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By Root 2116 0

came to my rescue with a few translating and editing jobs that allowed me to pay my rent, but my situation remained precarious. The OSE had long since suspended its subsidies. Sometimes I couldn’t afford to eat. I thought about going back to Porte de Saint-Cloud to smile at the salesgirl in the cheese shop, but the prospect embarrassed me. I wondered how long I would keep feeling sorry for myself. I felt uprooted and out of place. I no longer belonged to Europe. Bea had finally left for Canada. Shushani had disappeared, probably for good. Hilda and her husband were barely getting by. I often went to their home in the evening to baby-sit for their son Sidney, whose crib took up the whole “living room.” They wanted to go into business, but in the meantime they had just enough to live on. Sometimes I went back to Versailles for a decent Shabbat dinner, but Our Place had changed completely. Only Hanna hadn’t changed. She was as distant and sarcastic as ever. So be it. I had other worries. Nicolas sent me a long letter urging me to join him. Israel Adler sent me a one-word message: Come. The weeks passed quickly, and soon it was Passover, springtime. Suppose I went to Israel for the summer? I discussed it with Georges, Hildas brother-in-law, who held an important post in the Amaury press group. He thought it was a good idea and said he would arrange to get me a press card. The war in Israel was over, but there was still the armistice, which was not the same thing as peace. It would be the fulfillment of my dream: at last I would be a war correspondent. But how would I report on a war without war? Well, I would find plenty of other subjects, like the life of the new immigrants, and Israel as a land of refuge for all the sons and daughters of the Diaspora, Israel, the beginning of redemption. There was no way to tell how long I would stay. The important thing was to be there.

To make sure that my plan could work in practice, I went to the Jewish Agency and met with a deputy director who was enthusiastic. “By all means,” she said. “A good sentimental, romantic story is always useful for aliyah. The doors of the country are open, but too few Jews are entering.”

The mother of Méno Horowitz, a Versailles comrade who was studying agronomy, worked with me. We prepared a plan. In May or June I would join a group of immigrants and make the trip with them, from the train station in Lyons to Haifa. After that we would see. The group happened to include a few Irgun veterans, but they were leaving Europe for good, and I was ashamed to admit that I was less idealistic and above all less courageous than they. Then there was the detail of what I would live on in Israel. Surely the paper would employ me only on a free-lance basis. Still, my wallet was not quite empty: a few thousand francs (my life’s savings) plus one pound sterling, a gift from Freddo.

Arriving at the station carrying a suitcase stuffed with my tefillin, a few articles of clothing, books, and my unfinished manuscript on asceticism, I ran into my friends Baruch and Louis. The former adored Jack London’s novels, the latter fine food. Everyone was in excellent spirits. The elated young olim, or immigrants, sang and drank, alert and open to camaraderie as never before. They talked laughingly of their amorous conquests, while I dreamed of Hanna and Niny. I never said goodbye to either of them. In Niny’s case I had a good reason: She was on a training program in the United States. “What about you?” someone asked in the dark of night. “Come on, what’s with the secrecy? Some woman must have made you happy. Or miserable.” I pretended to be asleep. My buddies felt good. I should have, too, but I was unable to share in their joy. I pictured myself at the station in Sighet, waiting for my dead father, gripped with anguish, wondering whether the train would come. At last it did. The locomotive gave three long whistles, but no one opened the doors. The train was empty.

Trucks were waiting at the station in Marseilles to take us to the transit camp. As we drove through a tunnel, Baruch