by Jeanne Moran
Elisabeth looked like a freak, a crooked face on top of a grotesquely lopsided body. It was just the kind of unflattering action photo I was afraid I’d take. I’d hoped to throw shots like that in the trash before anyone else could see them. But there, on that poster, that photo lived.
Werner had given my photos to the Party. The Party turned them into this propaganda, their way of telling everyone what to think. That the ordered discipline of the perfect Youth was valuable; the struggling, imperfect Elisabeth was not.
My photos had been used against my friend Elisabeth. Against someone just like me.
In. Out. In. Out.
This poster was my fault. I should have known Werner would hand over my photos. Elisabeth would never forgive me. I would never forgive myself.
“Where did you find this?” My voice was barely audible.
“Tacked to a pole, right near the Marienplatz. For all I know, copies might be all over Munich.” Gabriele regarded me. “You took that photo of Elisabeth, didn’t you Sophie?”
My voice was a hoarse whisper. “Yes.”
“And the other one, the one of the Youth?” I nodded. Herr Franken narrowed his eyes. “Sophie, we don’t think you gave permission to use the photos in this way. But others here may not be so understanding.”
I looked from one face to the other, trying to understand. No one at the hospital would think I’d approve of this. Would they?
“I have some news,” my mother said on arriving for visitation, twisting her hands with palms pressed together. “Your Papa has been detained.”
My heart thudded against my ribs. “Detained? What does that mean?”
“He’s being questioned.”
“Why?” But I already knew the answer. “Because of the photos. Because they were sent to England and published. Because they show the Reich in a bad light.”
She regarded me, her eyes narrowed. “What do you know of such things?”
I handed her the cryptic letter Papa sent me by post. “This is the note I called you about.”
She read it, made a “Hmpf” sound, and thrust it back to me. “I’ll ask you again. What do you know?”
“I saw some photos here at the hospital.”
She continued to regard me as if trying to read the rest of the story in my face. “And Herr Doktor Vogel told you that your father was the photographer?”
“Not exactly.”
She smacked her hand against her thigh and stood, paced briefly and without another word, marched inside. I pushed after her, but she had a head start.
A dozen meters from Doktor Vogel’s office, I heard her raised voice but couldn’t make out the words. I hurried closer and pressed my ear against the door.
“… in the middle of your plan!”
Doktor Vogel’s soft reply was barely audible but gentle and steady as ever, even in the face of his friend’s irate wife. “I’m sorry to upset you so, Karla. Hans is aware of what he has done. I gave the most incriminating photos…” Here he stopped short before continuing. “Suffice it to say this person has connections with a newspaper in London. The rest of the photos, the ordinary ones of scenery and the daily life of the soldiers, had to be returned to Hans.”
“And I did my part,” my mother interrupted, “sending those back to him in my packages of food and clothing. But England, Alphonse? What if…” Her voice choked on these last words.
The opened letters. Mutti being followed. The SS visit to the bakery. Her abrupt manner on the phone. Finally, it all made sense. I wouldn’t have pegged my mother as one to get involved in a scheme like this, but I was proud of her. She had courage.
Rapid footsteps approached and the door swung open. Doktor Vogel glowered at me. “I’m not fond of eavesdroppers. Come in. I want to speak with you anyway.”
Inside the office, my mother paced, her fists bulging in her dress pockets and gray hair poking out of her bun like bits of wire.
“Sophie,” Doktor Vogel began, “I doubt you knew how your photos would be used.” He held the poster – Herr Franken certainly brought it to him quickly.
“What’s that?” my mother asked, and he handed it to her without comment. She examined it. “There’s my Klaus. The future of Germany. So handsome.” I watched her eyes drop to the bottom of the poster and a puzzled look crossed her face. “I know this girl. What’s wrong with her?”
“That’s Elisabeth.” The words stuck in my throat. “She was a patient here.”
Slowly, recognition crossed my mother’s face. “Elisabeth. The ballerina.” She folded her hands around the edges of the poster, then lifted her head abruptly. A spark crossed her face; a new connection had been made. “Ach, mein Gott!” She bolted to her feet and glanced from the poster to me and back again. “They’re saying that children like this Elisabeth and my Sophie are not…”
Doktor Vogel finished the statement for her. “Not good for Germany’s future. Because they are crippled. Ja. Useless eaters, they say.” He shook his head. “I expect these posters are all around the city, maybe all around the Fatherland.” He removed his spectacles, rubbing his eyes before putting them back on and turning to Mutti. “That’s why Hans and I felt so strongly. The Party is targeting … people who are crippled are next.”
Car doors slammed and I jumped. Doktor Vogel moved to the window and peered out, leaning a hand against the windowsill. He exhaled in a long sigh, slumping ever so slightly. Then he turned to us, squared his shoulders, and tugged the bottom of his vest into place. “I have visitors. Karla, Sophie, please go. Quickly.”
My mother stared past him out the window, her arms limp. The poster slid from her hands.
My heart pounded. “Who’s out there?”
Doktor Vogel gestured toward the door. “Best if you aren’t seen with me.” His tone was still calm even though his manner was urgent. “Please go.” He picked up the poster and handed it to me. I didn’t want it, but something in his expression made me take it. I stuffed the poster behind my back.
My mother spun and I followed. We didn’t get too far. Three SS men in knee-length black coats stood in front of us, a solid inky wall. One sneered, “Going somewhere, ladies?”
Chapter Ten
Foreground
M y mother’s answer was high and breathy. “I’m taking my daughter to the ward.” She stepped behind my chair and pushed as if the men would part like the Red Sea before Moses. They didn’t. She stopped short, my footrests just shy of their shins.
One of the men moved toward Doktor Vogel and spoke, but the pounding in my ears kept me from hearing his words. He shoved the doctor’s shoulder and ushered him past us out of the office and through an exterior door. A black sedan waited there, its back door open like a hungry mouth.
A second man spoke to Mutti and me but I couldn’t focus on his words either, just on that gaping car door.
A small knot of people had formed in the hall. Some patients were there with their guests, including my friends Herr Franken and Marla. Anna leaned against a wall, arms crossed on her stomach.
Why was Anna here on her day off?
Another black sedan pulled up behind the first and a fourth uniformed figure marched into the building. Werner. He glanced briefly at the little audience in the hall and exchanged nods with Anna. His high, nasal whine broke through the noise in my ears. “Young Adler should remain here. She’s proven quite valuable to the Reich.” Werner waved at my mother. “But take the woman.” One of the SS men grabbed Mutti’s elbow and guided her out. As the open car swallowed her, she glanced briefly at me, her face flush with panic. An SS man climbed in beside her. In moments, the other two SS were in the front seat and the car sped off.
Without another word, Werner saluted and took off after them in the second car.
In the knot of bystanders, a growling voice spoke. Anna, red-faced, pointed an accusing finger at me. “First Elisabeth’s photo is posted all around Munich, as if she’s some kind of, well, less than human.” Had she seen the poster too?
“And the photographer? Sophie Adler.”
My head spun but no words settled to my lips.
“Now our own Medical Director is taken away by the SS right before our eyes,” Anna continued. “And who’s in the thick of things? Sophie. And when her own mother is led away, who’s left behind?” She clucked her tongue and her eyes flitted from face to face in the group, obviously looking for agreement. “That’s right. Sophie.”
In. Out. In. Out.
Still she went on. “What did Werner, I mean the Scharführer say? ‘She has proven quite valuable to the Reich.’” Anna widened her stance and shoved her fists against her hips, daring anyone to contradict her.
“No!” I tried to protest, but the word was lost in the chaos that erupted in the hallway. Several people shouted and someone screamed.
I raced out of there to the ward and then out onto the porch where I stayed for hours, silent and alone, shivering and weeping. All evening, normal sounds came from indoors, voices, doors closing, music playing, even some laughter. I stayed there long after the sun went down and the cool night air sat damp on my skin. No one came to find me. Obviously, no one cared.
When the ward was finally dark and quiet, I snuck inside, washed and changed and crawled into bed. But not before tucking the poster under my mattress.
No one saw me. It was better that way.
26 June, Sunday
I spent most of the day alone on the porch, playing solitaire and pretending to read, but I couldn’t concentrate. So many things needed to be sorted out. A talk with an old friend would help.
I hesitated, pen against paper, struggling to find focus for my blurry thoughts and feelings. Eventually, I scribbled
Dear Rennie,
The Pied Piper has used his flute. Rats have attacked me and people I love. I don’t know what to do.
Sophie
I reread it a couple times to make sure nothing there would get either of us in trouble. Then I addressed it and started toward the hospital’s mail slot.
On my way through the ward, four patients huddled near the radio turned and scowled. They probably believed gossip and rumors told about me. I felt sick.
I wanted to leave, to go far away where no one knew me, where no one knew my family, where there was no polio and no SS and no parents or old family friends in trouble. I pushed faster, dropped my letter to Rennie in the mail slot, and sped down the hall.
I opened the library door and clicked on a table lamp. A beam of yellowed light shot above and below the lampshade and left much of the room’s contents in shadow – the shelves filled with dusty volumes and wrinkled newspapers, the half-dozen wooden chairs around the long, empty table, pocked and dinged from years of use. What if more of my father’s photos were here, photos Doktor Vogel didn’t have time to send to England? What if the SS found me in that room? The back of my neck prickled. I left in a hurry.
That placed me in the darkened, quiet hall in front of the physio room. On weekdays, that area was the hub of activity but here on the weekend, it was still as a tomb. Thin stripes of sunlight pushed between nearly-closed Venetian blinds and warmed the mat tables, the parallel bars, and the floor. I pushed in, transferred onto a mat and closed my eyes.
When I sat up, the stripes had moved up the wall and lost their warmth. Wetness and slime covered my hands, one side of my face, and the mat table. I dried them with my sleeve.
I’d missed supper. I transferred to my wheelchair and pushed past the ward, avoiding all manner of gazes and whispers. Once outside, I retreated to my refuge at the far end of the porch where I hoped to stay, hidden and unnoticed.
29 June, Wednesday
No one, not even the staff, really knew what to say to me. When Herr Franken spoke kindly to me, I burst into tears. When little Fritz tried to cheer me with silly sound effects, I forced a quavering smile but stayed quiet. After a couple days, they left me alone to brood.
I was quietly and obediently exercising on a mat in physio when three men bustled in. One, a middle-aged man in a dark blue suit with graying hair combed over a bald spot, twiddled a silvery end of his waxed mustache. Beside him, a uniformed Party officer glared around the room, feet spread and hands behind his back. The third wore the black coat of the SS. His eyes scanned the room and when they fell on me, he raised an eyebrow. I caught my breath. He was one of the men who arrested Mutti and Doktor Vogel. And he recognized me. There I was, lying on a mat in plain sight.
In. Out. In. Out.
“Heil, Hitler.” The Party officer snapped his heels and saluted the room full of patients and staff. Several people responded in kind. Gisela, busy with a patient in the parallel bars, stared silently. I propped on my elbows to watch. The officer cleared his throat and continued. “Your new Medical Director, Herr Doktor Georg Albrecht.”
The man with the waxed mustache stepped forward and saluted. “I’m in charge here now.” His voice boomed through the large room. “The previous Medical Director participated in activities,” he paused, “which were ill-advised. Today begins a new era at this hospital. As soon as possible, each of you will be returned to your rightful place in the Reich.”
What exactly was the rightful place for me or any of us with our crippled bodies, all of us ‘useless eaters’?
The new Medical Director strolled around the physio room, greeting everyone with a general disinterested nod, squeezing and pulling that mustache. He approached my mat table and I hoped he’d nod and pass me by, too. Instead, he stopped beside me and waited while I sat up and arranged my legs over the side of the mat. I reached out my hand as I’d been taught. “Sophie Adler,” I said.
He grasped my hand with both of his and pumped it a few times, the pointy mustache ends jiggling as he spoke. “Ah, I’ve heard much of your talents. I have something for you.” He patted his pockets and pulled out a folded paper. A telegram.
I’m pretty sure I stopped breathing. Telegrams meant bad news.
Received word Mutti also detained. Release from RLS 13 July to work bakery.
Klaus
It was bad news, all right. My stepbrother was coming home.
1 July, Friday
I was barely out of bed when Anna came into the ward. “You’re needed at the Medical Director’s office. Come.”
I didn’t know what to think of Anna anymore, but I knew I didn’t trust her. Yet here I was, and there she was. What else could I do? I followed her.
She rapped on Doktor Albrecht’s office door while pushing it open. “She’s here, Vater.”
Vater? The new Medical Director was Anna’s father?
The man looked up from his desk. “Danke.” He gestured me closer. Anna closed the door behind her and leaned against it. She was staying for this conversation. Doktor Albrecht sat back in his chair and began to tug his mustache, a habit I found annoying. “I’ve received word,” he said.
My heart jumped. “About what?”
“Your father and the former Medical Director have been formally charged. Treason.”
I caught my breath. “Treason,” I repeated.
“Ja, among other things. They were involved in a plot against the Fatherland.”
I could barely muster a whisper. “What, what’s the penalty for treason?” I chanced a glance at Anna. She still leaned against the door, a strange expression on her face. Satisfaction?
The doctor didn’t answer. “The trial begins September first.” He leaned forward to prop his elbows on the desk. “Now at the trial, certain things might be taken into account.” My heart hammered so loudly I thought I might miss his words. “Certain favors might be repaid.”
“Favors? What kind of favors?”
“Your photographs.”
“My photos might get Papa and Doktor Vogel, um,” I didn’t know how to finish my question.
He stood abruptly. “I can’t make deals.”
“And my mother?”
“I’ve told you what I could. Heil Hitler.” He saluted and waited for me to do the same. Ann
a stood near the door, her arm raised in a salute. I ducked under it and left.
2 July, Saturday
The treason charge meant my parents and Doktor Vogel were enemies of the Party. Anyone caught helping them would be arrested and charged as well. Even me. My shoulders tightened.
Klaus would be back in Munich in less than two weeks. No doubt he was still excited about the Party’s big projects and ideas. The most I could expect from him was neutrality. I wouldn’t put it past him to side with the Party, even against Mutti and Papa and the doctor.
Heavy footsteps drew my gaze. “Werner.”
He saluted. “You have film for me?”
“Um, no,” I stammered. “I, I haven’t taken any photos at all. Not since…”
“Keep it that way.”
“Excuse me?”
“Don’t use the two tins I gave you. Another assignment will come to you shortly.” He saluted and was gone.
The whole thing gave me a headache. I put my head down on the porch rail. I must have fallen asleep because a voice startled me. “I thought I might find you out here.”
“Rennie!” There she was, right in front of me, hugging me, clasping my hand. “What are you doing here?” I wiped my wet eyes. “When did you get home?”
“This morning. As soon as I got your letter about the Pied Piper, I got a weekend pass.” She squatted in front of me and studied my face. “Werner told me about your mother and your father’s arrest. And the doctor, too. I’m so upset, Sophie.”
I glanced around for a private spot and pointed to a broad shade tree a dozen meters away. She pushed me there and settled herself on a wooden bench, placed her hand over mine and waited. I soaked in the sight of her pale skin, her silvery eyes, and her short, dark curls for the first time in, how long – four or five weeks? How could she look peaceful and unchanged when my world was so different?