Exodus - Leon Uris [118]
At that instant, six blocks away, Simon Rabinsky staggered into his burning synagogue and fought his way gagging to the end of the room where the Holy Ark stood. He threw back the curtains with the Ten Commandments inscribed on them and pulled down the Sefer Torah, the Scroll of the Laws of God.
Simon pressed the holy parchment against his breast to protect it from the flames and staggered back to the door. He was badly burned and choking. He staggered outside and fell onto his knees.
Twenty of Andreev’s students were waiting for him.
“Kill the Jew!” Simon crawled a few yards and collapsed, covering the Sefer Torah with his body. Clubs smashed his skull. Hobnailed boots ripped his face....
“Kill the Jew!”
In mortal agony Simon Rabinsky screamed out ... “Hear, O Israel ... the Lord is our God ... the Lord is one!”
When they found Simon Rabinsky he was beyond recognition. The Sefer Torah, the laws which God had given Moses, had been burned by the mob.
The entire Zhitomir ghetto mourned his passing. He had died in the noblest way a Jew could meet death—protecting the Sefer Torah. Simon was put to rest along with a dozen others who had been murdered in Andreev’s pogrom.
For Rachel Rabinsky, the death of her husband was but another tragedy in a life which had known little else but sorrow. But this time her strength and will were gone. Even her sons could not comfort her. Rachel was taken off to live with relatives in another town.
Jossi and Yakov went to synagogue twice each day to say Kaddish for their father. Jossi remembered how his father had wanted to live as a Jew so that the Messiah would recognize him. His whole mission in life had been to protect God’s laws. Perhaps his father had been right—perhaps it was not theirs to live from the fruits of the earth but to serve as the guardians of God’s laws. In his sorrow Jossi probed to find a reason for his father’s brutal death.
Yakov was different. His heart was full of hatred. Even as he went to say the mourners’ prayers, his soul demanded revenge. He seethed and smoldered—he was restless and angry. He muttered time and again that he would avenge his father’s death.
Jossi, knowing his brother’s state of mind, barely let him out of his sight. He tried to soothe and comfort Yakov but Yakov was inconsolable.
A month after the death of Simon Rabinsky, Yakov slipped from the shop in the middle of the night as Jossi slept. He took from his father’s bench a long sharp knife and hid it in his belt and ventured from the ghetto toward the school where Andreev the Jew hater lived.
Jossi awoke instinctively a few minutes later. The instant he saw Yakov was gone he dressed hurriedly and ran after him. He knew where his brother would be going.
At four o’clock in the morning, Yakov Rabinsky pulled the brass knocker on the door of Andreev’s house. As the demented hunchback opened the door, Yakov sprang from the shadows and plunged the knife deep into his heart. Andreev emitted one short shriek and rolled to the ground, dead.
A few moments later Jossi rushed onto the scene to find his brother standing hypnotized over the body of the slain man. He pulled Yakov away and they fled.
All the next day and night they hid in the cellar of Rabbi Lipzin’s house. Word of Andreev’s murder spread quickly throughout Zhitomir. The elders of the ghetto met and came to a decision.
“We have reason to fear that you two were spotted,” the rabbi said when he returned. “Your red hair, Jossi, was seen by some students.”
Jossi bit his lip and did not reveal that he had only been trying to prevent the crime. Yakov showed no remorse for his deed. “I would do it again, gladly,” he said.
“Although we understand well what drove you to this deed,” said the rabbi, “it cannot be forgiven. You may well have started another pogrom. On the other hand ... we are Jews and there is no justice for us in a Russian court. We have reached a decision you are to abide by.”
“Yes, Rabbi,” Jossi said.
“You are to cut off your curls and dress like goyim. We will give you food and money enough to travel