Page 167 - LEIBY

Chapter 21 167

they take the body to a nearby tavern and throw it down there
near the entrance, making it look as if he had been killed in
a drunken brawl. Pesach carefully removed the door from its
hinges, covered it with a blanket and gingerly laid the Nazi
down on the makeshift stretcher. A few minutes later, the
pair left the hotel. They stopped a farmer who rode past in a
cart filled with hay, took the cart, and gave him a few coins as
payment.

“You’ll find your cart back here in another few hours,” Pesach,
who spoke fluent Slovakian, promised. “We need it to take an
ill patient to the hospital.”

The farmer looked at them disbelievingly, but Pesach ordered
him in no uncertain terms to go away. “We’re plain-clothed
policemen,” he whispered, and the farmer nodded naively and
fled.

Dovid and Pesach made their way hurriedly to the tavern a few
streets away – far enough to avoid suspicion, but near enough
that they would be able to return to the hotel soon, and get
ready to leave the place.

The sun’s first rays were just beginning to appear as they completed
their task. They slung the Nazi into a flower garden behind the
tavern, and Dovid ‘eulogized’ him with the appropriate pasuk
from Tehillim. “So may all Your enemies perish, Hashem.”They
returned speedily to the unnerved group waiting in the hotel.
Hershel sat there all alone, pale and still trembling, staring
as if hypnotized at the cup of warm water that he held in his
hand.

“Get ready, pack up, we’re leaving,” Dovid announced. Most of
the group were already prepared to go, the scent of oncoming
danger had them moving quickly.

They arranged themselves into a long line, packages in hand.
Pesach went first, at the head of the group, and Dovid took up
the rear. At the last moment, Dovid returned to the hotel to
make sure that no one had been left behind.