XII
THE DEAD TOWN
When travelling in the provinces after Jewish statistics, I one day met with a Jew dragging himself step by step through the heavy sand. He looks ill, can hardly walk, hardly put one foot before the other. I feel sorry for him and take him into my conveyance. He gets in, gives me a "peace be with you," and asks me every sort of question. I answer, and end by inquiring:
"And you, friend, whence are you?"
"From the dead town," he answers calmly.
I thought he was joking.
"Where is it?" I ask. "Behind the hills of darkness?"
"Where?" he smiles. "It's just in Poland!"
"In our country, a town like that?"
"There it is!" he said; "there it is! Although the nations of the world do not know of it, and have never given it a Gentile name, it is a genuinely Jewish town."