"Surely! As surely may I live!"
Then, because my own idea clung to me, I added:
"Don't you want something to eat?"
And before I finished speaking, he had vanished.
The second week after they fell upon us and led me away as a Cantonist,
to be brought up among the Gentiles and turned into a soldier.
* * * * *
Time passed, and I forgot everything, as he had foretold. They knocked
it all out of my head.
I served far away, deep in Russia, among snows and terrific frosts, and
never set eyes on a Jew. There may have been hidden Jews about, but I
knew nothing of them, I knew nothing of Sabbath and festival, nothing of
any fast. I forgot everything.
But I held fast to my name!