It was at that dangerous moment that old Philosoff chose to come forward. He walked right up to Wohltat, who had a bubble in the corner of his mouth. “I made a list. Since it had to be done.” In truth he did have a list, a long sheet of paper, with names on it, written in ink from Urinstein’s pen. Nobody made a comment. Nor did anyone attempt to hold him back. Freely, he handed the document to the Volksdeutscher. The latter read the first name out loud.

“One Ferdinand Philosoff.”

“Present,” answered the waiter. His beard hung down in long separate strands, as if he were having a meal of noodles.

“Ferdinand Philosoff,” Wohltat repeated.

“Also present.”

And then, before anyone had grasped what had happened, the head of the Civilian Authority began to giggle, then to guffaw. He pointed at the list of names. “Philosoff!” he roared. “It says Philosoff!”

It turned out that the waiter, after starting with his own name, had printed it again, forty-nine times. “What’s so funny?” he asked—not only of Wohltat, but of his colleagues, who were tittering, too. “Who else could I write down?”

Wohltat was taking little steps, wiping the tears from his eyes. “Ha! Ha! My good spirits have returned. I will do everything that you ask. You—” He pointed at Schotter. “Fetch the rabbis. All the ethical scholars. I, myself, will inform Isaiah Trumpelman that his presence is requested here. Ha! Ha! Ha! He put his own name down! He wants to be a farmer! Ha! Ha! Sit down, Jews! Talk it over! Seek advice! You now have until sundown, precisely sundown, to write the names.”

The Jews did sit down—less Schotter, who, a step ahead of the roaster-importer, darted through the Judenrat door.

Two flies had come in when the two men went out. They hopped from one dish of herring to another. They walked skillfully around the rims of the glasses of wine. One flew up and performed the letter Z several times before Popower’s nose. The other clung to Fried Rievesaltes’ cuff. Neither man noticed. The whole membership sat silently, like nappers, with their chins on their chests. At last Mordechai Kleen, who had turned recently forty, spoke a sentence or two aloud.

“At first I thought I would play the flute. With that instrument the breath passes over and not into the mouthpiece, so the sound it makes is that of breathing, of life. Nevertheless, I took up the oboe.”

Baggelman, the orchestra conductor, spoke after another short pause. “In 1885, when I was a boy aged eleven, my family moved from our village to the great city of Vienna. Here there was much to see: the fountains, the gardens, the men and women at tables, sipping red and green drinks. Once on the street I saw a man wearing a turban. That same year I went for the first time to the Vienna Opera. What did I see there? A stone statue singing! A pink cloud above him when he sank to Hell!”