All Rivers Run to the Sea_ Memoirs - Elie Wiesel [211]
For security reasons, we held our discussion outdoors, in the street, and at one point David told me to look behind us. “See those two thugs pretending to be looking for an address? We know them. They’re watching you. We know that orders have been issued to arrest you on the slightest provocation. Do me a favor and get out of here.” I refused. “Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you,” my friend finally said.
I went to the synagogue on Arkhipova Street. The entire embassy staff was there, and Michel went with me. At first he felt ill at ease. All those people praying, all those old women weeping, all those informers spying on foreigners. But soon he too, was drawn into the atmosphere, and the poet in him began to sing the soft evening prayers with us, celebrating the Kippur with us, in his fashion. Then came the festival of the Torah, and he was transformed. He glanced sidelong at me as I danced among the faithful with the sacred scrolls. And finally he overcame his reluctance and joined us. Michel claims to be the ultimate cynic, but I could see how moved he was as he clutched the Torah tight to his chest. He who considered himself “far from all that” was not so far after all.
My memory of that festival is as powerful as mine of the previous year’s celebration. The crowds in the street carrying torches, the collective defiance, the dances of the brave young dissidents and refuseniks—their eloquence and simplicity had their effect. “Now I understand why you love them so” was his only comment. He dedicated several elegant, bitterly lyrical poems to them.
We returned to the hotel shortly before dawn, escorted by an “adviser” to the Israeli embassy. Interestingly, though Michel was a French citizen and I an American, it was Israeli officials who saw to our security. I teased them and David, calling them paranoids who saw KGB agents everywhere. As if the secret police had nothing better to do.
I returned for morning services without Michel, who was exhausted from the night before. I felt the same soaring excitement at seeing the familiar faces again. As before, slips of paper were stuffed into my pockets: “I have an aunt in Chicago.… A relative of mine lives in Rishon Le-Zion.…” People whispered in my ear. “For the love of heaven, don’t forget us.” Or: “Tell the American Jews, the European Jews what you are seeing here.” Knowing that I was being watched, I would answer barely moving my lips, promising that I would do all they asked of me, promising to keep the faith, to come back as soon as possible, surely for next year’s High Holidays. An old man kissed my hand as though I were a rabbi. I wept.
When I got back to the hotel, my room had been searched. I wasn’t surprised. The year before I had walked in on a KGB agent rummaging through my things. He had shrugged without the slightest embarrassment, as if to say, Sorry, just doing my job. I opened the closet, checked my suitcase, the drawers, the bathroom—everything was in its place. But my notebooks had been opened, my shirts moved. Suddenly I remembered the book. I ran back to the closet, reached into the inside pocket of my raincoat—it was gone, the copy of The Jews of Silence I had foolishly brought along to give to a Soviet Jewish intellectual so he could let as many Jews as possible know that I had kept my promises, that I was speaking of them, for them. And now the volume was in the hands of the KGB. When I phoned David, he told me to wait there for him. I knocked on Michel’s door. After he had let me in, he whispered that his room had been searched that morning while he was at breakfast.
David arrived within minutes