Letters From the Lost

by Helen Waldstein Wilkes

  Another long silence. I listened but heard only the thumping of my own heart. At last, the woman sighed deeply, and then asked me to call again in the morning. We agreed to a 9 o’clock call.

  Next morning, the same woman answered my call.

  “What are your plans for the day?”

  “I want to walk around town in the morning, but I don’t imagine that will take long. Cham does not appear to be a large town. After that, I’ll be free until late afternoon when my train leaves. Could we meet for coffee?”

  “Where are you staying?”

  “Gasthaus Zum Weissen Schwan. It’s near a bridge over the river.”

  “I know it. I will meet you at noon in the foyer.”

  I was puzzled by this option and by the fact that she made all the arrangements. Why had she not put Max Weissglas on the phone? Still, I agreed.

  My exploration of the town did not take long. Like so many European towns, it is built around a town square with a fountain at its centre. A plaque at its base told me that this fountain is called the Hexenbrunnen, the Witches Well. It features a set of bronze witches chasing peasants who are too weak to resist the hex that both draws and pursues them. I found the fountain irritating and irksome. Its modern design dwells uneasily in the ancient square. Besides, blaming evil on witches always triggers my feminist sensibilities. This fountain stirs up an even deeper sensitivity. Is the town attempting to blame its complicity during the war on witchcraft? Has the town revived this ancient denial of responsibility and given it a new twist?

  Hexenbrunnen, the Witches Well

  The voice of conscience is not far away. Commanding the square is an old stone church that dominates both space and time. Hanging in its tall onion tower is a great bronze bell that is seldom silent. When its deep voice is not reminding townsfolk of the hour and the quarter hour, it is calling them to prayer. I could neither ignore the centrality of the church nor escape its tolling reminder of mortality. For me, each bong carried the name of a Jew for whom Death had come at the hands of the townspeople.

  Opposite the church squats a sedate building, prim and orderly as befits the municipal hall. In between, there are small stores, a bank, and several cafés. Their brightly checked tablecloths and umbrellas beckoned, but few clients were sipping coffee in the morning sunshine.

  With thoughts of my mother occupying my mind, I wandered disconsolately along the path that follows the curve of the Regen River. My mother had often complained that every Sunday afternoon, she and Anny had been forced to accompany their parents as they strolled sedately along that very path, greeting neighbours and embodying respectability I gazed up at the distinctive twin towers of the medieval Beer-gate and wondered why my mother had never mentioned this unique landmark. I walked past the convent grounds and the adjacent school where Gretl and Anny had sat on a hard wooden bench learning discipline and the ABCs from unsmiling nuns. Just past the convent, I found the small street of shops with the address my mother had given me: Fuhrmanstrasse, Number 11

  Number 11 no longer exists. On this short street where every building still stands, on this street that is an exact replica of a photograph in my album, only one building has disappeared from existence. Not modernized, not rebuilt, but simply eliminated. On each side of Number n, the walls still stand, protecting the small shops within. Number n is a paved passageway leading to a small department store on the next street. The store is called Frey and pronounced frei. The German word free. I cannot shake off the multiple meanings of the word or the irony of the large bold sign that beckons people to pass freely through the passageway. I cannot avoid thinking that the passageway is clear and free of obstructions because there is no longer a Jewish-owned building to block the way.

  The passageway where Number 11 once stood on Fuhrmanstrasse

  I took pictures from every angle and walked up and down the street, scanning my memory for clues to my next step. A butcher shop diagonally across the street triggered memories of my Aunt Anny talking of all the Wurst that was forbidden to them because it was not Kosher, and of how good it smelled and how much they longed to taste it. I looked inside, but the store was modern, part of a chain, and its clerks were all young. There was no point in asking.

  I walked up the street to a smoke-filled restaurant where a few elderly men were already clustered about tables laden with beer and platters of food. I asked the elderly man behind the bar if he or anyone present might have known my family. Somewhat to my surprise, he was helpful. After animated consultation with his customers, he directed me across the street to the apartment above the bakery where the baker and his wife, residents of Cham since long before the war, would definitely have known my grandparents.

  Eagerly, I rang the bell and identified myself through the intercom: the granddaughter of Max Grünhut.

  The reluctance I sensed through the intercom became stronger as an elderly woman wearing the expected apron over her housedress opened the door. Without uttering a word, she led me upstairs to the kitchen. An old man sat at the table, coffee mug in one hand, cigarette in the other. He neither stood up nor offered to shake my hand. He did not invite me to sit. His wife did not offer coffee and returned wordlessly to the sink. The message was clear. My presence was unwelcome.

  The man said right away that he knew nothing. Yes, there had been a Grünhut who had had a store just down the street, but he never knew him and never knew what happened to him. Although they had lived on the same street, his wife did not know Frau Grünhut nor did their children know my mother or her sister Anny.

  How did he know Anny’s name? I had not mentioned my aunt.

  I backed away from the table, muttering a hasty “thank-you-goodbye” and fled.

  It was with the foul taste in my mouth of this wilful forgetting of the past that I returned to my room. Quickly, I packed my few belongings, planning only to meet Max Weissglas before washing my hands of Cham. Suitcase in hand, I lumbered down the steps to the small reception area. A well-dressed, middle-aged woman approached, hands extended.

  “Frau Wilkes? Melanie Weissglas.”

  I liked her instantly. Her manner was warm and welcoming, betraying none of the reserve of her telephone voice.

  “Would you like to put your suitcase in our car? We thought you might like us to drive you around, and show you as much of Cham as we can. I have made a study of Cham and I have marked on my map all the places where Jews used to live. I have brought along my map, and my husband is in the car.”

  Somehow, I expected Max to have a physical disability. The ways in which Melanie sheltered him and took the lead in making the arrangements had led me to expect at best a very frail old man. The gentleman who greeted me needed no protection. He stood erect by a dark sedan. His suit was unwrinkled, his tie as straight as the shoulders that sat proudly under their tailored padding. Although he stood stiffly, the smile on his face was sincere as he pumped my hand and welcomed me to “my ancestral town.”

  Questions tumbled from my mouth. Melanie took the wheel, suggesting that we drive and talk lest we never leave the parking lot.

  “Are you from Cham? Did you know my grandparents?”

  “No, I was born in Poland. I came here after the war. After the concentration camps. I survived several camps. I was just a boy when I was taken away. I lost my whole family. Everyone. I don’t know how I survived. Or why.”

  “I’m so sorry. And Melanie too?”

  “No. Melanie is not Jewish. Melanie is my saviour. She is my angel. We met after the war, in Belgium. She was a nurse, helping us poor refugees when we emerged from the camps. I was broken. Starved, frightened, as helpless as a baby. Melanie gave me my health and my dignity. Then, she restored my soul. She made me into a human being. A Mensch. Do you speak Yiddish?”

  “No, my parents only spoke German. But I do understand the word ‘Mensch.’ It embodies all the good qualities to which most people want to lay claim. To me, a Mensch is more than just a decent person with admirable traits. A Mensch
is someone who has integrity and wisdom, but who acts from the heart. A compassionate person. It’s a way of being that usually takes a lifetime to learn.”

  Had I earned the right to call myself a Mensch? Melanie had clearly earned that right, and instinct told me that Max had too.

  “But tell me, Max, why did you move to Cham?”

  “Melanie’s family lived nearby. I could not go back to Poland. No one was left. My whole family was wiped out. Everyone was killed. I had no home, so we came here. I opened a little store and slowly, we created a life. We have a daughter who lives in Greece, and now, we even have a grandchild.”

  “Wonderful. You must be so proud.”

  “It is Melanie who made me believe in myself. She helped me to believe in life again.

  Melanie was driving, one eye upon the road, another upon her sheets of paper.

  “ Did your mother ever mention the Schwartz family?” Melanie asked.

  “Of course. She grew up with the Schwartz boys. I think my aunt had a crush on one of them.”

  “That’s their house there, the red brick with the yellow flowers. And what about the Fischers?”

  “Yes, yes. Martha Fischer was my mother’s best friend. She moved to New York and once, they came to visit us on the farm. I remember because Martha was so plump and had dark hair on her upper lip, but her husband was tall and good-looking. My mother said he married her for her money, which I thought was a terrible thing to say about your best friend.”

  Thus, we chatted and reminisced and asked questions and spoke freely as we drove up one street and down another. When we passed through Judengasse — Jew Alley, I expressed outrage, but Max and Melanie did not seem offended. Perhaps when one has survived so much, a name that may be centuries old loses its power to offend.

  When I asked if I might take them out for coffee or lunch, Melanie and Max exchanged glances and asked if I would like to see their home and have a bite to eat there. Indeed, I would.

  Their house was high on a hill, quite some distance from the town itself. A modern bungalow with flowers and greenery, not unlike that of my own neighbourhood in Canada. What surprised me upon entering was that the dining room table had already been set for three. Clearly, they had planned to invite me back.

  I found myself deeply moved by this incredible hospitality to a stranger. As Melanie opened a bottle of wine, saying this was an occasion to celebrate, I tried to verbalize my feelings. I had been aware only of having intruded, of having brazenly called because of my loneliness in this town once peopled with my mother’s family and friends. Instead, Max and Melanie were honoured that I had sought them out. They pointed out that not once in all these years had anyone sought to speak to Max just because he was the only Jew in town. No one had cared to ask about his story. No one in town wanted to know.

  While Melanie bustled about the kitchen, Max recounted small bits of his early life, including what he had seen and suffered. Later, Melanie took me aside and thanked me.

  “He never speaks of it, ” she confided. “I think it is good for him to talk. Not even our children know his story. They know only that he was in the camps. They know none of the details, and even I know very little of what he experienced. The knowledge of what happened will die with him.”

  I tried to tell Max that this would be a loss, terrible in its own way, even if different in quality and degree. To me, the loss of life had been appalling; but to lose even the memory of those lost lives would be to kill them again. That awareness lies at the root of my research, of my translation of the family letters, of my efforts to learn about the past. History erases the individual. Too often, it records only the actions of governments and armies. Ordinary humans are eliminated from consciousness. It is as if they had never been. But they did exist. They lived, they loved, they laughed and cried, and then they were killed. They mattered, these ordinary people.

  In times of peace, we go to extraordinary lengths to save a single life. We cheer when the helicopter scoops up the stranded hiker, when doctors save the almost dead patient, when rescuers dig beneath the rubble and find one more living soul. We do not ask if these were special people more worthy of the gift of life than others who were swept away by tragedy. We believe that each life matters. America will never forget the horror of the bombing of the World Trade towers in 2001 where almost three thousand innocent lives were wiped out. How then can we lump together the lives of six million innocents? How can we forget that each one was an individual, and that every individual matters?

  Max told me that he no longer believed in God. “I am a Jew not by belief but by experience. Others have made me into a Jew.”

  His history was burned into him as was mine. Although my experience cannot be compared to his suffering, still, a strong bond had grown between us. It was with great sadness that I noted the time had come for my departure.

  Max and Melanie insisted on driving me to the station where we embraced like family. A few hours ago, I had not met them and a day ago, I had not even known of their existence. Now I was leaving Cham with a precious gift. Max and Melanie had provided me with a lesson in life and its sometimes miraculous unfolding. Max had also reminded me that the past is always with us, even when we fail to acknowledge its presence. His life provided me with an example of what it is to be human, and how to preserve that humanity in the face of the unthinkable.

  My Aunts and Uncles

  IT WAS ONLY AFTER I RETURNED from my visit to Germany that I realized how deeply I had been affected by the contact with Tini. Strangely, it was a letter dated September 10,1998, from her daughter Erni that was the trigger to my feelings.

  For three weeks, the letter lay on the kitchen counter. Unopened. Sometimes I moved it to the cupboard, into the box of unpaid bills right next to the “to do” list. Then I would bring it back out to where I could see it. Each time the phone rang, each time I plugged in the kettle, each time I passed through the kitchen, the letter reminded me of everything that I did not want to think about. Sometimes I picked the letter up and held it, noting physical details. The way the stamps seemed to be curling away from the blue airmail paper. The faint grease spots that the paper had absorbed as it wandered from place to place. I held it often, thinking about what it might contain. This I could do. What I could not do was open the letter.

  Then came the day, no different from the others, a late January day with thick grey clouds when I knew the time had come. Before I could change my mind, I seized the bread knife, inserted the long blade under the flap, and slit open the envelope in one quick motion. With trembling fingers, I removed the contents and began to read.

  I read almost to the end before a sob broke the morning stillness. The sob was precursor to the tears that I had held back for so long. When at last they abated, I re-read the words that had opened the floodgate.

  Perhaps one day we shall walk together in those woods that are our common homeland. I think there is no plural for the word “homeland.” Ye t for myself, I have decided to have two homelands. I love that sleepy old Bohemia, but these days, I am glad to call Germany my home. For your new homeland, you have chosen what is considered to be the most beautiful metropolis in the world, and Rudi has fetched many illustrated books from the library so that we can have a better sense of Vancouver.

  Our roots are entwined but our branches stretch out over separate gardens, and if occasionally a little apple in the form of a thought, a greeting, or a visit falls from your branch into my garden, I shall always rejoice. That you exist is beautiful.

  That you exist is beautiful. Words that would bring comfort to any reader. Words that brought particular comfort to me as I sat at my kitchen table, recalling that that I exist only against all the odds.

  Why was I wafted across the sea to the safest of all places? What task did the universe lay upon my shoulders like a too short shawl whose design I cannot see? The questions are too big, the mystery too deep. Like a butterfly seeking a floral resting post for its beating wings, so the f
luttering heart and darting mind seek momentary repose. There are areas that are safe to think about, others that feel like standing at the edge of a cliff. One misstep and the abyss awaits.

  ————

  SO VIVIDLY HAD THE TRIP to Germany brought members of my family to life that I sometimes found myself withdrawing from my friends. The missing family members totally absorbed me. I threw myself into the task of deciphering and translating their letters with fresh energy.

  Because Tini’s description of my father’s sister Else had awakened my interest, I began this time with the Urbach letters.

  It was July 1939, but my aunt Else seemed to be living on another planet where political events did not intrude.

  There are usually visitors here on a Sunday. The children are looking forward to the holidays. Otto wants to go to a student camp for a month and Marianne would like to go away too, because there is nowhere nearby that one can go swimming.

  Else’s words appeared innocent until I recalled something I had learned long ago: among the first Nazi ordinances had been the banning of Jews from all swimming pools and public bathing areas.

  Even as a child, I knew about that ban. From eavesdropping on adult conversations, I also knew that so many Jews had been denied admission to swimming facilities in the Toronto area that some wealthy individual Jews had bought a farm outside the city to establish their own escape from the summer heat. Despite having showered and immersed my feet in the container of disinfectant, I always felt contagious when entering a public swimming pool.

  That sense of shame had been reinforced by our first “real Canadian” holiday. I was about 10 years old the summer that my parents loaded up the car, and we drove north to Georgian Bay, Lake Simcoe, and the Muskoka area. It was on that holiday that I saw the posted signs: NO DOGS OR JEWS. Not until 1954, by which time I was in second year university, did Ontario pass fair employment and accomodation legislation that outlawed the advertising of “Gentiles Only” establishments.4