Page 122 of Cilka's Journey

Elena nods at her. “Go on, Cilka.”

No one else speaks.

“I had my own room in the block. A block where they would put the”—she struggles to say the words—“sick and the dying women, before they would take them to the gas chambers to murder them.”

The women have their hands over their mouths, unbelieving.

“The SS officers, they put me there, in that block, because there were no witnesses.”

Silence. Complete silence.

Cilka swallows again, feeling light, dizzy.

Anastasia starts to cry, audibly.

“I know that sound, Anastasia; it is so familiar to me,” Cilka says. “I used to get angry. I don’t know why that emotion. But they were all just so helpless. I wasn’t able to cry. I had no tears. And this is why I have not been able to tell you all. I had a bed, I had food. And they were naked and dying.”

“How… how long were you there?” Elena asks.

“Three years.”

Margarethe comes to sit near Cilka and holds out a hand. “None of us know what we would have done. Did those bastards kill your family?”

“I put my mother on the death cart myself.”

Margarethe forcefully takes Cilka’s hand. “The memory is giving you a shock. I can tell by your voice. And you’re shaking. Elena, make a cup of tea.”

Elena jumps up and goes to the stove.

The rest of the women remain quiet. But Cilka is now too numb to think about how her words have been received. There’s an exhaustion taking over her.

Such a small space of time has passed, but the words have been so large.

When Elena returns with the tea, she says, “Hannah knew, didn’t she?”

Cilka nods.

Margarethe says, “I hope this isn’t more of a shock, Cilka, but many of us had guessed that you had been there. You being Jewish, not talking about your arrest.”

Cilka begins shaking again. “Really?”

“Yes, and things you would say here and there.”

“Oh…”

“You survived it, Cilka,” Elena says. “And you will survive here too.”

Anastasia, the youngest, still has her hand over her mouth,silent tears falling down her cheeks. But none of them has reacted as Cilka had always played over in her mind, had always feared. They are still beside her.

And so maybe she can tell Alexandr, too. Maybe he can know her, and still love her.

“I’d better go,” Cilka says.

Elena stands with her. “Come back again, if you can.”

Cilka lets Elena put her arms around her. And Margarethe. Anastasia still seems too shocked.

Cilka goes out into the night, dizzy and trembling.