Letters From the Lost

by Helen Waldstein Wilkes

  It is not difficult to imagine the effect of this letter on my father. He was not a man given to shrugging things off. He would have consulted all the self-anointed experts among the handful of immigrants that constituted his world, asking everyone he knew whether anything could be done to expedite the Fränkels’ immigration to Canada. When everyone replied in the negative, my father would have flogged himself inwardly for all that lay beyond his control. And because my mother clung to the hope that her parents would soon be arriving, my father would not have revealed to her his own despair.

  ————

  AT THE END OF MARTHA’S letter, there is a single line in a child’s irregular handwriting that triggers my tears.

  My dear Hely I think of you often and send you kisses. Ilse.

  Searching in Europe

  1997-1998

  FROM THE DAY THAT I FIRST READ the letters, they have absorbed all of my free time.

  I began by making photocopies. A friend with a background in archival preservation techniques showed me how to back the two-sided sheets with plain paper to lessen their transparency. She also insisted that I wear white cotton gloves to handle the fragile originals. Only then did I put the letters away, no longer in their cheerful red box but in acid-free envelopes in the darkness of a safety deposit box.

  My next task was to decipher the handwriting. In the case of my grandparents, I could not even make out the dates or the signatures, for my eyes are not trained in Kurrentschrift, the turn of the century writing style that students in German-speaking countries painstakingly practiced. My mother could read entire passages with relative ease, and she did much of this work. By then, she had moved to Vancouver to be with me. Physically frail but mentally alert, she willingly agreed to help me. For months, the clacking of her old Underwood accompanied my household tasks as she transcribed the spindly handwriting into German typescript.

  I acquired a scanner to transmit her typed words into my computer, but the scanner balked at the old-fashioned, ink-smudged lettering. Because there was so much that the scanner failed to read, page after page had to be re-entered by hand.

  My final challenge was to translate the letters. Because my mother had long ago decided to speak only English, I had not used a word of German since a brief teaching stint in the 1970s. The dictionary became my best friend as I worked from the German column on the left to the English meaning on the right. It was the first stage of a complex process.

  The next stage involved moving from literal meaning to colloquial English. Initially, I had planned to publish the letters in their entirety. I not intended to write a memoir, and saw myself merely as instrumental in bringing to life those who had written the letters. After completing a university course in “creative non-fiction writing,” I bowed to the expert advice of seasoned writers and agreed to incorporate my discovery of the letters into the completed work.

  As I proceeded, I wrote notes to myself. Every surface in the house soon bore scraps of paper with unanswered questions. My mother filled in some blanks, but countless questions remained. I pored over library books and Internet sites and created lists of people to ask. Still, each answer often led only to more questions.

  Not all the letters are dated. Seeking to put events into chronological order, I read and re-read the letters until their contents became stories of individual lives. Thoughts of the family became my daily companions.

  The more familiar I became with their letters, the more palpable became my longing for these absent family members. I began to fantasize about family gatherings, with relaxed and happy adults sitting around a table laden with food. Children would be weaving in and out, smaller ones scooped onto laps while older ones boisterously played out of earshot.

  I spent time with a friend who does genealogy. Her hallway is a gallery of turn-of-the-century figures whose stiff dignity is captured within simple black frames. I listened with longing as she described her discoveries in a rural Ontario churchyard. I would have to go further afield.

  Before long, opportunity literally knocked upon my door. It came on a dreary day in January, 1997, as I sat with magnifying glass in hand, trying to decipher illegible handwriting on a letter that I had already put aside several times. Suddenly a knock on the door accompanied the click of the mail slot.

  “Advertising,” I thought, as I stooped to pick up the green flyer. I was at that point of non-progress when even a piece of junk mail was a welcome distraction. To my surprise, however, this was no ad for window-washing or gardening help. It was a handwritten note asking if I would be interested in a house exchange. On impulse, I called the number.

  The woman who answered the telephone had a strong British accent. “My mother lives just up the street from you, ” she told me. “We are here on a visit. My husband and I and our children would like to come for a whole summer, but having all of us for twenty-four hours a day is too much for Mother. We would like to offer our country house in Dorset in exchange for a place in Vancouver. If it would help you to decide, we also have a condo in Switzerland, which you are welcome to use.”

  Within twenty-four hours, I had made my decision. I booked a flight and invited family and friends to join me for part of the summer. Because time seemed to stretch ahead, I opted to travel by train for the Swiss leg of the trip. With only a small detour, I discovered that the train would also take me to Austria, specifically to Linz where my friends Martin and Tracey had recently made their home. Linz is the very city where the Fränkels had lived. I longed to see the place that had been home to my Aunt Martha, my Uncle Emil and to my favourite cousin, Ilserl.

  ————

  I HAD MET MARTIN IN Vancouver many years ago when I was low on cash but rich in empty rooms. I posted a Room-for-Rent notice at the university where it attracted Martin’s attention. In addition to being a student, Martin was a handsome outdoorsman with a warm smile and a gentle manner that drew me instantly. We became good friends. Sometimes, I would read his term papers to smooth out awkward phrases and he would reward me with thick slices of the rye loaf he baked each week from his family’s bread starter.

  Martin brought Tracey into my life. She too was a graduate student, a warm witty redhead with Irish roots and a matching temperament. She was passionate about her studies and fiery in her condemnation of social injustice. Although she is scarcely half my age, Tracey is wise beyond her years. She brought with her a bubbling laughter balanced by deep spiritual insights. I was delighted that she stayed with me long after Martin decided to return to Austria for the completion of his doctoral studies.

  It was clear that Tracey missed Martin, and after lengthy deliberation, she agreed to try life in Austria. Because she spoke no German, it meant delaying her own dreams of professional accomplishment. Still, at a deep level, Tracey knew that she must follow her heart. Her intuition was right. Sometime later, they were married. In the photo that they sent me, Martin is proudly attired in lederhosen with embroidered suspenders and a Tyrolean hat, while Tracey wears the traditional Austrian blouse and dirndl. I was eager to witness their happiness first hand.

  I was not disappointed. They glowed with joy as we sat in their tiny kitchen, talking with ease as only good friends can. They were supportive of my other mission: to learn about my family. The next morning, Martin accompanied me to city hall where surprises lay in store both for me and for the young archivist in charge of the records.

  ————

  “Ah, if they were born in Linz their names will be here,” said the young archivist, proudly pointing to the shelf. “Volume VI, F for Fränkel.” I shook my head as I glanced at the title: Baptismal Records for Linz and Surrounding Areas. I was unable to utter the tangle of thoughts that tied up my tongue. Here, in this silent place filled with long, wooden tables where researchers huddled over their German documents, I felt again the awful shame and weight of my Jewishness. Finally, I managed a semblance of the truth:

  “They were not baptized.”

  Tracey and Martin
in traditional Austrian attire for their wedding

  The young man stared at me as if I were mad. “Not baptized? But everyone is baptized! Even the stillborn. Only then can a person be buried in consecrated ground.”

  Silence. He was young, and in his lifetime, there had only been Christians in his part of the world. I had to be blunt.

  “They were Jews.”

  Now the light went on, and with mutterings of “Ein Moment bitte,” he disappeared into the bowels of the archives. Eventually he emerged, clutching a package of file folders. They were marked with a Star of David and bore the words “Israelitische Kultusgemeinde.” The Jewish Community.

  I found a corner and settled down to work. The papers were all in order and I had no difficulty finding their names. Fränkel, Ilse, born in Linz-on-the-Danube, January 23,1931, resident of Linz-on-the-Danube. Ditto for her sister Dorothea, born July 10, 1938. Born just a few blocks from this table in the archives.

  The records have all been meticulously kept. Even the name of the midwife who attended both births is on file. The paper trail confirms that it was not until after Dorly’s birth that the Fränkels went to Prague. Where and how did they live during those last months in Austria?

  I rechecked the dates. Hitler annexed Austria on March 12,1938. Because of her pregnancy, Martha must have been unable to travel, for the Fränkels would not otherwise have remained in Austria. They were at an impasse. With Martha in a late stage of pregnancy, travel was risky, but staying was equally risky.

  Did they pack a suitcase, ready to flee in the middle of the night? Did they huddle somewhere, Emil, his pregnant wife, and their seven-year-old daughter? From which window did they observe the scene? Was Linz just like Vienna, where Jews were forced to scrub sidewalks with toothbrushes, watched by crowds of jeering spectators?

  Where was the Fränkels’ home? Had it been looted? Did Emil sell his company? Was it expropriated? In yet another set of archives in yet another government building, I found the address of both the house and of the manufacturing plant owned by Emil Fränkel.

  ————

  NUMBER 28 RUDOLFSTRASSE. The Fränkel house was not far, and I walked there that afternoon. The house was spacious, and seemed to have numerous inhabitants. Although I pressed each doorbell, there was no response. What would I have done if someone had answered?

  In my briefcase, I carried the papers from the archives, including the document that had stripped the Fränkels of this house. The document is couched in legalese, but its meaning is clear. It states that one Katharina Bartl gives sworn testimony that she is of pure Aryan stock and that she is therefore entitled to purchase the property of Emil Fränkel for a sum of 60.384 Reich marks, a sum corresponding precisely to an estimate determined by Josef Keplinger, Federal Representative for the Upper Danube. The signature of Emil Fränkel is notably absent. The document is boldly stamped and sealed with the German eagle and the words Heil Hitler. Dr. Fritz Fideo becomes the executor charged with the “de-Jewification” (entjuden) of Emil Fränkel’s remaining property.

  ————

  I STOOD FOR A LONG TIME IN front of the Fränkel house. Lines from the letters that I had read mingled with my own confused thoughts. This is where my cousin Ilserl had lived before she came to Prague. This is where the cries of Baby Dorly had echoed briefly in the nursery. This is where Martha had opened the door each evening to greet Emil with a kiss. I took a few photos of the building and shifted impatiently. I considered going to a café to sit down, but I had no desire for coffee. Restlessness drove me away.

  My footsteps led in the direction of Emil’s business address. Because street names had been changed to honour the Nazis and then changed again to cover up that period of history, finding this address proved more challenging. I returned to city hall where willing clerks dug through file after file and sent me from office to office. The paper trail is solid.

  The records indicate that Emil had been sole owner of a company engaged in the production of fruit juice and liqueurs. There are documents indicating that Emil was an Austrian citizen to whom many business licenses had been issued over the years. There are also documents dated 1938 that cancel those licenses “in accordance with the ordinances and laws governing Jewish property.”

  The various clerks, librarians, and archivists that I encountered were all very eager to help. My file folder marked Fränkel soon bulged with business cards, new referrals, and a multitude of photocopies. It was easier to keep collecting papers than to imagine the reality of 1938.

  Had the Fränkels been able to stay in their own home while waiting for Dorly to be born? If not, who might have hidden them? Did they dare venture out or had they spent months closeted indoors?

  I think involuntarily of Hilderl, a relative on my mother’s side. Hilderl was a beautiful child known to me only through my photo album. In the photo, she is perhaps five years old. Her hair is a mass of fluffy curls, her eyes are large and soulfully deep, and her cheeks are rounded. Her name is “Das arme Hilderl.” Poor little Hilda. Neither her name nor the details ever varied as my mother told the story:

  “Poor little Hilda was a delightful child, sweet, bright, charming. One day as she was walking home with her mother, a Nazi tank deliberately drove onto the sidewalk and killed Hilderl. I don’t know how her mother survived. We all thought she would go crazy.”

  Here my mother would pause. Her eyes would fill with tears and she would disappear to somewhere deep inside. I tried a few times to push the edges of the envelope, wanting to know more of Hilderl’s story. Each time, my mother’s voice would change. It became as cold and distant as the voice of a defendant before a hostile inquisitor.

  Did the Fränkels know about Hilderl? Did the incident happen in Germany or in Austria? Did it perhaps take place a few years later in Prague when the Fränkels were already there? A life snuffed out, a photo in my album the only evidence that poor little Hilderl existed. There is no one for me to ask.

  On the back of one of the documents that I collected in Linz is a handwritten note stating that Emil Fränkel and his family fled to Czechoslovakia in August 1938. I too longed to flee. I longed to flee the archives and to flee Linz with all its reminders of the past.

  ————

  WHEN I RETURNED FROM my impulsive house exchange, my mother relished every detail of my adventures in Europe. I had offered to include her on the trip, but by then, her health had become too fragile. Although she knew that I visited Austria, she asked only about England and Switzerland.

  For her, the Swiss mountains were a Sound-of-Music dream, as they had been for me. She loved to hear of my daily alpine walks, each culminating at a different local farm offering coffee and guest services along with unique cheeses made from the milk of their own cows or goats. She loved to hear how I would go out first thing each morning to buy fresh rolls at the local bakery and bring them back, still redolent of yeast and butter. Meanwhile, my friends would brew the coffee and set out the cups and plates on the deck where we would enjoy breakfast with a view of the Eiger and the Jungfrau.

  Das arme Hilderl (poor little Hilda)

  Repeatedly I tried to talk about my time in Linz. My mother was not interested. Invariably, she either left the room or changed the subject.

  However, she was happy to talk about growing up in Cham, a small town in Bavaria. After coming to live with me, my mother often regaled my friends with stories that I had heard before. Much to her delight, my friends listened to these stories with fresh ears. They smiled at her tales of getting dressed for Sunday afternoon walks along the river to meet and greet the passing parade of similarly attired townsfolk and their captive children. They showed interest in tales of her long hair and how hard it was to sit still while my grandmother combed it. They laughed at my grandfather’s outrage the day my Aunt Anny came home with bobbed hair.

  My mother never talked about leaving Europe. Not to others and not to me. The closer the conversation got to 1939, the more visible her upset. I tried
to push, but only so far. My questions brought about heart palpitations and a frightening level of agitation.

  Whenever I asked her how she was doing with the letters, she would sigh and say, “It’s all so sad.” Several times, I offered to find someone else, perhaps someone at the university to finish the task. Each time, my mother declined. I believe she intended the transcription of the letters to be her last gift to me, as indeed it was.

  ————

  IT WAS WHILE WE WERE working on the letters that my mother first spoke of a phone call from Germany. She had heard from Tini. I remembered the name, if not the person. Tini had been our Dienstmädel, a word that it is impossible to translate into the English “maidservant” without its veneer of Victorian class distinction but would be closer to the North American “hired girl,” which does not have the same class connotations, as it was often the daughter of a neighbour. Tini was a young girl who helped my mother do things like hand wash the sheets and prepare all meals from scratch in a large household that included my grandparents and me.

  “Tini called last night.”

  From long experience, I had learned to moderate my reaction.

  “Really? She’s still alive?”

  “Hmm. I answered the phone and it was a strange man whose voice I didn’t recognize. He said that he was Tini’s grandson, and then he said ‘Just a minute’ and then she came on the line.”