The Virtual Historian

Each camp was separated by an electric barbed-wire fence. Anyone who touched the wire was immediately electrocuted. One day, as I wandered to the electricfence dividing us from the Gypsies, a young boy called me from the other side. “Look!” he said, showing me a large bowl of mustard. “Do you want?” “Sure,” I said. “Bring bread,” he called back. I always liked mustard and thought it would be good with the dry bread that was all we ever got except for soup and tea. I returned to the same spot at the same time the next day, having saved my full bread ration for the day. I was afraid to put my hand through the electric fence, but the Gypsy boy was not. “Throw the bread.” I did and he immediately passed the large bowl with mustard through the fence and ran away. I took the bowl and also ran with it. It occurred to me that I could probably trade some of the mustard for bread. The bowl was heavy, far too heavy. I put my finger into the pot. I did not laugh or cry, but realized I had been taken. There was thin layer of mustard over the top of a pot full of sand. The Gypsy boy was gone, probably enjoying his extra bread ration. He earned it by sticking his hand through the electric fence.The winter of 1944 was severe. There was snow and ice. Many people got sick and some died. The days were long that winter; they were cold and dark. Our feet froze in our thin socks and wooden shoes. The women suffered even more than the men.They looked hopeless with their heads shaved, dressed in terrible, loose rags. How can I forget the night surgeons who operated on the frozen feet of one of our friends, a thirteen-year-old boy? His screams must have reached Hell. One dreadful, endless night, a young man coughed himself to death in the barracks where I lived. He was a sad-looking youngman with a pale face and large eyes that gave the impression of a Pierrot (a character from French pantomime). He spoke softly and I could not understand him. Feverish, he shook all over.