Mila 18 - Leon Uris [34]
“Yes, Momma.”
“Andrei, it’s a good thing your niece Rachael goes to the same conservatory. He would never practice a note.”
Andrei shot a glance at Wolf, who reddened.
So! he thought. You are one of those schmendricks looking over Rachael.
Wolf licked his lips, lowered his eyes, and made a move.
Andrei studied the boy. Gawky, a few straggling hairs on his chin, pimples ... What could Rachael possibly see in that thing? Not a man, certainly, but on the other hand not quite a boy. Known him since he was a baby. He is a good lad. He will respect Rachael ... I think.
“Your move.”
Andrei made an atrocious play.
“Checkmate,” Wolf said.
Andrei glared at the board for three full minutes. “Go practice your flute.”
He stretched and yawned and meandered over to Alex, who was writing in a large notebook.
“What’s this?” Andrei said, lifting the book and thumbing through it.
“Just a journal of events. Fulfilling my natural calling as a nosy person.”
“What do you expect to do with diaries at your age?”
“I don’t know if it has any use. Just a wild guess, Andrei, that it might have some importance someday.”
Andrei put Brandel’s journal back on the desk and shrugged. “It will never take the place of the Seventh Ulany Brigade.”
“I wouldn’t be too certain of that,” Alex said. “Truth used at the right time can be a weapon worth a thousand armies.”
“Alex, you’re a dreamer.”
Alex watched Andrei grow restless. He was really the only person with whom Andrei could speak from the inner reaches of his mind. Alex pushed his papers aside, took a bottle of vodka from his desk, and poured two glasses, a small one for himself and a large one for Andrei.
Andrei took the glass and said, “Le’chayim!—to life.”
“You were quiet at the meeting today,” Alex said.
“The rest of them did enough talking for me.”
“Andrei, I’ve seen you so unhappy only once before. Two years ago, B.G.—before Gabriela. You’ve had an argument?”
“I always have arguments with her.”
“Where is she?”
“In the church most likely, lighting candles and asking forgiveness of Jesus, Mary, the Apostles, and forty Polish saints for living in sin with a Jew.”
“It’s the coming war, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it’s the war and it’s Gabriela. There are things that a man wants answered before he goes out on a battlefield.”
“We talked about these things today for three hours. You weren’t with us.”
Andrei sipped his vodka and shook his head. “I am a bad Jew, Alex. I am not a Jew my father would have been proud of, may God rest his soul.”
Andrei walked to the window and pulled the curtain back and pointed to the great symbol of eastern Europe’s Jewry, the Tlomatskie Synagogue. “My father could find comfort for any problem in the words of the Torah.”
“But, Andrei, that is why we are Bathyrans and Labor Zionists and Revisionists. We could not find comfort in the Torah alone.”
“That is the point, Alex. I am not even a good Zionist.”
“My goodness, who’s been talking to you?”
“Paul Bronski. He sees right through me. I am a phony Zionist. Alex, now listen to me. I’m not a disciple of A. D. Gordon and that crap of love of the soil. I don’t want to go to Palestine, now or ever. Warsaw is my city, not Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. I am a Polish officer and this is my country.”
“You told me once very plainly that you don’t want anyone to steal your chickens. Isn’t that Zionism? Aren’t we merely in a struggle for dignity?”
“In dubious battle,” Andrei mumbled. Then he sat and his voice became very soft. “I want to live in Poland and I want to be a part of this country as though I belong. But at the same time I want to be what I am. I cannot accept Paul Bronski’s terms of giving up what I am. I have wanted to run to the synagogue and believe with my father’s faith. I want to believe in Zionism as you believe.”
Alexander Brandel tightened the muffler around his neck. He lifted his glass, revealing a big suede patch on his elbow.
“Did you ever read my article when I tried to explain the anatomy of anti-Semitism in Poland? Never mind, it was a bad