Danzig Passage

by Bodie Thoene

  Alfie made his tin Hitler-men stomp away and climb to the top of the shelf to report to Hitler; then they slipped and fell all the way to the floor. Sometimes he liked to make up his own ending.

  The story he liked best of all was the one he performed tonight. In the back of the bean-can New Church with the candle for a bell tower, Alfie put this place. His place. Home with mama. It was a sardine can with lots of sleeping tin men in it. Alfie was an infantry soldier in a handsome blue uniform. Sometimes his Alfie fought off troops of Hitler-men who came to take him. Sometimes he tapped through his imaginary city and visited people and shops. Tonight Alfie put the tin-man Alfie to bed and sang songs from New Church and prayed and pretended that it was dark even though it was not really dark because of the candle. Last of all he put the general on his tin horse and then put them both on the candlestick.

  “I am Jesus, King of everything,” the general said. “And you don’t have to be scared, Alfie.” Then the candle and Jesus swooped through the air.

  “Here I am!” the tin Alfie said, waking up. “I want to fight with you! Make me smart like other boys, and I will not be a dumbhead! I will fight the bad men!”

  Jesus flew down and the candle was bright on the silver can where Alfie lived with Mama. The horse rode slowly into the can and Jesus touched Alfie with His sword. “You are smart!” Jesus said. “And I will make you fight good for me!” And Alfie was not a dumbhead anymore.

  “Please wake up Mama, too!”

  The sword touched sleeping Mama and she woke up and hugged Alfie. She was so glad to see him that she hugged him and hugged him, and Alfie had trouble getting away to knock the bad men off the Brandenburg Gate and rescue Werner and Dieter and Heinrich.

  Alfie scooted back to look at his little world. He would be glad when things really happened the way he imagined. He stared hard at the pretend Alfie who stood before Jesus. He wished he could really be smart and fight a good fight for others the way Pastor had fought a fight for him.

  “How did I do, General Jesus?”

  Well done, Alfie.

  Then Alfie lifted up the horse and rider back in the air and they flew away to watch everything in Berlin from heaven.

  19

  Night Visitors

  The empty cans of Alfie’s city clanked and clattered down in the dark.

  It was pitch black. Alfie sat up in his bed. He was afraid. Something had knocked over cans! His heart was pounding fast, and he could not breathe because he was so scared.

  “Mama?” he said to the darkness.

  A deep sound of breathing answered him. For the first time Alfie thought about ghosts.

  “Who is there?” he shouted. He was afraid to reach for the candlestick. He was afraid to run for the steps. Whatever was there stood between him and the steps. He heard it! It kicked his city and maybe crushed his tin men with its big feet!

  “Is it . . . Jesus? Jesus, I hope it is you! Jesus?”

  Alfie was shaking all over, just like when he figured out that Werner was dead and that they would kill him too. He pulled his blanket over his head and scrunched way back in the corner, hugging his knees and pressing his face against his legs. He tried not to cry, for then it would hear him and get him.

  “Go away!” He took a deep breath and tried to sound brave. “This is my place!”

  More cans clattered down from the shelf. The breathing made a soft rumbly noise. Alfie closed his eyes right, expecting a blow.

  A can rolled across the floor. Then something pounced and landed lightly on the edge of the blanket. Alfie gasped and screamed in terror. He struck out and hit something soft and furry. With a hiss and a meow, it whisked up the steps and away.

  By the light of the candle, Alfie twisted open the sardine can. It hissed, and the aroma of the fish filled the place. He went up the steps where the cat had run away and placed a sardine just inside the iron gate.

  He dripped a little juice a few steps back and laid the next sardine on the marble floor. He decided he would not give the cat more than two sardines unless he came down the steps. Alfie broke a third sardine in pieces and left one bite on each step all the way down into his room.

  Animals were nicer than people. Alfie remembered what the lady said on the day after Berlin was smashed. It would be nice to have a friend!

  He prayed as he laid the little trail across his room and climbed back into his blanket. He put the sardine can right on his chest and left the candle burning.

  ***

  Bare light bulbs hung from the ceiling of Barrack 7 at Nameless camp, high out of reach from even the highest tier of bunks to prevent suicide by electrocution.

  In Barrack 7, however, there had been no suicides since Pastor Karl Ibsen had come among the prisoners. Sometimes smiles were exchanged between the men. They were kinder to one another than the prisoners of Barrack 14, where stealing and beatings were rampant. The difference was duly noted; it was not liked by the camp commanders.

  Prisoners were not supposed to act humanely toward one another. The retention of dignity was a sign of inner resistance. Even silent resistance sent a tremor of fear through the ideology of oppression, the mastery of strong over the weak. It raised terrible questions. Who is really strong? And who is really weak?

  Karl Ibsen and Richard Kalner shared a place with ten other men on the top tier of bunks. There was just enough room for them to lie side by side like sardines in a can. Their heads faced out toward the narrow aisle; they were not safe even in sleep from the blows of their captors.

  The lights blinked once, a warning that all prisoners must now be in place for lights out. In the most remarkable minute of each day, one man on each bunk recited a Scripture for the group to think on before sleep. The ritual had begun with Karl and Richard on bunk 49. It had spread from tier to tier, embraced by many and rejected by some, until these brief Scripture lessons became the high point of each day. Men who had not spoken a word of Scripture since bar mitzvah searched their memories to recall passages memorized in their youth. Those who had never read one word from the Bible sought out others from across the barracks.

  “It is my turn to say something tonight. Have you a short verse I can learn?”

  “The joy of the Lord is my strength.”

  “Look upon my suffering and deliver me.”

  There was no lack of supply, it seemed. Newcomers who scoffed at first soon found themselves as eager as their comrades to learn a new verse. After a while no one could remember who had started the tradition.

  Karl did not admit that this was something he had picked up at a church camp when he was a boy, or that he had memorized complete books of the Bible one verse at a time.

  “May my tongue sing of your word, for all your commands are righteous.”

  From the bunk below, Karl heard the quaking voice of a young man who had come from Austria a week before. He declared he was an atheist, and asked Karl for the shortest Scripture in the Bible. Now he repeated that verse in a mocking voice: “Jesus wept.”

  Silence below. Then, “Why did He weep?”

  “Because He knew what men could do to one another.”

  “He saw us here. It broke His heart.”

  A longer silence followed as each man considered the tears of Jesus. There was no great theological debate, no need for it. The Lord’s tears spoke to the heart from the shortest verse in the Bible.

  Throughout the barracks, guards with rubber truncheons shrieked for silence. The lights went out. Then the young atheist who had offered the Scripture in jest wept also.

  ***

  Since the church picnic last summer, Lori had often daydreamed about being alone in a quiet place with Jacob Kalner. She had even imagined what it would be like to kiss him. Now such thoughts seemed foolish. She glared at him with resentment and anger.

  The tiny bellows room of New Church was cold. Lori’s teeth chattered as they placed the pew cushions on the floor to serve as mattresses. The heavy red velvet draperies from behind the altar
had been taken down and would serve as a blanket for the trio. They dared not attempt to keep the furnace burning or sleep in a more comfortable room in case the Gestapo returned for a surprise search of the premises. The bellows room was the safest place, Jacob reasoned. At the first sound of trouble they could kick the cushions and the drapery into a corner among a stack of other items that had fallen into disuse around the church. And then they could slip back into the bellows to hide. Comfort was of small consideration compared to safety.

  This thought in mind, they climbed into their makeshift bed. Jacob lay closest to the door. Lori lay next to the bellows and Mark slept in the center. It was still early evening, but not even light from the streetlamp penetrated the black cubicle.

  Lori lay awake a long time as she listened for imaginary footsteps in the church beyond. Her breath mingled with the frigid night air in a steamy vapor. Jacob and Mark breathed with the even cadence of deep, untroubled sleep. Lori took some comfort in their ability to sleep. It was hard for her to close her eyes. Hard to give up watchfulness, in spite of the fact that they had rehearsed and drilled their escape a dozen times. What if they come and we do not hear them?

  Every pop and groan of the rafters became the imagined footstep of a Gestapo officer coming to search the tiny church for fugitives. The wind against the roof, dry leaves tapping on the windows—the slightest sound became the harsh whispers of their pursuers. Even beneath the heavy fabric of the curtain, Lori trembled with fear. Mark curled warmly at her back. Jacob slept against the door so he could hear if they came. But he slept so soundly! What if we do not hear them in time?

  She thought of her family and prayed for them one at a time. But those thoughts made her so sad that she considered slipping out of the church and marching to the nearest Gestapo office to give herself up. It was better not to think too much. Better to be afraid instead of locked in despair for Mama and Papa and Jamie. And so she let herself tremble, let the churning fear keep the sadness away.

  It was very late when her eyes finally grew heavy with the exhaustion of terror. At last she drifted off into an uneasy sleep where the sounds of Mama’s arrest replayed over and over again in her dreams. Somewhere far off, she thought she heard the thin, high wail of her brother’s cry as he was carried away: “No! No! Mama! Don’t let them take me! Mama!”

  Then she felt an urgent tapping on her head! The signal!

  Jacob wordlessly slipped from beneath the blanket, on his feet in an instant. He pressed his ear against the door and then, without explanation, tore the heavy fabric off Lori and Mark and tossed the cushions against the wall.

  Lori jerked wide awake at the first sign of danger. Without waiting to listen, she grabbed Mark by the arm and guided him back into the giant bellows of the pipe organ. Only seconds passed before Jacob followed into the cramped space. Lori wiped her face with the back of her hand. Her cheek was wet. She had been crying in her sleep.

  She listened, trying to hear what had awakened Jacob; trying to make out the imminent danger that must be ascending the steps to the organ loft.

  But she heard no sound except the thump of her heart in her ears, the rapid breathing of her companions.

  Jacob exhaled loudly, as if with satisfaction. “All clear,” he said in a voice that seemed too loud for the tiny hiding place.

  Neither Mark nor Lori dared to believe him. How could he know?

  He said even loudly, “Come on. Back to bed! Just a drill!”

  Lori groaned with audible relief. All this fear wasted on a drill! What gave him the right to say when they would have a drill? She had just fallen asleep, and now she had to do it all over again!

  “We have drilled enough!” she said angrily as she dusted herself off. “I just washed my face before bed, and now I’m all dirty again!”

  Jacob grabbed her by the arm as she reached for the doorknob. “You’re not going anywhere. I told you. Use the toilet before we go to bed, because once we’re here for the night, we’re here!”

  “You can’t make laws about such things,” she argued angrily. “Unless you’re a . . . Nazi!”

  “I told you—,” he began.

  “You did not tell me you would wake me up in the middle of the night for nothing!” She pushed past him and jerked open the door. He did not try to stop her, but set to work reconstructing their bed.

  “We needed a drill,” he muttered to Mark. “You don’t go running off to the toilet every time we have a drill, now do you, Mark?”

  Mark was too tired to reply. It seemed like a very long time since they had been able to sleep a whole night through.

  Lori grasped the cold metal banister and worked her way cautiously down the dark stairway to the foyer. Groping along the wall, she found the door of the women’s room and slipped in.

  They had agreed that lights must never be switched on in the church, and so she moved blindly to the sink and splashed ice cold water over her gritty face and hands and arms. She could not find the towel; she shook off the drops and wiped the dampness on her slacks, aware too late that her clothes were also filthy and she would have to wash her hands again.

  Silently fuming at Jacob, she repeated the whole process one more time and then searched for the towel. Then she heard it . . .

  In the pitch blackness of the tiled room, Lori heard the sound of shallow breathing. She stood rooted at the sink, blinking in the darkness toward where she knew the mirror would be. Was that her own pale face staring eerily back at her? Was she imagining? Why could she not move?

  Her mouth went dry with fear. She held her breath, hoping that perhaps she had only heard an echo, her own echo against the tiles. But it was not so. The breathing was real; human, but not human. She opened her mouth and tried to speak the name of Jesus. But her lips could not form the word, so she simply stood there, clutching the cold porcelain of the sink.

  There could be no doubt that whoever . . . whatever . . . was there with her had heard her clunking around. Why did it not speak? Why was the breath so shallow and . . . so frightened sounding? She drew a breath. Was it Mark? Had he slipped down here ahead of her to frighten her as a horrible prank, to teach her that she must obey Jacob?

  Resentment gave her courage. “Who . . . who is there?” she demanded.

  A little cry answered her, resounding off the tiles of the little room. “Lori? Sister? Lori?” It was the unmistakable voice of Jamie, sniffing through tears and calling with joy all at the same moment. “Lori?”

  “Jamie!” She said her brother’s name again and again as she patted the wall in search of the forbidden light switch. “Oh, Jamie!” she cried, no longer caring who heard her. It was Jamie! The light slammed against their eyes, making them both squint and blink as they took in the sight of each other in astonishment.

  Jamie was dressed in the black uniform of the Hitler Jugend. His shoes were new and brightly polished, and he wore a heavy warm coat and gloves. His clothes looked new and strangely dark against his fair skin and hair.

  He embraced her, holding tightly to her as he explained his escape from the Hitler Youth dormitory after dinner and his return to the dark and deserted church by way of a streetcar. “And then I came in through the window! And I was sitting in the basement for a long time, but then I had to use the toilet so I came this way and then I heard something . . . something . . . I don’t know. I thought maybe a ghost or Gestapo. I ran in here and hid up on the toilet tank, you see, but then you came in. You didn’t turn on the light . . . I thought the ghosts had followed me!”

  She stroked his back gently as he rambled wildly on. And then, mindful of the lights, she reached up and flicked them off again. Only then did Jamie fall silent and let her simply hold him close.

  “We must be careful of the light,” she said softly. “I don’t think they’ll come back—not with all the signs. But we cannot go turning lights on, or someone will notice.” She smiled in the dark, touching the fine, soft hair of her brother as Mama used to do.

  “Where is
Mama?” Jamie asked after a moment.

  “They took her. I . . . I don’t know where. Or Papa either.”

  “I saw our auto,” Jamie said, as if he were telling of meeting an old friend. “It is parked not far from the Kalners’ flat. The streetcar passed it, and I looked at it very hard. It was Papa’s auto . . . ” He sighed heavily. “I wish I had gone with Papa. Oh, Lori! What could have happened to them?”

  Lori held her emotions in check. She was the older, the more responsible. She would not cry like a little baby, even though she wanted to. She had asked herself the same questions a thousand times, but she had no way of knowing the answers. “They will let them go,” she replied in her most reassuring voice. “You will see. Mama and Papa will be released in no time. The Gestapo won’t hold them. They can’t. Papa hasn’t done anything. Mama is innocent. Don’t worry, Jamie.”

  “Are you alone?” he asked, drawing away and stiffening at the sound of footsteps against the flagstones of the foyer.

  A muffled voice called through the door. “Lori? Are you all right?”

  “Jacob!” Jamie said triumphantly.

  Hand and hand the two went out to tell him Jamie had come home.

  ***

  Alfie called his new cat Joseph, because his coat had so many different colors. Alfie knew the names of colors—orange and yellow and brown and tan. And Joseph had a little white on his pink nose and three white paws.

  Alfie was glad that Joseph had come to live with him and keep him company. He did not mind sharing the sardines. Joseph was very fat but did not eat a lot. He was no trouble and slept on Alfie’s feet every night. Joseph helped keep Alfie warm.

  The best thing about Joseph was the way he purred and buzzed all over when Alfie stroked his soft fur, almost like laughing. It made Alfie feel happy inside that the cat liked him.