The Testament by Elie Wiesel Page A

room. A cot, a table, two chairs, a trunk, a bookcase with some volumes whose titles the young boy’s eyes scanned. A shock: one was
I Saw My Father in a Dream
, his father’s work.
    “What is it, my boy, what’s the matter?”
    He saw Grisha’s eyes fixed on the bookcase.
    “Ah, I see! The book of poems. You’re surprised. But why? Don’t I have the right to like poetry? It’s in Yiddish, so what? I understand Yiddish.”
    He took the book and opened it at random to a poem called “Sparks.” He began to read in a hesitant voice; soon Grisha was on the verge of tears. So many questions flashed through his head: Who are you, Zupanev? This book, how did you get it? How long have you been a watchman here? Did you know my father?
    Zupanev seemed to understand. “Some day I’ll tell youmore. You’ll come back. I’ll tell you everything; you should know it all.” He lowered his bald head abruptly as if to press it forcibly into his chest. To hide his pain? Grisha felt overcome by an inexplicable uneasiness.
    Zupanev kept his word. There was no end to his stories. A spellbound Grisha listened to him without missing a single word or intonation; had his father himself been speaking to him, he could not have listened with greater intensity.
    Who was Zupanev? Why had he not seen him before? What did he do with his free time? Whom did he see? Who kept him informed and whom did he inform?
    In time Grisha understood that his friend never bared himself. He spoke of others to avoid speaking of himself.
    “David Gabrielovich Bilamer—does the name mean anything to you?” murmured Zupanev. “A writer, a great writer. A Jew, a Communist, and a friend of the big shots. Listen: one evening he is summoned to the Kremlin; he gets there early. He’s received politely, taken to an anteroom, told to wait. He’s so terrified that he develops an urgent need to go to the toilet, but unfortunately the door is locked, and no one is there to open it. What has to happen, happens: he wets his pants. Just then the door opens, an officer asks him to follow him. Bilamer tries to explain his problem, but the officer tells him:
He
is waiting for you. There they are in
his
presence: Stalin, in person. What a nightmare. Bilamer thinks: They’ll shoot me. He feels a huge icy hand on his back. And suddenly, he hears the familiar voice: ‘Comrade, I wanted to tell you personally how much I liked your article on myths in literature.’ Soon Bilamer finds himself back in the corridor, then outside where the wind takes his breath away.”
    A sickly smile, or rather, an unwholesome grimace on his face, Zupanev pauses a moment before reaching his punchline: during the anti-cosmopolitan purges, Bilamerwas arrested and charged with crime against decency and offense against the Head of the Party. And he was of course shot.
    How does Zupanev know all that? Grisha wondered. The watchman knew a lot more. A whole procession of men, well known and obscure, ordinary and odd, peopled his stories. Grisha could guess what was coming just by keeping an eye on his companion’s right hand: if it stroked a glass of tea, some contemptible people were about to be described; if it fiddled with a cigarette, the character would be admirable.
    “Do you know the story of Makarov?” Zupanev asked one evening, taking out his tobacco from an inside pocket. “I guess you’re too young. Ah, Makarov! Massive as a bull, gentle as a lamb, he really believed in the acceleration of history. That’s what the Revolution is, isn’t it? For centuries and centuries nothing moves; then, all of a sudden, mountains collapse and everything happens at once. Instead of wasting his time learning a trade or looking for a woman, Makarov joins the Party and suddenly—there he is, raised to the position of an official—excuse me, a high official; he’d skipped several ranks without knowing it. Congratulations, Makarov. Especially since he’s doing a good job. And the glory doesn’t go to