Just then, the two deputy directors and the teachers’ immediate superiors, Lichtenstern and Miriam Edelstein, emerge from of Hirsch’s cubicle. Mrs. K?i?ková gives a satisfied smile at this display of authority and signals them to come over to her immediately.
“Look here, this is supposed to be a school, no matter how dirty it is. As deputy directors, you can’t allow our young people to read vulgar pulp novels like this. The worst blasphemies I’ve heard in my life are contained in this book.”
To emphasize her comments, she asks them to listen to an example of lack of respect for the church hierarchy and the foul things said about a priest and a minister of God:
He’s as drunk as a skunk. But he has the rank of captain. No matter what their rank, God has given all these military chaplains the gift of always being able to fill themselves with drink to the point of bursting. I was once with a priest called Katz who was almost prepared to sell his soul for a drink. As it was, he sold a sacred container and we drank every last cent he got for it; and if someone had given us a little something for the Church, we would have spent that on drink as well.
Mrs. K?i?ková slams the book shut when she realizes that Lichtenstern is making a huge effort to stop himself from laughing. Dita keeps an eye on the harm being done to the book’s pages, which are on the verge of coming away from the spine. K?i?ková asserts that this is a very serious matter and demands that the book be banned. She continues to wave the pages in the air and again questions what sort of values they are inculcating in their youth if they allow them to read such books.
Dita, tired of seeing her wave the book back and forth like a fly swatter, jumps up, plants herself in front of the teacher even though she is fifteen centimeters shorter, and asks her most politely, but with steel in her voice, if she would let her have the book for a moment “… please.” And she emphasizes the please so forcefully that it sounds as if she’s hitting the older woman over the head with it. The teacher, caught unawares, holds out the mistreated pages with an offended look.
Dita takes the book with care, adjusts the loose sheets, and reinserts the dangling pages. She takes her time, and the others, intrigued, watch how she smooths the sheets and mends the book as if she were dealing with a war wound. Her hands and gaze show so such respect and care for the old book that not even the indignant teacher dares say a word.
Eventually, when everything is back in its place, Dita carefully opens the book and addresses herself to the circumspect Lichtenstern and Miriam Edelstein, who has a neutral look on her face. She says that it’s true this book contains tales like the ones the teacher has read. But it also tells stories like the following one. And then it’s her turn to read:
The last resort for those who didn’t want to go to the front line was military prison. I met a teacher who, as a mathematician, didn’t want to go and shoot in an artillery regiment. He stole an officer’s watch so they’d put him in prison. It was entirely premeditated. War neither impressed nor fascinated him. He believed that shooting at the enemy, and firing projectiles and grenades to kill the math teachers on the other side who were just as unfortunate as him, was colossal stupidity, an act of brutality.
“These are some of the bad ideas this foolish book teaches: that war is stupid and bestial. Do you disagree with this, too?”
Silence.
Lichtenstern wishes he had a cigarette to put between his lips. He scratches his left ear to gain time, and finally decides to speak so he won’t have to pass judgment.
“Forgive me, but I have to go and see the medics urgently about a matter to do with the children’s visits.”
Too many women at the same time. Lichtenstern opts to remove himself, and quickly.
Without wishing to, Miriam Edelstein has become the referee in the battle over reading matter.
“What Edita just read seems very sensible to me. Moreover,” she adds looking straight at Mrs. K?i?ková, “we can’t say that this is a sacrilegious book that treats religion disrespectfully when all it says, in the end, is that some Catholic priests are drunkards. Nowhere is the scrupulous integrity of our rabbis questioned.”
The two women teachers, offended and angered by the sarcasm, turn around as they mutter who knows what complaints and reproaches. When they are a safe distance away, Miriam Edelstein whispers to Dita that she’d like to borrow the novel one afternoon when Dita has finished it.
17.
Dita spreads out her library for another morning. When she went to Hirsch’s cubicle, she found him sketching out tactics for his volleyball team, which is going head-to-head with another teacher’s team in an important game behind the hut this afternoon after lunch. Dita is not as cheerful as her boss; she has pins and needles in her legs after the lengthy morning head count.
“How’s it going, Edita? It’s a lovely morning—the sun’s going to come out for a while today, you’ll see.”
“My feet are killing me, thanks to these wretched head counts. They’re never ending. I hate them.”
“Edita, Edita … Blessed head count! Do you know why it takes so long?”
“Well…”
“Because we’re all still here. We haven’t lost a single child since September. Do you understand? More than five thousand people in the family camp have died from disease, starvation, or exhaustion since September.” Dita sadly nods her head. “But not a single child from Block Thirty-One! We’re succeeding, Edita. We’re doing it.”
Dita gives him a sad smile of victory. If only her father were there so she could tell him.
*
She unobtrusively moves the bench with the books a few meters, so she can follow Ota Keller’s classes more closely. Now that her father has gone, she has to keep up her studies on her own; Keller always has something interesting to say. She studies him—his thick woolen sweater and round face, which suggests he was probably a chubby little boy.
He’s talking to the children about volcanoes.
“Many meters underground, the Earth is on fire. Sometimes, the internal pressure creates cracks from which white-hot material rises to form volcanoes. This material is molten rock, which becomes a really hot sort of paste called lava. At the bottom of the sea, volcanic eruptions create lava cones, which end up forming islands. That’s how the islands of Hawaii, for example, were formed.”
Dita listens to the sounds of the lessons rising from the little groups; it’s like steam heating up the inhospitable stable in which they are located and converting it into a school. And she asks herself yet again why they are all still alive.
Why have they allowed five-year-olds to run around here? It’s the question they all ask themselves.
If Dita could place her metal bowl against the wall of the Lager officers’ mess hall and listen, she would have the answer she’s looked for so many times.