Sunrise West by Jacob G.Rosenberg Page B

left wide open. We rushedthrough a pastoral world unknown to me, pushing relentlessly further, further, towards the heel of the Apennine Peninsula. Lying on a heap of straw, lulled by the rhythmic clatter of the wheels, I dozed off. I dreamed that I suddenly felt a touch on my shoulder. It was the young Russian woman. ‘I must speak to you before it’s too late,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve heard your singing — it’s good, it keeps the devil at bay. But I’ve also heard your silence, a bottled-up message on the sea of slaughtered time, seeking a shore to uncork its great lament.
    â€˜My name is Dina,’ she went on, ‘daughter of Jacob the shepherd and sister to twelve brothers. One day I walked out into the fields to meet with the local maidens, and among them was a young Komsomol member, Vanya, builder of a new world. He swore eternal love, but then without warning threw me to the ground and defiled my innocence. I was devastated, yet my father advised caution. This is the land where only wrong is right , he said. For three days my enraged brothers refused to break bread. I expected something vile to happen. Then war came, and they went off to defend our motherland. When their corpses were brought back, our father died of a broken heart. I was left alone, and pregnant, with an old and ailing mother. Before long she too passed on. Because of my knowledge of languages I was conscripted to do what I am doing.
    â€˜As you can see,’ Dina continued in my dream, ‘on the way to building a better world, mankind destroys everything that is good. I don’t know how this will ever end. But when you enter the promised land, don’t forget me. And should I ever come to you, embrace me, please, because thiswill be a time of loving. And teach me to restore, because this will be a time of restoring. Then we can all run back to our old father Jacob, and tell him: Your favourite son Joseph is very much alive, and so too is his noble legacy.’

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    Â  Light  
    From the railway platform of a town outside of Rome I spotted my old school friend, Mendel Goldman. He was on a train that was about to move off in the opposite direction. When I waved he jumped out of his carriage and came running, and we fell into each other’s arms. ‘Are you by yourself?’ he asked.
    â€˜No, I’m with Zakhor.’ I introduced them. Mendel and I sat down on a bench together.
    â€˜You look like a ghost,’ he said. ‘Are you sick?’
    â€˜I’m not too well.’
    â€˜Here, take this, take it all!’ he ordered amicably, thrusting a suitcase into my hand. ‘It contains a hundred thousand lire.’ This was then the equivalent of perhaps a hundred American dollars. ‘You’ve got to eat. And if you run short of money — here, sell this!’ And he dropped his silver-plated watch into my lap. ‘I’ll catch up with you some time.’ He squeezed my shoulder and darted to board his train, which had begun to move. Stunned, I peered into the suitcase. As well as the money, it contained a silky white shirt.
    Zakhor came up to sit beside me. ‘What a marvellous friend!’ he said. ‘What a fellow! How long have you known each other?’
    â€˜Ever since school — we were in the same class for a year, and our friendship continued in the ghetto.’
    â€˜He certainly seems a generous, caring man.’
    â€˜He is. He was never a top student, but he was always a top human being.’
    â€˜Makes sense,’ Moshe agreed. ‘Some people believe the mind can accommodate only so much intellect and so much nobility, and that to seek a large measure of both in a single person is a futile exercise.’
    He paused to reflect while I took this in. ‘Genius,’ he resumed, ‘is seldom noble. You only need to think, in our own tradition, of the thirty-six righteous men of each generation, without whom the world