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35 FALL 2021 my arm. I quietly left the room, walked up the hidden stairwell and left the church along the same corridor I had entered through with the priest. I con- tinued, reversing that terrible night when Motl took me from my secure home, and walked to where we lived and stood across the street from the apartment where my mother was on the second floor. Trembling and crying in the cold, I began calling my mother. She never turned on her light, no doubt to avoid attracting the attention of informants who roamed the city looking for oppor- tunities to notify the Germans of anyone not obeying the curfew. My mother did finally open her curtain in the dark, but upon seeing that it was me, she made vehement gestures clearly instructing me to return to the church. I have experienced the feeling of defeat many times in life, but never was the feeling as overwhelming and profound as it was that night. With the still-damp sheet clasped under my arm, I made my way back to my dungeon. " I cried all the way to my new prison. " Facing page: Albert with his father, Gershon Hepner, circa 1938. This page L: Albert Hepner's parents, Mirla and Gershon. Above: Motl Globerson, Albert's cousin and one of his saviors. was barely large enough to contain its seven cots, and there was hardly any room to move about, which determined what we could, or rather, couldn't do. For the most part, we could either stand in place or walk around quietly and sit on each other's cots. I made sure no one sat on mine as I didn't want anyone to discover that my sheet was wet. Unfortunately, the first night was the precursor to every night that I slept in the church basement; I wet the bed every night that I spent there. I remember Father Jan, in exasper- ation, exclaimed, "You must stop wetting the bed because I can't explain to the laundress why I need so many bed sheets washed." But no matter how hard I tried, and how ashamed I felt, I couldn't stop. So finally, I tried to do something about the problem. I got up, removed the wet sheet from the bed and bundled it up under