The Taster

by V. S. Alexander

  “Disciplined?” Helen asked. “The word is ‘beaten.’ That’s what happened to me.” Helen opened her mouth and pointed to the place where her tooth was missing. “I was struck by a guard who was unhappy with the way I scrubbed floors.”

  “You clean the cabins?” I asked.

  “That’s my job. I’m lucky to have it.”

  “I don’t know how long I can last,” Katrina said. “My hands were raw by the end of the day.”

  I felt sorry for her, but I wanted her to survive. “Remember your husband,” I said. “Be strong for him.”

  When we reached the cabin, Katrina opened her palms and showed us the lacerations on her skin. I doubted she would be able to work the next day. I looked down at my own hands and noticed the watery welts rising from the skin between my thumb and forefinger. They would be painful blisters by morning.

  I crawled into my bed while a few of the women sat on the bench and talked. Even with the lights on and the sustained chatter, I had no trouble falling asleep. I also slept through lights-out.

  Later that night, through the haze of sleep, I felt a pair of eyes staring at me. I had no watch and there was no clock on the wall, but the time must have been past midnight. I jerked awake, startled by the presence looming over me.

  “Don’t be afraid,” a female voice whispered. “Get up.”

  I shook the fog from my head and stared into the darkness. The dark form of a woman appeared in the bleak shadows. “Who are you? Where are we going?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough,” the woman said. “I could have you removed, but if you come willingly it will be much better.”

  I had no doubt about her sincerity, so I crawled from my bed as best I could, my stiff arms and legs aching. I slipped into my shoes when my feet touched the floor.

  “Come with me,” the woman commanded. “We can talk outside.” She led me to the door and down the path away from my cabin. After we had walked about fifty meters, she lit an electric torch. A pistol dangled from her left hand. I recognized her as the young, pretty guard who had told me I looked “strong and well fed.” She motioned for me to follow her into the deeper shadows under the trees. When we stopped, she stroked my hair and face. “I am Jenny,” she said. “I can make life easy for you.”

  I knew no good could come from her offer. “How?”

  She put the torch on the ground and leaned against a tree. The light cast sharp black streaks across her face. A moth flitted around its glow. “You are pretty. You and Katrina, but Katrina is too weak for what I have in mind. You are strong willed and will survive no matter the cost.”

  I shuddered as she touched my face and I pushed her hand away.

  “You have a choice,” she said. “Why not trade pain for pleasure?”

  I was afraid to ask what she wanted.

  She pulled a pack of cigarettes from the waistband of her skirt. “Do you smoke?”

  I wanted to turn away, run from her questions, but there was nowhere to go. “No.”

  She laughed. “Do you have any vices? Drink? Marijuana?” She leaned so close to my face I could see the sparkle in her eyes. “Men?”

  “What do you want?”

  “The German soldiers need your service.” She laughed again, this time softer with a hint of sadness. “I have given them as much as I can, but they grow tired of the same body. No man will ever admit it, but it’s true. Every man, married or not, looks for more. He cannot be satisfied with one woman.”

  “You disgust me,” I said, and then walked away. Glancing back, I saw the pistol rise in my direction.

  “Don’t ever walk away from me again unless you are ordered to,” Jenny said. “I will not hesitate to shoot you if you disobey me.”

  I turned. “Murderer.”

  She lowered her gun. “Believe me, no one will care if you are dead. No one will notice that there’s one less prisoner in the world. If you don’t consent another will take your place—perhaps Katrina after all. I will give you twenty-four hours to make a decision. I will come to you at the same time tomorrow night. I suggest you make the right choice.” She turned off the torch and pointed to my cabin. “Go back to sleep. Tomorrow’s work will be harder than today’s.”

  I walked away slowly, never turning around. If she was going to shoot me, she would have to fire into my back like a coward. The pictures Karl showed me from the Eastern Front. It seems years have gone by since I saw them. Men, women, even children, lined up on top of a ravine. Then shot in the back. The bodies dropped one by one into the pit until it was full. The dirt covered them until there was nothing left, not even tears.

  When I was sure I was far away from Jenny, I ran until I reached the cabin door. Out of breath, I grabbed the handle, but I couldn’t pull it open. Every horror of the past two days crashed down upon me and I collapsed, sobbing, on the damp earth, my body and soul cast into the hell of Bromberg-Ost. There was no way out. Whatever God there was in heaven had deserted my country, my family and me.

  CHAPTER 16

  Jenny was right—the next day’s work was harder than the day before. My muscles ached. My blistered hands throbbed in pain with every swipe of the hoe, as if glass shards were being thrust into my skin. Some relief from the heat came from the dense cloud cover over the camp. The air, however, clung to my skin like a damp washrag. The hours dragged by like days as I was forced to break open the rocky earth in muddy furrows.

  I noticed a curious thing at dinner. Katrina and another woman who had been in the cabin were missing. I didn’t dare ask one of the guards what had happened. I got my meal—this evening a brown mush supposedly made of chickpeas, which smelled raw and earthy—and sat next to Helen. Like most of the other inmates, she ate slowly, saying little, her head drooping over her bowl. She looked up at me with barely a hint of recognition when I sat next to her.

  “Have you seen Katrina?” I asked after a bite of the sticky mess on my plate.

  She shook her head.

  I got the sense she didn’t want to speak to me. “Do you know what’s happened to her?”

  Helen turned and glared at me. “We don’t speak of such things. It’s forbidden.”

  I stopped stirring my mush and let the spoon settle against the side of the bowl. Helen resumed her eating, unwilling to talk. “Let me tell you something,” I whispered. “I know by your silence that something terrible has happened to Katrina. I have no idea what, but if you won’t tell me, I will find out from someone else. We are killing our own people. It must be stopped.”

  We sat silent for a while, both of us eating our meager portions. When Helen had finished, she said, “The guards are listening, watching, for any excuse to be rid of us. You haven’t been here long. It’s dangerous to talk.”

  “We are surrounded by danger. We must live with it or die. What happened to Katrina?”

  Helen sighed. “You are foolish. I will deny that I told you anything.” She pushed her bowl away. “The guards make selections. Gerda, Jenny—they make the decisions about who goes and who stays. Katrina and another woman were sent away to Stutthof this morning. They were not in shape to work. Katrina was complaining about her hands; the other woman had trouble with her legs. She could hardly walk. They won’t be coming back.”

  “How do you know?”

  Helen looked at me as if I were an idiot, her eyes wide with wonder. “They never come back. Have you heard of the showers at Stutthof?”

  I shook my head.

  “Hundreds, maybe thousands, are sent to take showers and they never come out.”

  “They disappear?”

  “Yes, like Katrina. And then the camp smells of burning flesh.”

  I thought of the picture Karl showed me of the prisoner pushing a corpse into what looked like a giant oven. The prisoner in the photo looked as dead as the body. The only way I could keep from being overcome by the full horror of this revelation was to think of Karl. The hope, the faint prayer, that existed in my mind of seeing him alive one day was all th
at kept me from dissolving into tears. I hoped Katrina felt the same way on her way to Stutthof.

  We were participating in our own destruction. How could everyone in Germany look the other way? I wondered if those living in the cities or on farms outside the camps could smell the odor of burned flesh. Did they look to the skies as gray flecks of ash rained down upon them? How could they not know what was going on; and, if they did, why didn’t they care? Where were the people who needed to rise up in horror and indignation at what our government was doing?

  I walked back to the cabin alone, apart from Helen. I was in no mood for conversation. I took my time getting ready for bed. When I crawled in, I did not fall asleep because I felt an itchy nervousness as if ants were crawling over my skin. I lay awake, imagining the seconds ticking away, as I waited for Jenny.

  * * *

  True to her word, she arrived in the middle of the night. When she touched me, I still had no idea what to do. I thought of Karl and wondered what decision he would want me to make. I recalled our conversation when he told me that I should do everything possible to stay alive. My father would have said the same.

  I didn’t speak to her until we were outside, standing in the darkness. “I will go with you.”

  “You are wise,” Jenny said.

  I smelled liquor on her breath, not strong, but subtle as if she had taken a few nips of vodka. She lit a cigarette and told me to follow her. We walked through the camp to the showers, where she ordered me to undress and bathe. I slipped out of my jacket and skirt, put them on a hook and stepped into the shower. Jenny watched me, smiling as I stripped.

  “The Colonel will be pleased . . . except for the bug bites,” she said, with an arch laugh. “I told him I had a treat in store.”

  I started because I immediately thought of the Colonel who had banished me from the Wolf’s Lair. Then I realized he was probably not the same man. There were many colonels in the army. I cringed at what Jenny had in store for me; however, the warm, soapy water running over my body felt good because it had been days since I had been able to wash so thoroughly.

  “You will do anything he asks,” she said. “Whatever pleasure he wants, you will give. Don’t speak unless he speaks to you. I will be outside the door, with this. . . .” She patted her pistol, which was strapped in a holster underneath her arm.

  I spent a few extra minutes in the shower until Jenny began to fidget. I turned off the water and she handed me a towel. She stepped back quickly to avoid getting water on her leather shoes. Jenny was dressed in a black skirt, white blouse and sweater. She wore a red scarf around her neck; she looked as if she were going out for the evening. The other guards never wore anything as provocative as Jenny. She looked lovely, her long hair falling in waves, her face beautified with makeup.

  When I had finished drying myself, Jenny handed me a salve and powdered makeup to put on my body to cover my bug bites. She then gave me a white robe and told me to put it on. “It’s a short walk. Carry your disgusting clothes until we get there.” She squeezed her nose with two fingers as if to block the smell. Then, she ran her fingers through my hair and caressed my shoulders. “You’re almost presentable now. This way.”

  The evening seemed cooler after my shower as the air played over my skin. We didn’t have far to walk until we came to a cabin near the entrance of Bromberg-Ost. From the outside, it looked deserted, as lifeless as a vacant building, but behind the blackout shades I detected the yellow glimmer of candlelight. Jenny stopped in front of the door. “Return here when you’re finished. I’ll be here to take you back. The Colonel is in the back bed—waiting.”

  As I pulled on the handle, I reminded myself that I had no choice if I wanted to stay alive. I took a breath and stepped inside. My eyes took a little time to adjust to the light. A few candles cast their flickering shadows across the room. No air stirred, and the room smelled of ammonia and stale sex. This was the camp brothel. There were seven beds in the room, three on each side and one on the back wall. All were empty, aside from the far one. A man sat on the bed. He was naked except for a towel draped around his middle. He motioned for me to come forward. I tightened the belt on my robe.

  This Colonel was not the one who had sent me here. The man in front of me was in his mid-forties, handsome, with dark hair, graying at the temples. His body was mature, his chest and arms covered with black hair. As I walked toward him, he opened his legs and the towel parted down the middle. I stopped.

  “Come forward,” he said. From his tone, I knew he had been in the brothel many times. “I won’t hurt you.” He patted the bed. “Sit down beside me. Let’s get to know each other.”

  My nerves quaked under my skin. I shook violently, but I took my place beside him.

  “You’re new to this,” he said. “I’ve never seen you.” He turned toward me. “What’s your name?”

  “Magda,” I replied. I wasn’t sure I should tell him.

  “Magda—pretty. Like you.” He placed his hand on my leg and then rubbed his palm up and down over my robe. “You need to relax, enjoy yourself. I can make you happy. If you make me happy, life will be much easier.” He reached for me with his left hand, took my face gently in it and turned it toward him. “You’re shaking. I can command you to do what I say, but if you give in it’s so much nicer.” He pulled his towel open with his right hand. “Look,” he commanded, forcing my head downward.

  “Stop, please,” I said. “Give me a few minutes.”

  He relented and leaned back on the bed, his naked body displayed for me. “Would it be easier if I asked others to join us? Is that what you’d like? An orgy? Jenny can arrange it. In fact, she’d be happy to join in.” He laughed.

  I felt myself crumbling. “No, it wouldn’t be easier. It would be easier for me to die.”

  He chuckled. “Morals have no place in a brothel. Think of it as a moment’s pleasure. Over and then gone forever.” He took my hand and placed it on his stomach. “Tomorrow night you won’t even remember what I looked like. You won’t remember the feel of my . . .” He forced my hand lower, driving it into his pubic hair.

  I ripped my hand away from his.

  “I see this is going to be difficult. Perhaps force is the only way.” He shot up in bed and was about to call out for Jenny.

  “I’m pregnant,” I blurted out.

  He stared at me, his eyes wide with amazement. He slowly pulled the towel across his waist. He sat for a time, studying me, trying to tell whether I was lying. “I will talk to Jenny about this. She can’t get a man worked up and then throw a bucket of cold water on him. It’s not right.”

  “I’m married to an SS officer,” I said.

  The Colonel’s eyes snapped to attention and a wave of disbelief coursed through them. “If that’s true, what are you doing here?”

  The truth seemed to be better than lying—at least a half-truth. “I don’t know. I wasn’t told what my crime was. I was sent away from the Wolf’s Lair, where I worked for the Führer.”

  He inched away from me. “You worked for the Führer? What is your name?”

  “Magda Weber. I’m married to Captain Karl Weber.”

  He buried his face in his hands. “My God. I know Captain Weber. I knew him before he was asked to serve at the Berghof.” The Colonel screamed for Jenny.

  She pulled the door open and jumped inside, her pistol pointed at me. “What’s she done? Should I kill her?” she shouted as she rushed toward us.

  “Put that away before you shoot someone,” the Colonel said. “Get some clothes for this woman and take her to the guards’ dormitory. Keep her there overnight and make sure no harm comes to her. I’ll make a phone call in the morning.”

  “I don’t understand,” Jenny said, and looked at me as if I had stabbed her in the back.

  “That’s all,” the Colonel said. “Just do as I say. I’ll tell you tomorrow.” He lay back on the bed. “Send in another woman—someone more suitable.”

  Jenny pulled me off the bed an
d shoved me toward the door.

  “Remember,” the Colonel commanded. “Be good to her.”

  When we were outside, Jenny waved the pistol in my face and said, “I don’t know what you did, but if there was any trickery involved, I will personally kill you. I don’t like to be made the fool.”

  I bowed my head, saying nothing.

  “Whore,” Jenny said, and spat at my feet. She did not say another word as she led me to the guards’ dormitory.

  * * *

  Gerda woke me early the next morning. She told me I could shower at the dormitory and then get ready for the Colonel, who wanted to see me. She gave me a blue dress, clean underwear, stockings and shoes. She had even recovered my suitcase. A few things of no real importance were missing; it had been riffled through; the clothes left inside were wrinkled and messy. Gerda handed me a cup of coffee. The brew smelled delicious and I savored each sip. For the first time in days, I felt like a human being.

  Gerda took me to an empty office and told me to wait. The windows looked out on the common grounds, which sparkled like green diamonds in the early morning sun. Past the common, the detention cabins spread out like dominoes to the far ridge of trees.

  I saw the Colonel as he approached. He walked as stiffly upright as a stick with legs, his eyes never wavering from the view in front of him. I tried to judge his mood, which was much different from the night before. He seemed somber and subdued, as if whatever he had to tell me would be bad news.

  I put my coffee down on the desk and stood up when he came into the room.

  He brushed past me. “Sit down.”

  I sat and waited for his decision on my fate.

  The Colonel took a seat behind the desk, took off his cap and placed it in front of him. The death’s-head insignia, the skull and crossbones, caught my eye. He leaned back in his chair and said, “Tell me what you know about the plot to kill the Führer.”