Levi's War

by Julie Thomas

  It was almost as though he was talking to himself. Levi sat very still and looked at the piano keys.

  ‘Do you not think those are admirable goals, Hauptmann?’ Hitler asked. They were alone. Levi had been playing the Führer’s favourite pieces of Wagner for him. Hitler said it relaxed him and helped him to plan and strategise while he listened.

  ‘I do indeed, Mein Führer, but I expect nothing less from your brilliant mind.’

  Hitler sighed. ‘True, but you know, it is a heavy burden to bear sometimes. Being the only one who sees the future with such clarity. My generals are all idiots — unless I tell them exactly what to do, they flap around like fish on a slab.’

  Levi smiled. ‘A very imaginative description, Mein Führer.’

  ‘Why can’t they all be as successful as Greece, Yugoslavia, and Crete?’

  Levi wasn’t sure whether he was supposed to answer these questions. At the forefront of his mind was the mercurial personality of the Führer, which could turn from companionable to enraged in an instant.

  ‘Do you know about what happened on the beaches of France, Hauptmann?’ Hitler asked.

  It was always better to plead ignorance until you knew which tack the conversation was taking.

  ‘No, Mein Führer,’ he said.

  ‘We had them pinned down, and we halted our advance. Not my order. I trusted FieldMarshall von Rundstedt, and the enemy escaped. We could have forced Britain to surrender . . .’ his voice trailed off.

  Levi waited for a moment to make sure the Führer wasn’t going to start again. ‘I hear good things from the Eastern Front, Mein Führer.’

  Hitler scowled. ‘They think their counter-offensive will work. That bastard Stalin thinks he’ll hold onto Moscow and Leningrad. Just wait till the summer: next year will be a glorious one for the armies of the Third Reich.’

  ‘I read the newspapers of the English and they are scared. No matter what Churchill says publicly, Mein Führer, its plain they know they are no match for you,’ Levi said.

  Hitler smiled. ‘I’m very glad to hear that, Hauptmann.’

  Levi didn’t answer. Instead he started to play Wagner’s Piano Sonata in A Flat, very quietly. Hitler closed his eyes. When the piece was finished, he sat on the edge of his seat.

  ‘I admire Wagner more than I can tell you. Did you know he wrote an essay on Judaism in music?’

  Levi shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t know that, Mein Führer.’

  Hitler nodded. ‘I think about him when Reinhard is droning on about his final solution.’

  Levi’s hand shook momentarily. ‘Final solution to what, Mein Führer?’

  ‘The Jews. He has this plan, he’s going to hold a meeting about it in Wannsee, or so he tells me. He knows I want to eliminate the Jews, rid the continent of their filthy presence, and he says his plan will kill eleven million. Well, I shall put Himmler in charge of actually doing it, Heinrich knows how to get things done. Reinhard has an iron heart and he is a master of killing, but Himmler is the man for this.’

  Levi could feel his stomach churning and for one awful moment he thought he was going to be sick, but he took deep breaths, pressed his nails into his palms, and it passed. Hitler seemed to have forgotten he was there. He was murmuring about the plan to exterminate the sub-human races, as if to reassure himself. Finally he looked over at Levi and waved his hand.

  ‘That is all for today, Hauptmann, you may go now. I’m tired.’

  The National Archives Kew, London, September 2017

  There was a stunned silence in the room. Suddenly Cindy Horowitz burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. Her husband, David, rose swiftly and went to her, pulled her to her feet and embraced her.

  Simon made a strange choking noise in his throat. ‘If I couldn’t see him as he said all this, I would refuse to believe it,’ he said softly.

  ‘He was doing his duty, for his adopted country,’ David said, his voice firm and resolute.

  Simon looked up at him and shook his head. His dark eyes were full of pain and anger. ‘No, David, didn’t you hear him? He murdered Rolf! My brother, my gentle Levi, murdered his childhood friend. In cold blood. The man I knew wouldn’t swat a fly!’

  David frowned. ‘He had no choice, Poppa. If Rolf had reported him he’d have been shot as a spy, or sent to a death camp as a Jew.’

  Simon sighed. ‘Sometimes it is hard to remember what those days were like.’

  Daniel shifted in his seat. ‘Aren’t we forgetting something?’ he asked quietly.

  They all looked at him.

  ‘What?’ his father asked.

  ‘Well . . . he fooled them. Imagine that! He sat and played the piano for Hitler and no one knew he was a Jew! What would Hitler have said and thought and done if he’d known that he was talking about his plans to a Jew?’

  Major Stratton stood up and walked in front of the screen.

  ‘Daniel is absolutely right. What Levi managed, where his piano playing took him, is astounding,’ he said.

  ‘Did he sent that information back? Did it make any difference?’ Kobi asked.

  Major Stratton hesitated. ‘That’s a very good question. In recent years we have uncovered evidence that suggests some were aware of what was happening in the camps, but not the extent. The codebreakers at Bletchley Park had some idea about the horrors of the Eastern Front, and in 1942 there was a report from inside the Warsaw ghetto. Numbers, methods and quite detailed information, but it was ignored, I’m afraid to say, because the organisation that supplied it was a socialist one.’

  ‘What could they have done, anyway?’ David asked. ‘Bombing the camps would have just killed more people. People like Poppa, who survived.’

  ‘Exactly. Churchill did propose bombing Auschwitz, but he was overruled. In December 1942 the Allies issued a proclamation condemning the “extermination” of the Jewish people, but I can’t tell you what happened to the information Levi sent back,’ Stratton said.

  ‘So he risked his life for nothing,’ Cindy had a sob in her voice.

  Stratton shook his head. ‘Oh no, he went on to achieve much more than piano playing and listening, we’ve hardly begun the story. But I think, perhaps, that is enough for today. How do you feel about resuming tomorrow, Mr Horowitz?’

  He was looking at David, who glanced at his father. Simon’s expression was a mixture of bewilderment, grief and exhaustion. David nodded. ‘If you’re happy for us to come back tomorrow, I think we could all do with a rest,’ he said.

  ‘Of course. Can I organise a car to take you back to your hotel?’ Stratton asked.

  ‘I would be extremely grateful, thank you.’

  Stratton smiled at him. ‘It is the least we can do.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  Berlin

  March 1942

  The streets were running with blood. Thick and red it trickled between the cobbles and fanned out from the corpses. Levi ran from body to body. When he rolled them over each had their throat cut and each had the face of Rolf, the smile frozen in the rictus of death. The blood covered his hands and dripped from his fingers. He raised his head and cried out.

  ‘May G-d forgive me, I am not a monster.’

  Suddenly he jerked awake and sat bolt upright. Sweat ran down his face and he was shaking. It was yet another nightmare. He hesitated to go to sleep. Would he ever move on from that night?

  Levi’s world revolved around the newspapers, playing the piano, both at gatherings for leading Nazi officials and in private for the Führer, leaving information at the club for his British handlers and a growing friendship with Erik von Engel. In March, the young SS officer invited Levi to come home with him to Munich to meet his family for a week’s leave. Reich Minister Goebbels reluctantly allowed him to go. He was a valuable asset and hadn’t had a break from his work since his arrival in December 1940.

  Erik’s parents lived on a farm beyond the city. His father, Karl, had been an officer in the Navy. His wife, Elsa, had been a model and a c
abaret singer before her marriage and was a stunningly beautiful woman. She was Karl’s second wife and not Erik’s mother, who’d died when he was ten.

  On a warm spring day, Erik and Levi accepted Karl’s advice and took a picnic into the fields. All around them the forest rose at the edge of the grass, dark and quiet. Erik lay on his back and watched the clouds skid across the sky. Levi sat beside him, his legs stretched out and a rye-bread sandwich in his hand.

  ‘Have you read how well the war in the Pacific is going?’ Erik asked. ‘Japan occupies more territory every month and the Americans seem remarkably unprepared. I think they would make lazy sailors and soldiers.’

  Levi nodded. ‘I think the Führer is pleased. And the battle at Kerch really made him smile. Such a rout! It bodes well for the summer offensive in the Soviet Union. He believes we will defeat the communists by the end of the year.’

  ‘Good job. Imagine a world with no communists and no Jews and millions of miles of land occupied by Germans.’

  Levi munched on his sandwich. Erik sat up.

  ‘Are you happy, Werner?’

  Levi turned and looked at him. ‘What do you mean by that?’ he asked.

  Erik’s face was unusually inexpressive, but his colour was high, bright dots on his cheekbones, and his blue eyes looked innocently at Levi. ‘I mean . . . Well, I’ve never seen you with a woman. When we go out to the clubs and cabarets, you leave on your own. Do you ever sleep with anyone? Have any fun?’

  Levi hesitated. This was dangerous territory, perhaps the only thing he was unprepared for.

  ‘I’m busy with my work and my music —’

  ‘Are you homosexual?’ Erik asked.

  The question hung for a split second too long in the warm summer atmosphere. Levi looked down. He needed to deflect this discussion and get back to talk about the war. He needed to concentrate on why he had allowed this unlikely friendship to blossom. The idea of an intimate relationship with a man who’d murdered Jews should revolt him. He waited for that emotion to rise and smother this dangerous possibility.

  ‘I think your reluctance to answer tells me what your words do not,’ Erik said softly.

  ‘Would it make a difference? Would you feel you had to report me?’ Levi asked. ‘And I’m not admitting to anything.’

  Why did I ask that? Why didn’t I just deny the question, the accusation? What am I doing?

  Very slowly Erik leaned over and kissed him softly on the lips. The shock of reaction was familiar, if almost forgotten. Levi pulled away.

  Erik smiled at him. ‘What are you afraid of?’ he asked.

  ‘Your father —’

  ‘Is busy in his office.’

  Once again Erik leaned further towards Levi and kissed him. It took Levi a moment to respond. The roaring in his head blocked out all the warning bells as he kissed Erik back. As Erik moved closer towards him he held up a hand, palming facing outwards.

  ‘What?’ Erik asked, frowning in bewilderment.

  ‘There’s something I have to tell you. You might get the wrong idea.’

  Levi rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand.

  ‘You don’t want me?’ he asked.

  Levi shook his head.

  ‘No, not that. I . . . I had a condition, when I was a child. And I’m . . .’ his voice trailed off.

  Erik shrugged. ‘What? You’re impotent?’

  Levi gave a half laugh. ‘No! Nothing like that. I’m circumcised. It wasn’t, well my parents, they had no choice.’

  Erik smiled and put his hand up to touch Levi’s cheek.

  ‘Did you think I might suspect you were a Jew?’

  Levi nodded. ‘I wasn’t sure what you’d think. I just didn’t want you to get the wrong idea about me.’

  Now Levi had a much more dangerous line to walk. As if he wasn’t at risk enough, he’d added a sexual relationship that would, if it was uncovered, have them both sent to a concentration camp. How could he contemplate having feelings for this man, a death squad member? And if love was incomprehensible, was lust irresponsible? The potential for him to sleep-talk, betray something from his subconscious mind, was suddenly a dangerous reality and one he had no way to counter. Levi looked at himself in the mirror.

  I’m a Jew and a homosexual and I’m wearing a German military uniform. I am in the presence of Reich Minister Goebbels daily and often in the presence of the Führer, himself, sometimes alone. If I told my superior I felt at risk on the streets he would allow me to wear a side-arm and I could use that to assassinate the Führer. If I took that step I would then have to kill myself as the punishment would be more than I could bear. And what purpose would it serve? I, myself, am of more value alive, making mental notes of all I hear and see and reporting it back. I have to believe it makes a difference. That someone, somewhere, is creating better policy because of the risks I am taking.

  He sighed deeply and put his cap on. A long time ago, in another life, a teacher at school had given him a book of Shakespeare to read in English. Most of it had been too hard for his limited understanding of the language, but one phrase stuck with him and seemed so appropriate.

  ‘Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with our English dead!’ he said in English.

  Levi had thought about the possibility that he would be called upon to take part in abusing Jews, but there were so few Jews left at large in Berlin he’d decided it was something he might, with luck, avoid. Still, he’d mentally dissected the potential and how he should handle it. When his luck ran out and it happened, he was taken completely by surprise. It was a Saturday and he was on his way to a biergarten with Erik and three other friends. About half a mile from their destination they saw a group of orthodox Jews, men and women, walking at a rapid pace, presumably on their way home from the nearby half-ruined synagogue.

  Many Jews had been rounded up and shipped to the camps in the East and it was rare to see them on the streets. These must have some kind of special stamp on their papers; the men engaged in work vital to the war effort.

  Erik reacted immediately. ‘What are they doing still at liberty?’ he asked.

  ‘Disgraceful! What are we going to do about it?’ one of their friends responded. The two men grinned at each other and sprinted across the street. Levi stopped. He could see them talking to the Jews, asking for papers. The group was immediately engaged in an argument.

  ‘Come on, we can’t let them have all the fun,’ another of his companions pulled at his arm. Reluctantly Levi followed till he was standing beside Erik.

  ‘There has been an oversight. We need to escort these fine people to the central collection building,’ Erik said, ‘otherwise they might miss their train and we wouldn’t want that to happen.’

  One of the other officers spat at them. ‘We don’t want them taking up air that we could be breathing,’ he said.

  Levi looked at the group, three men, two women and two children, huddled together, their faces white and their eyes large with fear.

  ‘But before we do, there is some sport to be had,’ another officer said, laughing, drawing a knife from his trouser pocket. He pulled one of men out of the group and cut his ear locks off close to his head. Then he elbowed the man in the stomach and pushed him back into the group. The man was bent over gripping his torso in pain. Every fibre in Levi’s being wanted to help, but he dug his fingernails into the palms of his hand and said nothing.

  ‘Here you are,’ the officer was handing him the offensive scissors.

  ‘No, thank —’

  ‘Oh come on Werner, don’t be a spoilsport. No one will report you and even if they did, you’ll only get a pat on the back from Reich Minister Goebbels,’ said Erik.

  Levi took the knife and pulled another of the men from the pitiful huddle. He was a younger man and he stood silent, his hands by his sides. But instead of keeping his eyes downcast as the other man had, he looked Levi square in the eye. There was a note of silent, furious accusation in the brown e
yes as they gazed deep into Levi’s. What am I doing? Will my G-d ever forgive me these atrocities? Levi grasped the ear locks and cut them through, one at a time. Then he pushed the man back towards his family and handed the knife to Erik.

  ‘What? No punch?’ Erik asked him, smiling broadly.

  Levi shook his head. ‘Maybe I’m a coward, but I don’t hit unarmed men,’ he said softly.

  Erik’s smile vanished to be replaced by a scowl of anger. ‘Careful my friend, attitudes like that will have you branded a sympathiser. These are not men, they’re rats, vermin. Or have you not been listening to the Führer?’

  Levi shrugged. ‘As you wish,’ he said and pulled the young man out onto the pavement again. He hit him with a hard right-handed punch and the man was felled.

  Erik gave a loud burst of laughter. ‘Excellent!’ he yelled, and cut the ear locks from the last of the male Jews.

  ‘Werner, I want you to meet a friend of mine. He works at the Luftwaffe headquarters. This is Hauptmann Harro Schulze-Boysen,’ Erik said.

  Levi shook the outstretched hand. The man was tall and lean, his features chiselled, his colouring pale, his smile wide and his gaze spellbinding.

  ‘This is my dear friend, Hauptmann Werner Schneider.’

  ‘Heil Hitler, Hauptmann,’ Levi saluted.

  ‘Heil Hitler, Hauptmann,’ said Schulze-Boysen with a touch of amusement playing at the edge of his thin lips.

  ‘Harro works in the intelligence division of the Air Ministry. He does what you do, he analyses foreign press reports.’

  Levi nodded. ‘So you speak English?’ he asked.

  Schultz-Boysen smiled. ‘I speak and read French, English, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Danish and Russian.’

  ‘Goodness me, it makes my English, French and a little Italian seem very insignificant.’

  ‘I spent time in England during my childhood and in Scotland. I have an ear for languages.’