The Ambassador

by Yehuda Avner

  Kritzinger listened to Heydrich’s summary of the Jewish emigrations, the founding of Eichmann’s Central Office for Jewish Emigration and the extortion, bullying, and fear—Heydrich called them “procedures”—used to speed the expulsion of the Jews. “All this was carried out in a legal manner,” Heydrich said.

  Legal within a system of illegality, Kritzinger thought. He clapped his hand over his mouth as though he had spoken aloud and his eyes flickered around the table. He shivered. What would he have done had Brückner not offered him a channel for his sense of disgust? Would he still have sat here silently?

  “In spite of the difficulties with encouraging emigration,” Heydrich went on, “such as the demand by various foreign governments for increasing sums of money to be presented by Jews at the time of their immigration, the lack of shipping space, increasing restrictions on entry permits, or the cancelling of such, five hundred and thirty-seven thousand Jews were sent out of the Reich between the assumption of power by the Party and October 31, 1941.”

  Several of the men at the table turned briefly toward Eichmann. This was the work of his office. Though Kritzinger read jealousy and dislike on their faces, rather than congratulation, Eichmann gave a businesslike smile and bowed his head in acknowledgement.

  “Another possible solution of the problem has now taken the place of emigration,” Heydrich said. “That is, the evacuation of the Jews to the East, provided that the Führer gives the appropriate approval in advance.”

  Gestapo Chief Müller made a whispering hiss, like escaping gas, and grinned at Stuckart, the interior ministry’s expert on race law. Stuckart shrank his shoulders down into his double-breasted jacket.

  Heydrich watched Müller. As always, he registered no emotion, but he let the silence linger long enough for even Müller to appear a little cowed. “Practical experience is already being collected—” Heydrich gestured toward Eichmann, who again bowed slightly “—which is of the greatest importance in relation to the future final solution of the Jewish question.”

  At a nod from the chairman, Eichmann produced a sheet of paper. “You have in your dossiers a copy of the statistics compiled by my office. Approximately eleven million Jews will be involved in the final solution of the European Jewish question.”

  Kritzinger scanned the list of countries and the numbers of Jews. List A for Jews already under Nazi control in Germany, Poland, Norway, Belgium, France, and so on. List B for those in countries soon to be conquered, or coerced as allies into a role in the final solution—England, Ireland, Slovakia, the USSR.

  “I’m glad you didn’t leave Sardinia out of your calculation of Italian Jews, Obersturmbannführer Eichmann.” Müller leered sarcastically, waving Eichmann’s precise tables of figures. The Gestapo chief was given to blunter methods. “Or the two hundred Jews of Albania.”

  Heydrich licked his lips, the nearest he ever got to an outward display of displeasure. “The statistics are of necessity comprehensive. That is the task of the Obersturmbannführer Eichmann’s office.”

  “Fine.” Müller waved his hand in the air. “We find a Jew. We send him east. He dies.”

  Eichmann broke in. “The statistics must be maintained throughout the execution of the final solution, Gruppenführer Müller. If our forces were to, say, execute a considerable number of Jews in the field, but were subsequently to fail to document and report it, how would we know if all the Jews of Europe had been removed to the east or killed? The statistics compiled by my office will ensure that we know exactly how much work has been done and enable us to give the Führer a definitive report when the final Jew is removed from Europe.”

  A brittle, tense voice spoke up. It took Kritzinger a moment to realize it came from him. “It cannot be that the final solution should mean the actual extermination of the Jews of Europe. I ask you, Herr Obergruppenführer Heydrich, to confirm for me, now, that the insinuations of Herr Gruppenführer Müller are not the policy of the Reich.”

  The men about the table grumbled under their breath, as though an overenthusiastic student had asked a pointless question of the teacher when everyone else was ready to pack up their books and head for recess. Heydrich’s gaze swept from Kritzinger’s hands to his face. “The SS has commenced the construction of extermination camps for the Jews in the Generalgouvernement of Poland.”

  “But the Führer—” Kritzinger said.

  “In Poland? You haven’t cleared that with us,” bellowed Bühler, the representative of the Nazi governor of Poland.

  “The Führer promised me in person that extermination was not being considered.” Kritzinger recalled Hitler’s voice as he had spoken those words to him, and wondered what other lies the Führer had told him.

  Heydrich merely pursed his lips and ignored him.

  Stuckart started protesting that the interior ministry ought to have been consulted about extermination camps and the process for killing the Jews. Kritzinger settled back into his chair. His objections were over, for this meeting at least. He would give Brückner the report on the conference he wanted.

  Within a few minutes, the representatives of the ministries and the other Reich bodies fell silent. They brooded, knowing now, as Kritzinger did, that the conference was not about formulating a solution to the Jewish question, as Heydrich had said. That job was already done. The extermination camps were built. The Wannsee conference was a forum for Heydrich to instruct the ministries and offices of the entire regime that it was the SS which would be solely responsible for the Jews. For the murder of millions. Of an entire people.

  “It falls to me now,” Heydrich said, “to ask for the support of every man around the table.”

  He went from one functionary to the next, watching them keenly, daring them to look him in the eye. None of them did. Some offered caveats about the need for Jews to be kept alive as slave labor for the sake of the war economy, but all acceded to the demands of the SS.

  When his turn came, Kritzinger gave a curt nod and said, “I am with you.” His nervousness abated. His struggle was over.

  Heydrich brought them all into the salon for a cognac while Eichmann dictated the minutes of the meeting to a group of secretaries upstairs. The functionaries lingered over their drinks as Heydrich grew drunk. When the representative from the Ministry of Justice got up from his chair, Heydrich ordered him to sit. “I want you all to approve the minutes before you leave,” he slurred.

  Eichmann came down the stairs and distributed a thin sheaf of papers to each man.

  Kritzinger took his copy and glanced through it. “These are not verbatim.”

  “A summary is enough,” Heydrich said. “Sign for them and you may go.”

  Kritzinger initialed Eichmann’s register and put the minutes in his briefcase. Before he closed the case he saw his name on the first page in the list of participants. It may as well have been branded on his forehead. He was marked forever. He bade good day to Heydrich. The chief of the state security services ignored him and took another sip of brandy.

  Chapter 54

  Water was dripping from Arvid Polkes’s head when the Gestapo man brought him up into the airy, vaulted hallway at 8 Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse. His massive shoulders shook. He held his hands before his groin as though they were still cuffed. He seemed near death. Dan put his arm around him, then stumbled under the man’s considerable weight. He felt a chill through his jacket. Polkes was soaking wet.

  “Bertha is waiting for you, Arvid,” Dan whispered.

  The staring, terrified eyes flickered.

  The Gestapo man strolled over to them, rolling breezily on his heels. “Get that sack of shit out of here before I decide to give you a bit of what he got.”

  “He’s being released by Obersturmbannführer Eichmann, who will hear about the treatment to which his prisoner was subjected.”

  The officer took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one. “I’ll be glad to draw the Obersturmbannführer a diagram of what we did to the big Yid.” He shoved Polkes
playfully on the shoulder. “Want another ice bath, Jew boy?”

  Dan bit his tongue. The Gestapo man’s eyes dared him to speak, to curse, but he refused to give him the satisfaction. Dan hurried Polkes out into the street and into the embassy car. He wrapped him in a blanket and headed up Wilhelmstrasse.

  They turned onto Unter den Linden in a silence broken only by the chattering of Polkes’s teeth. As they passed under the air-raid camouflage, Dan felt a cold touch on his hand. He pulled away reflexively.

  Polkes smiled at him. A few of his teeth were missing. “Thank you, Dan. How did you get me out?”

  Dan reached for the cold hand and clasped it. It was like a big steak just out of the freezer. Eventually he felt it warm, blood moving through the poor man’s beaten body again. “I made someone an irresistible offer.”

  “How can I repay you?”

  “You can help me close the deal. How badly hurt are you?”

  Polkes shrugged his big shoulders. “I doubt that I’ll father any more children. But no bones are broken.”

  He was six inches taller than Dan, and twice as wide. Once he warmed up and stood straight, he’d be intimidating enough. Dan figured Polkes might enjoy the task he wanted him to perform.

  “How would you like to beat up a Nazi?” he said.

  Chapter 55

  Brückner took the papers from Kritzinger’s shaking hand. The state secretary let out a sigh, as though he had held his breath all the way from Wannsee to the Chancellery.

  The first page was stamped in red: Top Secret. Brückner scanned the page.

  Minutes of Discussion

  The following persons took part in the discussion about the final solution of the Jewish question which took place in Berlin, Am Grossen Wannsee No. 56/58 on January 20, 1942…

  He flipped through all fifteen pages, reading one paragraph several times, the awful meaning too much to take in at first. “Another possible solution of the problem has now taken the place of emigration, i.e. the evacuation of the Jews to the East, provided that the Führer gives the appropriate approval in advance.” No more emigration. Now it was evacuation. Forcible deportation. To who knew where.

  He glanced at the end. The conclusion was anodyne enough. “The meeting was closed with the request of the Chief of the Security Police and the SD to the participants that they afford him appropriate support during the carrying out of the tasks involved in the solution.” He looked up at Kritzinger. “What happened?”

  “The Jews belong to the SS,” Kritzinger whispered. “Heydrich has frozen out all other governmental bodies.”

  “And what will the SS do with the Jews?” Brückner put the minutes of the Wannsee conference into his attaché case. “Where will they send them?”

  Kritzinger put his hand to his chest. It covered the Nazi Party pin on his lapel, and also his heart. Both items were presently assaulting his guilty conscience, Brückner thought.

  “They will exterminate them,” Kritzinger said. “In Poland. I intend to tender my resignation today. To the Führer himself.”

  “Are you going to tell him why? I’m sure he’ll be touched by your concern for the Jews while he’s off in East Prussia planning his next suicidal assault against the Russians.”

  “I believe that the Führer would never approve of this—”

  “Heydrich will exterminate the Jews only with the Führer’s approval. He even says so in your damned minutes. The Blond Beast is doing this at the Führer’s behest, and he knows that the approval is a mere formality. If Jews are being gassed en masse then this document proves that Hitler wants it done.” Brückner took his greatcoat from the hat stand. “I’m going out. When I get back, I want to know exactly where these camps are.”

  “I told you, it’s an SS matter. They won’t give that information to me.”

  “Tell them the Führer wants to have a better idea of the numbers of rolling stock needed to transport the Jews, so he can figure out how many troops the railways will be able to move to Russia while these Jews are being shipped to Poland. It’s just the kind of detail he likes to meddle in. Get a breakdown by camp. Make it something bureaucratic and statistical like that. That way the SS won’t even notice that you’re asking for a list of death camps and their locations. Tell them it’s an immediate necessity.”

  Kritzinger stiffened his back and nodded his head curtly. Perhaps he had already managed to forget that this wasn’t a real order. He had converted his subterfuge into a command received, and so the obligation to carry it out overcame his fear.

  The captain exited to the corridor and made the long, echoing walk down the center of the Chancellery’s massive hallway toward the exit. Kritzinger sidled along the red marble wall to his office.

  Chapter 56

  Eichmann stopped his driver at the Hackescher Market and told him to go get a beer and wait for him. He walked under the elevated rail lines and hurried into the Monbijou Park. His mouth was dry and his pulse fast with anticipation. What a day. He had earned the respect of the Obergruppenführer Heydrich for his precise delineation of the statistical scope of the Jewish question that morning at the Wannsee conference. Now he would secure wealth and comfort for the remainder of his life by taking possession of the Stradivarius. All at the cost of one Jew freed from the Gestapo cellars. Freed for the time being. His lips trembled as he suppressed a smile.

  Eichmann walked briskly past the empty yellow benches for Jews in the park to reach Monbijoustrasse. The wind off the Spree was icy. He pulled his collar up around his neck. Two, perhaps three million reichsmarks, the violin was worth. A glance at his watch. Twelve fifty-nine. Right on time. He crossed the road and scuttled toward the ruins of Countess von Bredow’s home. As he did so, a woman emerged from the door of the Israeli embassy. A Jew of the Polish sort, Eichmann thought, with a touch of Romania in the gypsy olive skin and the big almond eyes. The Polkes woman. She carried a tray of large cups down the steps. The soup in the cups steamed around her. She smiled nervously and invited the Gestapo guards to take some. They clapped their cold hands and joined her on the stone bench beside the steps. Out of sight of the road and the sidewalk. It was shocking that they should fraternize with a Jew that way. Still, the ambassador was keeping to the deal. He had sent out this woman, who was supposed to be in hiding, to signal to Eichmann that he was ready for him.

  Eichmann slipped into the rubble of the bombed-out mansion, scrambling over the debris. He stumbled and jammed his knee painfully against a broken chair. A spray of splinters stuck through his breeches. He limped over the first mound and fell again. This time his shoulder took the impact.

  He rested briefly, panting. He was out of sight of the Gestapo detail, even if they did decide to abandon the shelter of the stairway and the presence of an attractive woman to drink their soup in the windy street. But they wouldn’t. The Gestapo was the laziest organ of the Nazi regime. Without its energetic informants, its agents would never arrest a soul. Eichmann picked himself up and climbed more carefully now across the stone and shattered furnishings and scattered clothing to the garden at the rear. He lifted his leg onto the garden wall and hauled himself over.

  As he landed, his ankle twisted. He cursed and rolled onto his back. He flexed his foot inside his jackboot. The dampness of the grass seeped into his clothing. He forced himself to his feet.

  The rear door of the embassy opened. Eichmann went gingerly toward it.

  Chapter 57

  Dan shut the kitchen door. Eichmann leaned against the table, shaking his injured leg. He turned to the ambassador and grinned. “Lucky I have a comfortable desk job,” he said.

  Dan didn’t return the smile. He gestured toward the hall. “This way.”

  They went across the lobby, toward the office where Wili Gottfried had worked. Eichmann stared about him. He processed thousands of Jews who made their applications through this embassy. Dan figured it had never occurred to the man that it was a real place of bricks and stairs and wall-mounted radiators, just as the
lists of Jews he compiled couldn’t really have been made up of actual people who hurt themselves when they fell. He saw Eichmann as he truly was, now that he had him on his own territory. The SS man was fairly stupid, deeply egotistical, and capable of profound hatred. But most of all, he was weak. A day in the front lines of battle would have finished him. Dan would break him easily.

  “Gottfried worked in that room,” he said. “Sometimes he would practice his pieces there, too.”

  “I can hear the traces of music.” Eichmann went over the rug to the door of Gottfried’s office. “I really can.”

  He went inside. Polkes spun out from behind the door and smashed Eichmann in the face with his big fist. He wore a long leather coat similar to those favored by Gestapo agents.

  Eichmann tumbled to the ground, and Polkes dropped onto him. The Nazi fumbled for his pistol, but the weight on him was too much. His face turned purple as Polkes cut off his windpipe.

  Eichmann swiveled his eyes toward Dan and tried to croak out a plea for mercy.

  The snarl on Polkes’s lips was almost enough to make Dan forget his plans. He wished he could just let the poor tortured fellow finish Eichmann right now. He shook his head. “Arvid, that’s enough.”

  Polkes relaxed his grip on Eichmann’s neck. He slapped him hard across the face, then back again with his knuckles.

  Eichmann cried out.

  “Get undressed,” Dan ordered. “Arvid. Help him.”

  Eichmann struggled against Polkes as the big man unbuttoned him and pulled off his clothing. Dan took a damp, ragged suit and a collarless shirt from the wing chair by the door. “Put these on,” he said.