The Horse Adjutant
cold comes.” The soldier asked, “Are you a tailor?” Max replied, “Yes.” The soldier looked around the room and saw the tools and materials of a tailor, “Can you fix my two buttons?” Max nodded, “Why not?” The soldier took his jacket off and showed Max it was missing two buttons. Max proceeded deftly to replace them. When he was finished, he returned the jacket to his abhorred customer. Satisfied with the work the soldier said, “Continue what you are doing until you are finished.” Yom Kippur arrived; it is one of the most important holidays for the Jews, and Max’s father decided to gather a minyan (10 men) at the synagogue and told Max he would need his help keeping an eye out for the Germans. When the time arrived, Max did as he was told. Most probably it was the last minyan at the Grybow Orthodox Temple. As the men prayed to God that the war should be over soon, Max waited and watched outside obedient to the wishes of his father. Thankfully, the night was quiet, and no one came. Soon after, Max started to plan his escape. As part of the plan, he went to Nowy-Sacz and found some small flintstones that he wanted to take with him purchasing 100 Zlo- ty worth. Since they were small, he could carry them easily in his pocket. He thought, wherever he went maybe he could sell them. Once the purchase was completed, he re- turned to German-occupied Grybow. Four days later on the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, he said to his father, “Papa, I’m leaving. I can’t live here anymore.” His mother started to cry. “Papa, I want you should sell me a horse and a buggy.” With this buggy and the flintstones rattling in his pocket, he took three friends, Isaac Goldman, and two oth- ers, and they all left. Isaac survived the war. They all said goodbye to their families and traveled southeast down to the river that divided Poland and Russia. They followed the river until they could find a spot low enough to cross and entered Russia. They ended up in Lwów. Max, loved this city. He said, “It had everything I could have wanted.” Max started to trade on the Black Market. It worked out brilliantly. The flint he brought turned out to be worth a great deal. He sold them to a few people, earning 500 Zloty on his 100 Zloty investment. This money made it possible to live well, at least for a little while. Then a combination of concern for his family and the need to replenish his supply of stones led him to think about going back for more, which is exactly what he did. On his second trip, Max went to the river again and crossed it. It was now early Fall,
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