Kommandant Höss scowled slightly and was just about to object when the Obersturmführer shot him a pointed glare. Some sort of a silent exchange passed between the two – just go along with me if you know what’s good for you, will you? – and Höss stepped back, visibly satisfied. Only, the inmates were much too well-trained by Auschwitz to recognize sweet lies fed to them with such ease and particularly the Kanada Kommando. Everyone wisely remained silent.
“If you make such an admission, you shall be immediately transferred into the main camp, where my officers will sign your release papers as soon as we finish writing down your testimony,” the interrogator made another attempt to untie a few tongues. Unsuccessfully, much to Wolff’s relief.
Of course, they were all corrupted. We were all corrupted, only where we took food and necessities for ourselves, the guards took money and gold and both parties pretended to look the other way. I had personally sewn a few golden coins, diamond bracelets, and dollars into the lining of Wolff’s jacket before he would go on his leave. It was an unspoken tradition in the Kanada, “an inmates’ goodbye,” of which the SS pretended to be blissfully ignorant, only to discover a few hidden “presents” in the safety of their homes in Germany. They returned, beaming and in a good disposition and we were allowed to eat whatever we could find and weren’t beaten by them any longer. Fair barter is all.
No, we weren’t stupid enough to betray them to whatever SS higher powers arrived to wreak havoc on our somewhat stable lives. We could survive because they were corrupted. We depended on them and were ready to supply them with found money and whatnot so that we’d remain safe and protected by them. Because who knew who this Obersturmführer would appoint in their place? Some ideological fanatic who would slaughter us all just for the idea.
Not a single inmate made a sound. In the background, Wolff hid a satisfied grin. The delegation left empty-handed, sealing the offices with official seals.
Not a word was spoken about Franz and that terrified me more than any interrogators put together.
“Where is he, Róžínka?” I kept whispering all day and all evening just to get the same, somewhat sympathetic, I don’t know, Lena, from her.
She was relieved that he was gone. Feeling utterly abandoned and infinitely alone, I cried myself to sleep at night.
25
Helena
New transport, new suitcases, new books – once again, in a foreign language. The door to Franz’s office was still sealed. Silence lay all about the Kanada detail, oppressive and full of torturous uncertainty. Not a word from anyone, not even a hushed rumor to allow at least a pitiful semblance of hope. We worked, quiet and subdued, under some new SS man’s charge who had been sent to aid Wolff until Franz… I drove the heels of my palms into my eyes, rubbing the tears away in anguished desperation. The truth was, no one knew when and if Franz was coming back at all.
“Keep stalling and I’ll leave you without lunch.” The tip of the new guard’s whip stung the skin on the back of my hands. I quickly pulled them off my face and rubbed the welts instinctively before resuming the folding. I hadn’t been hit in so long, the gesture itself hurt worse than the whip.
Franz hadn’t used his whip on anyone in months.
Franz allowed us to eat whatever we could find.
Franz permitted us to take warm cardigans and sweaters when Polish autumn, with its mists, occupied our parts.
Franz. Franz. Franz…
I wanted to howl from that uncertainty, from the sight of the sealed door, from the new man’s offending presence, from the fact that I was on my own, so very weak and at anyone’s mercy.
Another night. Another pillow soaked with tears. Franz allowed us to take pillows.
Franz!
A familiar face appeared in the warehouse. Andrej, who was prohibited from approaching our part of the Kommando after last year’s incident, stood beaming in front of my station, making use of Wolff’s and our new supervisor’s watching the unloading of the trucks. In his grimy, outstretched palm, a piece of fresh, thick sausage lay – a reunion offering, no doubt.
“For you and your sister. Hide it, quick! I went through such pains smuggling it here. Not because of the SS but because my fellow mates smelled it like first-class hounds and wished to commandeer it for themselves but I saved it for you.”
I stared at him, cold horror washing over me, one wave after another. Never before did I notice the stench of burnt flesh that clung to his clothes and skin itself, it seemed; never before did I feel so nauseated at the sight of the food and such a generous offering as this. My eyes welled with tears in spite of myself and he beamed even brighter, misinterpreting my emotions in an entirely different way.
“Don’t cry, Helena,” he cooed, consoling me. My entire body jerked in protest from the alien touch when he slipped the sausage into the pocket of my slacks. “That fascist dog is gone now. He won’t hurt you anymore.”
He reached out to wipe the tears off my wet cheeks but I recoiled in horror from his hand. The stench of death clung to it along with smeared ashes. He didn’t bother washing his hands anymore after burning the corpses.
“Don’t touch me.”
He blinked in confusion but then smiled again. “It’s all right, Helena. You don’t have to be afraid of him anymore. He’s not coming back.”
My hand flew to my mouth to stifle a scream that was ready to tear off my lips. He’s not coming back. Streams of sweat poured down my back. I could barely hear him talk as my entire body shook with silent sobs, “I shall take care of you now. You won’t need for anything, you can take it from me. Like back in the good old times, what?”
I yanked my arm out of his hand and backed away, rushed outside before he could catch me and, still short of breath, pleaded with Rottenführer Wolff to allow me to go to the latrines. He gave me an odd look but waved me off generously, nevertheless. Inside the facility, curled into a ball in the corner, I bawled so hard, my head and lungs began hurting from desperate, spasmodic sobs.
He’s not coming back.
Outside, the daylight had died.
“Rottenführer Gröning is here!”
I looked up at Róžínka in confusion. She patiently waited for me to acknowledge her announcement with at least some words but none came. Something broke in me a few days ago and now the thoughts just wouldn’t function right. In fact, there were no thoughts. Empty, mechanical movements had replaced them, completely and entirely devoid of any purpose. When I was told to line up for the Appell, I lined up. When Róžínka nudged me to get my ersatz coffee in the morning, I followed her into the line. But unless she physically forced the bowl to my lips, I wouldn’t think to drink it, just like I wouldn’t drink soup at lunch or munch on the piece of bread in the evening. The oddest thing was, for the first time here in Birkenau, I didn’t feel hunger. I didn’t feel anything at all.
“Lena! Did you hear what I just said?”
“I did.”
“Well?”
I turned away from her and resumed my mechanical folding. I spent the next few hours in the same manner until she shoved the wooden box under my nose and made me take it into my hands. “I’m on duty today but you bring it to him. Well? Go on! Go ask about your damned Dahler. I can’t stand looking at you, walking around like a zombie, another moment! You’re like one of Mengele’s guinea-pig girls, only the white apron is missing.”
But the eyes are the same – dead. She didn’t say it but it was clear enough, what she thought.
I brought the box to the familiar office, from which the official seal was now gone and knocked. Upon hearing the familiar “Enter,” something stirred inside, some distant memory, an association with someone infinitely dear, who had turned into memory as well.
Rottenführer Gröning’s desk was once again in perfect order. I shuffled to it and deposited the box on its surface. Not a word was exchanged between us while he was going through the familiar movements. Money – into one stack, diamonds – into the other. He h
ad no parcels to ask me about this time. The link, once connecting us, had vanished.
He looked up in surprise and confusion when a drop landed on one of the dollar bills. I brought my hand to my face and examined my wet palm in numb wonder. How could one not notice their own tears?
“Go back to work,” Gröning said quietly.
I didn’t stir. I had to ask him one single question but the words wouldn’t come and so, I stared at him silently, watched him count the money like he always did and pretend not to notice me.
“What happened to Rottenführer Dahler?” I even touched my own lips, unsure if I indeed had just uttered those words.
He had quite the talent to hide his eyes behind the glasses, behind all those accountant books and machines.
“Nothing. Go back to work.”
“Is he gone?”
He threw the pencil down and looked at me in annoyance. Then, something softened about his features; some unknown emotion passed through the blue, lens-framed eyes. He took pity on me.
“He’s in jail, here in Auschwitz. Along with the others. The SS investigated them all on corruption charges.”
“Are they going to kill them?”
His shoulders shook with barely concealed chuckles. He seemed almost amused by the terror in my eyes.
“No, they’re not going to kill anyone. Even Palitzsch, the former Rapportführer, is said to be heading to a camp in Brünn instead of the penal battalion and he was guilty of not only enriching himself quite handsomely from the stolen goods but having a Jewish inmate as a mistress, after the death of his wife. Dahler is accused of having unauthorized items in his locker – a few dollars and a pocketknife or something ridiculous like that. Hardly he’ll get punished worse than Palitzsch. Now go back to work. We have tons of things to go through and we’re expecting a transport later today.”
I collected the box from his desk, feeling smooth wood under my fingers, hearing the floorboards creaking under my steps. The world was slowly coming into focus once again. I was actually breathing, consciously and with immense relief, as though after emerging from under the murky water in which I had all but drowned.
But it was only when I saw him for myself, the familiar outline of an overcoat during the Appell, the familiar gait with such a slight limp that only I knew to notice it and the face, the dearest and most handsome face in the entire world, did I realize that I was alive once again. The smallest hint of a smile as our gazes locked after such a torturous separation was enough for my heart to explode in ecstasy in my chest.
He’s back.
He’s back. He’s back. He’s back!
“You’re back.” I touched the rough wool of his overcoat with uncertainty. We stood in his office, to which he’d summoned me during the lunch break. He was pushing a sandwich that he had saved for me into my hand but I wanted nothing, just to touch him and ensure that he was alive, still breathing and with me once again.
“Of course, I’m back. You thought they’d ship me back to the front and you’d be rid of me, didn’t you?”
I didn’t laugh at the joke, as it was all too much. He couldn’t uncurl my fingers that were digging into his sleeves even with the best will in the world. I clawed into him like a cat, which would rather see its nails pulled out, before considering letting go.
“Leni, please.” His whisper was soft and apologetic. “The investigators are still here. They still stalk about the camp and open doors at the worst possible moments. Nothing against your native Czechoslovakia but I don’t fancy sharing a train with Palitzsch one bit.”
He managed to pry me off of himself but the more he tried to push me away, the harder I clawed and the louder I begged until he sighed and took me in his arms, cradling me in his embrace while I sobbed my heart out.
“Promise to never abandon me, please,” I kept repeating against all of his reassurances. He had tried to calm me, tried to speak to me logically but it was of no use. The horror had seized me and now, I suddenly felt as though I would fall completely apart, disintegrate into the smallest bits and pieces if he was not there to hold me together. “Please, never leave me alone. I shall die without you.”
“You won’t die—”
“No, I shall die.”
Something in my voice made him grip me stronger. He stroked my hair, pensive and suddenly grim. “What happened to you while I was away, Leni?”
“I don’t remember anything. The world was gone. I worked.”
He looked at me with sudden fear and pity, like at a madwoman. Perhaps, that was the very thing that had happened. I had gone mad and didn’t notice? Only he did, just now and that’s what has frightened him so.
He pulled me close again, a tender gesture full of sorrow. “I won’t leave you, Leni, I promise. I shall forever be by your side.”
“You promise?”
“I swear. As long as I’m alive.”
26
Helena
Animated, even though still subdued, chatter breathed some air into the ordinarily deathly-silent warehouse. With the appointment of the new Kommandant – Obersturmbannführer Liebehenschel – the semblance of a somewhat tolerable working camp replaced the suffocating desperation of the extermination facility. Rumors were still exchanged concerning the reasons for Kommandant Höss’s removal but whatever the truth was, there wasn’t an inmate inside the perimeter of the camp who hadn’t greeted such a change with open arms.
We still couldn’t quite take it in, how one man could bring such a change in such a short period of time. Hardly a month had passed since Kommandant Liebehenschel had first toured the camp, inspecting every nook and cranny with admirable thoroughness and actually addressing the inmates and diligently putting their remarks down in his small notebook and we suddenly weren’t beaten by the Kapos any longer for doing nothing wrong whatsoever. The Sonderkommando wouldn’t stop bragging about the new reward system that had been introduced as an incentive to improve the production. Even the SS teased the lucky Polish members of the team, in a purposely loud voice and in front of us, Kanada women, about their recent trips to the newly installed brothel.
“Hey, Dummkopf! Did I hear it right that you spent the allotted fifteen minutes of happiness talking to the broad? What’s the matter? Couldn’t get it up or forgot where to put it, you miserable Arschloch?”
Amid guffaws of the SS and the heads of the Sonderkommando men hanging in embarrassment, it was a miracle of its own; the very fact that the SS deigned to jest with the inmates, laughing if not with them, then at them but laughing after all, instead of showering them with insults and blows. The men, unloading the trucks for us, were more than satisfied with such arrangements and soon gathered enough confidence to probe the waters and throw an occasional quiet, “She wasn’t all that pretty is all,” back at the SS, which invariably prompted more guffaws and back slaps from the uniformed guards.
“You look at them, cheeky Poles! We give them ass and they’re still being picky about the quality of it.”
The SS roared with laughter and grins broke out on the Sonderkommando men’s unshaven faces. Even we found ourselves giggling – not because Birkenau had overnight become a tolerable place to be but from the exhilaration that we were allowed to giggle and exchange remarks and not be beaten to death for it by an enraged Kapo. I suppose, after being surrounded by death and gore at all times, one grows to appreciate even such small changes; that must have been the reason why my suggestion to organize a Christmas celebration for the new Kommandant was met with such enthusiasm from my fellow inmates.
Right after lunch, I approached Franz and asked him if he thought it would be agreeable with Kommandant Liebehenschel if we, the inmates, prepared something nice for him and his staff in gratitude for his treating us so well.
“I don’t see why he would refuse such a generous offer but I suppose we still ought to ask him personally,” Franz replied and checked his watch. “As a matter of fact, he must be in the Kommandantur now. Do you want to go and plead you
r case in person?”
“By myself?” I stammered, mortified.
Kommandant Liebehenschel was no Höss by any comparison but walking into the Kommandantur full of high-ranking SS was utterly beyond my desire.
“Of course not.” Franz regarded my startled reaction with amusement. “You can’t wander around without proper authorization. I’ll take you.”
Turning sharply round, he shouted to Wolff that he was leaving to see the Kommandant. Wolff merely waved him off, even more relaxed and unbothered now, under the new command, than he used to be. Only one person hadn’t seemed to have fallen under the spell of the collective exuberant mood. Andrej, who had rejoined the delivery Kommando in charge of the trucks in Franz’s absence, watched us depart from the warehouse, like a hawk. His face was a mask of cold, grim hate. Franz spoke of removing him from the work detail as soon as he saw him but after I pleaded with him to leave the man alone – surely, no one wanted to spend their days shaving the heads of the corpses or burning the bodies of the gassed people – he reluctantly agreed to let him be. I was grateful that Andrej was sensible enough not to muddy the waters and try and chat to me when Franz was present but he wouldn’t stop grumbling curses in the latter’s direction, wondering why the Gestapo didn’t off that SS swine, as he deserved.
Just like I pretended not to hear those hateful words, I pretended not to see his sharp gaze following us until we left the warehouse. Outside, blinded by the fresh snow and finding myself alone with Franz, I instantly forgot about him.
“Whose idea was that? About the performance?” Franz inquired, leveling his step with mine.
I was used to trailing behind not only SS-men but Kapos as well and such a gesture on his part touched me to the marrow.
The Girl in the Striped Dress: A completely heartbreaking and gripping World War 2 page-turner, based on a true story Page 22