Soon after
Elie and his family are moved to a smaller Jewish ghetto, they are deported to Auschwitz. As
Elie says with some sense of , they are moved on Saturday, the Jewish day of rest.
The Jewish community had come to an agreement with the Hungarian police that they would
organize themselves. They all gather at the synagogue, where they waited twenty fours for the
convoy. The women waited upstairs, and the men waited downstairs.
The
synagogue was a sign of what was about to come. It resembled a train station: "The altar
was shattered, the wall coverings shredded, the walls themselves bare." There were so many
people in there that Elie says it was hard to breathe. Some people are so afraid to go outside
that they defecate in the corner.
In the morning, they walked to the train
station, and the awaiting Hungarian police loaded them into what Elie calls the cattle cars.
Elie says that they fitted 80 people into each wagon. The police
gave each wagon bread and a few pails of water and put one person in charge of the wagon. They
told them that if someone tries escape that person would be held responsible and shot.
Inside the wagon, Elie says there was very little air and space. Most people had to
stand. Some people lost their inhibitions and "caressed one
another."
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