A Boy Is Not a Bird by Edeet Ravel

Author:Edeet Ravel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Groundwood Books Ltd
Published: 2019-08-12T15:25:06+00:00

7

A Secret Message

“Stop lying!” the officer on the other side of the desk roars at me.

He’s the ugliest man I’ve ever seen. He looks as if his head is made out of clay, and the person making the head was a four-year-old who just poked three holes for eyes and a mouth and piled on extra clay for a nose.

“You have three seconds to tell me where your mother is hiding!” he shouts. Then, switching to a quiet, threatening voice, he hisses, “When people don’t cooperate, we lock them up in a cellar with rats. Is that what you want? Rats gnawing at your fingers and toes? Those rats are as big as cats.”

I’m so petrified I begin to stutter. I’m also shaking from head to toe. I wonder if I’m having some kind of seizure.

The worst part is how much he hates me. I’ve never been hated before. At least, not specifically. Mrs. Bubu hated me, but she hated everyone. Same with the Iron Guard. It wasn’t personal.

But this man hates me, Natt Silver. It’s the worst feeling in the world.

And for what? I truly, honestly, don’t have a clue where my mother is. Why don’t they believe me?

I’m blubbering again. “I’m a P-pioneer,” I say. “I t-took an oath to love … to love and cherish my mother … my motherland.” Oh, no, I think. I hope he realizes that I’m just having trouble speaking, that I wasn’t putting my mother ahead of my motherland. “I even won a rev-revolutionary prize from Comrade Martha. Really, sir, I g-give you my word of honor that I don’t know where she is.”

“Pioneer!” he sneers and begins to laugh. “You, a Pioneer? You’re the son of an Enemy of the People and a liar. That’s what you are. And you’re going to rot in the rat cellar until you tell me the truth.”

My last bit of hope drains away. If I’m not a Pioneer, then I’m nothing, as far as they’re concerned.

“I d-don’t live with her during the week,” I try to explain. “I only see her at weekends, at my … at my aunt’s.”

“I want a list of every single one of your relatives. And their addresses. Pronto!”

I do my best to remember the names of all my relatives and where they live, and as he writes down the information, he checks it against another piece of paper. He looks extremely angry every time he checks the paper. It makes him furious that I’m not providing him with any new information.

“What about Chernovitsy? Who are your relatives there?” he barks.

I’m concentrating so hard on trying to breathe that for a second my brain stops working and I forget that Czernowitz is Chernovitsy in Russian. Luckily, the blackout only lasts a second.

“I have an aunt there, Clara Geller,” I say. “Clara and Hayim Geller.” Clara and Hayim also have two children, Suzy and Hugo, but he doesn’t need to know that.

“Geller!” He checks his list and snorts with satisfaction. I’ve finally given him a name he doesn’t have on his list.

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