The Hollow Bones

by Leah Kaminsky

  Somewhere between Calcutta and Baghdad they developed engine trouble and had to make an emergency landing in Karachi, where they took the opportunity to transform themselves into clean-shaven, well-dressed German citizens. They boarded a Junkers U90 waiting to fly them to Vienna and, from there, the Otto Killenbeth, Himmler’s personal aircraft, brought them to Munich. There, Himmler joined the five young adventurers, and they all entered a private room where Himmler and his chief of staff debriefed them over a cup of coffee. Ernst was presented with a Totenkopfring, an SS death’s-head ring inscribed with Himmler’s signature, a cherished item awarded only to unblemished SS officers: men with clean reputations and clean family lines.

  They made the last leg of their journey to Templehof, built shortly before the Olympics. As they closed in on the airport, Ernst saw that its design suggested an eagle in flight, with semicircular hangars resembling a giant bird’s wings spread out.

  They stepped off the plane into a warm summer breeze, accompanied by the enthusiastic Reichsführer. He and Ernst walked happily side by side towards the terminal, Ernst’s men remaining respectfully a few steps behind. They were paraded past the façade’s imposing limestone columns and made their way through the lofty entrance hall, where they were greeted by a large crowd cheering ‘Willkommen!’

  Ernst Schäfer was feted as a national hero. His dreams had all come true.

  In spite of all the celebrations, Ernst was haunted by the question of what he might have achieved had he been able to stay longer in Tibet. Given the leisure of a few more months, he would have relaxed more and camped alone in the wilderness. Herta had always implored him to simply enjoy nature, to sit quietly and just observe a bird’s behaviour. She was right. He would have taken his time, jotting down notes and sketching new species in his journal, before shooting them to add to his collection.

  As Ernst was ushered out of the terminal, he noticed the stars glimmering in the slowly darkening sky. According to World Ice Theory, the earth, along with the entire universe, was spiralling towards the only star that had ever existed, our very own sun. The twinkling lights Ernst saw were merely reflections from distant glaciers and ancient moons of ice plummeting towards earth. The giant implosion of everything that had ever been would be the final conflagration that would swallow all existence, in the same way science and love and Tibet had devoured Ernst. The season was changing, and he had followed the call to fly home.

  CHAPTER 30

  Mother taught me that the extra moment it takes to say goodbye is never a waste of time. A mother’s love can never let go, she said. I am beckoning Sleep to come to me, so I might close my eyes and dream. It is blustery outside; the clouds gather and are whisked away before they have a chance to rain down. It’s the same with Sleep; the more I wrestle for it, the more it runs away from me. I remember Sleep from my days in Wild, can still feel how it would drape itself over me after Play, when I rolled around on the ground or climbed up and down Bamboo as fast as I could. And the croaking and hooting all around would make my eyelids heavy. I try so hard to remember Wild, to remember the Then, when we were all together.

  For more than eighty years, says Curator, I have been joined to my Adult Female and Adult Male, held together by Concept and Glass. Each of us travelled great distances to stand next to each other Forever. Shepherd told me I would still be here telling His story in a thousand years. I wanted so badly for that truth to be my only cage. He said my flesh has become His spirit and I am proof of Science, not God. But how then to understand today’s visit by Curator, and Assistant who held Panda File in her paw, writing briskly with Stick as he spoke? I see Guard’s face as he turns away and Girl, whose eyes rain as she packs up World Wildlife Fund Bag. My eyes stay dry. Even when Jerkoff tells me I would make a nice Panda-covered chair, with matching coffee table.

  I see a ragged flock of geese fly past Window, like a moving scar in Sky. ‘Migrating,’ Scientist told Students once, ‘from one side of Wild to the other.’ Perhaps that’s what Shepherd meant for me, to give me freedom beyond the night that used to swarm with shining eyes and flying shadows. I plummeted into the limbo of continuous present behind Glass. I always wondered whether I would instantly grow old if I ever left Glass. Curator says we must make way for the New. He wants to have Workers haul me back to Basement, at least until my type are able to qualify as Extinct, in which case I can be dusted off again and brought back. I will soon be closed away and forgotten, like a nameless tombstone, standing outside of Time, simply watching it pass before me. Long ago, inside one of the thousands of long metal drawers down in Basement, I saw a faded label attached to some tiny bones that were as yellow as old teeth. Scrawled in black ink were the words ‘Phalanges (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) the toes of a Panda Bear’. It was signed ‘E. Schäfer 5/13/1931’.

  They came in the sleepless, small hours of Sunday 18th to remove Glass, bearded men with exhausted eyes holding coffee cups decorated with Bamboo. They also carried a sign: ‘Endlings – A Room of Extinct Species’. Stars watched all night outside Window, until darkness lifted. Curator has brought all manner of bird and beast together for the new exhibition. A button-eyed giant Haast’s Eagle faces a Honshu Wolf, a Great Auk stands beside a Tasmanian Tiger. It takes me some time, but finally I recognise Thyla from those days down in Basement spent with Shepherd. How I wish I could smile and say hello to her. I’m so glad she will finally make it into Glasslands after all those years of waiting. Having once been shipped safely from afar in Crate, they have all come to a standstill here. I am honoured to make way for them even though Curator will abandon me to the darkness, where I will vanish on the other side of Permanent Storage, sinking into Time. It is important for Visitors to see what can no longer be seen. Scientist told Smalls that the way my type is destined anyway, it may not be long before I will be brought back to appear in New Glass with all these strangers.

  But what will become of my Glass Mother? She will be ‘rehoused’, they say. Taken to the Big Museum to join the Fake Panda there, whom Curator says was fashioned from dyed bearskins. Apparently, we are Illegal; our sole purpose now is Preservation. Assistant says it is sad to be losing me; she is used to saying hello every day as she walks past on her way to Administration, or back to Café. Curator tells her that all I am is a fibreglass dust-collector with a fur coat, and that she should Get a Life. I would be very interested to know where one might go to Get a Life.

  CHAPTER 31

  9 November 1937

  Carinhall

  Autumn undressed the trees as sunlight squinted between their branches. Waves tickled the small boat, which rocked gently. Ernst looked over towards Herta. She smiled at him and wrapped her shawl around her shoulders. When she closed her eyes, she saw colourful patterns swirling around the imprint of his face.

  Last night, she dreamt he finally found Margarete and brought her home. Despite his gruff exterior, Herta knew the heart of the boy had not changed after all. He loved her, had always loved her. She felt his lips on her forehead, his hand stroking her hair as she breathed in his scent, his animal smell. They were each so different and yet the same. He had carved out who he was in nature, whereas she preferred to disappear in its folds, melting into its beauty. This was the perfect time to let him know he would become a father soon. While he was away, she would stay with Mutti and Vati, and have the baby in the town where they had both grown up. She hoped it would be a boy. By the time Ernst returned from his adventures in Tibet, their little son would be old enough to run and greet him. Two years from now, perhaps things would be different and Margarete would be allowed to live freely. They could all begin anew.

  Her shawl fell from her shoulders. She opened her eyes and reached down to grab it.

  ‘Ernst,’ she said softly.

  The oars creaked in their locks. He hadn’t heard her.

  ‘Ernst.’ The life inside her insisted on making itself known. She spoke a little louder this time. ‘I have something to tell you.’

  A flock
of ducks emerged from the shelter of the forest without warning. Ernst thought about how he had worked so hard to reach a position in his career where he was poised to become the top in his field. He couldn’t risk losing that now. Surely he had provided Herta with everything she needed. What more did she want from him? Any other woman would have been content with the comfort and security that simply came from being Ernst Schäfer’s wife. He heard the ducks’ garish laughter. There was always some convenience in the death of a bird whose wayward flappings had threatened the entire flock.

  As soon as the first duck’s panicky quack pierced the air, Ernst lifted his rifle and aimed. Moments before he fired, he registered Herta calling him.

  The shot exploded, and Ernst saw Herta look up at him and gasp.

  He felt the swish of her skirt against his leg as she fell back. He reached out, trying to catch her, but she landed in a pool of water at the bottom of the boat. Leaning across, he held his hand over her chest. A sudden gust of wind slapped him as he kneeled to lift her in his arms. Her eyes met his, but there was no flicker of light or recognition. He knew that look from thousands of kills: the vacant stare of the nearly dead.

  Her shawl began to look like a world map, bloody continents divided by blue pashmina oceans. Holding her pallid hand, his thumb stroked the gold wedding ring he had slipped onto her finger months earlier. He leaned in close and kissed her lips, tasting her salty blood as it trickled down her chin. The colour was rapidly draining from her face as she left for uncharted terrain. The flock of ducks, his only witnesses, had already escaped to the far side of the lake, shrieking in the wake of gunshot that still seemed to echo through the whispering trees.

  Silence swallowed the air.

  ‘Help!’ he cried into the canopy of rainclouds slowly gathering above the lake.

  Looking over to the shore, he saw the silhouette of the warden, Engel, emerge from the cabin.

  ‘Hurry!’ he cried across the water. ‘There’s been an accident!’

  The warden ran along the pier and jumped into a dinghy. He rowed briskly towards them, but by the time he arrived, Herta’s face was already porcelain.

  EPILOGUE

  9 November 1937

  You held me in your arms, watching my blood mix with the rusty water pooling in the bottom of our boat. My last wish was to speak the language of bird and bear, panda and elk, my voice holding the chorus of their cries, so that you might hear their pain. All those you have stoned, shot, dissected and stuffed. All those whose marrow you have sucked and whose blood you have drunk. I wish I could see that young panda standing patiently in its glass case, staring out into the impervious face of time. I would tell the beautiful bear that I am the only one you didn’t succeed in pinning down. Let the thousands of specimens you have pillaged from the safety of the wild and brought to display in domestic parlours and museums around the world be shown for what they are. Their enforced immortality could never take away the beauty of their fragile, fleeting lives.

  I fly away from you now, no need for final words. The most powerful language belongs to them. It’s the animals who make us human.

  AFTERWORD

  Ernst Schäfer

  After his return to Germany from Tibet, Schäfer remarried in December 1939. During World War II, he led the Sven Hedin Research Institute for German Genealogical Inheritance and was a member of Himmler’s elite Circle of Friends, the Freundeskreis RFSS. In 1942, Himmler put him in charge of the planning of a huge expedition of twenty German scientists under strong military guard into the Caucasus to incite a Tibetan rebellion against the Raj, which never came to fruition due to the ongoing war campaign. That same year, Himmler sent him to film medical experiments on inmates at Dachau concentration camp.

  Schäfer was imprisoned by the Allied military government at Camp Moosburg in 1945. In 1947, when he was transferred to Cell 264 at Nuremberg in preparation for his trial, he wrote that he felt as if he had metamorphosed into one of his specimens, trapped in a cage. But Schäfer knew how to wriggle his way out of a tight spot. He asked for a typewriter and tried to manipulate his way to freedom, pleading his innocence in English to the US Army’s judge advocate general, Telford Taylor, one of the prosecutors of Nazi criminals:

  During the longer time of the Hitler regime, the aims of which were not known to me, I therefore was abroad working for the benefit of an American scientific institution and risking my life for it … After my life had been promulgated in the European press I was out of obvious reasons called back to Germany and simultaneously appointed an honorary leader in the SS. This constituted one of those notorious machinations of the Nazi leaders to bind young and able scientists to their system and it was effected without my own free will. I am a completely unpolitical man who waged a never-ending struggle directed against the Nazi system, in the course of which I protected Jews, Poles, Russians and German persecutes, within the realm of my institute. I faced a choice between emigration and devoting my exertions to the common cause of humanity … I chose the last, or rather there was no other choice without seriously endangering the lives of my co-workers, the lives of my wife and my children, and last but not least my work. There are scores of Nazis, many of my colleagues with a shadowy past, who were quickly given back the bliss of freedom after the war and are now happily teaching in universities, both here and in the United States.

  Schäfer also volunteered that Himmler held strange views about the occult and berated his colleagues at the Ahnenerbe for their pseudoscientific beliefs. In 1949, Schäfer was exonerated. His interrogators in the trial came to the conclusion that, on balance, he had done more good than harm, and handed him a Category V certificate, which deemed him denazified. They demanded he pay a fine of twenty-five Deutschmark, after which he walked free.

  Upon his release he took up a position as a professor in Venezuela, establishing the Caracas Botanical Garden. He returned to Europe in 1954 to become an advisor to King Leopold III of Belgium. He served as curator of the Department of Natural History at the Lower Saxony State Museum from 1960 to 1970. He died aged eighty-two in Bad Bevensen, Germany. He was survived by his wife, Ursula, and their three daughters.

  Nazi Party membership #4690995

  Summer 1933: Joined the SS

  1936: Untersturmführer

  1937: Obersturmführer

  1938: Hauptsturmführer

  Herta Völz

  Outside of Schafer’s diaries, I have not been able to find any official record of Herta, besides her death certificate and a photo of her father, Lothar, standing outside the Heidelberg Pädagogium. Ernst Schäfer is reported to have been remorseful that he killed her, but the incident, in what has been suggested was a cover-up, was ultimately blamed on the warden, who was charged with manslaughter.

  Bruno Beger

  In 1948, Beger was exonerated by a denazification tribunal. In 1960, he was arrested for his part in a Jewish skeleton collection acquired by murdering inmates of the Auschwitz concentration camp. He was released four months later, but when the case came to trial in 1970, he was found guilty of being an accomplice to the murder of eighty-six Jews. Although he was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment, on appeal this was reduced to three years’ probation. He died in Königstein, Germany, in 2009, aged ninety-eight.

  Edmund Geer

  Geer, who had been a member of the Nazi Party since the 1920s, was exonerated at the Nuremberg trials, assigned Category IV (‘Follower’).

  Ernst Krause

  In 1942, Krause and Schäfer were sent to visit Dachau to record and film medical experiments performed by the notorious Nazi doctor Sigmund Rascher. Prisoners were locked in simulated-altitude chambers and their vital signs recorded until they died of excruciating pain and convulsions from a lack of oxygen. He was completely exonerated in the Nuremberg Trials, assigned Category V, and went on to become an academic.

  Karl Wienert

  In 1942, Wienert worked on a project sponsored by Himmler to search for gold in Bavarian riverbeds. He
was completely exonerated in the Nuremberg Trials, assigned Category V, and later had a successful academic career, working as a geophysicist in Pakistan, where he built a geomagnetic observatory. From 1958, he was the head of the Earth Magnetic Observatory in Munich. He died aged seventy-nine.

  Gertrud Scholtz-Klink

  The head of the Nazi Women’s League, by 1940 Scholtz-Klink was married to her third husband, SS-Obergruppenführer August Heissmeyer, and made frequent trips to visit women at political concentration camps. At the end of World War II, Scholtz-Klink and Heissmeyer were briefly detained in a Soviet prisoner-of-war camp but escaped shortly after. With the assistance of Princess Pauline of Württemberg, they went into hiding in Bebenhausen. They spent the subsequent three years under the aliases of Heinrich and Maria Stuckebrock. In 1948, they were identified and arrested. Scholtz-Klink was sentenced to eighteen months in prison on the charge of forging documents, but in a 1950 review she was classified as the ‘main culprit’ and was sentenced to an additional thirty months. After her release in 1953, Scholtz-Klink settled back in Bebenhausen. In her 1978 book, Die Frau im Dritten Reich (‘The Woman in the Third Reich’), Scholtz-Klink espoused her continuing support for Nazi ideology. She died aged ninety-seven.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Help came from so many generous people in the writing of The Hollow Bones. My deepest gratitude to Meredith Curnow and Tom Langshaw for their extraordinary encouragement, brilliance and support. Jacinta Di Mase and Natasha Solomun are a strong and fabulous team, whose unwavering faith in my writing goes beyond the call of duty. A special thanks to Alice Nelson for believing in Panda and friends from the start. Carol Ann Major, Emma Viskic, Brenda Walker, Lee Kofman, Peter Bishop, Catherine Therese, Ashley Hay, David Carlin, Hayley Katzen, Amanda Webster and Andrea Rothman are my crew of gifted writer friends who have held my hand along the way. Barbara Ellermeier, David Templeman, Isrun Engelhardt, Gidi Ifergan, Ned Gilmore, Jennifer Vess and Dani Measday provided me with extraordinary help in many (often bizarre) matters of research and fact-checking. Louise Ryan, Bella Arnott-Hoare and the team at PRH are a cheerleading force beyond belief. Alex Ross designed the book cover of my dreams, and I thank Jo Butler for her proofreading. I am indebted to Julianne Schultz and Varuna the Writers House for a Griffith Review–Varuna writer’s fellowship. A Bundanon artist-in-residence fellowship afforded me peace and quiet to write, in the delightful company of a burrowing resident wombat under my studio. An early draft of the manuscript was a finalist in both the Disquiet-SLS-Dzanc Prize and the Churchill Trust fellowship award, which gave me a huge boost in confidence to proceed with the work. My dear friends Sandra Levin, Deborah Leiser-Moore, Diana Hanaor, Julie Lustig, Daryl Karp, Brendan Higgins and Donna-Lee Frieze kept me sane during the process. There would be no book without my wonderful family, Yohanan, Alon, Ella and Maia Loeffler, who are my greatest support, and were the first to encourage me to write this story. They also cooked meals for me, workshopped ideas for the narrative and provided astute editorial advice. I could not write a book about sentient beings without acknowledging my constant, faithful non-human companions, Kotzy, Pup, Ruby and the Fish.