Page 6 of Cilka's Journey
“Thank you,” he mouths. “It’ll be over quickly.”
With blood dripping from her arm, though not as much as last time, Cilka whispers, “Be gentle with my sister,” before moving on as slowly as she can so Magda will be able to catch up. She looks curiously around for the girl who’d been in front of her. She glances back at theTätowierer. He has not watched her walk away. She sees the girl who’d been five in front of her standing outside Block 29 and joins her and the others waiting to be admitted into their “home.” She studies the girl. Even with her head shaven, the baggy dress hiding whatever curves she may have, or once had, she is beautiful. Her largedark eyes show no signs of the despair Cilka has seen in so many. She wants to get to know this girl who made theTätowiererstare. Soon, Magda joins her, wincing from the pain of the tattoo. They’re temporarily out of sight of any guards and Cilka clutches her sister’s hand.
That evening, as the girls in Block 29 each find a space in a bunk to share with several others and cautiously inquire of one another, “Where are you from?” Cilka learns the girl’s name is Gita. She comes from a village in Slovakia, not too far from Cilka and Magda’s town of Bardejov. Gita introduces Cilka and Magda to her friends Dana and Ivanka.
The next day, following roll call, the girls are sent to their work area. Cilka is pulled aside, not sent like the others to work in the Kanada, where they sort out the belongings, jewelry and heirlooms brought to Auschwitz by the prisoners, and prepare much of it for return to Germany. Instead, by special request, she is to report to the administration building, where she will work.
CHAPTER 3
Vorkuta Gulag, Siberia
The temperature is dropping. It hasn’t been sudden, more a gradual change noticed at night when Cilka and the others have found themselves snuggling into each other. They are all in summer clothing. Cilka doesn’t know what month it is, though she guesses August or September, and she does not know where they are going, though the language at each stop is Russian.
One day bleeds into the next. Illness creeps through the carriage. Pitiful coughing drains the women of what little energy they have. Conversations become fewer and shorter. At the last few stops, men had taken pity on the cargo, had stripped and thrown in theirkal’sony, as they called it, off their own bodies. Cilka and Josie had pulled the loose, still-warm undergarments up over their goosebumped legs, waving a weak thank-you.
It has been three days since they last stopped when the train screeches to a halt, the heavy doors flung back. A vast, unpopulated landscape of dirt and yellow-green grass lies before them.
This time it isn’t one or two guards greeting them. Dozens of men in uniform, rifles at the ready, line the length of the train.
“Na vykhod!”they yell.Get out!
As the women struggle to their feet, many collapsing on legs no longer capable of bearing weight, the shouting continues.
Cilka and Josie join the others outside for the first time in weeks. They link arms with two older women who are struggling to stand. They don’t need to be told what to do; with a line forming in front of them they know which way to face. They can see some crude buildings in the distance, on the broad, flat plain. Another camp, thinks Cilka, surrounded by nothingness. But the sky here is different—an impossibly vast gray-blue. They trudge along with the flow of the others toward the faraway buildings. Cilka tries to count the number of carriages, some disgorging men, some women and children; people of all different ages, in varying states of ill health and distress. Some who’d been on the train since the beginning, some who’d been added along the way.
Time stands still for Cilka as she remembers lining up to go into theother place. That line led to an existence that bore no end date. This time she knows her end date, should she survive to see it. Fifteen years. Will having an end date make the labor more endurable? Is an end date even to be believed?
Before long, Cilka is standing in front of a large woman dressed in a thick khaki uniform. Her own clothing is still too light for this weather. They must be far north. She can barely feel her hands and feet.
“Imya, familya?”the woman barks at Cilka, scanning a list on a clipboard.Name.
“Cecilia Klein.”
Her name ticked off, Cilka follows the line into a large concrete bunker. Immediately she looks to the ceiling for the telltale signs of showers. Will it be water or gas? Her relief at not seeinganything threatening is palpable and she holds on to Josie to steady herself.
“Are you all right?” Josie asks.
“Yes, yes, I’m fine. I thought we might be going to have a shower.”
“I’d love a shower—it’s what we need.”
Cilka forces a small smile. There does not seem any point in explaining what she had feared. Looking at the bafflement on the faces around her, it dawns on her that few of them will have gone through something like this before. Only survivors from thatother place, or those from other camps, carry the burden of knowing what may be in store for them all.
As the room fills, several male guards enter.
“Clothes off. Now.”
Women look around for guidance. The words are whispered through the gathering in different languages, and they catch on as several slowly start removing their clothes.
Cilka whispers to Josie, “You have to take your clothes off.”
“No, Cilka, I can’t, not in front of men.”
It seems Josie had only had her head shaved in prison, not the full ordeal. Cilka knows that all the hair on their bodies will be shaved.
“Listen to me. You have to do as you’re told.”
Cilka starts undoing the buttons on the front of Josie’s dress. Josie pushes her hand away, confused, looking around at the other women in various stages of undress. The naked women hold their hands in front of their pubis and across their breasts. Slowly Josie begins to undress.
