Lo, from the Tomb

In 1941, farsighted Gabriel Cohen, a Belgrade shopkeeper, tied several thousand dinars into a neat package. Then he locked and shuttered his shop, and with his bundle of money under his arm, took a stroll to Belgrade's biggest cemetery. There he held a long conversation with a sexton. The money changed hands. The sexton led the way to a family-sized crypt, which Cohen entered. The crypt's massive door slammed, was locked from the outside. Shortly after, the Germans blitzed Belgrade, then took over what was left of the city.

During the three and a half years they stayed, all but a handful of Belgrade's 12,000 Jews were killed or sent away. Cohen's name was listed among the dead or missing. But Cohen was not dead. Last week, having heard the Germans had left, Cohen came out of his tomb. He was pale, shrunken, with a big, matted beard. He told how every day the sexton had brought him food and the newspapers. One coffin, encrusted with candle drippings, had been his table, another his bed.

Then Cohen took down the shutters of his shop, began to do business again. He said that he found things much as he had left them 42 months before.

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