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Back The Tribe Save as PDF
Chapters (33)
  1. Cover
  2. Introduction by Grady Hendrix
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. Prologue
  6. Part One: Roger Hawkins
  7. 1
  8. 2
  9. 3
  10. 4
  11. 5
  12. 6
  13. Part Two: Rachel Levy
  14. 1
  15. 2
  16. 3
  17. 4
  18. 5
  19. 6
  20. Part Three: Belzec
  21. 1
  22. 2
  23. 3
  24. 4
  25. 5
  26. Part Four: The Rabbis
  27. 1
  28. 2
  29. 3
  30. 4
  31. 5
  32. About the Author
  33. About the Cover

“I’ll watch the baby,” Judy said, and Rachel and Kaye went through the door and into the room with the pool. Three walls and the floor and pool sides were light blue tile; the fourth wall was sliding glass doors all fogged up, and the ceiling was a skylight. The room was lit by spots hung from beams that crossed under the skylight. Condensed steam ran down the walls, and even though the big room was empty, they heard noises all around them coming through the door and windows. A few women talked, and laughed, one hummed out in the hall, someone turned on a hair dryer. The water heaved a little, the surface was gray and oily-­looking and Rachel thought if it was dirty she couldn’t go in, ritual or no ritual, but the water was so clear she could see the white grout in the blue tile of the floor. It wasn’t warm, it wasn’t any temperature at all, and as she walked to the center of the pool, the gray turned to light blue, then darker blue, until the lovely clear color was all around her and the water just covered her breasts. She held her breath to duck. The voices stopped and someone turned off the hair dryer. The humming kept on . . . la, la, something. She didn’t know the tune, but she’d heard it at weddings when she was young.

She closed her eyes and sank down until she sat on the bottom of the pool. The water went through her hair to her scalp and into her ears. She opened her mouth to let some down her throat, choked, and came up blowing water. She faced the mist-­covered glass doors and said the brocha. She sat down in the water again and this time she opened her eyes. Reflections flashed across the tile sides of the pool. She looked up, the lights overhead undulated, the whole thing was a light show, and something like joy did overcome her. She felt light, thin, beautiful. She was still young, she was in love, and he loved her. They’d get married. . . . She came up fast, shedding water in the light, and in a loud, clear voice over the singing she said the brocha again and went under one more time. This time she knelt on the tile, felt it press into her knees, and she whispered, making bubbles, “Please, God, don’t let me die tomorrow.”

5

Chapter 5