"Burstein,_Michael_A._-_Kaddish_for_the_Last_Survivor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Burstein Michael A)

Sarah blushed. "Yes. Um, I tried to keep it a secret. I'm sorry."
"What is there to be sorry about?"
"Well, it's just..." Sarah trailed off.
"It's OK, _Saraleh_. I understand your generation. It is not that much different from mine."
"But you don't approve of Tom, do you?"
Grampa sighed. "Tom's a good boy, a fine young man. I would have preferred if you had met someone Jewish, but I can't fault you for your choice. He will make a good husband."
Sarah thought for a moment. "Grampa, can I ask you something?"
"Anything, _mameleh_. But you'd better hurry." They both smiled at that. Sarah blinked hard, to stop the tears.
"Why is it so important to you that I marry someone Jewish? It's not like you were ever religious or observant."
Grampa closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "You ask such a difficult question, like the simple child's question about the Passover _seder_. It's true, I never was observant, not before the camp, or after. But, Sarah, because of where I was -- Auschwitz -- your children _have_ to remember, they _have_ to know what they are and understand where they came from. I need them to be Jewish, and not just because you are. They have to _know_ that they are Jewish."
"But why?"
He sighed. "Because if they do not realize who they are, they will be the first to go to the gas chambers the next time there is a Holocaust."
Sarah was shocked. "Grampa, you can't seriously believe that it could happen again. The Holocaust is a distant memory from the last century. Even if it did happen -- "
"If it happens ... when it happens, God forbid, again, the first Jews to die will be the ones who don't realize they are Jewish. The German Jews saw what Hitler was doing. They were Germans, they said, not Jews. What Hitler is doing doesn't apply to us. They never believed it would ... until it was too late."
"But it couldn't happen again. Could it?"
Grampa was silent for a moment. "Sarah, your generation grew up in a world that felt much safer than mine. We made it that way. Maybe it really wasn't so safe, maybe we weren't so bright, but your parents and I certainly tried to protect you from the world outside. Maybe we succeeded too well.
"It is because you feel so safe and because the Holocaust is so distant, that your generation is in danger. People are forgetting. The Holocaust Museum in Washington lost its funding and is gone now, after only thirty years, because no one thought it was important anymore. Auschwitz -- Auschwitz is now a side attraction for people going to the VR mall across the way." Straining, he bent his head over and spit on the floor. "There are even people who claim the Holocaust never happened in the first place, people who are being taken far too seriously."
"I know what you mean. Just outside -- " Sarah bit her lip.
But it was too late. "What? What happened outside?"
Sarah shrugged. "A reporter. He -- he accused us of making it all up."
Grampa frowned, his voice bitter. "Always," he said. "Always the big lie. Well, they wouldn't let me live in peace. Why should I expect then to let me die in peace?"
"It was only one, Grampa," Sarah said, dismissively. "The other reporters are -- I mean, they know it's for real."
"Even one person denying the truth is one person too many." He sighed. "The deniers are everywhere, Sarah. They started when I was just out of the camps, telling me that the horrible things I had seen with my own eyes never existed. Telling me I was crazy. But there were always enough of us around, to educate, to lecture, to write, to bear witness for the world. But now -- "
He coughed, loud, long, and hard. Sarah stood up. "Grampa, you must rest. You're letting yourself get all worked up. I'll go get you some water."
He shook his head and waved for her to sit back down again. "Please, Sarah, wait. I don't have much time, and this is far too important."
She sat down again. "Yes, Grampa, what is it?"
"Sarah, you must promise me. After I am gone, there will be no one to bear witness. I am the last of the survivors. _You_ must bear witness for me -- for all of us, the six million who died and those who survived to tell the world." He took her left hand in a grip that was surprisingly strong.
Now the tears welled up in her eyes, past her strength to hold them back. She began to weep. "Yes, Grampa, I will."
Her tears blurred her sight, and Sarah wiped them away. As her vision cleared, Sarah noticed Grampa staring directly into her eyes.
"Sarah, listen carefully. I want you to open that drawer over there." With his right hand, Grampa pointed to the top drawer of the bureau. Sarah let go of his left hand, dutifully walked over to the bureau, and pulled the drawer open. It contained only one item, a small shiny metal box with the logo MEMVOX printed across the side. She pulled it out and turned it around, studying it.
"My God, Grampa," she said. "Is this what I think it is?"
He nodded. "A memory recorder. The chip is inside."
Sarah hesitated before asking her next question. She feared she already knew the answer. "Grampa ... what's on it?"
He coughed. "Me. When I am gone, I want you to play it."
Sarah now understood what Grampa had meant about her bearing witness. She shook her head. "I can't do this, Grampa."
"You will do the right thing, I am sure of it. Sarah, you must. You're young, you're strong, you can handle it. When you play that chip, _you_ will be the last survivor." He coughed. "_Zachor_. Remember. Bear witness, from generation to generation." He turned away from her, and began to recite the Jewish affirmation in the existence of God, "_Sh'ma Yisroel_..." His voice trailed off. His breath faded. Then it ceased entirely.
Sarah wiped the tears from her eyes. She stood up, then covered her grandfather's face with the blanket. She finished reciting the Sh'ma for her grandfather in English; she hadn't realized that she remembered: _Hear, O Israel, the Lord is God, the Lord is One_. She turned off the light and left, closing the door silently behind her.
* * * *
That night, Sarah sat alone in the bedroom of the two-room Manhattan apartment she shared with Tom. She had asked Tom for some privacy, and he had readily agreed; so he was in their living room, watching TV or logged onto the Internet, Sarah wasn't sure. Tom had assumed that the stress of the quick late afternoon funeral and burial was what had prompted Sarah to ask for some time to herself, and she had chosen not to correct him. She was glad that Jewish tradition held that a funeral and burial should take place as soon as possible after death; she had a lot to think about, and didn't want to have to worry about seeing her mother again so soon after Grampa's death.
On the small night table in front of her sat the memory recorder and the chip. She picked up the chip and turned it over and over in her hands. Grampa had labeled it in black ink with his name and date of birth. Sarah had written in today's date at the bottom of the label, in blue ink, but that was all she had done so far. Tom had given her the privacy she requested over half an hour ago, and Sarah still wasn't sure what to do.
A wastebasket sat next to their second-hand full-size bed. Sarah could just drop the chip into it, and never think of it again. Or she could take it to a recycling center, and get some small amount of money for it. As for the memory recorder, although used, it was valuable, and could easily pay the rent for the next few months.
But that would almost be like desecrating her grandfather's grave. Grampa had given her the recorder and the chip for a reason. He wanted her to play it, to share those experiences with her. She thought about those experiences, the stories he had told her about the Holocaust when she was six years old; and she realized that she would never want to live through it herself, even vicariously through someone else's memories. She held the chip above the wastebasket, ready to let it fall --
-- And then she remembered the reporter from this morning.
She had to fulfill her promise; her grandfather had depended on it. Quickly, so she would not be tempted into changing her mind again, she inserted the chip into the recorder, attached the wires to her head, and hit PLAY.
An hour later, when the chip had finished playing, she slowly removed the wires. She shuddered and began to cry, but softly, so as not to alert Tom. She removed the chip from the recorder and stored it safely away. The memories from her grandfather's Holocaust experiences precipitated in her a decision, a choice; she just hoped that Tom would understand. She knew that she would have to find someone knowledgeable about computers and recorders, someone sympathetic to her position who could hack the Internet and force Grampa's memory records to be played by anyone plugging in, at least for a short while. Sarah would come forward and take responsibility, once she was assured that no one would ever take the revisionists seriously again. But ... if she went forward with this plan, to bear witness for her grandfather, there was one other step she needed to take first.
* * * *
Sarah walked into the tiny store, a remnant of the old Times Square, struggling against the gentrification of the past thirty years. Most places of this sort had moved to the outer boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn, but this one was still here. The sign above the glass bore the one word ADULT, in large black letters, and hanging in the window Sarah could see signs promising things like fake ID chips and real tobacco cigarettes.
She strode in purposefully, ignored the grime of the floor and shelves, and walked through to the room in the back, where the guy she was looking for worked. The room was small, empty at the moment except for the artist, who was reading a newstape as she entered. His appearance repulsed her, as he had rings through his nose, ears, and eyebrows, and he also sported tattoos on his arms and face. She would never see a person like this socially, but she was here for something else. The guy looked up at her inquisitively as she approached.
"Hello," she said. "I'd -- I'd like to get a tattoo. Can you tattoo on a number?"
"Sure," he said, putting down the newstape. "I can do anything."