by Jana Petken
“I’d have thought you’d be eager to help her, Father, since you now know what’s going on in Brandenburg,” Paul finally responded.
“Whatever do you mean?” Laura asked, perking up.
“Ask him about his new medical product. Make him tell you what it’s being used for.”
Laura’s eyes flicked to Dieter, “Darling, what’s Paul talking about?”
Dieter glared at Paul. “Shut your mouth and get off your high horse. I’m not the one who killed Judith’s sister, you are! You’re as guilty as the doctor who stuck the needle in her vein.”
Laura gasped.
Paul reached for her, but she slapped him away. “Take a good look at me, Father,” said Paul, pulling at his epaulettes. “You made me into this ... this thing. We could have wiped our hands clean of this whole business by going back to England with Hannah and Frank. We could have fought the Nazis instead of being party to their sick, murderous schemes. I could have become the doctor I dreamt of becoming, not some vile exterminator!”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Paul put his hand on Judith’s bedroom door, but then walked past it. He’d already said goodbye to her. It wouldn’t be right to upset her again.
He got into his car, sat behind the wheel and glared at his father who stood on the porch scowling at him. The argument had got out of control, and what had begun as a heated discussion had turned into a fight with cruel words and shocking revelations from both sides. His mother, a kind woman who adored her children, now knew about the gassings. She knew, yet she still wanted to stand by her husband.
“I am a German,” his father had said, thumping his fist on the table. “I am a patriot. We will win this war, and when we do, I will walk down Berlin’s streets as a proud citizen of the Reich, not as a man who defected to the enemy.”
Paul would have moved heaven and earth to get them to Switzerland. They could have decided their fate from there: to be with their children, or to stay put until the war ended. He’d given them the chance to turn their backs on Hitler, but they had both looked at him as though he were a madman.
He had a couple of stops to make, the first being the tailor’s shop in Berlin’s city centre where his father had ordered him an SS medical officer’s uniform in tuxedo style to be worn on formal occasions. He recalled Brandt’s warning about following his routines to the letter and not doing anything different, so, he’d get the bloody tuxedo just in case his father checked up on him. “Now that you’re an officer in the military elite, you should look the part,” his father had said a couple of days earlier, “and the tailor has been kind enough to rush this through. Wilmot decided to join the non-commissioned ranks, but you, my boy, were invited in as an officer and that honour will open a lot of doors for you.”
Under duress, Paul had also agreed to accompany his father to the Vogel factory the previous day. But, he’d not been happy about wearing his SS field uniform or being paraded about to make his father look good in front of the SS soldiers who now protected the building.
“I want to show you off,” Dieter had said when Paul protested. “I have SS guards patrolling the factory, and they’ll be more inclined to trust me and my workers if they see that my son is an officer. They’ve been disruptive to productivity. You can do this for me, can’t you, Son?”
Paul walked into the tailor’s shop, reminding himself that he’d never wear the fancy tuxedo once he left there with it in a box.
The tailor cocked his head to the side while pulling the jacket down at the front. “It’s perfect. Are you pleased with it, Untersturmführer?”
The middle-aged man was not his father’s usual tailor, Paul thought, nodding in response. He looked like an owl with large round eyes that never seemed to blink, a little, beak-like nose and nasal whine when he spoke. And he hadn’t stopped sneezing since the minute Paul had walked into the place.
“You should get that cold seen to before it turns nasty,” Paul remarked.
“Ach, it’s nothing, just my allergies. I always get them in the summer when the flowers come out.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, what happened to Herr Baumann? He had this shop for over fifty years.”
“Ha, that old Jew. The Gestapo threw him out months ago. I laughed when I heard. I wanted to buy the shop from him in 1936 when he threatened to retire, but he wouldn’t accept my generous offer. Serves him right – last I heard, he’d been sent to some camp or other for chaining himself to the till here – he was a typical, greedy Jew. You know how they are.”
“He was always very kind to me,” Paul said. “He used to give my brother and me sweets when we came here with my father.”
Paul, cringing at his decked-out reflection in the mirror said, “Today is my first official day in the SS, so, tell me, why do I have two medal ribbons on the jacket?”
The shop was empty, nonetheless, the tailor looked furtive. “Between you and me, the SS prefer their officers to look like heroes. It’s all a bit of trickery to get the lower ranks to respect their superiors. Don’t you worry about them, Untersturmführer.”
Paul thought it more likely that his father had asked a high-ranking drinking friend at one of his fancy clubs, to arrange for the medals be put on, “I don’t feel right wearing them,” he insisted. “I’d like you to remove them, Herr...?”
“Jäger. I’m sorry, but I can’t take them off. That’s what was asked for and that’s how I’ve to present the jacket to you. What you do with it when you leave here is up to you. Wear them, don’t wear them. I don’t care, so long as you tell people that you took them off.”
Paul hurried into the dressing room, desperate to get the new uniform off his back, only to find his field uniform still hanging there, waiting for him to put it back on. He picked up the cap and fingered the emblem depicting a skull. It meant loyalty to Hitler unto death. He recalled Willie telling Hannah about the skull’s meaning at the graduation party. What would she and Frank think if they saw him, a doctor, wearing it on his SS cap? Hannah would have a fit if she found out.
After Paul had dressed, Herr Jäger handed him the tuxedo wrapped in a brown paper parcel tied with string. “Don’t worry, Untersturmführer Vogel, you’re not the only officer who’s wearing medals for bravery without having fired a shot or held a gun. Take it from me, all you have to do is wear the uniform with pride, and you’ll be fine.”
Paul sat in his car without putting the key in the ignition. Brandt, the old spy living in his dressing gown in the grey terraced house hadn’t sent word yet. How might the message come to him, Paul wondered for the umpteenth time? He should have asked Brandt what sort of communication it would be: a carrier pigeon, a coded message from a man standing behind a hedge with a secret handshake, or a good old-fashioned telephone call. His mind boggled.
He didn’t like the spy world. It was far too secretive and unstable for his liking. He liked order and discipline and facing people straight on without worrying about intrigue and subterfuge. He liked knowing what was going to happen, not wondering if today would be the day, or this would be the week.
He started the engine and pulled away from the kerb; a destination in mind. He’d thought long enough about his options. Max and Brandt had only three days to finalise whatever plan they were concocting. He was running out of time and couldn’t follow Brandt’s orders to wait for some daft cryptic sign to appear, or a sudden surprise meeting to occur. “You’ll know when it happens,” Brandt had said. What the blazes was that supposed to mean?
Paul had second thoughts about getting out of the vehicle after parking it in front of Brandt’s house. What if he was being followed by one of Leitner’s men? He still didn’t trust the Hauptsturmführer – but what if he was being paranoid and Leitner wasn’t having him followed at all?
Paul wrapped his hands around the steering wheel until he reached a decision. Before arriving in the neighbourhood, he’d counted the cars travelling behind him and none of them had pursued him into the last two turnings.
It was easy to spot other vehicles nowadays; there were so few of them on the road.
A woman was leaving the house next to Brandt’s. She glanced at him and then walked off down the street. The only good thing about wearing the SS uniform was that no one would ask questions about what he was doing there or where he was going. It was taken for granted that anyone who wore it was a good Nazi on the straight and narrow.
Paul knocked three times. On the third rap, he heard Brandt’s voice hiss, “Go away.” Afraid to give his name, or to speak at all, Paul tried again with even louder knocks.
Brandt shouted, “I said, go away!”
It was then that Paul noticed the spy hole in the door. Brandt wasn’t going to let him in, not today.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Paul was embarrassed and frustrated with Brandt for turning him away. He was also uneasy about hanging around the street mulling over whether he should try the old man again. He wasn’t used to being in military attire or seeing people’s guilt-ridden glances as they walked past him. He didn’t have a driver or an official car, and was not adept at putting on a confident Nazi swagger or staring at people with suspicious superior eyes. He was more like a skulking, naughty schoolboy playing truant from school and trying not to be noticed.
Paul got in his vehicle and repeatedly thumped the steering wheel with his fist. “Damn it! Stupid idiot! What were you thinking?”
“Yes, what were you thinking, Paulie? He told you not to come back here. You’re still as pig-headed as ever, I see.”
Paul gasped as his eyes focused on the rear-view mirror where he saw the reflection of Max’s raised hand waving at him. “Jesus, Max, how did you get in here?”
Max was lying across the back seat and he chuckled. “Do you mean Germany or your car? You didn’t lock it, idiot. Drive. Head in the direction you were planning to go. Don’t turn around to look at me, no matter how much you want to see my handsome face, and don’t stop until you find a secluded spot. We’ve got a lot to talk about, and judging by that monstrous outfit you’re wearing, we don’t have much time.”
Paul pulled into a country lane at the edge of the Spreewald Forest. It wasn’t a well-used road as such, more like a dirt track used by farmers to herd their cows, but it was as secluded as it got.
When the twins walked into the forest they were sheltered and hidden by huge oak trees. Max and Paul shook hands and then embraced. Paul, the more sensitive of the two, sniffed hard. “It’s good to see your ugly mug. I’ve missed you, Max. You’ve no idea how much.”
Max joked, “And I’ve missed seeing my face without having to use a mirror. Christ, Paul, look at the state of you, what have you got yourself into?”
The two men sat on a damp log and the atmosphere instantly changed. Paul was excited, but still shocked to see Max turn up in person. “I never thought for a moment that you’d actually come here. I imagined you and I meeting across the border, or that you’d send someone to represent you. You’ve taken a big risk.”
“There was no way in hell I was going to let anyone else guide you out. Besides, I wanted to see what kind of trouble you’d got into for myself.” He paused and stared at Paul. “Tell me more about this Jewish woman. I understand why you’re desperate to help her, but we only have a very small window to get you both to Switzerland. You should have given Brandt her details during your first meeting. He doesn’t have much time, if any, to mess around with new documents for her.”
“I know that now, but nothing is black and white here. She was safe one day and the next was on a list for … never mind that … I thought Brandt would let me in this morning to explain. I brought a photograph of her as he asked.”
Max frowned in disapproval. “You put his cover in danger by going there in uniform. I told you last year; espionage is not a game. You can’t break the rules when it involves other people, because mistakes can kill. You understand that, right?”
“Yes, I understand. I panicked. Don’t patronise me, you sound like Father. There’s a lot you don’t know.”
“And you can tell me everything that’s going on, but you might have to accept leaving the woman behind.”
Paul took a deep breath and then slowly exhaled. “I understand the urgency, and you’ve every right to be angry at me turning up at Brandt’s door, but I’m not going anywhere without Judith. I gave her my word and I’m going to keep it.” Paul gulped. “Max, Judith is in this mess because of me. I took her sixteen-year-old sister to Brandenburg Hospital and within two weeks she was murdered by lethal injection, then I went to her house and lied to her family. I’m responsible for everything that’s happened to her.”
Paul wrestled with his words, unsure about how much to say and what to keep to himself. “You don’t know, Max … you can’t possibly. Judith’s on the hospital’s admittance list, and the minute she gets to Brandenburg she’ll be gassed to death.”
Max lips moved but nothing came out. He shook his head as though to clear it. Then, his eyes narrowed in anger. “What’s going on in that place?”
Paul described the gas chamber and the euthanasia programme. He told Max about the number of SS soldiers guarding and maintaining the crematory ovens. He admitted to taking part in the mass gassings by examining the patients beforehand and after they had died, but he also swore that he’d put up a bloody good fight against it.
“I swear on my life, on Mother’s life, I would have shot those SS buggers had I had a machine gun to hand.” Then tears came from nowhere and Paul broke down.
“Don’t Paul. You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to.” Max squeezed his brother’s shoulder. “It’s okay.”
“No, it isn’t … nothing’s okay. What I’ve seen can never be unseen … what I did can never be undone or forgotten. The memory of that day will haunt me forever, and there will be more days like that to come. You must see why I have to do everything I can for Judith?”
Max, stunned into silence, stared unseeingly at the bush in front of him until he let out a disgusted sigh and put his arm around Paul’s shoulder. “We’ve not heard as much as a peep about any of this.”
“I’d be surprised if you had. It’s a secret programme. Brandenburg is a test site, but I think they’re going to extend the gassings to other euthanasia centres. I hope to God I’m wrong about that.”
“This is not war its annihilation – it beggars belief,” Max spat, studying Paul who was trying to hold himself together. “Paul, listen to me, you didn’t turn the lever on the gas pipe. You didn’t gas them, and you can’t save every Jew or sick person that goes to your hospital ...”
Paul shrugged Max’s hand off his shoulder. “It doesn’t matter whether I gassed them or not. I was complicit. I watched the whole thing. I even checked for signs of life after we were given the all-clear to go inside. I turned children’s bodies over and looked in their dead eyes. I can’t get them out of my head, Max.”
“Does father know about Brandenburg?”
“Yes,” Paul sneered. “To be honest, I don’t think I can trust him anymore. He’s working with the Party, getting rich off new contracts from the Interior Ministry. He won’t hear a bad word against Hitler or Goebbels or the high-ranking officials from the Party who turn up at his house for coffee and cake. He makes me sick to my stomach – I’m sorry, I know you don’t want to hear this, but it’s the truth.”
Max was quiet as though measuring his words, but when he eventually spoke it sounded more like a reprimand than comforting advice. “I can’t defend Father, given that I don’t have an inkling of what’s going on at home and in the factories, but I won’t allow you to condemn him. Papa has never once apologised for supporting Hitler, Paul, and he’s certainly profited from the Nazi years, but he’d never betray you, or Mother. If there’s one thing we know to be true, it’s that he loves her, and us, above all else.”
“If he loved her, he’d have let her go to England before this mess started!”
Max lit a cigarette. “Were you
forced to join the SS, or did you enlist voluntarily?”
Paul growled. “What do you think? It was either this uniform or a concentration camp – don’t look at me that way – and before you ask, yes, it’s really that bad. The rule of law has been crushed by that narcissist Hitler. I’ve had no basic training. I don’t have a gun or orders to go to war. I haven’t been taught drills or about ranks and insignias, and I’ve never been inside the SS headquarters. It’s a sham, nothing but a bloody sham to keep me in my place – Mother thinks the Reich is using me to control Father, but I’m not so sure he needs controlling. Not once did he question how quickly I put this on after signing a little bit of paper – It doesn’t make sense. Nothing is real or sane anymore.”
“I promise you, Paul, we’ll dig deeper into your Brandenburg gassings.”
Paul grunted. “What’s the point? The British won’t bomb a hospital, and even if they did, more centres are being ear-marked. As I said, Brandenburg is only the test site, and now that they’ve seen it working they’ll go on to use this programme to kill healthy Jews. Mark my words, this is just the beginning.”
“Then, we’ll have to bomb the factories that are producing the gas,” Max responded.
Paul’s face reddened with guilt.
“What is it? What are not telling me?”
“Nothing … it’s nothing.”
Max stood to stretch his muscles. “I’ll give you something that might help you persuade Brandt to fix Judith’s paperwork, but even if he agrees, it’ll take him a couple of days at least.”
“Thank you,” Paul said.
“Don’t thank me yet. She’s not the biggest problem, you are.”
Paul was mystified. “Why? I can travel anywhere I want within Germany’s borders, and no one will stop me going into Switzerland. Businessmen do it all the time so long as they pay the border guards and deposit their bags of stolen money in Swiss banks. And look at me. Who’s going to question my motives when I’m wearing an SS uniform?”