There were a number of book written about
Colette and some also by her. The books discuss her
family history, her life, therapy techniques and stories. One is "“Conch of Secrets”
- a fascinating book written by Tamar Bergmman in Jerusalem.. It is available in Hebrew and can probably be
obtained via Steimatzky bookstores. Tamar and her translation agent, "In
Kindly note that this material is copyrighted and is posted here solely to provide a glimpse into Tamar's work and Colette' life.
The material is posted in support of the "Conch of Secrets Project"
Click HERE for project description
Project results will be posted on
www.geocities.com/conchofsecrets.project
An excerpt from the youth novel "A Conch of Secrets" by Tamar Bergman
Translated by Eddie Levenston
English translation Copyright © Tamar Bergman
Published by arrangement with the Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature
www.ithl.org.il
The material or parts of it may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission from the agent, who may be contacted as shown above.
Conch of
Secrets
by
Tamar Bergman
Based
on the memoirs of Colette Aboulker-Muscat
Translated by Eddie Levenston March 1999
Copyright
© Tamar Bergman
published without the author’s written permission. Her eMail address is:
Grandma calls me Tali, just like everyone
else, and I call her Grandma, though actually she’s Father’s grandmother.
Everyone else calls her Colette.
You won’t believe this, but all my friends
are jealous of me for having such a great-grandmother: every time I come back
from a visit to her I have a new story to tell them. Grandma Colette has an
inexhaustible fund of stories, she’s like a conjurer... she opens her mouth
and out pops another ball, and another, and another...
I once asked her:
“Grandma, where do all your stories come
from?”
Father’s grandmother smiled and answered:
“From my childhood!”
“But all grown-ups had a childhood”, I
said, “yet they don’t all have stories like yours.”
Grandma shrugged her shoulders:
“Maybe it’s because it all happened so
many years ago, at the beginning of the century. I was born and grew up in the
city of
“Perhaps”, I said, “but I think it’s
not only because of what you say, but how you tell it...”
It’s because when I was a child, they
sealed my mouth with sticking plaster”, she told me, “they only took it off
for meals and at night, before I went to sleep. I learnt to tell myself
innumerable stories in my mind...”
“They sealed your mouth with sticking
plaster? Who did?”
“My father.”
“You had such a wicked father?”
Grandma laughed:
“No, I had a very good father. He was a
well-known doctor, a nose-throat-and-ear specialist. When I was a little girl of
four or five he discovered that I had a problem with my vocal cords. He was
afraid that if I spoke I might lose my voice. But how can you keep a little girl
quiet when she has so much to say? I was a girl who always wanted to be at the
center of attention, and since we were a large family and I had lots and lots of
cousins, boys and girls, and they all had something to say, I often had to shout
in order to make myself heard. Father explained that closing my mouth for a
while was good for me. He and my mother sang beautifully and I wanted to sing
like them when I grew up, so I accepted with love the need to close my mouth”.
“Wasn’t it hard for you to keep
quiet?” I asked, seeing in my mind’s eye a little girl with sad eyes and a
large piece of sticking plaster over her mouth.
“Hard to keep quiet? Actually, as it
turned out, it wasn’t at all hard,” Grandma answered, “there were even
advantages!”
“Advantages?”
“Yes, my big cousins used to tell me their
secrets, since they knew I wouldn’t tell anybody; some of them whispered
secrets in my ear as though it were a conch that always remains silent, and
others were all mixed up, they thought that if I couldn’t speak I couldn’t
hear either, and they spoke freely among themselves about the most secret
things... I was their conch of secrets!” Grandma laughed.
I love Grandma’s laugh. Sometimes she
laughs like a young girl, doubled up with joy, and then I forget her wrinkles
and her white hair and for a moment I seem to be with a friend of my own age.
“But what about the sticking plaster?” I
asked, “didn’t it hurt when they pulled it off?”
“When Mother did it, it hardly hurt at
all”, Grandma told me, “but often she was busy; I had two younger sisters,
and the youngest was still a baby. We had a young servant girl living with us at
the time, she was born and grew up in the
“It doesn’t sound at all like a happy
childhood to me”, I said, “I think it must have been really hard.”
“Hard? Never! I always accepted things as
they occurred, simply, and whenever I was faced with a new problem I tried to
find the quickest, easiest solution.”
“For instance?”
“For instance... the biggest adventure of
my childhood began when I found a simple solution for a problem that had
bothered me since I was small, hardly five years old.”
“Tell me about it, Grandma!” I said, and
sat down on the carpet at her feet.
“It’s a long story”, said Grandma and
smiled. I knew I wouldn’t have to press her much,
“Just the beginning, then!”
Okay. It happened one day when I was playing
in the garden of my grandmother, my father’s mother. Behind a large
bougainvilleia bush I found an ants’ nest and I lingered there with bated
breath watching some of them leaving the nest and some of them coming back and
being swallowed up in it, dragging behind them grains far bigger than their tiny
bodies. Mother and Grandma were chatting on the verandah. A cool wind was rising
from the
- ... I only became a mother with the
second...
What does she mean? - I wondered, - after
all, I’m the firstborn. In that case, Mother is saying that she’s not my
mother...
That night I found it hard to fall asleep:
if Mother is not my mother. then who is? I couldn’t ask, since I was
forbidden to speak. I did know how to write already- with mistakes, of course,
but they could have under- stood me- yet somehow it was clear to me that nobody
would take my question seriously.
When I grew up I came to realize that there
are many children who sometimes wonder whether their parents really are their
parents. When Father tells you off for something you’ve done or haven’t
done, there’s nothing easier than to daydream that actually you are the
daughter of a king, a princess who was kidnapped from the palace and placed in
the hands of these people who call themselves your parents.... only many years
later, after I had given birth to children of my own, did I understand what
Mother had meant: she had been young, not yet eighteen when I was born, and not
ready for motherhood. Two years later, when my sister was born, my mother knew
how to take care of a baby. But as a child I didn’t understand this.
I lay in bed and wondered: who is my real
mother? Suddenly I had an idea: my aunt who lives in
Grandma fell silent. She gazed above my
head, as though she could see there things that happened many years ago. For a
few moments I too kept quiet, in order not to prevent her remembering. I thought
about my sister Danielle, whom I love, though sometimes I wish she would go far
away and I would have Mother and Father all to myself. In the end I couldn’t
restrain myself - I was afraid Grandma would interrupt her story at the most
exciting point, and that is something I really, really hate.
“Is that all for today?” I asked.
I saw her gaze return to me as though she
were coming back from far away. She chuckled:
“That was all for that day, but I told
you- that was only the beginning.
When I woke up the next morning, I had no
doubt what I had to do. After breakfast Mother closed my mouth with sticking
plaster and went off to feed my little sister. The servant girl was looking
after my middle sister, Father had left for work and since it was the Passover
holiday I wasn’t taken to the kindergarten. I was left alone in my room, free
and independent. There was no one to watch over me, no one to see how I climbed
onto the stool, took my lovely fur coat, that I had received as a present from
my grandmother, off the hanger and put it on. And no one heard the front door
open and shut behind me.
The railway station in Algiers was at the
foot of the hill on which our house stood. I went down the familiar, wide stone
steps to the station entrance. I was not yet five years old but I already knew
how to read. I crossed the platforms and read the signs slowly and carefully
until I found the train that was leaving for Oran. It was standing in exactly
the same place as the train that Mother and I had traveled on half a year ago to
bring New Year greetings to my aunts and my grandmother. Then Mother had helped
me to climb up into the carriage; now I was on my own and it proved no easy
matter for a little girl... the first step was quite high. I tried again and
again without success. Suddenly I felt someone lift me from behind and place me
in the entrance to the carriage. I turned round and saw a tall man with a bald
head and a large moustache smiling at me from the platform. I wanted to thank
him but I couldn’t because of the sticking plaster that sealed my mouth. I
tried to smile at him with my eyes but he didn’t notice my smile, he had
already turned round to help his own children climb up and finally to support
his wife who had climbed up with a baby in her arms. By the time he had managed
to load on their many bags and parcels that were standing on the platform, his
children had pushed past me and taken their seats in the carriage. I followed
them and sat down on the other side of the corridor, next to the family that had
got on before me.
The train hooted and started on its way. The
carriage jolted faster and faster and before long the passengers had found
places for themselves and all their baggage, like peas falling into place, side
by side in a narrow container after you shake it.
I was not afraid of the ticket inspector:
little girls of my age traveled free of charge. I sat at the end by the
corridor, hoping all the time that the large woman sitting next to me and
keeping an eye on her children would not push me off the bench. I looked up at
her. I could see how she was staring at the man who had helped me get on, and
his wife. I realized that she was angry. The woman with the baby returned a
similar look. Neither of them spoke but I felt as though there was a sword fight
going on above my head. Suddenly I understood: each of the women thought I was
the daughter of the other, and each of them must have been thinking:
- What a cruel mother, shutting her
daughter’s mouth with sticking plaster....
The children were chattering and sometimes
teasing each other, all the time peering at me curiously and avoiding catching
my eye. As though I suffered from some defect, both intriguing and alarming.
Maybe they were thinking:
- What terrible thing did she do, that
little girl, to be punished like that...
Nobody asked any questions. In fact, the
grownups on the train spoke very little - there were pictures hanging on the
walls of the carriage showing the face of a man with his finger to his lips,
advising us to keep quiet: there was a war on, the First World War. It was all
taking place on the continent of Europe, but Algeria, which is in North Africa,
was then part of France and all the young men had been called up and had gone
off to fight. The man in the picture was warning us:
- Keep your mouths shut! Don’t reveal any
secrets - the enemy is listening!
I shrugged my shoulders. What did it have to
do with me? I couldn’t even reveal the secrets of my cousins because my mouth
was sealed. I turned and looked towards the window. There were children standing
in front of it, hiding the view. Never mind, I knew exactly what they could see:
the sea and vineyards and in the distance mountains, the Atlas Mountains. Even
with my eyes shut I could see the way. Sea, vineyards, mountains, sea vineyards,
mountains...
Suddenly, in my sleep, I heard paper
rustling. A cork popped out of a bottle, cups clattered. I opened my eyes. Large
baskets of food had been opened - apparently it was lunchtime. I saw the two
women exchanging glances - how is the little girl going to eat? When they saw
that nobody was paying any attention to me, they seem to have understood: not
hers and not hers - a little girl on her own... for a moment they raised their
eyebrows in astonishment and straightaway forgot me, started sharing out among
their own families the food that filled their bags. Only the man with the bald
head and the moustache, who had taken the baby in his arms, gave me a smile and
offered me a roll.
Again I tried to smile with my eyes and held
up my hand towards him in a gesture of “No, thank you!”, only Mother can
take off the sticking plaster, and anyone else she allows to, of course....
Imagine what I looked like: a little girl,
alone, her mouth sealed with sticking plaster, her little feet dangling far
above the carriage floor, trying not to let the fat woman push her off the
seat...
I could cope with the hunger, I was used to
not eating between meals, but something else was beginning to trouble me. The
night before, when I was thinking about the journey, I imagined myself at the
beginning- at home and at the railway station - and at the end, in the arms of
my aunt Celeste. But on the way... there were other things on the way... like
the need to go to the toilet. On previous journeys it was Mother who took me
there. But now? I crossed my legs. I tried to control myself. No, I
couldn’t...
I got down from the bench and started to
move along the corridor, trying to step over the bags and parcels that blocked
my way. The toilet compartment was in the next carriage. I would have to cross
the wobbly metal floor that separated the two carriages. I stood there
hesitating. In those days there was a space between the railway carriages.
Anyone who wanted to pass from one carriage to another had to hold on to the
cables that stretched between the two sides of the crossing, and fight a strong
wind. I was a little girl, weighing very little- I had no doubt that if I took
one step forward the wind would grab me and take me far, far away...
I stood a long while at the end of the
carriage. I was afraid that soon “I would lose it”, but I was too shy to ask
one of the grownups to take me to the toilet... in the end, I gave up. With
difficulty I got back to my place, squeezed in next to the hips of the large
woman and pressed my knees together...
I don’t remember how the rest of the
journey passed. An endless amount of time went by until we reached Oran. The man
with the bald head and the moustache helped me down from the carriage, took me
to the stationmaster, entrusted me to his care and disappeared.
The stationmaster looked across his desk at
me. Presumably he had no idea what to do with this piece of lost property that
had been brought to his room. He studied me quietly and from the expression on
his face it was hard to know whether he thought I was a prince or a frog... the
fur coat indicated that I came from a good family, but how could he find out my
name or my parents’ name when my mouth was sealed? I went up to his desk,
stood on tiptoe, took the pencil that was lying there and wrote on one of the
pieces of paper: “Jules Harbourger”.
That was the name of my uncle, Aunt
Celeste’s husband. I may have spelt it wrong- how much can you expect of a
five-year old? - but I added the address. I remembered it.
I saw the man hold back a cry of
astonishment. He looked up the telephone number and rang my uncle.
When I heard my uncle’s voice in the
doorway I knew I had arrived home. He embraced me warmly and must have thanked
the stationmaster before he lifted me into his carriage, but I was almost
petrified by now and didn’t hear a thing. When we finally arrived home, Aunt
Celeste’s embrace, that I had dreamed about so much, even her greeting- “my
little darling” - was almost torture... I ran to the toilet and shut the door
behind me.
For a long time I sat on the lavatory seat,
but remained frozen, as though everything was locked up inside me. In the end I
despaired and got up to wash my hands and face. Suddenly the tears burst
through, I couldn’t stop them. All the tension and fear, the feeling of
loneliness and longing for Mother and Father, it all poured forth in a flood of
weeping. I sobbed a long time, everything was released simultaneously, yes, the
pee as well, that too began to flow, at last I felt warm at heart, I felt good.
Crying became sweet, and when I came out of the bathroom once again I was the
little girl that everybody knew.
I heard Uncle Jules talking to my mother on
he telephone and only then did I understand what I had done to my parents: they
thought they had lost me! Gypsies had kidnapped Mother when she was a baby girl
and only by a miracle was she found safe and sound - she must have gone out of
her mind this morning when she discovered I had disappeared...
- Can you imagine? - my uncle said to Mother
- she traveled all the way by herself... buut here she is, the young lady... we
took off the sticking plaster, of course, she can speak for herself.
He handed me the telephone receiver.
Mother’s voice brought back the flood of tears to my eyes. How could I have
done such a thing to her? And Father...
- Today of all days, when I received a
call-up notice, you chose to run away - he said to me. I was unable to reply.
How could I have forgotten? He had told me, the Army needed doctors at the
Front, and soon his turn would come!
- Since you have presented us with a fait accompli and reached your Aunt Celeste - Father told me in a
grave voice - stay there till I come back home. But remember - you mustn’t
speak! When I get back from the War, I’ll examine your vocal cords and see
whether we can do without the sticking plaster. I rely on you to be a good
little girl and not to tease your cousins...
- Father! - I finally burst out - when will
you come back?
- Soon- he replied, - I think the War will last just a few weeks and by the beginning of the summer we shall be together again at home!
“Grandma”, I asked, “did the war last
just a short time, like your father said?”
I remembered how much I used to long for
Father whenever he did reserve duty. Some times he would be away for a whole
month, and that was terrible. Okay, sometimes he came home on leave, but then he
was so tired that he slept most of the time, and even when he woke up he
wasn’t really with us, as though all the time his head was somewhere else.
“Unfortunately, my father was wrong”,
said Father’s grandmother, “the First World War lasted four years, and
that’s a very long time. My father hardly ever came home, because he was a
surgeon and they needed him at the Front. He was wounded several times and each
time he went back to work, even when he had to spend some time in a wheelchair.
Whenever Mother couldn’t bear being parted from him any longer, she would go
off to join him.”
“And did you stay with your Aunt Celeste
all the time?”
“Yes. All the time the war went on. It was
hard for Mother to bring up my two younger sisters with Father at the Front...
but three times she took me with her, from Algeria to France, to visit
Father.”
“Wasn’t that dangerous?” I asked,
“there was a war on!”
I know now that it was dangerous, but at the
time I was not afraid. I thought Mother knew exactly what she was doing, and she
would always know how to solve any problems. Before the first journey her own
mother, my grandmother from Oran, pressed her not to go but Mother’s longing
for Father overcame the logic in what Grandma was saying. Mother came from
Algiers to collect me and board the ship that was waiting to sail for France.
The night before departure we awoke to the
sound of deafening thunder. I looked at the window: the sky was aflame, as
though somewhere a huge fire was burning.
Grandma came into our room.
- The Germans are bombing the harbor - she
said gravely - Get up! Come up on the roof!
Grandma insisted that we get up and see what
was happening in the harbor at the foot of the hill.
- Do you see where you’re going? - she
said to my mother, - where you’re taking the little one? How can you set sail
when they are sinking ships even in the harbor?
Mother remained silent. I knew that nothing
would change her mind. I was happy that she didn’t give in, because I wanted
to go to Father.
I stood looking all the way down, at the
harbor bright with flames. It was an amazing sight: the port was as bright as
daylight and from time to time, when the fire reached an ammunition shed,
flowers of flame would rise in the air and spread in all directions, like
fireworks. I knew that this was something terrible, that many people were being
injured down there in the burning harbour. I prayed for them, but above all I
prayed that “our” ship would not be damaged and we would be able to set
sail..
“And did it really remain undamaged?”
“Not exactly, but it was the only ship
that wasn’t destroyed in the bombardment, and it was possible to repair some
of the damage and set sail. A day or two later some British warships arrived in
the harbor. They had traveled in convoy from the Indian Ocean through the Suez
Canal, bringing Gurkhas to the front in France. We boarded “our” ship and
set sail for France, escorted by ships of the British navy.”
“Grandma”, I asked, “what are ‘Gurkhas’?”
“They are soldiers from the north of India
and Nepal. They were dark-skinned and reckoned among the bravest and most daring
soldiers in the British Empire”.
“And did they look after you, Grandma?”
Grandma laughed:
“Yes, they all looked after me, but I also
looked after them...”
“How could a little girl look after
soldiers?”
“Very simple: the biggest danger lurking
in the sea was the German submarines. But in those days there weren’t any
sophisticated instruments that could detect a submarine approaching under water.
On the other hand, neither did a submarine have any means of detecting a ship
when it was in the depths of the sea - it had to rise close to the surface of
the water and raise an instrument called a periscope that could look above the
waves and spot the ship. Only then could the submarine launch its torpedoes and
try to sink the vessel”.
“So what could you do?”
I had very good eyesight, but I was small -
just a little five-year old. The sailors found a solution: every time a
different sailor would hoist me onto his shoulders. I would scan the waves in
all directions. It’s true, they didn’t rely just on me: there was always a
sailor sitting at the top of the mast, searching the sea with binoculars. When I
was older I understood that actually they were having fun with me, but I took my
duties seriously.
On the morning of the second day after we
set sail, I was sitting on the shoulders of one of the sailors and suddenly I
noticed something strange poking out of the sea, halfway between our ship and
one of the escort vessels. It didn’t look like a dolphin leaping above the
waves and plunging back into them, but a pipe, rising slowly out of the water,
revolving and staying in the same place, as though looking at us. I choked with
excitement. I wanted to shout - but my mouth was sealed with sticking plaster. I
tapped the head of the sailor and pointed to the strange pipe.
The sailor cried:
- Submarine!
Immediately all was bustling on deck. The
sailors ran to take up their firing positions on the guns. The boat nearest to
us fired a salvo of shells at the pipe. Suddenly a patch of oil began to spread
on the surface of the water, growing quickly larger.
- A hit! - the sailors shouted in
excitement, - a bull’s eye!
Sailors on the escort vessels waved to me
and shouted:
- Bravo!
When we reached the port of Marseilles,
Mother and I disembarked and went to the hotel. Just as we were about to lie
down and rest after the journey, we heard the distant sound of drums. Soon it
was joined by the music of Scottish bagpipes coming nearer and nearer. Mother
said it was the Gurkhas, who had disembarked and were marching through the
streets of the city on their way to the railway station. She thought it fitting
that we pay our respects to these soldiers on their way to the front, so we got
dressed again and went down to the street to watch the parade.
There was a large crowd standing on the
pavement and preventing me from seeing anything. Mother was peering over the
shoulders of the people, but I didn’t ask her to lift me up so that I could
see as well, because I knew she was tired from the journey. The hotel proprietor
was standing next to us. He was almost a member of the family, because whenever
we came to Marseilles we always stayed at his hotel. I tugged at his arm and he
understood: immediately he swung me up onto his shoulders.
I was totally dazzled: sparks were flashing
and dimming, flames were dancing. It seems the Gurkha were marching on parade in
their best uniforms, wearing white turbans studded with precious stones -
rubies, emeralds and sapphires. The gems sparkled in the sun, shining and
flashing in a riot of colors. They were tall and handsome, these dark-skinned
warriors, looking to me like creatures from another world.
Suddenly one of the marching men caught
sight of me. He quickly broke ranks, made his way towards us and when he reached
me took me by the hips and swung me off the shoulders of the hotel proprietor. I
found myself carried from shoulder to shoulder, and each soldier proclaimed -
Our lucky charm! She’s our lucky charm! - and passed me on to the next man.
I felt myself hovering on the wings of
angels of light, sailing through sparks and colored flames, moving on and on, to
the head of the parade...
Mother was running along the sidewalk,
behind the wall of people watching the parade, trying to break her way through
to the soldiers, signaling to them, imploring them to return me to her arms, but
only when they reached the railway station did they put me down on the ground.
Mother was standing there, pale, gasping, unable to say a word.
- Mother! - I said to her, my eyes glowing -
the angels carried me on their wings!
But Mother just gave me that look that I
knew so well:
There she goes, letting her imagination run
away with her....
“Grandma”, I said, “how come they let
a woman and her small child get near the Front?”
Grandma smiled:
“That’s a good question, Tali. They not
only didn’t give civilians permission to come any- where near Dunkerque, they
evacuated all the women and children who were there. The First World War
lasted four years and most of the time the two sides occupied trenches and tried
to conquer a section of the enemy territory. When the Germans saw that they were
nowhere near a decisive breakthrough, they exploited the winds blowing across
the front and sent poison gas against the soldiers facing them. But winds change
direction from time to time, and the whole area was tainted with mustard gas. A
dangerous yellow mist, with a terrible smell, hung over the towns and villages
of Normandy, in western France, that’s why they evacuated the civilian
population”.
Suddenly I felt something cold creeping
across my back. I recognize the feeling- it’s the fear that comes every time I
remember the days when I sat with Mom and Dad and Danielle in the sealed room
with gas-masks on our faces, and not far away, in Ramat Gan, missiles fell and
destroyed houses. Afterwards Mom said we were lucky that in that war, the Gulf
War, there were not more casualties. I thought it needed a lot of courage and
much love to go and visit someone in an area where there was a danger of poison
gas.
“So how did your mother get there, and
with a little girl too?” I asked.
“Mother was pretty, really lovely, and
when she asked for something, no one could resist her charm. Besides, Mother
claimed that she had to look after Father, otherwise he would be unable to look
after anyone else. So when there was a respite from the use of that horrible
gas, we received permission and went to Dunkerque.”
“Was the city really empty?”
“There were no children there. And no
women, apart from one old lady, so old that they didn’t insist on evacuating
her against her will. Mother rented two rooms in this old lady’s house. We
stayed there on each of our three visits to Father, and that’s where the
adventure of the second visit took place.”
“Adventure?” I asked, “a real
adventure?”
Grandma chuckled:
“Really real,
The house of Madame Briand- that was the old
lady’s name - was on the outskirts of the city. She had a small garden,
surrounded by a fence, and beyond it sand dunes stretched all the way to the
cliffs by the shore of the Channel....
“The channel? What channel?”
The English Channel, or
“A horse fell at the Front? You’re
kidding me, Grandma...”
“No, not at all!”
At the beginning of the War Father rode his
horse across the battlefield, looking for wounded soldiers and treating them.
Once, when he had dismounted to examine a soldier who was groaning in one of the
trenches, a shell fell not far away and killed the horse there and then. It was
hit by shrapnel and Father, who was lying down behind it, was saved. Father had
received the horse that I knew a short while before we arrived in Dunkerque. The
German prisoner-of-war used to put me on Trusty’s back and walk me round the
garden several times until Madame Briand called him to do something or other. I
would stay next to the horse, in the stable, feeding him cubes of sugar. Trusty
would puff hot vapor over the palm of my hand, looking at me with large, moist
eyes, as though he were grateful.
Madame Briand was Roman Catholic. She was
very pious, and it never entered her mind that the well-known doctor who ran the
military hospital, his wife and his little girl were Jewish! Presumably, if she
had known, things would have turned out differently....
One day when Mother was helping Father in
the hospital and I had stayed at home, the old lady beckoned to me with her
finger to draw near. I went up to her wheelchair, expecting her to ask me for
her prayer-book or a glass of water, as she usually did. But Madame Briand
looked at me with her tiny, screwed up eyes and suddenly whispered in my ear:
- He has arrived. He is here!
I
stared at her, understanding nothing: who is here?
- Satan! - she whispered, concealing her
mouth with her fingers, lest any stranger should hear, - when the town became
empty and there was no one to pray in the churches, he returned and conquered
the world...!
I gazed at the thin, wrinkled face of Madame
Briand, at the mole quivering on her chin, and suddenly I realized she was
terrified, actually quaking with fear. I laid my hand on her cold arm and waited
for the trembling to go away.
- I prayed. - she went on, - I tried all the
spells, but nothing helped. He goes round and round the house, day and night,
looking for a way to break in and carry me off...
She fell silent and scrutinized my face.
- Are you ready to help me drive Satan away?
- she asked suddenly.I nodded my head in aggreement. Why not? Mother and Father
always told me I had to help anyone who turned to me for help. If there was any
chance I could drive away Satan and bring some peace to Madame Briand, why not
try?
She beckoned to me to place my ear next to
her mouth.
- Only a little girl like you, pure and
innocent, can tempt him. That’s what it says in the books. Go beyond the
fence, he’ll see you and try to catch you. Then run away without looking back:
remember, you mustn’t look back. Otherwise, he’ll catch you immediately. And
he’ll be running just behind you...
- But where to? - I wondered, - How will it
end?
- Run to the sea! - whispered Madame Briand,
- you’ll tempt him to jump into the water. Satan will perish in salt water-
all the devils melt in the sea- and the world will be saved!
I stood up. I patted Madame Briand on the
back of the hand as a sign that I had understood and she shouldn’t worry - and
went outside.
There was no one beyond the fence. A light
breeze was blowing, the sand dunes stretched in front of me, empty and desolate.
Suddenly the wind changed direction and the
hair on my head stood on end: I felt something or someone standing behind me and
breathing down my neck - Satan!
Straightway I picked up my feet and started
to run. I ran towards the sea and the “thing” was hard on my heels. I ran
with all my might. I climbed up one dune, a second, a third, and felt my
strength was running out. The wind changed direction and blew in my face, from
the sea, almost thrusting me backwards, into his arms ... I threw myself down
and rolled to the bottom of the dune. When I got to my feet, I wanted to turn
round and see if “he” was still there, but I remembered what Madame Briand
had said and didn’t turn my head. Even if I had wanted to, I couldn’t have
managed, he was pressing close on my heels, very near and fast. I broke clear
and ran towards the cliff above the sea.
I knew the place: it was a sheer cliff, high
above the deep water. Down below the waves roared and broke against the rocks.
- What will happen? - I thought- if I stop,
“he” will catch me and conquer everything: first he’ll seize Madame Briand
in her little house, then Mother and Father and after them the whole world...
and if I jump... he’ll jump after me and perish. But what about me? What will
happen to me?
I had known how to swim since I was very
young. But in such stormy waves?
I was already close to the cliff. I
hesitated. I slowed down. Suddenly I felt a hand grasping my dress, pulling me
back. I gave a great cry, sprang forward and jumped off the cliff.
The water hit me at once, cold and dark.
I sank to the bottom, down and down. At last
I came up again. It was terribly cold, the ocean water. I began to strike out
with my arms and legs, swimming away from the cliff. I remembered that on the
other side there was a small bay- but how could I get there? I swam and swam
until I lost consciousness. I don’t remember any more...
Something warm was blowing on my face. I
opened my eyes: a horse! There was a horse standing next to me, leaning his head
towards me, taking in my smell: Trusty! I tried to raise my hand and stroke him,
but my hand wouldn’t respond: I was frozen stiff. I gathered all my strength
and rolled over on my stomach, in an effort to stand up, but I remained lying,
petrified.
Trusty stood there for a moment, as though
making up his mind. Suddenly he took the belt of my dress in his teeth, lifted
me off the ground and swung me up towards his back. With frozen fingers I
grabbed his mane, got one leg over his back and lay on the horse, clutching his
warm neck.
It was Trusty who brought me back home.
As I slipped off the back of the horse down
to the ground, my strength began to return. I went indoors. Madame Briand
indicated that I should approach her. She felt my wet clothes, smelt the sea and
her face glowed with joy.
She kissed me warmly on both cheeks, made
the sign of the cross repeatedly and began to offer prayers of thanksgiving with
deep emotion. She suddenly stopped, looked sideways at me, turning her head like
a suspicious bird and whispered:
- This has to remain a secret between you
and me!...
I nodded. As you know, in those days I had
no trouble keeping secrets.
Grandma fell silent. She looked at me with a
smile and a mischievous glint in her eye, “You were very grave, Grandma,” I
said, “not every child would have done what you did!”
“Brave? I didn’t think so then...”
Grandma told me, “as always I did what was expected of me... But the important
thing is... I stayed healthy. Imagine- I didn’t even catch cold...!”
Today I was late getting to Father’s
grandmother.
“I had lots of English homework,” I told
her as I came into her room, “I just can’t cope with that awful
language...!”
“Foreign languages are important, Tal!”
she said, “sometimes they can even save lives!”
“Save lives?” I asked, “do you know
anybody whose life was saved because he knew another language?”
“Yes,” Grandma said to me with a secret
kind of smile, “it happened to a little girl aged six who was traveling to see
her father at the Front, during the First World War...”
“That was you!” I cried, “Grandma, do
you have another story for me?”
Grandma laughed:
“I have lots of stories, but this is the
third and last adventure from my journeys to see my father, because this was the
last visit.”
“What was the language that saved your
life?”
“German. I told you that during the War I
stayed in the home of my Aunt Celeste, in Oran. My two cousins had a German
governess who spoke hardly any French. Her task was to teach them German and I
also picked it up, just by listening.”
“And how did German save your life?”
It’s a long story. It begins in 1915, at
the railway station in Orleans, in France. I was sitting in this big, empty
station, curled up in the white fur coat that my grandmother had given me. I was
wearing long, warm stockings and my glossy black shoes which were dangling in
the air as always, whenever I sat on a bench for grownups.
My mouth was still sealed with sticking
plaster. I was sitting there waiting for my mother. She had gone to the
stationmaster’s office. I knew she was trying to persuade him to let her board
a military train. I was sure the stationmaster would be unable to refuse my
mother, she was so pretty and so wise, but the station was completely empty.
Civilians had been evacuated from the town and the huge station was cold and
deserted.
Suddenly I heard the clatter of wheels. I
turned my head and saw an engine entering the station, a beautiful, polished
engine, not like those which took soldiers to the Front. It was pulling one
carriage, just one, that looked as though it was from a fairy tale: painted
white, with gold ornamentation, and muslin curtains white as snow hanging in the
windows.
There was a screech of brakes from the
entrance to the station. A body of men passed through the great gate and marched
straight towards the carriage. At their head strode a tall man with a blond
beard, dressed in smart well-pressed clothes, wearing a peaked cap. I had no
doubt that he was the most important member of the group.
I could see that the front of the engine was
pointing in the direction we wished to travel, to Dunkerque. I didn’t think a
moment longer. I tore the sticking plaster off my mouth, jumped off the bench
and ran towards the tall man. I caught up, ran in front of him and stood between
him and the carriage, just as he was about to climb the white steps that had
been placed there for him.
- You can’t leave without us! - I shouted
and looked him straight in the eye. His eyebrows rose in astonishment.
- Who is “us”? - he asked.
- Mother and me! Father is running a
military hospital near the Front. He’s wounded but keeps on working. If Mother
doesn’t join him, to look after him, he’ll be unable to go on treating the
wounded soldiers! Take us with you!
- Where is your mother? - the man asked. His
gray-blue eyes scanned my face. I saw them linger over my mouth: I must have
removed the sticking plaster too quickly- I felt drops of blood forming around
my mouth.
- In the office- I said, and wiped my mouth
with a handkerchief. I was used to doing this.
The tall man leaned over, lifted me off the
ground and took me to the stationmaster’s office. When he opened the door, I
saw Mother turn and look at us in amazement. Suddenly she inclined her head and
gave a deep bow: apparently I was in the arms of Leopold, King of Belgium.
- Why are you going to Dunkerque? The
civilians were evacuated from there long ago! - the King asked Mother.
Mother repeated in her own words what I had
said before.
The King smiled:
- In that case, I invite you to travel with
me! - he said, and led us to the royal carriage.
Father was sitting in a wheelchair in the
small station outside Dunkerque. He had been awaiting the arrival of the King of
Belgium. There were many Belgian soldiers fighting on the Normandy Front, and
the military hospital was full of casualties from the King’s country. He was
about to visit them and give them encouragement.
Father was standing - or more precisely
sitting - at the head of a small team of doctors who had found time to pay their
respects to the King. The engine drew near and stopped. The carriage door
opened, the white steps were placed on the platform and the King appeared in the
door... with me in his arms.
I think that was the greatest surprise of my
Father’s life but, as always, his face gave nothing away. When he had
completed the customary exchange of courtesies with the King, he took Mother by
the arm, looked at me and said:
- I hope the little girl behaved herself
properly!....
- That goes without saying! - said the King
and put me down on the platform, - this little girl is a real war hero!
He looked down on me from on high and asked:
- Is there anything you would like? I would
like to give you a present!
I hesitated a moment.
- In two days time I shall be six years old!
- I said, - and I would like to invite you to my birthday party!
The King laughed.
- I’ll come! - he said, - provided you
don’t seal your mouth with that terrible thing....
And that’s how it happened that the King
of Belgium was a guest at the festive meal arranged for my birthday. It was a
great honor, and famous doctors and senior army commanders were sitting round
the table, but I was bored. I was the only little girl at the party. The King
was having a grown-up conversation with my father and I ate in silence, thinking
about what had happened to my mother and me a few hours before:
That morning I had gone with my mother to
visit the soldiers in the trenches. I wanted to distribute presents so that they
too would be happy on my birthday. In winter the Normandy skies are gray, with
low clouds, and a cold wind blowing. We walked along a frozen path, light snow
covered the little hummocks that lined the trenches, which looked deserted.
Suddenly we heard a strange noise
approaching from behind. An airplane emerged from the cloud just above us. It
flew along the path, as though following in our footsteps. It was flying so low
that I could see the face of the pilot. I waved to him. He smiled and waved
back, but before he had passed over our heads a soldier jumped out of the
trench, grabbed hold of us and pulled us down into it. I managed to catch sight
of the cross painted on the belly of the aircraft, next to an entrance that
suddenly gaped open, Something fell out and dropped onto the path . A mighty
explosion shook the ground, deafening our ears. At the same time, a shower of
snow-covered spots of mud fell on us. An after that - silence.
- A German! - said the soldier who had saved
our lives, - didn’t you hear it coming? He tried to kill you!...
The cake that was served with coffee at the
end of the meal was dark in color, like the mud that spattered us in the
trenches. I couldn’t eat it. I asked Mother for permission to leave the room.
She consented and immediately returned to attend to her guests.
I stood on the verandah of the house and
wondered: what shall I do? I could play hopscotch, I could skip... I could do
lots of things by myself, but more than ever I felt the lack of a playmate.
Suddenly I heard the same strange noise, the
same buzz, or rattle, but this time it was a little further away, above the sand
dunes. I turned my head in the direction of the sound and there it was again,
the very same airplane, with the same camouflage pattern, and it seemed to me I
could see the edge of the cross on its belly. It passed in front of the house,
dipping its nose as though about to land, and disappeared over the dunes. The
strange sound faded into silence.
I went down from the verandah and started to
walk towards the large sand dunes behind which the airplane had disappeared. I
had to see him, this German pilot. I had to tell him you don’t do things like
that, it’s not nice - I thought- you can’t return a little girl’s greeting
and smile at her and at the same moment drop a bomb on her!
Grandma Colette relaxed in her armchair and
gave me a smile.
“You were an innocent little girl,
Grandma”, I told her, “what did you think, that there are rules in war?”
“I really was innocent”, said grandma,
“today little girls aged six know a lot more!”
“So what happened?” I asked, “did you
find the pilot?”
When I reached the top of the dune I could
see the plane parked at the bottom. The engine was silent. I slid down the dune
and drew near. It was a small plane, like they were in those days, not a large
fighter plane like we have today. Even a small boy could have climbed up into
the pilot’s cabin. The door was open. I stood on tiptoe and peered inside. The
cabin was empty.
I managed to pull myself up and climbed
inside. I was curious: I had never been in an airplane. It was all so strange to
me, so new: the many dials, the control column, even the smell which was like
nothing I had ever smelt. I sat in the pilot’s seat and tried to guess what a
little girl would look like, walking along the path below... suddenly I seemed
to hear someone approaching!
I quickly got out of the pilot’s seat and
cowered down at the foot of the second seat. A shadow fell across the entrance
on the left. Someone big climbed in and sat down. Without a pause he started the
engine and a deafening noise filled the tiny cabin. The plane lurched forward,
at first slowly and then faster and faster and suddenly it left the ground. We
had taken off!
And then the German pilot discovered me.
Startled, he looked at me, as though he could hardly believe his eyes. Suddenly
he leaned his body to the right, opened the door next to me and gave an order:
- Jump!
I could see his cold, gray eyes close to me
and the deep cleft between them. I knew that if I jumped - it would be the end
of me. We were already very high. The wind slammed the door shut. I rose and
peered out. We were just passing over the seashore. That must be
What shall I tell him, this German pilot,
who wants to toss me into the sea? I searched for the right words and suddenly
they came to me, all of them, in German.
- Do you have any children? - I asked.
The pilot gave me a surprised look.
- I’m sure you think about them and miss
them, - I said, - so how can you kill a little girl, who might be their age?
Instead of answering me he again leaned his
body to the right and checked whether the door next to me was properly closed. I
understood that nothing bad would now happen to me. I sat up and looked out.
I could see white cliffs coming nearer and
nearer. I guessed it was England. The pilot circled over them, taking lots and
lots of photographs and finally turned round to fly across the Channel, back
towards France.
I don’t know how long the flight took. I
suddenly saw the familiar sand dunes coming nearer and the house where Mother
and Father were entertaining the King of Belgium...
The plane began to glide, as though about to
land, and when the dunes were directly beneath us the pilot again opened the
door.
- Jump! - he commanded me in a stern voice.
I knew that this time I had no choice. I
stood a long time in the wide open door. Suddenly I seemed to feel a hand
touching my back... I jumped.
My feet hit the soft sand. I rolled down to
the bottom of the dune and lay there, stunned.
Two soldiers, casualties of war from the
military hospital, hurried towards me. They had been walking on the dunes,
exercising their wounded legs, when suddenly they had seen me jump from the
plane. They picked me up, checked that there were no bones broken, shook the
sand from my clothes and returned me to my parents.
When I opened the door of the room, I saw
that nothing had changed. The grownups, as usual, were immersed in endless
conversation. I sat down in my place and, as always, I kept quiet.
Only in the evening, before going to sleep,
did I tell my parents what had happened..
- Dreaming again! - they said and kissed me
goodnight.
Grandma Colette fell silent.
“Grandma”, I asked, “was it real or
was it a dream?”
“What do you think?” Grandma asked me.
I shrugged my shoulders. To tell the truth-
I don’t know to this day...
An excerpt from the youth novel "A Conch of Secrets" by Tamar Bergman
Translated by Eddie Levenston
English translation Copyright © Tamar Bergman
Published by arrangement with the Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature
www.ithl.org.il
The material or parts of it may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission from the agent, who may be contacted as shown above.
Jan 11, 2009