The Kommandant's Mistress
Page 33
To Evelyn Schott, my friend who saved the story all those years and then sent it to me, long after the novel had been published and won critical acclaim as well as awards, cautioning me, in advance, that the original story was "really bad". And to Evelyn's husband, Greg, both of whom came to every single reading I ever did in Cincinnati, though they must have had the book memorized by the tenth time or so. Love to you both, always.
To my Uncle Paul, retired police officer/detective, for teaching me all about guns and shooting for the scenes between Max & Rachel. To the Wright Patterson Air Force Museum Special Collections Director, who trusted me alone in a room with an SS-Officer's uniform and weapon. Bless both of you for taking an interest in a writer's first novel.
To my agents, Geri Thoma, of the Markson Thoma Agency, who originally sold the novel to HarperCollins; and to Jennifer Hengen, formerly of Sterling Lord Literistic, who sold it to Arcade. Thank you for your efforts on my behalf.
To Brenda Segel, Senior Vice-President & Director of Rights at HarperCollins, who came up with the much improved title, suggesting the change from my original, bland The Kommandant, to The Kommandant's Mistress, based on the "rumors about Rachel" in Part Three of the novel as well as on John Fowles' famed The French Lieutenant's Woman. Thank you, Brenda, for putting Urgency in my title, and helping to sell the book not only here in the US, but all over the UK, Europe, and Asia.
To Timo Jacob, of Book Scanning Digital Imaging (http://bookscanning.com), who provided impeccable references before I hired him, scanned the original version of the novel in preparation for its revision and expansion, helped me with reformatting the book (which was most definitely not part of his job description, patiently endured all my e-mails & phone calls, answered every single question I ever had, and did it all with professional graciousness and a delightful sense of humor.
To Spike, Zoë, Vinnie, Hannah, and Zeke: though you were taken from us far too soon, you're with us still. I thank you for your unconditional love as well as for lying on my desk and computer every single day while I wrote. I miss you more than I could ever say. You are in my heart forever.
To Shooter Tov, Eli, Mosie, Trixie, Ling, Sascha, Sophie, and Sadie the Doggie: without having rescued you and brought you into our lives, my own happiness would be lessened. Thanks for letting me use my office, desk, printers, computer keyboard, and chairs when it doesn't inconvenience you too much. You know what you mean to me.
To Grandpa and Grandma Hirsch, who gave me my first chess-set when I was 8-years-old, spoke Yiddish at home, faithfully honored the Jewish Sabbath by closing Grandpa's neighborhood/corner grocery every Saturday (and opening it on Sundays despite living in the era of "Blue Laws"), had Shabbas every Friday at sun-down, and instructed me on "being Jewish" when I was a little girl.
"Grandpa, how did you know all I wanted in the world was a chess-set?"
"A little angel sitting on my shoulder told me."
"Aren't we Jewish?" I said. "Do Jews believe in angels?"
"Such a smart little girl, we have," said Grandpa Hirsch, patting me on the head.
"Who's a smart little girl?" said Grandma , behind me. "Because she plays chess?"
"Because she just asked if we were Jewish."
Grandma Hirsch knelt down, took me by the arms, and whispered.
"If anyone asks if you're Jewish, you must say, 'I was baptized & I go to Catholic schools'. You understand?"
I nodded.
"Are you Jewish?"
"Yes."
"No," she said, still holding onto me, shaking her head. "Are you Jewish?"
"I was baptized…and I go to Catholic schools."
"Good girl," she said, kissing me on the cheek and hugging me.
"You see?" said Grandpa Hirsch, mussing my hair. "I told you she was smart."
To you, Grandpa and Grandma Hirsch, who thought your family name would die with the baby boy you lost & other family members killed in the Holocaust; because you had to hide our ethnicity and heritage; because you sent all your daughters, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren to Catholic schools "to keep us safe" from anti-Semitism — Yom HaShoah — I've never forgotten.
To all the family members I lost during the Holocaust, though I didn't learn about you until after I wrote this novel and did a genealogical search on Grandpa and Grandma Hirsch's family in Germany.
To Great-Aunt Z, who escaped Russia and came to America, alone, without knowing any English, when she was only 12-years-old, between 1903-1906, the last time Czar Nicholas permitted any Jews to freely leave his country to escape the government-organized pogroms. Your stories and love are still with me.
And special acknowledgment to my dear friend Dr. Anna Ornstein, who survived Auschwitz; who, along with her husband Paul, welcomed me into their home, hearts, and lives; and who, over the years, has told me the sort of details that could never be found in any books: köszönöm, edesem Anna.
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Copyright Page
The Kommandant's Mistress. Copyright © 1993, 2000, 2012 by Alexandria Constantinova Szeman (formerly writing, published, and copyrighted as "Sherri" Szeman).
All rights reserved. This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. This e-book sold subject to the condition that it not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, copied, printed, hired out, or redistributed without prior consent of publisher or in any form, cover, or binding other than that in which it was originally purchased.
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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
Permissions & Publication Acknowledgments
• Excerpts from Eichmann Interrogated: Transcripts from the Archives of the Israeli Police, edited by Jochen von Lang. Translation © 1983 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux, LLC.
• Excerpts from Einsatz instructions, Waldsee postcard, and C. H. Kori letter (about ovens) from The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William Shirer, © 1959, 1960 by William L. Shirer; © renewed 1987, 1988 by William L. Shirer. Reprinted with the permission of Simon & Schuster.
• Excerpts from the official documents, orders, anecdotes, speeches, and language from The Destruction of the European Jews (revised and definitive edition), © 1985 by Raul Hilberg. Used with gracious permission of author, his agent Raines & Raines, and publisher.
• Excerpts from teletype messages 4 May 1943 and 13 May 1943 from The Stroop Report: A Facsimile Edition and Translation of the Official Nazi Report on the Destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto, translated by Sybil Milton, © 1979 by Random House, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc.
• Excerpts of Verdi's La Traviata, © 1853-1865, Used with permission.
• A small portion of this work appeared (in altered form, as a poem entitled "The Kommandant" under the name "Sherri" Szeman) in the following journals: MSS, Red Cedar Review, Sidewinder.
• The poem "The Kommandant" was published under the name "Sherri" Szeman in my Ph.D. creative writing dissertation of original poems, Survivor: One Who Survives (University of Cincinnati, 1986).
&n
bsp; • The original poems "Cutthroat: A Player Who Plays for Himself" and "First Day of German Class" originally appeared, in their entirety, under the name "Sherri" Szeman, in Hawaii Review and Ohio Journal, respectively.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Szeman, Sherri.
The Kommandant's Mistress, a novel: Alexandria Constantinova Szeman (formerly writing as Sherri Szeman).
p. cm.
1. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) — Fiction. 2. Nazi Concentration camps — Fiction. 3. Jewish women — Fiction. 4. World War II — Fiction. 5. Political Studies — Fiction. 6. Psychological Studies — Fiction. 7. Women's Studies — Fiction.
PS3569.Z39 K66 2000
811'.54—dc210055840
• 1st Edition published by HarperCollins 1993, ISBN 0060170115 (Cloth/Hardcover, 5 Printings), & by HarperPerennial 1994, ISBN 0060924977 (Trade Paper, 4 Printings).
• 2nd Edition (including translation of lyrics to Verdi's Opera La Traviata) published by Arcade Publishing 2000, ISBN 1559705426 (Trade Paper, 6 Printings).
• Revised & Expanded, 20th Anniversary Edition (including Author's Preface, Original Story & Poem, Chapter-by-Chapter Scene Index, and Discussion Questions) published by RockWay Press, LLC, 2012.
RockWay Press Trade Paper ISBN 9780976819653
LCCN 2011963579
E-Book ISBN 9780976819615
• Book scanning provided by Timo Jacob at Book Scanning Digital Imaging (WV) http://bookscanning.com.
• Cover Artwork provided by ESCollection (image #ptg01509816) http://www.inmagine.com. [sister company of 123RF http://www.123RF.com] Used with permission.
• Cover design by Alexandria Szeman & RockWay Press, LLC. Copyright © 2012 Alexandria Szeman & RockWay Press, LLC.
• Interior design by RockWay Press, LLC. Copyright © 2012 Alexandria Szeman & RockWay Press, LLC.
• Author Photograph © 2012 by RockWay Press, LLC.
Publisher's Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Though historical figures, places, and incidents appear in this novel, they are used in artistic ways by appearing with fictitious characters, places, and incidents that are wholly the product of the author's imagination; any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), remarks, quotes, events, organizations, or locales is entirely coincidental or is used fictitiously/artistically.
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Excerpts from Author's Other Books
Novels
About
No Feet in Heaven
(a novel)
Warning:
Not Intended for Children
Contains
Mature Content, Adult Language,
Sexual Situations, Violence
There's a vicious serial killer on the loose, and law enforcement officers can't seem to get close enough to catch him, despite a bewildering array of clues. According to brothers Nick and Frank, and to their cousin Dinah, who lives with them, that's because the FBI doesn't know as much about the elusive killer as the trio thinks it does.
Both fascinated and horrified by the serial killer dubbed "TinMan," the three decide that with their knowledge of TinMan's victims and possible whereabouts, the cousins can catch the killer themselves. In doing so, they'll not only save potential victims, but be catapulted to celebrity status while getting rich from the reward money.
Armed with a scrapbook of newspaper and Internet articles detailing each of his crimes, intimate information about the way serial killers — both male and female — operate, and a good deal more bravery than sense, the three cousins set off to hunt down and capture TinMan.
A ruthless serial killer who may, even now, be stalking them.
A captivating and disturbing examination of our society's fascination with serial killers and violent culture in general, the heart-pounding sections of No Feet in Heaven are woven into one unsettling yet compelling whole. The first tale is told by an "idiot"; the second, by a frightened, victimized girl; the third, by a disillusioned, tormented brother. All three narrators — Nick, Dinah, and Frank — are inextricably bound by their love for each other. At the same time, however, each is determined to beat the other two to international fame, celebrity, and wealth by capturing the terrifying serial killer known as TinMan.
From the author of the critically acclaimed and award-winning novels The Kommandant's Mistress and Only with the Heart comes another unforgettable story that will have you constantly checking the locks, jumping at strange noises, and sleeping with all the lights on long after you reach its staggering and electrifying conclusion.
Read an Excerpt from
No Feet in Heaven
(a novel)
In production now: Available August 2012
(begins on next page)
Warning:
Not Intended for Children
Contains Mature Language, Adult Content,
Violence, and Sexual Situations
No Feet in Heaven
a novel
Alexandria Constantinova Szeman
RockWay Press, LLC • New Mexico
Copyright © 1993, 2000, 2001, 2012
by Alexandria Constantinova Szeman
Nick
From the claw,
one can tell a lion.
Latin saying
Gina
But me and Frank had to go after him. On accounta what he done to Gina. She was his first. She was Frank's girl even though nobody knowed it. Gina lived with her Grandma only two blocks from ours, and Frank use to go over there at night to leave presents for Gina on her windowsill. It was a secret 'cause the Grandma said Frank was too old for Gina.
Then one day Gina was gone. Nobody knowed where. When the policemans and the Grandma come over to our house, Frank come down from our bedroom and said he didn't know nothing.
The Grandma started calling him, "Liar, filthy nasty peeping-tom liar," before she begun slapping him.
Dad and the policemans pulled her off Frank, but he still didn't know nothing about what happened to Gina.
She was a good girl: she never gone to no bad places, she come straight home right after school like she was suppose to, she gone to church every Sunday with one of them white-lace veils on her hair even though girls didn't have to wear them veils no more, and she had a sparkly chain with Jesus-dying-on-the-cross around her neck.
One day she just wasn't there.
Me and Frank helped look for her. Everybody looked: me, Frank, Dinah, Mom, Dad, the Grandma, the policemans, everybody. After she was gone two days and nobody finded her, the policemans said we better look in the woods by the river.
Woods is scary. Wolves and witches and ghosts live in woods in the dark with all them scary noises. When we was in the woods hunting, I wanted to hold Frank's hand, but he called me a Big homo-baby and pushed me so hard, I falled down in the dirt.
Dinah telled Frank, "Shut your yap," and she holded my hand tight while we was trying to find poor lost Gina.
The policemans telled us to walk so our shoulders touched, and said, "Keep your heads down and your eyes peeled so you don't miss nothing on the ground not even the tiniest little thing no matter how insignificant. Don't nobody look up for no reason at all. And whatever you do, don't nobody touch nothing."
Dad said, "Jesus, this is just like 'Nam. I feel like I need my M-16. Like I should be looking out for trip-wires."
"How many times I gotta tellya?" said Mom, walking as she keeped on looking at the ground. "'Nam's over."
"Always a war somewheres," said Dad.
"In your head, maybe," said Mom.
Dad looked at her even though the policemans said not to look up for nothing no-way no-how. After one of the policemans finded something, he called out. We all gone over and looked. It was a piece of long dark curly hair, like Gina's, with some skin on it. Some of the lookers crawled after that, to find more stuff on the ground. Me and Dinah seen Gina's sparkly Jesus-dying-on-a-cro
ss necklace, all muddy and broke in the wet leaves.
Then Frank finded Gina's foot.
With no shoe on it, and its toenails painted.
"Jesus-fucking-Christ," Dad said, "even the gooks didn't do that kinda shit."
The policemans wouldn't let nobody help no more after that, not even the Grandma. It was a crime scene like Law & Order-CSI. They wrapped yellow tapes that said Stay out unless you're policemans all around the trees where Gina was laying face-down in the dirt and wet leaves in the woods so she couldn't breathe. The Grandma couldn't put no blanket on her bare butt or hold her hand or nothing.
Frank and me crawled through the bushes toward the river until we was pretty close. I seen one of Gina's legs that wasn't covered by no dead leaves. It didn't have no foot neither.
Poor Gina. She was a good girl.
And now she wouldn't be able to walk in heaven.
"Hans My Hedgehog"
"Once there was a husband who wanted a baby more than anything else in the world," said Mom.
"In tummy," I said.
Mom touched me on the face.
"Yes, I used to read this to you when you were in my tummy."
"Before I was borned…"
"No, after you was born," said Frank, reading his Fantastic Four.