Read Online The Fighter by Jean Jacques Greif - Free Book Online

that Albert made for me. I hope Rachel and Élie are safe in Montauban withhim. I think about my other brother, Jacques, who left three weeks before me. If it is true that few prisoners survive for more than three weeks, then I’ll have to accept the idea that my elder brother is already dead.
    The men with the clubs order us to stand outside in rows of five. They shout exactly like SS. We walk across the camp, when suddenly, I see—Is this possible? Walking corpses! Two corpses are carrying a third one…. I have always considered myself a tough guy. I didn’t shake when the SS murdered comrades on the platform. I used to see blue cadavers on the bridge across the Vistula, while I was gliding from stove to stove. But walking corpses? They move slowly, as if they were climbing a mountain, as if they wanted to save whatever strength they retain. All of a sudden, in the middle of July, I feel so cold I begin to shiver. I try not to look at their emaciated faces, their bulging eyes, the grin that uncovers their teeth.
    Our guides are grinning, too.
    â€œIn one month, you’ll be like them, shitbags. If you’re lucky enough to be alive in one month!”
    They take us to the eighth barrack. We don’t call it a barrack but a
block
. The men with clubs are
kapos
. c Among the prisoners, there are Jews from Poland who understand the German language, but also Jews from France and Holland who don’t, as well as ordinary Poles or Russian war prisonerswho aren’t even Jewish. If they want to stay alive, they’d better learn German pretty fast. Everybody knows at least kapo, block, and also
Lager
(the camp),
Häftling
(a prisoner),
Mütze
(the cap), and, of course,
Drecksack
(shitbag),
Dreckfresser
(shit eater),
Scheissjude
(shitty Jew),
Schweinehund
(pig dog), and
Hirenzine
(son of a bitch, a Yiddish insult that even the Germans use).
    In Pithiviers, they crammed a hundred of us in barracks that were built for fifty. In Auschwitz, our whole train enters block eight. Close to a thousand men! The guy in charge of the block or
Blockältester
d (block senior) is a non-Jewish Pole named Marek. He starts counting us, with the help of a dozen assistants. At the same time, his deputy, the
Stubendienst
(room servant), a Jewish Pole, begins a speech in Yiddish.
    â€œMy name is Laybich. Listen to me, you Hirenzine. I’d rather kill you all than break one of my nails. You think you’re wise guys, right? While I was stuck in Poland, you lived like princes in France. You drank champagne, you spent your money on French whores. Well, that’s over, my friends. The strongest of you will live three weeks. In one month, you’ll all be dead and other Hirenzine will come and replace you. We’re all going to die, but I’ll be the last to kick in.”
    He goes on and on with his speech, half-rambling, half-spitting the vilest abuse. A well-dressed and rather stiffFrenchman, an army officer perhaps, tries to ask a question, searching awkwardly for the right Yiddish words.
    â€œI can’t answer you now,” Laybich says. “I’ll take care of you later.”
    When his speech is over, he adds:
    â€œYou have eyes to see and ears to hear and a mouth full of shit that you’d better keep closed. You there, you interrupted me. Maybe you think this is some kind of a meeting. You’ll see.…”
    As the block senior hasn’t finished counting us yet, the deputy walks in our midst and asks whether any of us has already killed, taken part in a burglary or armed robbery, spent time in jail.
    â€œCome on, Hirenzine, don’t be shy. Come and speak in the hollow of my ear!”
    Several men approach him. We understand he is recruiting assistants for himself and for his boss. After a while, the block senior and his men have counted us all. The block senior doesn’t speak Yiddish, only bad German.
    â€œYou too many. We plus you, one thousand and five. Not