Right away I run to my two horse handlers, who are now combing their steeds. I point at my pursuer: ‘He’s a bad egg, that one, ha-ha!’ The man looks daggers at me and takes off. The horse grooms laugh. I talk with them a while and catch my breath. Little by little my hands calm down.
As I was chatting away, a number of heroes visited our basement, but they were more interested in watches than in women. Later I would see many an Ivan with whole collections on both arms – five or six pieces, which they would constantly compare, winding and resetting, with childlike, thief-like joy.
Our street corner has become an army camp. The supply train is billeted in the shops and garages. The horses munch their oats and hay, it’s comical to watch them stick their heads out of the broken display windows. There’s a hint of relief in the air – Oh well, there go the watches. ‘Voyna kaput,’ as the Russians say. The war is kaput. And for us it is kaput, finished, all over. The storm has rushed past and now we’re safely in its wake.
Or so we thought.
Things started happening around 6 p.m. A man built like a bull, dead drunk, came in the basement, waving his pistol around and making for the distiller’s wife. No one else would do. He chased her with his pistol up and down the basement, shoved her ahead of him, towards the door. She fought back, hitting him, howling, when all of a sudden the pistol went off. The bullet went right through the supports and hit the wall; no one was hurt. The basement broke into a panic, everyone jumped up and started screaming. The hero seemed to have frightened himself and slipped off into the corridors.
Around 7 p.m. I was sitting upstairs with the widow, peacefully eating our evening porridge, when the concierge’s youngest daughter burst in yelling: ‘Come quick, you have to talk to them in Russian. There’s more of them after Frau B.’ The distiller’s wife again. She’s by far the plumpest woman in our group, very buxom. People say they like that. Fat means beautiful, the more woman there is, the more her body differs from that of a man. Primitive people are said to have had particular respect for women who are fat, as symbols of abundance and fertility. Well, these days they’d have a hard time fording such symbols here. The older women in particular who had once been quite plump have shrunken terribly, at least for the most part. Of course, the distiller’s wife is an exception. Since the war began she hasn’t lacked for things to trade. And now she’s paying for her unmerited fat.
When I came down she was standing in the doorway, whimpering and shaking. She had managed to run out and escape. But she didn’t dare go back to the basement, nor did she dare go up the four flights of stairs to her apartment, since the German artillery was still firing occasional shells. She was also afraid the Russians might follow her upstairs. Digging into my arm so firmly that her nails left marks, she begged me to go with her to the ‘commandant’ to request an escort, some kind of protection. I couldn’t imagine what she was thinking of.
A man came by with stars on his epaulettes and I tried to explain to him how afraid the woman was, but couldn’t think of the word for ‘afraid’. He just shrugged us off impatiently. ‘Don’t worry, nobody’s going to do anything to you, go on home.’ Finally the distiller’s wife staggered upstairs, sobbing. I haven’t seen her since; she must have sneaked off somewhere. And a good thing, too – she was too compelling a decoy.
No sooner was I back upstairs than the concierge’s girl – evidently the designated messenger – came running in for the second time. More men in the basement. Now they’re after the baker’s wife, who’s also managed to keep a bit of flesh on during the years of war.
The baker comes stumbling towards me down the hall, white as his flour, holding out his hands: ‘They have my wife…’ His voice breaks. For a second I feel I’m acting in a play. A middle-class baker can’t possibly move like that, can’t speak with such emotion, put so much feeling into his voice, bare his soul that way, his heart so torn. I’ve never seen anyone but great actors do that.
In the basement. The lantern is no longer burning; it’s probably out of kerosene. By the flickering light of a so-called Hindenburg lamp – a wick in tallow kept in cardboard – I see the baker’s wife in a recliner, her ashen face, her twitching mouth. Three Russians are standing next to her. One is jerking her up by the arm, but when she tries to getup, another shoves her back in the chair as if she were a puppet, a thing.
All three are talking to one another very quickly, evidently arguing. I can’t understand much; they’re speaking in slang. What to do? ‘Commissar,’ the baker stammers. Meaning, find someone who has some authority. I go out on the street, now peaceful, calmed down for the evening. The shooting and burning are far away. As luck would have it I run into the same officer who had been so dismissive with the distiller’s wife. I speak to him in my most polite Russian, ask him for help. He understands what I’m saying and makes a sour face. Finally he follows me, reluctant and unwilling.
The people in the basement are still scared stiff and silent, as if they all, men, women and children, had turned to stone. It turns out that one of the three Russians has backed off. The other two are still standing next to the baker’s wife, arguing. The officer joins the conversation, not with a tone of command but as among equals. Several times I hear the expression ‘ukaz Stalina’ – Stalin’s decree. Apparently Stalin has declared that ‘this kind of thing’ is not to happen. But it happens anyway, the officer gives me to understand, shrugging his shoulders. One of the two men being reprimanded voices his objection, his face twisted in anger: ‘What do you mean? What did the Germans do to our women?’ He is screaming: ‘They took my sister and…’ and so on. I can’t understand all the words, only the sense.
Once again the officer speaks, calming the man down, slowly moving towards the door, and finally managing to get both men outside. The baker’s wife asks, hoarsely, Are they gone?’
I nod, but just to make sure I step out into the dark corridor. Then they have me. Both men were lying in wait.
I scream and scream… I hear the basement door shutting with a dull thud behind me.
One of them grabs my wrists and jerks me along the corridor. Then the other is pulling as well, his hand on my throat so I can no longer scream. I no longer want to scream, for fear of being strangled. They’re both tearing away at me, instantly I’m on the floor. Something comes clinking out of my jacket pocket, must be my key ring, with the key to the building. I end up with my head on the bottom step of the basement stairs. I can feel the damp coolness of the floor tiles. The door above is ajar, and lets in a little light. One man stands there keeping watch, while the other tears my underclothes, forcing his way—
I grope around the floor with my left hand, until I find my key ring. I hold it tight. I use my right hand to defend myself. It’s no use. He’s simply torn off my suspender belt, ripping it in two. When I struggle to come up, the second one throws himself on me as well, forcing me back on the ground with his fists and knees. Now the other keeps lookout, whispering: ‘Hurry up, hurry up.’
I hear loud Russian voices. Some light. The door opens. Two, three Russians come in, the last a woman in uniform. And they laugh. The second man jumps up, having been disrupted in the act. They both go out with the other three, leaving me lying there.
I pull myself up on the steps, gather my things, drag myself along the wall towards the basement door. They’ve locked it from the inside. ‘Open up,’ I say. ‘I’m all alone, there’s no one else.’
Finally the two iron levers open. Everyone stares at me. Only then do I realize how I look. My stockings are down to my shoes, my hair is dishevelled, I’m still holding on to what’s left of my suspender belt.
I start yelling. ‘You pigs! Here they rape me twice in a row and you shut the door and leave me lying like a piece of dirt!’ And I turn to leave. At first they’re quiet, then all hell breaks loose behind me, everyone talking at once, screaming, fighting, flailing about. At last a decision: ‘We’ll all go together to the commandant and ask for protection for the night.�
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And so finally a small platoon of women, along with a few men, heads out into the evening twilight, into the mild air smelling of fire, over to where the commandant is said to be staying.
Outside it’s quiet. The guns are silent. A few men are sprawled in the entranceway – Russians. One of them gets up as we approach. Another mumbles, ‘They’re just Germans,’ and turns back over. Inside the courtyard I ask to speak to the commandant. A figure breaks away from the group of men standing in the door that leads to the rear wing of the building: ‘Yes, what do you want?’ He’s tall, with white teeth and the features of someone from the Caucasus.
He looks at the pitiful group of people come to complain and laughs, laughs at my stammering. ‘Come on, I’m sure they didn’t really hurt you. Our men are all healthy.’ He strolls back to the other officers, we hear them chuckling quietly. I turn to our grey assembly: ‘There’s no point.’
We leave and return to our basement. I don’t want to go back, don’t want to look at their faces any more. I climb upstairs, together with the widow, who’s hovering over me as if I were sick, speaking in hushed tones, stroking me, watching my every move to the point where it’s annoying. I just want to forget.
I undress in the bathroom – for the first time in days – and wash up as well as I can with the little water I have and brush my teeth in front of the mirror. Suddenly a Russian appears in the doorframe, as still as a ghost, pale and tender. ‘Where, please, the door?’ he asks in a quiet voice – in German, too. He’s evidently strayed into the apartment. Frozen in shock, wearing nothing but my nightgown, I point the way to the front door, leading to the stairwell, without saying a word. ‘Thank you,’ he says, politely.
I hurry into the kitchen. Yes, he broke in through the back door, which the widow had blocked off with a broom cupboard – he simply pushed it aside. The widow is just coming up the back stairs from the basement. Together we barricade the door again, this time more thoroughly, piling chairs in front and shoving in the heavy kitchen dresser for good measure. That should do it, says the widow. As always she bolts the front door and turns the lock twice. We feel a little secure.
A tiny flame is flickering on the Hindenburg lamp, casting our overlarge shadows on the ceiling. The widow has set up a place for me in her living room, on the sofa bed. For the first time in ages we didn’t let down the blackout blinds. What for? There won’t be any more air raids this Friday night, not for us, we’re already Russian. The widow perches on the edge of my bed and is just taking off her shoes when all at once we hear a clatter and din.
Poor back door, pitifully erected bulwark. It’s already crashing down, the chairs tumbling against the floor tiles. Scraping of feet and shoving and several rough voices. We stare at each other. Light flickers through a crack in the wall between the kitchen and the living room. Now the steps are in the hall. Someone pushes in the door to our room.
One, two, three, four men. All heavily armed, with machine guns on their hips. They look at the two of us briefly without saying a word. One of them walks straight to the chest, rips open the two drawers, rummages around, slams them back, says something dismissive and stomps out. We hear him going through the next room, where the widow’s tenant used to live before he was drafted into the Volkssturm. The three others stand around murmuring among themselves, sizing me up with stolen glances. The widow slips back into her shoes, whispering to me that she’s going to run upstairs for help from the other apartments. Then she’s gone; none of the men stop her.
What am I to do? Suddenly I feel insanely comical, standing there in front of three strange men in nothing but my candypink nightgown with its ribbons and bows. I can’t stand it any longer, I have to say something, do something. Once again I ask in Russian, Shto vy zhelaete?’
They spin around. Three bewildered faces, the men lose no time in asking: ‘Where did you learn Russian?’
I give them my speech, explain how I travelled across Russia, drawing and photographing, at such and such a time. The three warriors plop down in the armchairs, set aside their guns and stretch their legs. As we chat, I keep my ear cocked for any noise in the hallway, waiting for the widow to return with the neighbours and the promised help. But I hear nothing.
Meanwhile the fourth soldier comes back and leads number three into the kitchen. I hear them busy with the dishes. The other two speak quietly to each other, evidently I’m not supposed to understand. The mood is strangely restrained. Something is in the air, a spark, but where will it land?
The widow doesn’t come back. I try to draw the two men into conversation again, as I get under my quilt, but nothing comes of it. They look at me askance and shift around. That’s a sign things are about to happen – I read about it in the papers, when there still were some – ten or twenty times, what do I know. I feel feverish. My face is burning.
Now the other two men call them from the kitchen, and they get up clumsily and stroll over there. I crawl out of bed, very quietly, put my ear to the kitchen door and listen a moment. They’re obviously drinking. Then I slink down the pitch-dark corridor, silently, on bare feet, grab my coat off the hook and pull it on over my nightgown.
I cautiously open the front door, which the widow has left unbolted. I listen at the stairwell, silent and black. Nothing. Not a sound, not a shimmer of light. Where could she have gone? I’m just about to go up the stairs when one of the men grabs me from behind. He’s sneaked up without a sound.
Huge paws. I can smell the alcohol. My heart is hopping like crazy. I whisper, I beg: ‘Only one, please, please, only one. You, as far as I’m concerned. But kick the others out.’
He promises in a low voice and carries me in both arms like a bundle through the hall. I have no idea which of the four he is, what he looks like. In the dark front room with hardly any windows he unloads me on the former tenant’s bare bedstead. Then he shouts a few short phrases to the others, shuts the door and lies down beside me in the dark. I’m miserably cold, I beg and plead for him to let me back into the made-up bed in the next room. He refuses, seemingly afraid the widow might come back. Not until half an hour later, when things are quiet, can I get him to move there.
His automatic clanks against the bedpost; he’s hung his cap on the bedpost knob. The tallow light has gone on burning quietly, for itself. Petka – that’s his name – has a pointy head, a widow’s peak of bristly blond hair, it feels like the nap on a sofa. A gigantic man, broad as a bear, with the arms of a lumberjack and white teeth. I’m so tired, exhausted, I barely know where I am. Petka fumbles around, tells me he’s from Siberia – well, well. Now he’s even taken off his boots. I feel dizzy I’m only half present, and that half is no longer resisting. It falls against the hard body smelling of curd soap. Peace at last, darkness, sleep.
At four o’clock I hear the crowing of a rooster, part of the supply train. Right away I’m wide awake, pull my arm out from under Petka. He smiles, showing his white teeth. He gets up quickly, explaining that he has guard duty, but he’ll definitely be back at seven, absolutely! In parting he practically crushes my fingers.
I crawl back under the blanket and sleep fitfully, in fifteen-minute intervals. Once I think I hear the word ‘Help!’ and jump up but it was only the rooster. Now the cow is mooing as well. I unwrap our alarm clock (it’s really the widow’s, but I now consider myself part of the household) – just to be safe we keep it wrapped in a terry cloth towel, far back in the chest. We never look at it unless we’re completely alone and safe. We don’t want to lose it to some Ivan.
It is five o’clock. I can’t sleep any more. I get up and smooth out the bed, shove the crates and chairs back against the rear door with its broken lock, clear the empty bottles the men have left behind and check to see whether we still have our burgundy in the kitchen cupboard, hidden in the old bucket. Thank God they didn’t find that.
A reddish-grey light shining through the window means the war is still on outside. A distant rumble and hum. The front is now rolling into
the centre of town. I get dressed, wash myself as best I can, and listen carefully to the morning quiet of the stairwell. Nothing but silence and emptiness. If only I knew where the widow had sneaked off to! I don’t dare knock on any doors, don’t want to frighten anyone.
The next time I prick up my ears, I hear voices. I run up, they’re already coming my way, a whole group of women, with the widow in the lead, sobbing lamentably, ‘Don’t be angry with me!’ (As of yesterday we’ve been calling each other by the familiar ‘du’.) A number of women around her are sobbing as well. I just laugh in the face of all the lamentation: ‘What’s the matter, I’m alive, aren’t I? Life goes on!’
As we head up to the next floor, to the booksellers’, the widow whispers in my ear about how she knocked on several doors and asked people to take us in and give us shelter for the night. In vain. No one opened. At the postmaster’s they hissed through the chained door: ‘The girl? That would be asking for trouble. No, we don’t want to be luring them this way!’ After that it was pitch-dark when some Russian came up and grabbed her, threw her on the floorboards… A mere child, she whispers, no beard at all, smooth-skinned and inexperienced – a smile breaks through her face, so swollen with sobbing. I don’t know her age exactly. I’m not even sure she would tell me. Probably between forty and fifty; she dyes her hair. But for them any woman will do, when they’re grabbing in the dark.
Some fifteen people have holed up at the booksellers’, bringing their bedclothes and spreading out on the sofas, the floor, wherever there’s room. The doors of the apartment has patent deadbolts and extra reinforcements anchored in the floor. On top of that the front door has a metal backing on the inside.
A Woman in Berlin Page 7