Before The Brightest Dawn (The Half-Bloods Trilogy Book 3)

by Jana Petken

  When Bothmann’s answer was interrupted by a telephone call, Paul stared sightlessly through the open window. He was envious of the man. He’d seen Erika; had maybe held her in his arms. He’d spoken to Valentina; something he hadn’t been able to do since before their child was born.

  Paul received mail from Valentina on a bi-weekly basis, and the letters always enclosed up-to-date pictures of the baby. He loved getting the photographs, but his wife’s writings didn’t convey sentiment or affection. If truth be told, Valentina’s penmanship was aloof and hurried, as if she’d been reluctant to write at all.

  She spoke lovingly about the baby, her days in Berlin, the few-and-far-between air raids they were getting, which, she’d quickly pointed out, had no great effect on the city, and her desire for the war to be over. But she said nothing about her love for him or how much she missed him. Not once had she asked him if he had upcoming leave, or if they could go off together when such leave did come. And she never referred to anything he had told her in his letters.

  He didn’t know his wife, not the real Valentina, he’d concluded not long after she’d left Poland. In her letters, she prayed for a more peaceful future for the baby and herself but never mentioned him being with them. These ambiguities left him confused about how to reply. He was uncomfortable using terms of endearment when he no longer knew if his feelings were reciprocated. What had happened to their passion for each other? It had been intense, but apparently, short-lived from her end…

  “Sorry about the interruption,” Bothmann said, replacing the telephone in its cradle.

  Paul, becoming angry as always when he thought about Biermann’s influence over Valentina, lost his poise and grumbled, “Did my father-in-law ask you to send for me?”

  Bothmann’s eyes narrowed. “Yes, Oberarzt. He thought it would be a good experience for you. Now that the hospitals in the ghetto have been closed and your new posting has come through, he presumed you’d benefit from this visit – was he wrong?”

  “No … excuse me, sir.”

  Bothmann lit a cigarette and studied Paul through a plume of smoke. “I get the feeling you don’t approve of what we do here. Freddie – Kriminaldirektor Biermann – did mention your habit of questioning our policies. You do understand why we conduct these operations, don’t you?”

  That popular question again: you do understand why we do it, don’t you? when it came to committing atrocities against the Jews. “Yes, of course, Commandant,” Paul said. “We want to get rid of Jews in Europe and cleanse the Fatherland of their stench.”

  Bothmann’s previously suspicious eyes widened with satisfaction. “That’s a good answer, Paul. Exactly what I expect to hear from a loyal soldier of the Reich.”

  Paul smiled, concealing his sarcasm.

  “Ach, I suppose we have it easy here.” Bothmann relaxed in his chair. “The Jews come and go in the space of a day. You’ll find that Auschwitz is a much more complex setup. Some Jews are disposed of upon arrival, mostly the children and elderly who are useless to our war effort; others live and work there, but they will all die in the end.”

  Paul, keeping his expression neutral, was aware that for the second time that day, he was being tested. After he eventually left Chelmno, he was certain Bothmann would report to Biermann in Berlin with his impressions of this meeting. For the life of him, Paul couldn’t grasp why his father-in-law was still making it his mission in life to torment him. It wouldn’t bring him any closer to finding the paintings or punishing Dieter Vogel.

  “Do you need me to sign death certificates for the Jews arriving today? I’d like to make myself useful while I’m here,” Paul said.

  Bothmann raised a puzzled eyebrow. “Whatever gave you that idea? I have four doctors on my staff, all perfectly capable of dealing with the new arrivals. You won’t have to get involved with the Jews at all. You will observe, and when our work is done, you can return to Łódź. I’ll arrange for a vehicle to take you to Kolo. From there, you can get the last train – don’t look so worried, Oberarzt, I will telephone your father-in-law to tell him what a charming, helpful young man you are.”

  Paul’s chest was tight from holding in a bagful of emotions he couldn’t begin to go through. “When will the prisoners arrive?”

  “In an hour or two. They’ll come into Koło railway station first. It’s about ten kilometres northwest of here. Our police and SS will supervise the transfer of prisoners from the freight train to smaller-sized cargo trains that run on the narrow-gauge tracks to Powiercie station just outside Chełmno. Why don’t you put your feet up in the officers’ mess? I’ll send my man to you when the prisoners get here.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Paul saluted and went to the door.

  “Paul … one more thing before you go. There’s no need for you to tell anyone about what you might see here today.”

  Paul nodded. “Of course not, Herr Commandant.”

  ******

  A Leutnant, who had been wearing his Waffen SS uniform five minutes earlier, met the new arrivals at the double doors to the manor house. Dressed now as a local squire and sporting a Tyrolean hat, he announced to the Jews that some of them would remain at the estate to work.

  The Jews were processed as soon as they entered the manor house. The German, still playing the friendly host, gathered the arrivals around him in the reception hall.

  “Good afternoon. Before you settle in, you must all take a bath. Won’t that be nice?” he asked the expectant faces.

  Paul stared at the strategically placed plaque on the wall, saying, Bathhouse, with an arrow beneath pointing the way; a thoughtful piece of deceit.

  “You must hand in your valuables to be registered,” the squire continued. “These include wedding rings and eyeglasses. All hidden banknotes will be destroyed during steaming, so you must take them out and hand them over for safekeeping. Your clothes will be disinfected, but women may keep their slips on. Come with me – this way.”

  Paul trailed behind the group of one hundred fifty Jews whilst picturing what was to come. They were now going to remove their shoes and clothes and hand over precious rings and watches, eyeglasses and money that they had guarded on their persons for years, and they would do it with an air of optimism. Some of them were to work on the estate, they’d been told, and in their minds, they’d believe that the friendly-looking squire had no reason to lie to them. They were safe; the rumours of this being a death camp were unfounded.

  Kriminalassistent Busch, Paul’s new guide, led the first group of prisoners away for bathing, but Paul lagged at the back of the line to listen to the people in front of him whisper questions to others who shot back hopeful, albeit naïve answers: “I hope we get more food here. They’ll need us to be strong if we’re to work,” an elderly woman wearing her fur coat in September said.

  “Everything is going to be better from now on,” the old man next to her responded, holding her hand.

  “I agree. We’re important to the Germans. They must have chosen us because we look useful,” another elderly man decreed.

  “If I’m any judge of character, that nice squire won’t let the children starve,” a woman threw over her shoulder to the first person who’d spoken.

  “If we’ve been chosen to work, why did the children come?” another man asked, cutting the conversation dead in its tracks.

  After stripping off in a large, bare room, the Jews were taken to the cellar and marched along the passageway. Paul, still following behind the group, saw a small detachment of Jews sorting and packing personal belongings at a line of tables in a room to his left. These men and women looked as miserable as he felt.

  At the end of the corridor, the door opened onto the ramp that Paul had seen earlier. The first group of Jews crossed it, then disappeared into the back of a van, whose doors were immediately closed.

  When he got outside by another exit, Paul observed a group of SS guards picking out Jewish men from another batch of prisoners. They were not being selected random
ly, he noted; the chosen looked stronger and younger than the most elderly in the group. He began to shiver, even as the hot sun hit him. His whole body trembled, and his breath came in quick, shallow pants as it tried to seep past the lump of shame at the back of his throat.

  “Come with me, sir,” Busch said.

  Paul’s highly charged emotions were evident as he stared at Busch. “Come where?”

  “The Commandant wants you to see the final part of the operation. It’s a short drive in the Kübelwagen.”

  Paul jumped as the engine revved with the first fully loaded truck. The driver in the cab, wearing the SS death head pin, was about forty years old. He stared straight ahead, ignoring his surroundings and the guards standing at the side of the vehicle talking above the noise.

  “Don’t worry, we’ve got plenty of time to see the end results in the forest. It’ll take about twenty minutes to finish that lot off,” Busch nudged Paul.

  In the clearing about four kilometres from the house, large open-air grids were already in the ground. Young Jewish men wearing striped suits and shackled with chains on their ankles were trying to run and jump around the perimeter of the grids under the watchful eyes of about fifty of the camp’s Sonderkommando.

  “What on earth are they doing?” Paul asked Busch.

  “The SS hold jumping contests and races among the Jewish camp workers to deem who’s fit to continue working. The losers are shot and replaced with new blood from the recent arrivals – it’s a battle of the fittest here.” The assistant’s smug tone matched his apparent enthusiasm for the sport he was watching.

  Paul was ushered to the first van when it arrived at the site twenty-five minutes later. Busch handed him a flashlight. “Take a look in the back of the van.”

  Paul turned on the torch and got behind the steering wheel, playing a role for the SS and Gestapo who were watching him. Between the driver’s cab and the rear part were two peepholes. He flashed the light through them into the gas compartment and choked back a sob. The pile of mangled dead bodies, their loose, wrinkled skin with hardly any flesh underneath, looked almost cherry red in the strange light. Caved in stomachs with protruding ribs was a common sight to him these days, but these naked bodies were contorted, lying across, below, and above each other, displaying genitalia, saggy breasts, bony arms and legs with joints bulging like tennis balls. The gut-wrenching, unworldly corpses combined with the slack mouths on the open-eyed, terror-stricken faces, were enough to turn the strongest man’s stomach to mush, and for the second time in his career, Paul vomited.

  When his stomach had settled, he switched off the torch and jumped down to the ground, his face now a mask of indifference. He wouldn’t apologise for the vomit running down the outside of the driver’s door and staining his jacket, nor give an opinion of what he’d just seen; not to the dispassionate men ogling him.

  “I’ve seen all I need to see, Kriminalassistent. Please take me to the train station,” he uttered to Busch.

  “I cannot. We haven’t finished, Herr Oberarzt. I’ve been told you must go through the whole procedure,” Busch retorted, without a hint of respect for Paul’s officer rank.

  “I don’t give a damn what you were ordered to do! I must return to Łódź. I’ve wasted enough of my day and have more pressing matters to attend to.” Paul gestured to the van. “These Jews have no need of a doctor’s services.”

  Paul turned sharply at a loud creaking noise and watched as the van’s door was opened and the dead bodies tumbled out of it and straight onto one of the grids.

  “At first, we removed the corpses from the gas-vans and placed them in mass graves,” Busch explained. “We filled the long trenches within weeks, but the smell of decomposing bodies began to permeate the surrounding countryside, including nearby villages. A few months ago, the SS came up with the idea of burning the bodies in the forest, hence these grids. Follow me. I need to take you closer.”

  Paul, conceding defeat regarding his demand to leave, crossed the few metres of burnt grass to the crematorium site. Standing closer to the corpses, he breathed in the sweaty stench of pre-death fear rising from the shallow pit. He recognised a naked child near the top of the pile. The little soul had fought for his last breath; his mouth was still gaping, his terrified … or were they puzzled and confused eyes … were open, and his bony arms lay across his caved-in tummy. He’d seen the little boy often playing with other children outside Kurt’s tenement block. Once, Paul had given him and his friends a bar of chocolate to share between them. The lad’s excitement had been precious. He swallowed the bile of disgust in his mouth and put on his dark glasses.

  “The grids are constructed of concrete slabs and rail tracks,” Busch was now saying. “We use pipes for air ducts and put in long ash pans below the grid. Because of the stench, the Jewish Sonderkommando had to exhume the mass graves and burn the previously interred bodies. Those men are also responsible for cleaning the excrement and blood from the vans.”

  Paul had seen and heard enough. “We’re leaving now. I’ll be late for the train, and I don’t want to spend the night here. No argument, Kriminalassistent Busch,” he said, already heading towards the Kübelwagen.

  “I was told to take you back to the palace. You must be needing a coffee after your tour, but not a Kaiser’s Kaffe ... ja?”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Łódź, Poland

  10 September 1942

  The letter fell from Paul’s hand and floated downwards in a zig-zag pattern until it eventually settled on the floor to lie face up. He looked at it; the words written in ink in his father-in-law’s flawless, elegant style. His flamboyant, oversized signature; the seal of his own inflated ego, the brief, sharp and to-the-point sentences without a hint of sympathy or respect for the reader’s feelings; all were quintessentially Fredrich Biermann.

  Berlin

  August 1942

  Oberarzt Vogel

  I’m writing this letter to inform you that your brother, Schütze Wilmot Vogel, has recently been in Berlin. I spoke to him whilst he was here, entertained him in my home, and helped him secure a posting in North Africa. The fighting has been heavy in that region – I hope my next letter to you will not be informing you that poor Wilmot has been killed – it’s dreadful to hear of so many young men in Rommel’s army falling like flies in the desert.

  Should he be unlucky, I shall, of course, tell you that Wilmot died as a hero for the Führer, Volk und Vaterland – for the Führer, for the people, and for the Fatherland – and that his sacrifice will not be forgotten. Unfortunate, is it not, Paul, that such grand applause is not something I could ever convey to anyone about you or your dear papa?

  I informed Wilmot of Kurt Sommer’s treason and subsequent death at the fumbling hands of your Jewish doctors. As you can imagine, he was upset and angry at Sommer’s betrayal.

  My daughter and granddaughter are both well in my care, and you no longer need to feel responsible for either of them. Valentina’s feelings for you have changed, and she will be speaking to a lawyer about ending her marriage. Her eyes have been opened, Paul. Since her return to Berlin, she has discovered a new independence and what her true principles are. She is working with a women’s society which devote their time to raising funds for soldiers on the front lines, and she also has a job at the Reich Main Security Office. Her disappointment in you shocked me, truly. ‘Paul cares too much about the Jews. He embarrasses me and dishonours real Germans who are suffering terribly.’ Her words, not mine, you understand.

  I feel it would be better if you refrain from writing to my Valentina … that is my wish. Her wish is that you sign the divorce papers and send them back to her as soon as possible so that she may look forward to a new and better life.

  Kriminaldirektor of the Gestapo (retired)

  Fredrich Biermann.

  Unlike the letter Paul had received from Biermann to inform him of his father’s death, this one lacked warmth and instead displayed the Kriminaldirektor’s contem
pt and intention to hurt Paul in every line, comma, and period. He was furious, yet unsurprised by his father-in-law’s latest sick stunt.

  Although devastated about Biermann’s news of an impending divorce from Valentina, Paul claimed a modicum of personal satisfaction; he was not heartbroken, as a rejected husband should be, neither was he shocked or angry. How strange, that his love for his wife had died – where or at what moment, he didn’t know – and that it had taken this callously given information to make him realise he no longer cared about her feelings, what she thought of him and his so-called love for the Jews, or what she was doing in her own life in Berlin. Biermann had prised his daughter and son-in-law apart like a wishbone, as though it were part of his game, and Valentina had allowed it to happen. He had no gaping hole in his heart, no desire to persuade her to stay. He was, instead, shattered about a future without his baby daughter in it. That pain was so immense, he could hardly breathe.

  He sat on the edge of his bed, glaring at the letter, still enraged even though he’d read it four times in the last week. Biermann was now retired; forced probably, a sick old man who wanted to spend his remaining time on earth making the Vogels suffer for his failures.

  He pitied his father-in-law, as he had when the man was in hospital, but he also hated him. He likewise despised the insipid Olga who could see no wrong in her sadistic husband … hated everything that damn family stood for.

  Paul could see the future unfolding with startling clarity, and it was ugly and bitter. Now, he understood Valentina’s coldness in her writings. She didn’t love him either. He wondered, had she ever?

  He picked up the letter, folded it neatly, put it into his rucksack, and then fished out an envelope containing another three-page letter from his bedside drawer. It had arrived six days earlier while he’d been at Chelmno, yet it had been written at the end of July. It was an infinitely more satisfying and truthful letter; so honest, in fact, he wondered why most of the lines had not been redacted.