A fighter replied: “Too late.”

“We can’t do it,” another added.

It was odd how, in the light from the electric torch, Taradash only widened his smile. “But we are fighting in a war. You are soldiers.”

“On your feet! It’s an order! You’re deserters!” Hersh Einhorn screamed at the squatting brigaders. He shook them. But no one rose. Chaffer was still pouring dirt over his body, like a child at the shore.

“We know you are short of supplies. We shall drop you guns, bullets, antitank weapons. The Red Army is counting on your support.”

“No, no, you don’t understand—” It was Doctor Zam. He took the presser’s arm and guided the light onto the Bloomgarden orphan, who was sitting off to one side. “Look. See.”

Ignacy immediately shielded his eyes. You could see both bones inside the arm he flung up. He swallowed. The bulge moved down his neck. Zam forced the light onto Faulhaber. The American sat cross-legged, his head in his hands. He looked like a beggar in India, or a holy man there. Miss Bibelnieks next, leaning on Faulhaber’s shoulder. She breathed through her mouth. Her teeth were long, yellow, like a horse’s. On to little Kipnis. Only the mole beneath his eye had kept growing. It was dark, furry. With one hand he raised the other, in order to make a fist. Next the scalp of the cannibal woman, which showed through her hair. On Nisel’s chest you could see where the drum of his heart was beating. Quite a show! Just skeletons! In America you say, like something the cat dragged in!

“Enough!” said the brave airman. “Turn off the light.”

The presser obeyed—and at once dropped down next to the others. It was as if it had been the energy of the light, with the bugs and gnats flying in it, that had held him upright.

Quiet, quiet. Then someone said, “He who does not work does not eat.” A quotation from the Ghetto King. The plain truth was that the brigade members were starving. Indeed, only weeks before the widow of Trilling had in that way died.

“We will drop food from the air, rations—” the commando began. Then he, like the others, grew still. Another moment went by. A cricket, under a rock, started cricketing. Dew came down. Of course it was pitch-black again.

Mister Pipe, of the Mosk Works, in a low voice spoke first. “Tell me, Comrade. Is it true that in the new Russia the workers own the means of production? I wanted to ask.”

Before the airman could answer, Hersh Einhorn cut in. “The government, land, and machinery are controlled by the working class. It is a dream that has come true. Like in Plato’s Republic.”

Young Bloomgarden: “No bosses? No exploiters? No one orders you around?”

“That’s so,” said Kipnis. “All the goods are held in common. No one has too much. Everyone has enough. That’s why, under socialism, the instinct for domination, the urge to seek power over others, and all the brutality of life just disappear.”