Night Ch. 2

Not all of them could sit down in the train, so the Jews took turns sitting down, and there was very little air. There were eighty people in the boxcars. After two days if travel, everyone was thirsty and there was a lot of heat. The Jews got freed from their constraints and the kids started hiding under things. There was food in the trains, but it was never enough to satisfy their hunger. The train stopped in Kaschau, it is a small town on the Czechoslovakian border. A german officer opened the door and told them that they are under the authority of the German army. They would have to hand over any valuables and if they don't and if the Germans find them with valuables, they will be shot. People who are ill will go to the hospital car. If there were not eighty people in the car, the one in charge would be shot.
There was a women next to them called Mrs. Schachter. Elie knew her well. She was in her fifties and her ten year old son was with her. Her husband and two older sons had been separated from her. She is a quiet, tense woman with piercing eyes, she would often go to their house. Her husband was a pious man who spent his days and nights studying. She had lost her mind. On the first day, she has been crying and screaming. There was a fire on the third night. There was a moment of panic and Mrs. Schachter screamed. She looked like a withered tree in a field of wheat. People tried to see, but they couldn't because of the darkness. It took them a long time to recover from the harsh awakening. There was now a little boy crying. They tried to calm the mother and child. A few young men forced her to sit down, then bounded and gagged her. There was silence for a short while again, but after an hour or two, there were more screams. They had to hit Mrs. Schachter in the head multiple times and in the morning, she settled down. She started to scream again and no one bothered, but then she stopped. The heat and the air was beating down on them and it was suffocating them. After a few days, everyone would start screaming. The train did not move again. Auschwitz was the final location for them. There was a labor camp on site, the conditions were good, and the families would not be separated. The young would work in the factories, and the old and the sick would work in fields. Mrs. Schachter was sitting in the corner for all of the train ride. They all started to sleep, but there was another fire. They couldn't see anything, so they went back to their spots. The train started to move again. Then Mrs. Schachter said again that she saw a fire, people saw the fire and kept staring at it. It was the smell of burning flesh and they arrived in Birkenau.