“Could you describe exactly what happened between you and Herr Dahler?” the prosecutor inquired. “What did he do?”
“In front of Helena, nothing,” Novák declared, looking at Dahler derisively. “That’s another reason why I advised the court on account of his character. Herr Dahler has always been extremely cunning. He knew that being the sensitive person that she is, Helena would be appalled if he began beating me in front of her. So, he told me to follow him and only when we were in the open field, far beyond both bunkers, did he begin working on me with his whip and then beating me just with his fists, when the whip wasn’t enough of a thrill for him, I suppose.”
“Was it just the two of you in the field?”
“No. He brought me near the ravines next to where the unearthed bodies were being burned. Part of my Sonderkommando was there, along with a few SS officers supervising the process but, needless to say, none of them paid the slightest attention to an SS man beating a Jew. It was such a common occurrence, it didn’t impress or interest anyone.”
“What happened next?”
“After he beat me within two breaths of my life, he took his gun out and stood over me with a smirk on his face. Dragged me near the edge of the big pyre and turned me, by my collar, towards it, saying, ‘Well, waste of life, tell me which I should do now – shoot you first and then throw you in there or throw you in there alive?’ I was terrified he’d actually do it, so I began begging him for my life. Finally, he dropped me onto the ground, kicked me one last time in the stomach and said, ‘You’re assigned to this part of the Sonderkommando from now on. You’ll be burning these stiffs until we run out of them and after that, you’ll be burning them in the crematorium that we’re building. You’ll be burning bodies until you kill yourself or until the time of your Sonderkommando comes’ – they would kill off almost the entire Sonderkommando every four to five months, leaving just a few people to instruct the new Kommando on what to do. They didn’t want to leave any witnesses to their crimes. I guess Herr Dahler hoped that it would be my fate also. He also warned me that if he ever saw me speaking to Helena again, he wouldn’t be asking me any preferences as to how I would like to go into the pyre, dead or alive.”
The Chairman shifted his attention to the defendant. “Is that true, what Herr Novák just described to the court?”
“Not entirely. I did beat him and I did ask Kommandoführer Hössler to assign him to the part of the Sonderkommando that was in charge of the cremation. But I never threatened him with my gun or any burning pits. That’s a blatant lie,” he announced dryly.
“Of course, you would say it’s a lie,” Novák said poisonously. “You wouldn’t want your wife to learn the truth about the many things you did.”
“I don’t have secrets from my wife and what you just described certainly doesn’t fall into the category of the things I did.” Despite his tone being coolly polite, the derisive look he threw Novák’s way spoke volumes. “I haven’t said a word against anything spoken in this courtroom that was true to the fact. I’m not trying to paint myself better than I am but I will not sit here silently either and listen to your lies. If something that you say is not true, I will let the court know it. I regret if such a position upsets you.”
“It doesn’t upset me,” Novák replied sweetly. “Quite the contrary; it’s you who will have to live with yourself for the rest of your days knowing the crimes you committed against innocent people.”
Dr. Hoffman concentrated on the couple in front of him. Helena visibly stiffened, while, next to her, Dahler took a deep breath, seemingly bringing his emotions under control. After a moment, he was back to his politely uninterested self. Dr. Hoffman almost applauded such self-control.
“I am very well aware of my part in the Holocaust, Herr Novák,” Dahler began slowly, carefully measuring his words. “It is not my intention to minimize it in any way. I know that my participation in what was proclaimed and rightfully so, a crime against humanity, will be forever on my unclean conscience. In no way is it my intention to deny my responsibility for being a part of that collective mechanism that brought death to millions of innocent people. Do I regret the part I played in it? Absolutely. With all that said, I won’t be taking the blame for something I didn’t do. I hope that you will respect this court as much as I respect it and treat it accordingly. Speak the truth that is. Otherwise, this entire procedure is pointless. Besides, if we’re talking about throwing people into burning pits, it’s you who is guilty of this crime, not me.”
All of the heads turned to the Slovak. All the blood seemed to leave his face at once. “What lies are you spreading now, Herr Dahler?”
The emphasized use of the German form of address didn’t escape Dr. Hoffman’s attention. He was mildly surprised that Novák didn’t address him by his full military rank. He almost expected a jab of this sort from the Slovak.
“Not lies, facts.” Dahler shrugged, unimpressed. “Wasn’t it you and your comrades who shoved an SS guard alive into the crematorium’s oven during one of your revolts?”
An eerie silence hung over the room. Dr. Hoffman could hear himself breathing. Blood rushed back to Novák’s cheeks, painting them in crimson patches.
“Do you know how many people he killed? That man deserved it!” he cried, trembling with his entire body.
Dahler was the picture of composure. “Again, blatant lie. That guard was no Moll by any accounts. He was one of those apathetic guards that didn’t care one way or another as to what’s going on around them as long as the work gets done. He was much too indifferent to beat anybody, let alone derive any sadistic pleasure from it. He just happened to be there, alone with you and you used the chance to take your revenge out on at least someone wearing the uniform you all hated so much. Let’s call a spade a spade, Herr Novák. You killed an innocent man; sentenced him to die a horrific death in an oven. Of course, it’s now my word against yours but judging by the fact that out of the two of you – the man, whom you and your friends burned alive and yourself – it’s you, who’s lived to tell the tale. That makes you the sadistic killer, not me. I didn’t throw you into any burning pits, otherwise, we wouldn’t have been having this conversation right now.”
“How dare you call me a killer?! You, who wore the SS uniform, who sent millions to their death, who savagely beat the woman he claimed he had feelings for, how dare you call me a sadistic killer?!”
The Chairman hit his hammer, calling Novák to order. “We won’t be having a circus here with a shouting contest, Herr Novák. Calm down, please. As a matter of fact, I think it would be wise for all of us to take a little break. I’m announcing recess and I’ll see you all here in one hour precisely.”
Chapter Fourteen
A State Magistrate’s Office’s cafeteria was a simple affair but it was functioning and that’s all that mattered to the harassed-looking court members and American MPs. An outline of an eagle was still visible on one of the walls even through a hasty whitewash job the German POWs had managed to complete last year, with whatever miserable resources were available to them. Lieutenant Carter and Dr. Hoffman chewed their lunch in silence, each immersed in his own thoughts. Ever since the end of the war, they’d had to plow through thousands of denazification cases, yet neither of them had ever come across anything of this odd sort.
Andrej Novák barely touched his food. Instead, he shifted his gaze from the psychiatrist back to an MP and back again, growing more and more agitated.
“You’re not actually considering believing that Nazi, are you?” He’d finally had enough of that silence. “You do understand that he brainwashed his wife into saying all of those things, don’t you?”
Lieutenant Carter stopped chewing and looked at Dr. Hoffman. The latter put down his fork. With the Slovak sharing their table – a co-plaintiff, he had the right to sit with them – the quiet lunch, it appeared, would not happen. Might as well talk about the elephant in the courtroom.
Dr. Hoffman fidgeted in his seat
uncomfortably. A torrent of accusations would pour down onto his poor head after what he was about to say but he was here to observe and give his verdict and so, here it went. “I don’t think he did,” he announced quietly, after a pause.
“No?” Carter regarded him with curiosity. He took the announcement much better than the Slovak, who slumped back into his chair in stunned, furious silence. But Carter had long grown used to relying on the psychiatrist’s opinions concerning even much higher-ranking war criminals; to Novák, Dr. Hoffman was just another American uniform in glasses who didn’t know the SS from his elbow. He hadn’t had time to earn the Slovak’s respect, as a specialist, yet, so such mistrust was only too understandable.
“No,” Dr. Hoffman repeated. “Based on the behavior that I observed, it is my profound conviction that Mrs. Dahler hasn’t been coached in any way for this testimony. It doesn’t have a ‘learned’ quality to it. One can easily tell when a person has been coached to give a certain testimony. It’s invariably stilted, often repeats itself as though to drive a point across; it lacks emotion and doesn’t stray away from the subject. In short, it sounds like a recited lesson. Mrs. Dahler’s story was her own. I don’t believe that Mr. Dahler influenced it in any way prior to this hearing. However—”
“I can’t believe you have actually fallen for his lies!” Novák had found his voice again. He made a gesture of despair with his hands before dropping them helplessly onto his lap. “I have warned you that he’s a snake – a veritable snake, yes! – who belongs on the gallows! That woman, whom he calls his wife, is a victim! All that he does, starting with all that, can she sit next to me business, is manipulation through and through! How you, a psychiatrist, can’t see through it? He has frightened her into submission! And do you know what? Perhaps you’re right and he didn’t have to specifically prepare her for this hearing. She’s so afraid of him, she’d never dare think of saying something against him! She’s terrified of him and he’s only using her as a means of getting that denazification clearance certificate from you! Who knows what’s going on in their house, behind the closed doors? And you’re planning to let him walk away free and keep tormenting her throughout her entire life? Or, maybe, she won’t have to suffer any longer. If you clear him, he won’t need her anymore. Do you understand that he may kill her?”
A mild smile spread slowly over Dr. Hoffman’s face. The Slovak was certainly passionate about Helena Dahler’s safety. Or, most likely, Helena herself.
“I doubt he will kill her, Mr. Novák.”
“I don’t. Not for a second.” The Slovak crossed his arms over his chest defiantly. “Because I know him. His real face. You only know the one that he wanted you to see.”
“I apologize for the interruption but I did hear a ‘however,’ if I’m not mistaken.” Carter stepped in to save his colleague from Novák’s passionate rebuke.
Dr. Hoffman grinned in gratitude.
“As I have already stated, I don’t believe that Mrs. Dahler was coached to give this testimony. However,” he looked at Carter, who smiled broadly in return, “there’s something wrong with Helena herself.”
“Wrong? As in…”
“As in, psychologically.” Dr. Hoffman’s gaze concentrated on the ruins outside.
The glass in the windows had all miraculously been replaced, wherever the city administration bartered it from. It was the view that was the same as everywhere in Germany. Shambles and shards of the former life; pitiful gray piles of dust and concrete and former glory. It was all swept aside from the main roads and carefully stacked alongside them. All around, a former shell of a city lay, thoroughly pretending that it was all right and very much functioning when, in reality, it still crumbled whenever the clearing brigades pulled the wrong brick out of the pile.
In front of Dr. Hoffman’s eyes, the faces of his recent interviewees materialized in place of the ruins – the victims, not the perpetrators. How similar it was with them – a seemingly functioning façade, but once he touched the wrong brick, provoked the wrong memory or asked the wrong question and the whole person collapsed, tumbled, and disintegrated into a totally destroyed, obliterated mass. Too much internal structural damage. It would take years to rebuild them anew if it was even possible to rebuild them at all.
“Care to elaborate?” Carter’s voice brought him out of his reverie.
Dr. Hoffman regarded his notebook but didn’t open it to consult his notes. He looked pensive and lost for a moment, unsure of where to start. “Some of her emotional reactions to certain events are far too strange. For instance, when she was describing the lashing that he gave her and what followed… Have you noticed how she repeatedly stated that she hardly felt any pain and instead was overwhelmed with this profound feeling of gratitude? How she minimized the harm that was done to her and praised Dahler instead for such a wonderful deed? I understand that he saved her sister but… if you look at the things logically, he and his compatriots are the reason why that sister found herself in that camp in the first place. An ordinary person’s reaction would be suppressed anger, silent condemnation, definitely emotional and physical hurt… Mrs. Dahler, instead, declared that she almost loved him at that moment.”
“Because he told her to say it!” Novák cried in desperation once again. A few heads from the neighboring tables turned in their direction but the majority ignored the shout entirely. Such outbursts were nothing new in this place; lawyers and prosecutors were particularly prone to them.
“I doubt it was his doing.” Dr. Hoffman shook his head. “I firmly believe that she did feel love for him but why, that’s what I’m yet to understand.”
Carter sipped his coffee. “When you say that there’s something psychologically wrong with her, does that mean that she’s unfit to stand trial, as a witness, or…”
“Oh no, she is fit,” Dr. Hoffman quickly replied. “She’s not clinically unsound or anything of that sort but… she definitely suffers from one sort of dissociative disorder or the other.”
“And you, a Stanford graduate, don’t know what it is?” Carter’s face drew to a wry smile.
“I’m afraid, no,” Dr. Hoffman admitted, spreading his arms in a helpless gesture. “How can I better put it for you to understand? Imagine that I’m a nineteenth-century physician who has just noticed the beginning of sepsis in a patient. I know that something is wrong with the patient but have not the faintest idea as to what has caused it or how to cure it. Nowadays, we would blame the bacteria, give him penicillin and he’d be like new in a couple of weeks. But just a hundred years ago, I would be absolutely and utterly helpless. Same with Mrs. Dahler, I’m afraid. I can tell that there’s something wrong with her but I can’t tell what. There are no described precedents like that when a victim would willingly defend the perpetrator and even go as far as declare love for him. It’s simply unheard of. I don’t understand it and I have not the slightest clue as to what caused it and even less clue as to how to treat it. If it’s treatable at all, that is and if such treatment would be beneficial for her.”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Sometimes, a psychiatrist can do more harm with such treatments. Forceful conversion therapy for homosexuals is just one such example. It does absolutely nothing to change their nature but causes an appalling number of suicides. Sometimes it’s better to leave the things as they are if they don’t harm the patient.”
“You’re saying that she’ll off herself if you separate her from Dahler?” Carter arched his brow just enough to express utter disbelief.
Dr. Hoffman pondered something for a long time. “To be honest with you, I wouldn’t be surprised. She appears to be dependent on him to an unhealthy degree. She searches for his hand each time she struggles with words. He said it himself that she prefers to be next to him at all times. At first, I thought that he only said it in order to control her and what she says but then I noticed that she does it on her own. And the way she entered the courtroom? My first impression was that she was a typical v
ictim following her abuser who, by not allowing her to walk in first, reminds her of her place, once again. But now I think that it was her initiative. She was hiding behind his back. She definitely brought a lot of issues with her from the camp, severe social anxiety is one of them, depression and perhaps even certain elements of trauma-related psychosis. With all that, she doesn’t see Dahler as an abuser but as a protector. I have not the faintest idea why, but there you have it.”
“Perhaps, because he was the only person who made her feel safe, to a certain degree, I mean, in the camp?” Carter suggested.
Dr. Hoffman nodded slowly. “That was my impression too. I do believe that if it was that other SS man, whom she mentioned, Gröning; if he were kind to her, she would project those emotions on to him. Or the previous accountant, Weber. Or whoever else was in control and on whose decisions and favor, her and her sister’s lives depended.”
The Girl in the Striped Dress: A completely heartbreaking and gripping World War 2 page-turner, based on a true story Page 12