R ea di ng P ot K id s

2

2

pyres. They staggered outside in their paja-
mas, clutching their seared case books.
Finally, Dr. Ricardo also woke, coughing
up burned gray phlegm, sputtering. His pre-
cious tapes, the wall of evil that he wished
to preserve, was being consumed before his
eyes. He tamped out what he could, but he
could not extinguish the blaze.
The librarian might have been able to save
himself, but there was one more question he
had yet to ask. He grabbed at the last tape on
the shelf, the one that served as a bookend be-
cause the secretary had not had time to file it.
His fingers blistered from the touch, but he
jammed the cassette into the monitor whose
cord was a glowing copper filament. Never-
theless, the machine worked.
The lady appeared on television against a
background of flames. "Pardon me," she said,
"but why do you wish to know?"
He punched the device's fast-forward mech-
anism. There was a blur, and when he lifted
his finger, the lady seemed to smile as she
said, "I do not think you are unsympathetic.
I think you are jealous, Herr Dok —"
He hit the button again, and left his finger
there for what seemed like an eternity. He
lifted it to see her silence and hear his own
voice from off-screen, "Jealous of what? Jeal-
ous of suffering? Jealous of death?" But where
he expected to hear himself give a last, re-
sounding, "Hah!" there was only continued
silence. The machine may have been damaged
by the flames, which rose up the curtains. He
could hear sirens.
Suddenly the lady answered, "Yes, jealous."
"What?"
"Jealous of the Holocaust."
In his delirium, he wondered if fire was the
fate of all libraries. First there was the Library
of Alexandria with the wisdom of the ancient
world, and now, the Library of Moloch con-
taining what its keeper truly believed was the
wisdom of the modern world. Perhaps, he
thought crazily amid the mounting flames,
this fate was not inappropriate, for Moloch
was the fire god to whom children were rou-
tinely sacrificed. Moloch, the Lord of Gehenna,
lived outside of Jerusalem in what was truly
the valley of the damned, forever exiled in
sight of the heavenly city.
He started to answer the flickering screen,
but she would not allow him an opening.
"Jealous of having a reason to hate. Jealous
of tragedy, because your life is no Charleston.
Jealous of a people who refuse to submit to
the impurities that surround them. Jealous
of those who adhere to a broken covenant.
Jealous of the sacred. So here you have it, Herr
Doktor, so enjoy!"
"I do not understand."
"My poor professor. You know, the killers
never understood us either. 'How,' they asked
themselves, 'can these people meet our eyes?
How can they persevere no matter the pun-
ishment we inflict?' Mind you, they were so-
phisticated; they knew that it was not merely
the scourging of the body of the community,
but the anguish of being compelled to ac-
LIBRARY page 38

When Pruning Shears Shoot

SARA ESHEL

TRANSLATED FROM THE HEBREW

1

t happened at the be-
ginning of May 1948
when the British were
preparing to leave the
country. To the east of
our kibbutz there still
remained a camp with
British soldiers. To the west there
were little Arab villages whose or-
ange groves were beside our own.
In our grove, life continued as
usual. There, among the trees,
three of us worked together, do-
ing the most necessary summer
tasks. Eli and Moshe were mov-
ing the pipes which watered the
grove, and I was pruning the dry
branches.
On the morning of the day I am
going to describe, we ate our
breakfast as usual. We made a
salad, fried eggs, and brewed very
strong coffee. Then at the end of
the meal, before each went on his
way, Moshe suddenly told me
with half a smile:
"Don't forget to take your gun
and the hand grenades."
"I won't forget," I answered.
"And if you happen to come
across the enemy, don't ask him
to pull the trigger..."
I tried hard to smile, but did not
succeed very well. I did not like
the conversation, and I did not
like to wear the grenade-belt, nor the
gun. The noise of the last hand
grenade practice still echoed in my
ears. But I faithfully obeyed Moshe's
order.
The part of the grove where I was
to work that day was far off from the
kibbutz, close to the road leading to
the British camp. Somehow I had
never paid much attention to it, but
now, suddenly, I saw that the farther
north I went, the farther south my
friends went. There were many, many
trees between us, and the days were
days of fear and worry. In almost every
corner of the country Jews and Arabs
were fighting, even as our "referees"
were getting ready to leave us. There
was a feeling of war everywhere, and
danger seemed to hide behind every
bush.
I reached the trees I still had left to
prune. The time passed slowly and I
began to feel bored. I knew that Moshe
and Eli were placing the water pipes
at the other end of the grove, moving
farther and farther from me. Some-

time later I glanced at my watch:
eleven o'clock. In another hour we were
to meet in the well-shed and have our
lunch together.
I was working, working and singing
in a whisper. Then all of a sudden I
saw them: three men coming in the
direction of our grove! They were mov-
ing slowly, looking about carefully as
they went. I was in the fourth row from
the road, and the men were Already at
the first row. What should I do? I held
my breath. The three were getting
closer. Then they disappeared. The
trees were hiding them. The trees were
also hiding me! I didn't move. I'll wait, I
thought. This isn't happening. Perhaps
I am dreaming? Should I run to the
shed...and what if they come after me?
They are three and I am alone. I was
well-covered by the grapefruit tree,
which I was pruning. Nothing moved.
I could not see the men — it was as if
the earth had swallowed them.
Perhaps it was only a vision. I
opened the pruning shears again and
quickly started cutting, cutting with

speed, and each falling branch made
a terrible noise. Suddenly, one of the
men got up and looked straight at me
with wide eyes, his gaze falling on my
sharp pruning shears gleaming in the
sun .... A mighty yell escaped him and
all three ran away as fast as they
could.
When I didn't arrive on time for
lunch, Moshe and Eli came to look for
me and we met halfway. When I told
them what had happened, they asked
me to show them exactly where I had
seen the three men. I led them to the
end of the grove. There, above the
water-canal, which was full to the
brim, we saw some military clothes
scattered about. "All," said Eli, "They
were probably hot soldiers who came
L.0
to have a quiet bath."
CT)
"Did you open fire?" asked Moshe. ,C-2 •
"No," I answered calmly, "I opened N:
my pruning shears." O
>-

From The Jewish Kids Catalog edited and
illustrated by Chaya M. Burstein, used by
permission of The Jewish Publication So-
ciety. Copyright (c) 1983 by Chaya M. 37
Burstein.

