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to him longer than with the Grimatlichts. He
planned to go as far as he could from this area into
the swamps of Pinsk and there join a partisan
group. It would have been sheer madness for a
young woman to start out on such a long and
perilous journey. A few weeks later, I heard that
the murderers had caught him and shot him.
Later the peasants also told me that both
Grimatlichts had been captured and killed.
The little Jewish boy, Bartek, who worked
as a shepherd, went around freely in the open,
having enough to eat, because everyone already
thought of him as one of them. Everyone took care
of him and watched over him like a precious thing.
But one day, while he was grazing the cows in another
village, he came upon some Bulbovtsy
(Ukrainian Nationalists), who lied to him by saying
that they were true partisans. Little Bartek
believed them and told them the truth about being
a Jew. They took him into the woods and shot
him.
The daughter-in-law of Berger, another
Libivne Jew, met a fate no different from Bartek'sor
so the peasants told me.
I later heard about a Jewish woman by the
name of Perl who was staying with a gentile for
some time. She had some money and jewels and
paid the peasant to keep her hidden. No matter
how hard I tried to get in touch with her, I never
succeeded.
I thus spent another winter and another
summer under subhuman conditions. Another
winter was closing in. From various pieces of
talk that I overheard, I understood that the Germans
were losing on the Russian front. Also, the
partisans had stepped up their activities. But
just then, when a faint ray of hope had began to
show on my horizon, hope that I would somehow
pull through, I almost died from a danger
that arose suddenly.
I had stayed for some time in the house of an
old peasant who lived alone. Since he did not
know me, I had introduced myself to him as a
gentile girl from the next village, whose home had
been burned and whose husband had fallen on the
front. The old man accepted this story and invited
me to stay with him. My stay there was not too
bad, for I became his housekeeper. I milked his
THE STRUGGLE FOR LIFE 307
cows, cleaned the house, cooked for him, and ate
whatever I wanted.
One day two young Germans came to the
house. I did not manage to run away. Instinct
warned me I should not lose my nerve for a
second, or else all would be lost. And so I began
to play the role of a very old gentile woman,
pulled my dirty shawl low over my eyes, dirtied
my face with soot, and when called by the peasant,
I began to set the table, walking like an old
woman with a bent back, my hands shaking and
listened to their conversation.
They were saying that the peasant woman
was not as old as she pretended to be in her dirty
outfit. I immediately realized what I had to do; I
told the peasant that the cows had run into the
corn and would do much damage there and I had
to run and chase them out. No sooner said then
done! I ran quickly outside, for the hut was near
the woods and I hid there.
Later the peasant told me the Germans had
wanted to hit him to make him tell them what he
had done with his "daughter." Fearing the Germans
would return, I had to leave my new home,
the best one I had had since leaving the ghetto.
The process of wandering began anew for me.
After I got to a point where I could not bear the
bitter life and pangs of hunger began to torment
me, I decided to go back to Sidor, who had been
the first to rescue me. Even though it was quite
far from where I was, I knew well all the main
roads, backstreets, and small paths, so I gathered
my courage and finally reached his house. I no
sooner knocked on the door and called out to him
my name than he opened the door and took me
inside. Everyone was happy to see me, as if they
were greeting a long-awaited guest. Unfortunately
I could not stay long at Sidor's. A young Jewish
man was hidden there too, and he shocked me
so with his uncouth behavior that I had to leave
the next morning. Yet I would come to Sidor from
time to time to get some food.
Saving myself from great dangers and death
traps, I roamed the woods like a dog without its
master. Once I met a gentile girl from a village
who immediately recognized me. She hugged me
and kept on kissing me, she was so happy to see
me! But then she began to cry, seeing how piti-