638
PARTISAN REVIEW
Berlin, and Paris. Alone ofour family in Poland, he came through the events
because he was assimilated to Polish life, blue-eyed, without close family
attachments to hinder him, and he passed through the German occupation as
a Polish bricklayer. When he was finally sent to a camp, he was sent as a
Pole, not aJew. He was called Henry. He was betrayed only near the end.
He lived.
When he arrived in America, he wanted to be a doctor again. He
studied, took exams, and failed the English part of it. Okay, he studied some
more. In late middle age he was going to learn enough English to
be
a doctor
in America. He thought he would
be
an eye surgeon again.
In the mysterious isolation in which a world like the suburbs of
Cleveland envelopes itself, a scheme developed among several families. A
neighbor also had a relative, a survivor, a woman who had suffered, lost her
loved ones, and lived. What a sweet idea to put these two together, make a
match! Okay, they weren't young, but it's never too late.
Better not let them in on the plan. They were both shy; who knew
how nervous some people get? Absolutely better not to warn them. This
was grown-up business. After all they had gone through, they were like
children, timid kids. They were dependents now-we had to consider this.
"You will come to tea with some friends," my mother told Henry.
Obediently, like a good child, he assented.
We arrived at the house of the neighbor. In his courtly way, Henry
bowed and touched the hand of our hostess. And then she introduced
Henry's fellow survivor. He stared, and then he spat on her.
I didn't ask for the details and he never offered them.
It
was enough
that he had known her in the camp. I had read what it meant to be a Kapo,
and in the widening horrified pale blue eyes ofmy cousin, I caught a glimpse–
not enough-{)fwhat it was to be a victim. I couldn't see the expression
in
the
woman's face because I was ashamed to look.
There was consternation in the little group of neighbors and friends.
They thought the war had ended with minor changes, mostly conciliatory–
now Russian Jews were admitted to the country club which previously was
limited to German Jews. I don't know what they learned from their
consternation except maybe not to set out matchmaking as if the rest of the
world was Shaker Heights, Ohio.
For the few months more that I knew Henry he seemed silent and
withdrawn, oddly smooth-faced with the weight he had gained suddenly. He
passed the state medical language exams and was licensed to practice
medicine, went to work in a hospital, and almost immediately suffered a
stroke and died. He is remembered now more for that act of spitting on a
fellow Jew than for anything else. Those who might have remembered him
