To the Edge of Sorrow Read online

  ALSO BY AHARON APPELFELD

  Badenheim 1939

  The Age of Wonders

  Tzili

  The Retreat

  To the Land of the Cattails

  The Immortal Bartfuss

  For Every Sin

  The Healer

  Katerina

  Unto the Soul

  Beyond Despair:

  Three Lectures and a Conversation with Philip Roth

  The Iron Tracks

  The Conversion

  The Story of a Life

  A Table for One

  All Whom I Have Loved

  Laish

  Blooms of Darkness

  Until the Dawn’s Light

  Suddenly, Love

  The Man Who Never Stopped Sleeping

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  English translation copyright © 2020 by Schocken Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Schocken Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York, and distributed in Canada by Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in Israel as Ad Khod Hatza’ar by Kinneret, Zmora-Bitan, Dvir Publishing House Ltd., Or Yehuda, in 2012. Copyright © 2012 by Aharon Appelfeld and Kinneret, Zmora-Bitan, Dvir Publishing House Ltd.

  Schocken Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Appelfeld, Aharon, author. Schoffman, Stuart, translator.

  Title: To the edge of sorrow / Aharon Appelfeld; translated from the Hebrew by Stuart Schoffman.

  Other titles: ʻAd ḥod ha-tsaʻar. English.

  Description: First edition. New York: Schocken Books, 2020.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019011548. ISBN 9780805243420 (hardcover: alk. paper). ISBN 9780805243437 (ebook).

  Subjects: LCSH: Jewish soldiers—Fiction. Holocaust, Jewish (1939–1945)—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PJ5054.A755 A62513 2019 | DDC 892.43/6—dc23 | LC record available at lccn.loc.gov/​2019011548

  Ebook ISBN 9780805243437

  www.schocken.com

  Cover photograph by Ildiko Neer/Arcangel Images

  Cover design by Linda Huang

  v5.4

  ep

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Aharon Appelfeld

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  A Note About the Author

  1

  My name is Edmund, and I’m seventeen years old. Since last spring we’ve been inching our way over these hills: most of them bare, some sparsely wooded. The bald patches in the forest make our life difficult, but we’ve gotten good at camouflage and deception, and we’ve learned how to stay close to the ground, utilizing blind spots to surprise the enemy. The enemy knows it is dealing with damaged, resolute people; it unleashes its well-trained fighters, assisted by gendarmes and local farmers, who act as informants. We will not be easily defeated.

  Daylight is a problem, but the night belongs to us. We also need to be very cautious at night, but over time we’ve learned the advantages of darkness. There’s nothing like lying in ambush on summer nights: you’re on high alert, picking up every sound, poised to strike like a panther.

  At the end of the summer, the commander decided that we had to leave this place and head toward the wetlands, to the swamps and the lakes. Such a move would distance us from the fields and orchards that provide our vital needs but would give us several clear advantages: stagnant water is an obstacle, and an army is not eager to plod through swamps, cut off from its headquarters.

  During the day, we are dug in and camouflaged, and we advance at night. Progress is slow but steady. Each day brings us closer to the goal. On the last few nights we could smell the water and celebrated quietly. But we must never rest on our laurels; the enemy is vigilant and follows us always. They try to outflank us and block the way to the wetlands. We outsmart them and ambush them. Our calculations have worked out so far, and we haven’t suffered many casualties, but who knows how this bitter struggle will end.

  At the beginning of September, we arrived at the ridge overlooking Lake Tanura, a long lake surrounded by boulders. The previous day, the commander had sent an experienced squad to prepare rafts; they reached their destination, cut down trees, and when we arrived, a few small rafts awaited us on the water.

  Several fighters went out on the first raft to check the opposite shore. We watched them row, ready to provide covering fi
re and to help them. The crossing was undisturbed. We saw them land, spread out, and carefully survey the area. After two hours, they signaled us to launch the remaining rafts.

  The little rafts floated back and forth, carrying people and equipment. By the way, our equipment is not minimal; it includes hammers, knives, axes, saws, cooking utensils, and food. Not to worry, everything is well packed and travels with us from place to place, supervised by Hermann Cohen, about whom I will have more to say when the time comes.

  By midnight we were all on the other bank. We saw right away that this was different territory, covered with thick vegetation and smelling heavily of dampness.

  2

  Ever since I joined the fighters, I’ve changed beyond recognition. The commander promises us that if we try hard, train diligently, and follow orders precisely, at the end of the course we’ll be fighters. Fighters do not complain; they grit their teeth and do not pity themselves.

  Just one year ago I was a student, a teenager of average height with eyeglasses, and until last year I excelled at school. I don’t want to talk now about last year, when I was a tangle of contradictions. Presumably things will become clear when the time comes, but I will say this, my parents were greatly pained by the decline in my studies.

  My report card glittered with high grades during my time at high school. I was my parents’ pride and joy, but suddenly my life veered off course, and their quiet happiness turned into shame. They were periodically called to the school and stood mutely before the vice principal, unable to offer a word in my defense.

  The teachers grieved alongside my parents over my failure, especially the math and Latin teachers.

  “What happened?” my humiliated father would ask in despair.

  “Nothing,” I would say, over and over.

  “Why aren’t you studying like you used to; something must have happened.”

  The war was at our doorstep. People ran around in the streets, trying to escape the trap, but my parents were sunk in their depression. The decline in my studies concerned them more than the imminent danger. In those days I was blind and merciless. I felt that my parents were drowning in their own world and blocking my way. I didn’t speak up or make excuses, but without meaning to I was pouring salt on their wounds.

  * * *

  —

  NOW THEY ARE far away from me, and I’m here. Sometimes it seems that everything that has happened to me in these past months is a nightmare to be deciphered in the future. I will undoubtedly be found guilty, which is why I try hard to obey orders and be a flawless fighter.

  The training is exhausting. The commander has no pity for stragglers; he demands extra effort, and weakness is forbidden. Those among us who do not meet his standards guard the base and help with the cooking. They chop wood and gather twigs for bedding.

  Fighters, the commander calls us. Our training includes long runs, hurdling over obstacles, climbing ropes, advancing correctly in forested areas and swamps, carrying heavy loads. More than once, I collapsed, and had it not been for friends who supported me, I doubt I would have met all the demands.

  I look in the water, and to my surprise I don’t recognize myself. My face has filled out and reddened, and my shoulders are broader. In a sheepskin coat I look more like a young farmer than a gymnasium student. My hands are rougher, too. I’ve lost my previous quickness; a different quickness guides my steps. I can bend scraps of tin and iron, break poles, dig a trench in minutes. I doubt my parents would recognize me, and if they did, I wonder how they’d react. Deep in my heart, my transformation makes me happy. Every success in training, every compliment, makes me swell with pride, and I feel that on the battlefield, face-to-face with the enemy, I will perform to my commanders’ satisfaction.

  * * *

  —

  THE WETLANDS. Is this home base or the start of the journey? We press on through the thick foliage, where the darkness is greater than the light. Progress sometimes means strenuous chopping of trees, all hands clearing the path. I do not complain; I accept the difficulties as a duty and atonement for sin. The training exercises and ambushes do not weaken me. I assume that when the time comes, not far off, we will become forest creatures, and the trees and bushes will wrap us in a warm, wide mantle.

  There’s no point wasting time with fantasies; better to clean the weapon, fix what’s left of my shoes. The soles are torn, and I tie them with string. That’s how it is for nearly all of us. Were it not for the cold nights, it would be easier, but the cold and wet are unrelenting. Thank God for the whispering coals that keep our clothes a little dry.

  3

  At first the commander planned to move the camp the very night we crossed over, but given our fatigue of the past few days, it was best to stay here another night, refresh ourselves, study the territory, and only then push onward.

  It was a sleep I had not known since I left home: soft, downy, filled with bright visions. I saw my parents dressed in white summer clothes, standing at the bank of the River Prut, like every summer. I wanted to ask them where they are now, but the question got stuck in my mouth.

  When we awaken, we are greeted with coffee and sliced bread slathered with jam. There is nothing like a cup of coffee and a slice of bread to banish nocturnal dreams and hunker down to reality. After a cup of coffee, the morning seems young and sharp. You’re ready to march, carry heavy gear, overcome obstacles of water and foliage. Before going out on a mission, the fighters need something more: a glass of vodka. There were days when everyone drank vodka, but now the supply has dwindled, and it is reserved for the fighters. No problem; this is not discrimination; all of us here depend on one another.

  Once, when the child Milio fell ill with typhus, the fighters raided the home of the village pharmacist and took all the medicines he had on hand. This was a bold action: the pharmacist lived in the middle of the village, and there was a risk that the village youth would fight back. The raid passed without mishap, and we’ve had medicine and bandages ever since.

  * * *

  —

  OUR COMMANDER, Kamil, is not like other people; he is head and shoulders taller: six feet four inches. He graduated with high honors from the architecture academy, and everyone predicted a brilliant career. But the war, and who knows what else, turned him into a daring commander.

  It should be stated at the outset: Kamil is prone to mood swings. Sometimes he will retire to his tent for hours and leave the command to his deputy, Felix. This isn’t regarded as neglect but seclusion for the purpose of rethinking. Our war is complicated, and each day brings new dangers. Our enemy is filled with guile and tries to outflank and surprise us. Kamil is an artist in the warfare of the few against the many. Apparently the strain is not easy on him.

  His face reflects his ascetic nature, and it’s clear that he takes a long view of our war. Sometimes he sits and lays out his thinking for us: not day-to-day needs but matters of the spirit. In his opinion, our war will not easily be won, and therefore, alongside the intensive military training, our spirit must be nourished as well.

  Kamil did not earn his authority overnight. In the past, several of the best fighters had their doubts and suspicions. It was claimed that his monastic disposition could undermine his judgment. But before long, Kamil proved that he knew not only how to lead his fighters but also how to win battles in which we were sorely outnumbered.

  Moreover, he knows the territory like the palm of his hand, and more than once, we eluded hostile gendarmes because he knew the area better than they did. From a young age he loved to hike, climb, and spend hours alone in the woods. Even then, unknowingly, he was preparing himself to be a commander. With him, it’s hard to distinguish between the commander training his soldiers strictly and a spiritual leader carefully weighing each word he utters.

  To us, Kamil was at first an unknown quantity. He is without a doubt a mysterious person, but little by little we
learned to appreciate his hidden powers. And once, in a moment of great darkness, he cried out, “Get rid of your sadness! A damaged people cannot afford such luxuries.” Back then we saw how he could lift the defeated camp in both of his hands and set it on its feet.

  We became aware of Kamil’s unique strength during one of our daring raids. He stood in front of the fighters and read from the Book of Psalms. He read the psalm slowly, emphasizing each word. He was not a fluent reader of Hebrew, but he tried his best to capture the essence of the words. No one imagined that this tall man, planted in reality, who knew how to handle every obstacle and setback, would enlist the words of an ancient poem to accompany the fighters into battle. That’s Kamil: unpredictable.

  His deputy, Felix, is very different: short and broad-shouldered, he walks with small steps but firmly holds his ground. His solid stance sometimes makes it seem that he carries more gear than the rest of us.