"Quick, kinder," he whispered. "The storm cellar door at the back of the house. Through the fields, they won't see you leaving that way."
Chaim reached for Esther's hand and pulled her to the storm door.
Suddenly, he stopped, aware that her parents were not following them.
"Come," he whispered. "Hurry! There is no time."
Her father stood quietly in the dark, his arm around his wife's shoulder.
"We are not going," he said. "Better someone be here for them to find or they will begin searching the fields."
The din over their heads grew louder as the gun butts began to break through the door.
Chaim walked back to her father.
"Then we all stay and face them," he said calmly, picking a heavy stave up from the floor. "They will learn a Jew does not die so easily."
"Go," her father said quietly. "We gave our daughter in marriage. It is her safety that should be your first concern, not ours.
Your bravery is nothing but stupidity.
How else have Jews survived these thousand years except by running?"
"But- " Chaim protested.
"Go," the old man hissed. "Go quickly.
We are old, our lives are finished. You are young, your children should have their chance."
A few months later, they were in America.
But it was to be almost twenty years before the Lord God Jehovah relented and let her have a child.
Last, she prayed for her brother Bernard, who was a macher now and had a business in a faraway place called California, where it was summer all year round.
She prayed that he was safe and well and that he wasn't troubled by the Indians, like she saw in the movies when she used the pass he'd sent her.
Her prayers finished, she went back into the kitchen.
The soup was bubbling on the stove, its rich, heavy chicken aroma almost visible in the air.
She picked up a spoon and bent over the pot. Carefully she skimmed the heavy fat globules from the surface and put them in a jar.
Later, when the fat was cold and had congealed, it could be spread on bread or mixed with chopped dry meats to give them flavor.
While she was bent like this over the stove, she heard the front door open. From the footsteps, she knew who it was.
"That you, Duvidele?"
"Yes, Mama."
Her task finished, she put down the spoon and turned around slowly.
As always, her heart leaped with pride as she saw her son, so straight and tall, standing there.
"Papa went to shul," David said. "He'll be home at seven o'clock."
She smiled at him.
"Good," she said.
"So wash your hands and clean up. Supper is ready."
3.
When David turned the horse into the little alley that led to the back of Shocky's garage, Needlenose came hurrying up.
"Is that you, David?"
"Who did yuh think it would be?" David retorted sarcastically.
"Geez, we didn't know whether you'd show up or not.
It's almost ten o'clock."
"I couldn't sneak out until my old man went to sleep," David said, stopping the wagon at the side of the garage.
A moment later, Shocky came out, his bald head shining in the dim light.
He was of medium height, with a heavy barrel chest and long tapering arms that reached almost to his knees.
"You took long enough gettin' here," he grumbled.
"I’m here, ain't I?"
Shocky didn't answer. He turned to Needlenose.
"Start loading the cans," he said. "He can help you."
David climbed down from the wagon and followed Shocky into the garage.
The long row of metal cans gleamed dully in the light from the single electric bulb hanging high in the ceiling.
David stopped and whistled.
"There must be forty cans there."
"So he can count," Shocky said.