no effect, because everyone is seized with such travel fever that nothing can stop them from leaving. For one thing, all of them want to escape from the “fire” on this side; secondly, they want to see close up, in reality, the unknown for which some of them struggled and of which they dreamt. Finally, after two hours’ waiting, we manage to get on the second train [2] about to leave for Małkinia. With thumping hearts we meet the penetrating stares directed at us from all sides of the compartment. Peasant men and women from the border areas are also travelling with us, bringing sacks packed full of various goods. Abundant opportunities to make money have now opened up for them. They are not prevented from taking across as much as they can carry … and our entire luggage consists of small rucksacks. No lights have been switched on in the carriages and so, in the dark, we arrive in Małkinia at 8 o’clock in the evening. The Jews are herded off to be searched, but we manage to sneak through with the Christians and avoid the search. We set off along the railway tracks towards the road leading to the border. We are following the railway line when I am stopped by a twenty-year old ruffian: “Jude,63 come to work”. He is seizing Jews for work, those who have already been searched, and holding them for a few days until they pay him off. In the process, there is nolack of blows inflicted on the Jews by the soldiers under his control. He can’t say more than Jude before we pay up on all sides, so that he doesn’t even havetime to shout. We run off as fast as our legs will carry us, till we are out ofreach of the beams from the soldiers’ electric pocket torches probing the dark.
We keep running till we reach the open fields near the border crossing. The night is so pitch dark that you can’t see the person next to you. Everyminute a floodlight lights up the whole area. We all lie down on the ground until it is dark again [3] then move forward, treading carefully. On the way we are joined by a couple of Christians, so we are now a group of ten people. I know the way a bit, because I was on exercises in the area during my military service. One of the Christians is also a bit familiar with the area. We talk it over and decide to go through the village of Zawisty,64 a part of which
