The Girl in the Striped Dress: A completely heartbreaking and gripping World War 2 page-turner, based on a true story

by Ellie Midwood

  I thanked him and followed him inside. It was comforting to have familiar faces around during one’s last minutes. We removed our clothes, men and women alike. When no SS was looking my way, I discreetly motioned the familiar Sonderkommando man over and pressed a golden coin – the one that Rottenführer Dahler gave me before going on his leave and which I didn’t spend but kept as a sort of talisman – into his hand. “Could you please give my boots to my sister Róžínka? She also works in the Kanada—”

  “I know your sister. Don’t worry, she’ll get them.” He quickly stepped away and pretended to give commands to the others.

  Soon, we were stripped bare, a sea of emaciated, gray bodies. I was the only one with hair. One of the Sonderkommando men asked his SS supervisor if it would be wiser to shave it off first. The latter only waved his hand languidly.

  “Later, in the crematorium.” He stifled a yawn. “Teeth, that too. Let them worry about it. Not our responsibility.”

  The door to the gas chamber opened. The Sonderkommando began herding us in. It was almost surreal how calmly everyone went to their death. Perhaps, unlike the new arrivals, we all knew all too well that no amount of protesting or pleas would help things or we were simply too exhausted from our endless ordeal and simply surrendered to our common fate, welcoming it almost with relief.

  Don’t be afraid. It’ll be over quick.

  Still, in the last moment, I caught the familiar Sonderkommando man’s sleeve. “Has anyone ever survived it? The gassing, I mean?”

  He looked at me as if I were mad.

  “I’m only asking to make sure… Is it possible that I’ll just lose consciousness and then when… in the crematorium…?”

  That was my biggest fear – to be burned alive in a furnace. He realized it and smiled softly, a veritable bear of a man with such sad, sorrowful eyes. “No one ever survived it. But if you like, I can wring your neck before they put you on a gurney. Just to be safe.”

  “Yes, just to be safe.” I smiled at him warmly. “Thank you.”

  Reluctantly, I let go of his arm.

  The chamber was shrouded with darkness. I looked up and located a few square hatches in the roof, through which the light had slipped inside and through which the SS would throw the gas in later. I sat right under one, remembering the man’s words. Take deep breaths. You’ll lose consciousness before you know it and won’t suffer.

  I closed my eyes and waited for the SS to call the Sonderkommando men out and lock the airtight door.

  “Helena! Helena Kleinová!”

  Startled at the voice frantically calling my name, I didn’t think about getting up at first but someone was already shoving the bodies around me aside until Unterscharführer Dahler materialized in front of me. His hair was tousled, the uniform in disarray and the overcoat lacking. He was deathly pale. His eyes were wild with fear.

  “Here you are!” Still out of breath as though after a sprint, he grabbed my wrist and yanked me onto my feet. “Up with you! Out of this rat trap – now!”

  One of the SS men in charge of the Aktion was blocking his path in the door.

  “Where are you taking her?” He regarded us both with suspicion.

  “She’s not supposed to be here. Didn’t you see her clothes? Why haven’t you alerted me that one of my Kommando people was here?”

  The other SS man opened and closed his mouth, seemingly thrown off track with Dahler’s rebuke.

  “Well… why would she be here then?”

  “Because she clearly ran off in the hope to off herself with your help, you Sherlock with chevrons!” Dahler pulled me forward so that I’d stand directly in front of the officer. My arms flew up to my chest – not so much out of modesty but to cover the rash. “Does she look like someone who didn’t pass selection to you? Look at her! She’s twice the size of any of these people!”

  That was certainly a stretch but I didn’t look like a walking skeleton, that much was true.

  The officer still wasn’t persuaded. His eyes gleamed eerily in the semi-darkness of the gas chamber. “Why would anyone want to gas themselves?”

  “Her boyfriend kicked the bucket a few days ago. She’s upset over it.”

  “That seems to be true, Herr Unterscharführer,” the familiar Sonderkommando man stepped in to help Dahler. So, the two officers were of the same rank, that explained all the authority challenging. “I saw her. She sat right under the hatch to kill herself quicker.”

  After muttering a curse on my account, the second officer finally moved aside, allowing us to walk out.

  “Where are your clothes?” Dahler asked me sternly, taking care to turn me away from the spectators. He, too, was afraid they’d notice the telling red spots. Unlikely that he worried about them ogling at me with this greater worry in sight.

  I pointed to one of the hooks where I left my belongings.

  Under his SS comrades’ prying glances, he shouted at me, “I ought to have you walk naked back to your work detail for the stunt you pulled!” Unceremoniously, he shoved me in the direction of the clothing. “Get dressed and be quick about it! And get it into your stupid head once and for all – here, we decide how long you stay alive, not you!”

  The door to the gas chamber closed and the lock turned with a dull sound. Under the eyes of several SS men and the Sonderkommando team, I was hastily pulling my clothes on with shaking hands.

  “Should have left her there if she wants to die so much,” the same Unterscharführer commented to Dahler.

  “She’s a textile expert in my unit. Who’s going to do her job? You?” Dahler countered mockingly.

  A few SS men guffawed. As I was buttoning my shirt, one of them gave a signal to the orderly who stood in the door leading outside. The orderly, in his turn, waved to someone on the roof. Just a few moments later the commotion began behind the airtight door, first the coughing, then – screaming, as many fists pounded the steel door from the other side. Next, cries and frantic pleading came. The Unterscharführer in charge checked his watch, the same, bored expression back on his face.

  “Where are you taking them after?” Unterscharführer Dahler asked, motioning his head towards the gas chamber.

  “To the crematorium.”

  “I thought it was no longer in use because of the chimney? Wasn’t it the reason for all those outdoors pyres for the past couple of months?”

  “They’ve fixed it for now. We are to use it while they’re building the four new ones.”

  “Those monstrosities next to my Kanada?”

  The other Unterscharführer grunted his affirmation. “Those are said to be industrial type, not that sorry affair in Auschwitz that is crumbling after each use. There will be two stories, with the bunker and the elevator to transport the bodies from the gas chamber below to the cremation facility upstairs. I saw the blueprints,” he added boastfully. “Five ovens, each with three chambers. There will also be a Kommandoführer’s office,” he finished with dreamy notes in his voice, clearly in the hope to be promoted to the said Kommandoführer in the nearest future.

  “You mean like the offices that we all already have in the Kanada?” Dahler asked sweetly.

  The Unterscharführer shot him a glare. “Take your Jew-girl and piss off back to your Kanada, you self-important veteran of the wars! I ought to have locked you both in there so that you wouldn’t wag your tongue next time!”

  Dahler laughed carelessly, seemingly delighted at his words hitting a sore spot and grabbed my elbow to lead me out of the anteroom. His face betrayed nothing at all. Only his hand trembled on top of my arm.

  Outside, the snow-covered field shimmered under the sun. It blinded me instantly. I was so weak all of a sudden, so positively exhausted. Without realizing it, I began sinking into the welcoming, soft snow.

  “No, no, no, we’re not having any of that, Leni!” Dahler propped me upward at once and shook me slightly. “We need to walk, little soldier. No sleeping yet, the enemy is watching.”

  It was odd th
at on the verge of losing one’s consciousness, it was only an SS man’s order that kept us going. I saw it so many times before with the Muselmänner and now, much like them, I found myself placing one foot in front of the other despite not having any strength to move.

  He held me fast. To an outsider, it would appear as though he was dragging me someplace where they administered punishment to our kind whereas, in reality, his steely grip was the only thing that kept me upright.

  But soon even he couldn’t march any longer.

  “Do you mind?” he asked quietly after we had walked some distance away from the bunker. “I need a smoke.”

  I barely stood on my own but still, mechanically picked up the lighter that he had dropped into the snow. His hands were shaking worse than mine. After a third attempt, he managed to light the cigarette and swallowed a few times as though he were physically sick.

  “I’ve never seen it before.” He tried laughing as though in excuse for his ghostly pale face and the beads of sweat that broke out on his forehead despite the negative temperatures outside but receded quickly and swallowed again. “The process itself, I mean. The medics assured us during the orientation that they die instantly; that the gas paralyzes airways within seconds…” He looked at me at a loss and added, a strained touch of anguish in his voice, “Maybe they didn’t drop enough gas? Maybe he did it on purpose? He seemed like a veritable bastard to me, don’t you think so? Arrogant dung heap with epaulets! Botching an Aktion on purpose! He ought to be reported to the Kommandant!”

  I almost felt sorry for him and the desperate look he gave me. I knew that they always screamed. Andrej told me that much.

  Dahler knew it, too. The trouble was, it was much too painful to admit it to himself that his kin was murdering mine on an industrial basis and in such a barbaric manner at that. Perhaps, he needed to see someone he cared about there to finally be incensed about it.

  He looked back at the bunker almost with hatred and took me by the forearm again. “Let’s go. No need to loiter here.”

  With great effort, I parted my lips once again. As long as I was talking, as long as I pretended to be in control of my faculties, I could still walk to wherever it was he was taking me. “How did you know, Herr Unterscharführer?”

  “Irma, your block elder, ran all the way to our barracks as soon as they took you.”

  “Irma?”

  It was a pleasant surprise. She didn’t have the reputation of someone particularly charitable among the inmates, but who knew whether she was simply too careful to show it? Perhaps, there were some other lives she’d saved and no one was any the wiser?

  Dahler only shrugged in response. “I think she knows I’m in love with you,” he replied simply.

  The snow crunched under our feet as we walked side by side, shivering with cold.

  “Where are you taking me, Herr Unterscharführer?” I asked at last.

  “Back to the Kanada, where else?” He tried to smile but the grin came out as miserable as they get.

  “I have typhus.”

  “I know. Irma told me.”

  I looked at him, positively confused. “The entire barrack was sent to the quarantine because of me.”

  “It’s the standard protocol. They want to make sure that it doesn’t spread.”

  Was he purposely avoiding the direct answer?

  “But where am I going to go then?”

  “Officially, to the infirmary.”

  “And unofficially?”

  “Stop talking. We’re getting close to the gates.”

  I fell a few steps behind him as we neared the checkpoint – the usual way the inmates accompanied SS guards. The guard on duty yawned, offered Dahler a half-hearted salute and motioned us through without bothering to ask for a reason why an SS man was strutting around without his overcoat and with an inmate in tow. Fortunately for us, he appeared to be more interested in his morning coffee than the camp’s discipline. They pounced on us, the inmates, at the blink of the eye; to their fellow SS colleagues, an entirely different set of rules applied. I stumbled after Unterscharführer Dahler, applying my all to appear bursting with health.

  From a distance, we saw that Rottenführer Gröning was already instructing a new group of women prisoners in the detail where my Kommando ordinarily worked. They were brought from the women’s camp, much to Wolff’s displeasure. He kept observing them, their striped dresses, scrawny bodies and shaved heads under the kerchiefs, with a sour look on his face as he sipped his coffee from the Thermos. With both of his colleagues busy with the new arrivals, Dahler had no trouble smuggling me into his office unnoticed.

  “Well, now…” He looked around, suddenly at a loss.

  It had become clear then why he so positively refused to discuss his plan with me. He didn’t have one.

  I kept looking at him, almost with pity. He was much too impulsive for his own good. Sure enough, he dragged me out of the gas chamber, he brought me here but now what? I had virtually no place to go, not even back to the barrack which was being disinfected according to the protocol. The camp administration was quite paranoid on account of typhus after last July’s outbreak during which a few SS men were unfortunate enough to catch it.

  Dahler brought me to his desk and pointed at the space between the two sets of drawers connected by a solid panel. “You’ll have to stay here for now. I have to go report for duty but I’ll be back soon with some food and blankets. Do you still have your syrup?”

  “Yes.” I pulled the half-empty bottle out of my pocket. I just wanted to lie down and be left in peace.

  “Good. I’ll try to get you more, later. And,” he stumbled upon the request, a bit embarrassed, “could you try and be quiet while I’m not here? Try to cover your mouth when you cough as much as you can, please. I don’t want anyone finding out that you’re here. I’ll leave the radio on but still, try to be quiet, all right?”

  “Of course, Herr Unterscharführer.”

  He gave me a bright smile, turned the radio on and left, locking the door after himself.

  20

  Helena

  He returned by lunchtime and dropped a mountain of fur onto the floor before kneeling in front of my hideout.

  “How have you been, little soldier?” he asked, signing for me to come out from under the desk.

  “Good.” I crawled out on shaking legs and arms, feeling the sweat pouring down my body from the sheer effort to move. My head was pounding something horrible. The muscles, which had grown stiff from the cramped sleeping position, were in agonizing pain. I tried to smile at him through it.

  “I organized you some goods,” Dahler declared, with pride in his voice and immediately set to arranging a sort of sleeping nook under the desk, piling up a few fur coats and sheepskins one on top of the other. He even procured a small embroidered pillow from somewhere. “There. This way, you won’t have to sleep on the bare floor.”

  “Thank you, Herr Unterscharführer.”

  He looked at me more intently. “You look like you’re running a fever.” He touched my forehead. “Are you cold?”

  “A little.” I closed my eyes against the light. It was much too bright, almost blinding. I made a motion to crawl back into my nook and rest some more. Just to shut my eyes and not feel anything.

  Unterscharführer Dahler stopped me at once. “Not just yet, Leni. Here, drink this. I got you some chicken broth from the canteen.” He produced a Thermos, a standard affair from which they, the SS, rarely were parted in winter. “You need to get some food into you first.”

  “I’m nauseous.”

  “I know. The doctor, your compatriot, said that you need to eat even if you are.”

  “You spoke with him?”

  “Of course I did. I need to know how to care for you, no?”

  I regarded him with infinite gratitude. “But what if I—”

  “What if you what?” He got up, crossed the room and fetched a bucket that the inmates used to wash the floors in his office.
“If you get sick, you get sick. I’ll empty it later. But it is imperative that you eat, Helena. The doctor said so.”

  I roved my gaze around the office, as though seeing it for the first time. I was suddenly aware of my surroundings – of the camp around and the barbed wire; of the rows and rows of barracks that housed far too many people who only died and died and died again and turned into ash and buried us all, the survivors, under it, until our turn would come to die as well. The earth itself was poisoned here, festering with far too many corpses that had been killed far too many times by the SS men’s hand – gassed, shot, buried, then burned as though they wished to wipe our very memory off the face of the Earth by killing us multiple times. Everything around was hostile and treacherous – the gray-clad guards and their Alsatians, the Muselmänner who terrified us for they were our very future, someone caught between life and death itself and, worst of all, the agonizing loneliness among the hundreds of thousands of people. We were all so very alone here, crammed together, yet impossibly alone, with nothing, no one to rely on…

  A rush of anguish passed through my veins. Across from me sat an SS man. His image blurred and swam before my eyes. I oughtn’t to accept anything from him. These were the murdered people’s coats. The food was taken from the starving. I had no right to use any of that. I never had the right to sleep on a dead man’s mattress. I never had the right to wear a dead woman’s clothes. I never had the right to survive while the others were dying by their hundreds.

  Slowly and with effort – yet with sudden harsh, lucid resolution – I pushed the Thermos across the floor back to him.

  For over a minute, Dahler made no sound, only regarded it coolly. “What is it, Leni? A revolt? Defeatism among the ranks, what?” He pushed the Thermos back to me. “Drink.”