There was the square, thick with people as on a market day, only different, because a market-day crowd is colorful and loud, with chickens clucking, … - Ida Fink

Once again it was quiet, too quiet after what had happened. ("The End")

She had already begun to resemble her mother, and would surely have relived her mother's life-a fine home in a small town, pretty children, pretty dresses, the annual trip to a health resort-if the sentence of time hadn't made tragic heroes even of those least suited to play the part.

I recall one image from those days of difficult waiting: the train in the meadow. It was on a day when a thunderstorm was brewing. Under the black, rain-swollen clouds we were raking hay in the fields. A long, serpentine train slithered through the meadow. Watching it disappear from sight, I felt—very clearly, very palpably--the proximity of danger and the futility of my desperate scrambling, my frantic efforts to break out of this closed circle. It was as if a metal band was suddenly squeezing my ribs. The world went quiet and dark. A thick, heavy silence fell. I dropped my rake on the ground, loosened my blouse. I was gasping for breath. (p185)