The Road to Heaven
by Michael Lacare



She is a friend of my grandmother’s and her name is Adiya Fields. She is a survivor of the camps and has volunteered to speak to my Sunday religious school class.

Standing barely five feet tall, Mrs. Fields stands in the front of the class, looking frail, hands trembling at her sides. Her gray mop of hair sits atop her head, and her skin hangs loose from her face. She speaks in a mild-mannered way about the day the soldiers came and took her and her parents and younger brother away. She pulls up the sleeve of her cardigan and shows us the faded numbers etched beneath the skin.

You can hear a pin drop in that room, the way she talks about the death of her mother and father and brother, like a dream she says, so matter-of-factly, as if the reality of it never existed.

This is forty-two years ago.

How could God have allowed such atrocities? Mrs. Fields has no answers, but she remains faithful to Him just the same. I am not sure I could have been as loyal.

“We must never forget,” she says. “It is your duty and responsibility to ensure that the next generation does not forget as well.”

Mrs. Fields is a woman who frequents our home. She is a woman whose husband has died of a stroke and finds herself alone again. She sips coffee and nibbles on cookies at our kitchen table, occasionally flashing half-smiles at the things my mother and grandmother says.

When you are young, it is difficult to spot the pain and anguish of others. But it is there, lurking behind each face. It is always there, a quiet resiliency that resides within those that have experienced inexplicable things. I see it more that day in class than any other time, because today is the first time I hear Mrs. Fields speak of such things. She is like a stranger to me.

“Can you picture,” she says, “living in a country where they come for you and stuff you into boxcars and lead you away?” She scans each face, including mine. Each eye is riveted to her. “These words I imagine seem foreign to you.”

They are foreign to me. I am not sure how it all began; how one man, with just his words, can stir such contentment, such hate that it arouses so many to turn on their neighbors.

A hand goes up. It is Seth Koenig. “How did you survive?” he asks.

That half-smile again from Mrs. Fields. “That is a very good question,” she says. “How did I survive?”

Questions without answers. Maybe she is part of God’s cruel joke placed upon humanity, the survivors themselves having become nothing more than the new Job, unwilling participants in this test of faith between good and evil.

The soldiers at the station all had guns. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, cousins are packed into boxcars like cattle. They clutch one another, the tears drip from their faces in rivulets. The soldiers are shouting orders; the older citizens who are a little slower getting across the platform will be the ones who will likely feel the wrath of these ruthless men.

And there it is. For reasons unknown a young Adiya witnesses a soldier wrench an old man away from his wife and clubs him across the back of the knees. The man slowly crumples to the ground, his wife pleading with the soldier to please let him alone, but the words fall on deaf ears.

The man tries to stand, but his legs abandon him, the pain much too great for his fragile bones. The soldier shouts at the old man to get up, but it is like talking to a wall, for all the old man can do is howl in agony. His poor wife is at his side, begging him to rise up, just try to stand. I’ll carry you, she says, her eyes wet and frantic as she tries to lift him off the ground. But she cannot. Her arms are not strong enough.

Adiya glances up at her father. His eyes are riveted to the scene that is unfolding. Another soldier keeps the line moving and Adiya and her parents and younger brother continue on their inevitable trek towards the train.

“What will happen to them?” Adiya asks once they have climbed into the boxcar, but she receives no answer. It is crowded and as more people are tossed inside, Adiya is forced against strangers, their elbows and shoulders pinning her against her parents.

She can no longer see the old man and his wife. A child is thrown into the boxcar and the little boy reaches out for his momma, who has still not gotten onto the train, the soldiers holding her back, as she desperately tries to dislodge from them. He cries out, but the doors are closing and a woman with blond hair pulls the boy’s arms away before they are caught in the door.

Pure darkness envelops them as the train begins to pull away from the station. People are sobbing and the dank stench of fear rises into Adiya’s nostrils. She can feel her mother’s hands clutching her close. Adiya tells herself not to be afraid, but her heart thumps against her chest and small beads of sweat slide down her ribs and back. A woman begins to pray in Yiddish.

Where are they taking us? she so badly wants to ask, but the words are frozen in her throat. The blond woman presses the boy in front close to her and begins to hum a lullaby. It is working, for he has stopped crying for now.

This is a dream, Adiya thinks to herself. You are in your bed and soon mother will come to wake you so that you can eat.

The train ride lasts almost three hours.

Mrs. Fields sits down on a wooden folding chair. Our teacher, Mrs. Finkelstein, inquires whether she would like a glass of water, but Mrs. Fields declines.

“Did you know Anne Frank?” David Simcha asks.

Mrs. Fields shakes her head. “I’m afraid not.”

David looks somewhat disappointed.

“What happened when you got to where they were sending you?” Haley Eisenberg asks.

“What do you think happened?” David Simcha pipes in.

“Shhh,” Mrs. Finkelstein says. “Class, please show Mrs. Fields some respect.”

“Maybe I will take a little water,” Mrs. Fields says and Mrs. Finkelstein nods and leaves the room.

The camp is in Sobibor and it is built by utilizing Jewish labor. The approximate eighty Sonderkammando, who once resided in the surrounding ghettos, will now become prisoners of the camp. Upon completion of the project, each Jew that assisted in the construction is shot. One by one they collapse onto the hard, cold ground, their blood slowly being absorbed by the earth.

The Sobibor camp, the Jews are told, will primarily function as a transit camp. It quickly evolves into a labor camp, and then a place where the activities of extermination are undertaken. Erick Fuchs, a skilled motor mechanic, and one of the men responsible for the method in which Jews there had perished, describes how the gas chamber became the method of choice.

“Sometime in the spring of 1942 I received instructions to collect a gassing engine which I then took to Sobibor. Upon arriving in Sobibor, I discovered a piece of open ground close to the station on which there was a concrete building. We unloaded the motor. It was a heavy, Russian petrol engine, presumably a tank or tractor engine of at least 200 HP carburetor engine, eight-cylinder, water-cooled. We put the engine on a concrete plinth and attached a pipe to the exhaust outlet. Then we tried out the engine. At first it did not work. I repaired the ignition and the valve and suddenly the engine started. The chemist whom I already knew from Belzec went into the gas chamber with a measuring device in order to measure the gas concentration. After this a test gassing was carried out. I seem to remember that thirty to forty women were gassed in a gas chamber. The Jewesses had to undress in a clearing in the wood which had been roofed over, near the gas chamber. They were herded into the gas chamber by SS members. When the women had been shut up in the gas chamber, I attended to the engine. The engine immediately started ticking over. I stood next to the engine and switched it up to "release exhaust to chamber" so that the gases were channeled into the chamber. On the instigation of the chemist, I revved up the engine, which meant that no extra gas had to be added later. After about ten minutes the thirty to forty women were dead. The chemist and the SS gave the signal to turn off the engine. I packed up my tools and saw the bodies being taken away. A small wagon on rails was used to take them away from near the gas chamber to a stretch of ground some distance away.”

Mrs. Fields leans forward in her chair. “When we got to the camp, we were made to undress in front of everyone and distribute any valuables, but there were none to be had. The soldiers had taken everything.” She brings the glass of water to her lips and takes a slow sip. “Before we were ordered to remove our clothing, a man in a white lab coat came to talk to us,” she says and her eyes look pale and distant. “He looked like a doctor to me.” She sets the glass down on the edge of Mrs. Finkelstein’s desk. “He announced that we would have to work and that we would be required to take baths, to disinfect us of any disease.”

Mrs. Fields remains silent. I can hear a siren and car horns in the distance.

“And then what happened?” Rebekkah Weinstein asks.

Mrs. Fields glances up at the sound of her voice. “My parents and younger brother were directed to go towards a structure they called, The Tubes and when the doors closed behind them, I never saw them again.” She snorts and reaches for the glass of water again, but before she drinks from it she says, “They were gassed. They were all gassed.”

A heavy silence passes between everyone. I wonder how much of this my grandmother knows. I wonder when they are together at the table, does Mrs. Fields not mention these terrible things? Perhaps my grandmother simply directs the conversation elsewhere.

“I was led to the barracks where the woman with the crying boy saw to me. The following morning one of the SS men pointed to a large pile of naked corpses and told us that was where our family was. We were then responsible for burning them.”

I glance away, out the nearby window. I observe a sparrow take off from a tree and fly through the brilliant blue and cloudless sky. I see a young girl standing before a twisted mass of limbs, rummaging through all the lifelessness.

“The Road to Heaven,” Ana Kemper says. “It’s what my grandfather said they called the path that led to the gas chambers.”

Mrs. Fields eyes become like saucers. “Yes, that’s right.”

Rabbi Switak appears in the doorway.

“Hello, Rabbi,” Mrs. Finkelstein says.

“Hello,” Rabbi Switak says.

“Tell us how you got out,” Seth says.

“Oh yes,” Mrs. Fields says. “My story of survival.”

There are only two known successful attempts at uprisings by Jewish prisoners in the camps, and Sobibor is one of them. There are rumors floating about that the camp will be shut down. This begins to stir agitation amongst the inmates, and especially since the number of prisoner transports have descended dramatically over the recent weeks. The few Sobibor transplants from the Belzec concentration camp are discovered with notes on their persons reflecting what it would mean to the Jews if, in fact, the camps did close. They are shot without question, most times right there on the train platform.

In fact, the rumors prove to be false and there are plans to expand the camp at Sobibor. This leads the prisoners to organize a movement aimed at escaping from the camp.

A transport of ex-military Soviet-Jewish prisoners is brought to the camp. “Their military training will become of use to us,” Mrs. Fields says. “On a cold October day, we were successful in killing eleven SS officers.”

I watch what had been a small slit on the mouths of the students stretch to grins.

“The plan was to kill all of them and walk free out of the front gate.” Mrs. Fields lowers her eyes. “But this did not happen.”

As the grins fade, Mrs. Fields continues. “The deaths of the guards were discovered and suddenly we found ourselves under fire. There were six hundred of us initially that tried to escape. There would have been more, but some of them were too afraid. All in all, about half of us made it out. We ran towards the forests.”

“That’s three hundred more than would have survived had they remained,” David Simcha says.

Mrs. Fields clears her throat. “What is your name?”

“David.”

“Not all of them survived, David. There were land mines buried beneath the ground and then winter descended upon us.”

Here is the universe again with its great big joke.

“Some of them were recaptured and put to death,” Mrs. Fields says. “We hid until we knew for sure that they had stopped looking.”

“Whatever happened to the little boy and to that woman?” Sara asks. “The one who took care of you in the camp.”

For the first time a smile crosses Mrs. Fields face. “They both made it.”

There is a collective sigh of relief that sounds as though a valve has been turned.

“Shortly after our escape,” Mrs. Fields goes on to say, “the chief architect of the camps, a man named Himmler, closes Sobibor and orders trees to be planted in its place to hide any trace of their existence.”

“What an idiot,” Seth says and draws a small giggle from the others.

“There is a small museum there now,” the Rabbi adds. “I saw it when I was there visiting not too long ago. If you go, and you should go one day, you will see a pyramid there on the grounds. It is made of the ashes and crushed bones collected from the cremation pits.”

My thoughts once again turn to Mrs. Fields’s parents and brother, their bones and ashes. We meet each other’s gaze and I can see the strength inside of her. I can see the faith and the love, but most of all, I can see the hope.