wishes Cibi were with them – the promise that they will always be together weighs heavy in her mind. Are they tempting fate by leaving her behind?
Over the next ten days they hitchhike, walk, and travel by train until they arrive in Constanta, two days ahead of schedule. They have met little resistance and both Livi and Magda are wildly grateful. They have been lucky, they acknowledge this to one another, and pray this ‘luck’ holds out for the voyage.
At the port the ship is already docked, awaiting its cargo of excited migrants. The evidence of a war recently fought surrounds them: many buildings sit in heaps of rubble still waiting to be cleared, but in town the ancient buildings still stand tall and proud, untouched by the chaos that rained down on the port.
A day later, the one hundred trainees from the Moravian Karst forest camp, the first to arrive, are joined by hundreds more from other camps across Europe.
Magda and Livi feel a thrill of exhilaration as they mill around the port, caught up in the anticipation and excitement for the journey ahead.
‘Everybody on board and be quick about it!’ Vlad is rounding up the young men and women, urging them towards the ship.
Magda takes Livi’s hand at the foot of the gangplank. ‘This is it, little sister,’ she says. Her eyes are shining. Livi knows Magda’s tears are for Mumma, for their grandfather, but they are also for herself and Livi too. They are not only about to embark on a voyage across the ocean, but they are crossing over from one life into another.
‘I’m ready,’ says Livi. ‘Let’s walk up together.’
Livi thinks of the three sisters on the platform of the train station in Bratislava, on their way back to Vranov. They had been so scared they had clung to each other the whole way. She doesn’t feel like that now, she isn’t scared, and she is glad Magda is beside her, but then Livi feels a familiar tingle up her spine, a note of dread. Again, she wishes Cibi were with them, the constant protector who kept her alive in Auschwitz through sheer will and determination. Not now, she tells herself, but how do you embrace the future with an open heart when that same heart has been broken over and over again, the shards of it hammered into dust? Maybe that’s what this is all about, Livi thinks, as the ship pulls away, putting our hearts back together. Cibi is safe with Mischka and Karol and soon they will honour the promise and follow them to the promised land.