Page 4 of Cilka's Journey

The girl sitting at Cilka’s legs, a bit younger than her and wearing a similar summer dress, shifts to standing and calls out, “What’s your name?”

“Ana,” the girl whimpers.

“Ana, I’m Josie. We will look after you,” she says, looking around the compartment. “Won’t we?”

The women murmur and nod their assent.

One of the women grasps the girl’s face between her hands and brings it toward her own.

“Have you not had a monthly bleed before?”

The girl shakes her head: no. The older woman clutches her to her breast, rocking her, soothing her. Cilka experiences a strange pang of longing.

“You’re not dying; you’re becoming a woman.”

Some of the women are already tearing pieces off their garments, ripping sections from the bottoms of their dresses, and passing them along to the woman caring for the girl.

The train jolts forward, dropping Josie to the floor. A small giggle escapes from her. Cilka can’t help but giggle too. They catch each other’s eye. Josie looks a bit like her friend Gita. Dark brows and lashes, a small, pretty mouth.

Many hours later, they stop again. Water and bread are thrown in. This time, the stop brings additional scrutiny and the young mother is forced to hand over her dead infant to the soldiers. She has to be restrained from trying to leave the compartment to be with her dead child. The slamming of the door brings her silence as she is helped into a corner to grieve her loss.

Cilka sees how closely Josie watches it all, with her hand against her mouth. “Josie, is it?” Cilka asks the girl who has been leaning against her since they first got on the train. She asks her in Polish, the language she has heard her using.

“Yes.” Josie slowly maneuvers her way around so they are knee to knee.

“I’m Cilka.”

Their conversation opener seems to embolden other women. Cilka hears others ask their neighbors their names, and soon the compartment is filled with whispered chatter. Languages are identified, and a shuffling takes place to put nationalities together. Stories are shared. One woman was accused of aiding the Nazis by allowing them to buy bread from her bakery in Poland. Another was arrested for translating German propaganda. Yet another was captured by the Nazis and, being caught with them, accused ofspying for them. Amazingly, there are bursts of laughter along with tears as each woman shares how she ended up in this predicament. Some of the women confirm the train will be going to a labor camp, but they don’t know where.

Josie tells Cilka that she is from Kraków, and that she’s sixteen years old. Cilka opens her mouth to share her own age and place of birth, but before she can, a woman nearby declares in a loud voice, “I know why she’s here.”

“Leave her alone,” comes from the strong older woman who’d suggested sharing the bread.

“But I saw her, dressed in a fur coat in the middle of winter while we were dying from the cold.”

Cilka remains silent. There’s a creeping heat in her neck. She lifts her head and stares at her accuser. A stare the woman cannot match. She vaguely recognizes her. Wasn’t she, too, one of the old-timers in Birkenau? Did she not have a warm and comfortable job in the administration building?

“And you, you who wants to accuse her,” says the older woman, “why are you here in this luxurious carriage with us going on a summer holiday?”

“Nothing, I did nothing,” comes the weak reply.

“We all did nothing,” Josie says strongly, defending her new friend.

Cilka clenches her jaw as she turns away from the woman.

She can feel Josie’s gentle, reassuring eyes on her face.

Cilka throws her a faint smile, before turning her head to the wall, closing her eyes, trying to block the sudden memory flooding in of Schwarzhuber—the officer in charge of Birkenau—standing over her in that small room, loosening his belt, the sounds of women weeping beyond the wall.

The next time the train stops, Cilka gets her ration of bread. Instinctively she eats half and tucks the rest into the top of her dress.She looks around, fearful someone might be watching and try to take it from her. She turns her face back to the wall, closing her eyes.

Somehow, she sleeps.

As she floats back awake, she is startled by Josie’s presence right in front of her. Josie reaches out and touches Cilka’s close-cropped hair. Cilka tries to resist the automatic urge to push her away.

“I love your hair,” the sad, tired voice says.

Relaxing, Cilka reaches up and touches the younger girl’s bluntly chopped hair.