Tzili: The Story of a Life

23

IT BEGAN TO SNOW and she was obliged to look for work. The long tramp had weakened her. Overnight she lost her freedom and became a serf.

At this time the Germans were on the retreat, but here it was the middle of winter and the snow fell without a break. The peasants drove her mercilessly. She cleaned the cow shed, milked the cows, peeled potatoes, washed dishes, brought firewood from the forest. At night the peasant’s wife would mutter: “You know who your mother is. You must pay for your sins. Your mother has corrupted whole villages. If you follow in her footsteps I’ll beat you black and blue.”

Sometimes she went out at night and lay down in the snow. For some reason the snow refused to absorb her. She would return to her sufferings, meek and submissive. One evening on her way back from the forest she heard a voice. “Tzili,” called the voice.

“I’m Tzili,” said Tzili. “Who are you?”

“I’m Mark,” said the voice. “Have you forgotten me?”

“No,” said Tzili, frightened. “I’m waiting for you. Where are you?”

“Not far,” said the voice, “but I can’t come out of hiding. Death is not as terrible as it seems. All you have to do is conquer your fear.”

She woke up. Her feet were frozen.

From then on Mark appeared often. He would surprise her at every turn, especially his voice. It seemed to her that he was hovering nearby, unchanged but thinner and unable to emerge from his hiding place. And once she heard quite clearly: “Don’t be afraid. The transition is easy in the end.” These apparitions filled her with a kind of warmth. And at night, when the stick or the rope fell on her back, she would say to herself, “Never mind. Mark will come to rescue you in the spring.”

And in the middle of the hard, grim winter she sensed that her belly had changed and was slightly swollen. At first it seemed an insignificant change. But it did not take long for her to understand: Mark was inside her. This discovery frightened her. She remembered the time when her sister Yetty fell in love with a young officer from Moravia, and everyone became angry with her. Not because she had fallen in love with a gentile but because the intimate relations between them were likely to get her into trouble. And indeed, in the end it came out that the officer was an immoral drunkard, and but for the fact that his regiment was transferred the affair would certainly have ended badly. It remained as a wound in her sister’s heart, and at home it came up among other unfortunate affairs in whispers, in veiled words. And Tzili, it transpired, although she was very young at the time, had known how to put the pieces together and make a picture, albeit incomplete.

There was no more possibility of doubt: she was pregnant. The peasant woman for whom she slaved soon noticed that something was amiss. “Pregnant,” she hissed. “I knew what you were the minute I set eyes on you.”

Tzili herself, when the first fear had passed, suddenly felt a new strength in her body. She worked till late at night, no work was too hard for them to burden her with, but she did not weaken. She drew strength from the air, from the fresh milk, and from the hope that one day she would be able to tell Mark that she was bearing his child. The complications, of course, were beyond her grasp.

And in the meantime the peasant woman beat her constantly. She was old but strong, and she beat Tzili religiously. Not in anger but in righteousness. Ever since her discovery that Tzili was pregnant her blows had grown more violent, as if she wanted to tear the embryo from her belly.

Heaven and hell merged into one. When she went to graze the cow or gather wood in the forest she felt Mark close by her side, even closer than in the days when they had slept together in the bunker. She spoke to him simply, as if she were chatting to a companion while she worked. The work did not stop her from hearing his voice. His words too were clear and simple. “I’ll come in the spring,” he said. “In the spring the war will end and everyone will return.”

Once she dared to ask him: “Won’t your wife be angry with me?”

“My wife,” said Mark, “is a very forgiving woman.”

“As for me,” said Tzili, “I love your children as if they were my own.”

“In that case,” said Mark in a practical tone of voice, “all we have to do is wait for the war to end.”

But at night when she returned to the hut reality showed itself in all its nakedness. The peasant’s wife beat her as if she were a rebellious animal, in a passion of rage and fury. At first Tzili screamed and bit her lips. Later she stopped screaming. She absorbed the blows with her eyes closed, as if she knew that this was her lot in life.

One night she snatched the rope from the woman and said: “No, you won’t. I’m not an animal. I’m a woman.” The peasant’s wife, apparently startled by Tzili’s resolution, stood rooted to the spot, but she immediately recovered, snatched the rope from Tzili’s hand, and began to beat her with her fists.

It was the height of winter and there was nowhere to escape to. She worked, and the work strengthened her. The thought that Mark would come for her in the spring was no longer a hope but a certainty.

Once the peasant’s wife asked her: “Who made you pregnant?”

“A man.”

“What man?”

“A good man.”

“And what will you do with the baby when it’s born?”

“I’ll bring it up.”

“And who will provide for you?”

“I’ll work, but not for you.” The words came out of her mouth directly and quietly.

The peasant’s wife ranted and raved.

The next day she said to Tzili: “Take your things and get out of my sight. I never want to see you again.”

Tzili took up the haversack and left.